ur own
household. The insolence, the ignorance, and the stupidity of the
age has embodied itself, and found its mouthpiece, in men who are
personally the negations of all that they represent theoretically.
We have men who in private are full of the most gracious modesty,
representing in their philosophies the most ludicrous arrogance; we
have men who practise every virtue themselves, proclaiming the
principles of every vice to others; we have men who have mastered
many kinds of knowledge, acting on the world only as embodiments of
the completest and most pernicious ignorance. I have had occasion
to deal continually with certain of these by name. With the
exception of one--who has died prematurely, whilst this book was in
the press--those I have named oftenest are still living. Many of
them probably are known to you personally, though none of them are
so known to me; and you will appreciate the sort of difficulty I
have felt, better than I can express it. I can only hope that as
the falsehood of their arguments cannot blind any of us to their
personal merits, so no intellectual demerits in my case will be
prejudicial to the truth of my arguments.

To me the strange thing is that such arguments should have to be
used all; and perhaps a thing stranger still that it should fall to
me to use them--to me, an outsider in philosophy, in literature,
and in theology. But the justification of my speaking is that there
is any opening for me to speak; and others must be blamed, not I,
if

the lyre so long divine
Degenerates into hands like mine.

At any rate, however all this may be, what I here inscribe to you,
my friend and teacher, I am confident is not unworthy of you. It is
not what I have done; it is what I have tried to do. As such I beg
you to accept it, and to believe me still, though now so seldom
near you,

Your admiring and affectionate friend,

W.H. MALLOCK.

P.S.--Much of the substance of the following book you have seen
already, in two Essays of mine that were published in the
'Contemporary Review,' and in five Essays that were published in
the 'Nineteenth Century.' It had at one time been my intention, by
the kindness of the respective Editors, to have reprinted t