olitics."

In this indulgent view, more evident in his later years, and the more
remarkable because his expressions were often too vehement, there was
nothing of the cynical "man of the world" acceptance of a low standard
as the only possible standard, for his moral earnestness was as
fervent at eighty-eight as it had been at thirty, and he retained a
simplicity and an unwillingness to suspect sinister motives, singular
in one who had seen so much. Although accessible and frank in the
ordinary converse of society, he was in reality a reserved man; not
shy, stiff, and externally cold, like Peel, nor always standing on a
pedestal of dignity, like the younger Pitt, but revealing his deepest
thoughts only to a few intimate friends, and treating others with a
courteous kindliness which, though it put them at their ease, did not
encourage them to approach nearer. Thus, while he was admired by the
mass of his followers, and beloved by the small inner group of family
friends, the majority of his colleagues, official subordinates, and
political or ecclesiastical associates, would have hesitated to give
him any of friendship's confidences. Though quick to mark and
acknowledge good service, or to offer to a junior an opportunity of
distinction, many deemed him too much occupied with his own thoughts
to show interest in his disciples, or to bestow those counsels which a
young man prizes from his chief. But for the warmth of his devotion to
a few early friends and the reverence he paid to their memory, a
reverence touchingly shown in the article on Arthur Hallam which he
published near the end of his own life, sixty-five years after
Hallam's death, there might have seemed to be a measure of truth in
the judgment that he cared less for men than for ideas and causes.
Those, however, who marked the pang which the departure to the Roman
Church of his friend Hope Scott caused him, those who in later days
noted the enthusiasm with which he would speak of Lord Althorp, his
opponent, and of Lord Aberdeen, his chief, dwelling upon the
truthfulness and uprightness of the former and the amiability of the
latter, knew that the impression of detachment he gave wronged the
sensibility of his own heart. Of how few who have lived for more than
sixty years in the full sight of their countrymen, and have been as
party leaders exposed to angry and sometimes spiteful criticism, can
it be said that there stands on record against them no malignant word