le
analysis"; how it comes about "that the most elaborate of modern
histories does not contain an idea above the commonplaces of a
crammer's textbook"--and so forth, in the true Black-and-White style
which is so clear and so familiar. But let us beware of applying to
Macaulay himself that tone of exaggeration and laborious antithesis
which he so often applied to others. Boswell, he says, was immortal,
"_because_ he was a dunce, a parasite, and a coxcomb." It would be a
feeble parody to retort that Macaulay became a great literary power
"because he had no philosophy, little subtlety, and a heavy hand." For
my part, I am slow to believe that the judgment of the whole
English-speaking race, a judgment maintained over more than half a
century, can be altogether wrong; and the writer who has given such
delight, has influenced so many writers, and has taught so much to so
many persons, can hardly have been a shallow mannerist, or an
ungovernable partisan. No one denies that Macaulay had a prodigious
knowledge of books; that in literary fecundity and in varied
improvisation he has rarely been surpassed; that his good sense is
unfailing, his spirit manly, just, and generous; and lastly, that his
command over language had unequalled qualities of precision, energy,
and brilliance. These are all very great and sterling qualities. And
it is right to acknowledge them with no unstinted honour--even whilst
we are fully conscious of the profound shortcomings and limitations
that accompanied but did not destroy them.

In a previous paper we discussed the permanent contribution to English
literature of Thomas Carlyle; and it is curious to note how complete a
contrast these two famous writers present. Carlyle was a simple,
self-taught, recluse man of letters: Macaulay was legislator, cabinet
minister, orator, politician, peer--a pet of society, a famous talker,
and member of numerous academies. Carlyle was poor, despondent,
morbid, and cynical: Macaulay was rich, optimist, overflowing with
health, high spirits, and good nature. The one hardly ever knew what
the world called success: the other hardly ever knew failure. Carlyle
had in him the elements that make the poet, the prophet, the apostle,
the social philosopher. In Macaulay these were singularly wanting; he
was the man of affairs, the busy politician, the rhetorician, the
eulogist of society as it is, the believer in material progress, in the
ultimate triumph of all tha