erroneously or not, that the principles at
issue are much broader than those of ordinary contention.... I
humbly ask for confidence when I state my own belief that the
objects we have in view at the present time are objects connected
with the welfare of mankind upon the widest scale.... Whatever we
may say amidst the clash of arms and amidst the din of preparation
for warfare in time of peace--amidst all this yet there is going on
a profound mysterious movement, that, whether we will or not, is
bringing the nations of the civilised world, as well as the
uncivilised, morally as well as physically nearer to one another,
and making them more and more responsible before God for one
another's welfare.... I do most heartily thank you for having
given me the credit of being actuated by the desire to consider in
public transactions the wider interests of mankind, and I venture
to assure you that so far as my objects and intentions are
concerned, objects of that nature, and nothing meaner or narrower,
will ever be taken as the pole-star of my life.

III

(M194) Two days after a departure from Glasgow which he calls royal, the
unwearied warrior made his way through scenes of endless stir all along
the journey, back to his temple of peace at Hawarden (December 8). There
he at once resumed his habits of daily industry, revising proofs of
speeches "reaching 255 pages!" placing books and reading them--Catullus,
Hodgson's _Turgot_, somebody on Colour Sense, somebody else on Indian
finance, Jenkins on Atheism, Bunbury's Geography--and so forth. Also,
"wrote on mythology and on economics; together rather too much. I am not
very fit for composition after 5 P.M." Meanwhile Christmas arrived, and
then the eve of his birthday, with its reflections--reflections of one--

"Who though thus endued as with a sense
And faculty for storm and turbulence
Is yet a Soul whose master-bias leans ...
Where what he most doth value must be won."

_December 28._ ... And now I am writing in the last minutes of the
seventh decade of my life. This closing is a great event. The days
of our life are three score years and ten. It is hardly possible
that I should complete another decade. How much or how little of
this will God give me for the purposes dear to my heart? Ah! what
need have I of what I may term spiritual leisure, to be out of the
d