people. Ewelme, the mission to the
Ionian Islands, the royal warrant, the affair of the judicial committee,
vaticanism, and all the other things that gave offence, and stirred
misgivings even in friends, showed that the very last question he ever
asked himself was how his action would look; what construction might be
put upon it, or even would pretty certainly be put upon it; whom it would
encourage, whom it would estrange, whom it would perplex. Is the given end
right, he seemed to ask; what are the surest means; are the means as right
as the end, as right as they are sure? But right--on strict and literal
construction. What he sometimes forgot was that in political action,
construction is part of the act, nay, may even be its most important
part.(318)

The more you make of his errors, the more is the need to explain his vast
renown, the long reign of his authority, the substance and reality of his
powers. We call men great for many reasons apart from service wrought or
eminence of intellect or even from force and depth of character. To (M192)
have taken a leading part in transactions of decisive moment; to have
proved himself able to meet demands on which high issues hung; to combine
intellectual qualities, though moderate yet adequate and sufficient, with
the moral qualities needed for the given circumstance--with daring,
circumspection, energy, intrepid initiative; to have fallen in with one of
those occasions in the world that impart their own greatness even to a
mediocre actor, and surround his name with a halo not radiating from
within but shed upon him from without--in all these and many other ways men
come to be counted great. Mr. Gladstone belongs to the rarer class who
acquired authority and fame by transcendent qualities of genius within, in
half independence of any occasions beyond those they create for
themselves.

III

Of his attitude in respect of church parties, it is not for me to speak.
He has himself described at least one aspect of it in a letter to an
inquirer, which would be a very noble piece by whomsoever written, and in
the name of whatsoever creed or no-creed, whether Christian or Rationalist
or Nathan the Wise Jew's creed. It was addressed to a clergyman who seems
to have asked of what section Mr. Gladstone considered himself an
adherent:--

_Feb. 4, 1865._--It is impossible to misinterpret either the
intention or the terms of your letter; and I thank you for it
since