oodness conspicuous in the world, and often
made the subject of contrast there; for which, however, we seem to want
exact words, and which we are obliged to describe rather vaguely and
incompletely. These characters may in one aspect be called the
"sensuous" and the "ascetic." The character of the first is that which
is almost personified in the poet-king of Israel, whose actions and
whose history have been "improved" so often by various writers that it
now seems trite even to allude to them. Nevertheless, the particular
virtues and the particular career of David seem to embody the idea of
what may be called "sensuous goodness" far more completely than a
living being in general comes near to an abstract idea. There may have
been shades in the actual man which would have modified the
resemblance; but in the portrait which has been handed down to us, the
traits are perfect and the approximation exact. The principle of this
character is its sensibility to outward stimulus: it is moved by all
which occurs, stirred by all which happens, open to the influences of
whatever it sees, hears or meets with. The certain consequence of this
mental constitution is a peculiar liability to temptation. Men are
according to the divine, "put upon their trial through the senses." It
is through the constant suggestions of the outer world that our minds
are stimulated, that our will has the chance of a choice, that moral
life becomes possible. The sensibility to this external stimulus
brings with it, when men have it to excess, an unusual access of moral
difficulty. Everything acts on them, and everything has a chance of
turning them aside; the most tempting things act upon them very deeply
and their influence, in consequence, is extreme. Naturally, therefore,
the errors of such men are great. We need not point the moral:--

"Dizzied faith and guilt and woe;
Loftiest aims by earth defiled,
Gleams of wisdom sin-beguiled,
Sated power's tyrannic mood,
Counsels shared with men of blood,
Sad success, parental tears,
And a dreary gift of years." [7]

But on the other hand, the excellence of such men has a charm, a kind
of sensuous sweetness, that is its own. Being conscious of frailty,
they are tender to the imperfect; being sensitive to this world, they
sympathize with the world; being familiar with all the moral incidents
of life, their goodness has a richness and a complication: they
fascinate their own age, and in