ughts
and purposes he had moulded; or the feeling which his loss causes in
them of a blank, great and not to be filled up, not only personally for
themselves, but in the agencies which are working most hopefully in
English society. But even those who knew him least, and only from the
outside, and whose points of view least coincided with his, must feel
that there has been, now that we look back on his course, something
singularly touching and even pathetic in the combination shown in all
that he did, of high courage and spirit, and of unwearied faith and
vigour, with the deepest humility and with the sincerest
disinterestedness and abnegation, which never allowed him to seek
anything great for himself, and, in fact, distinguished and honoured as
he was, never found it. For the sake of his generation we may regret
that he did not receive the public recognition and honour which were
assuredly his due; but in truth his was one of those careers which, for
their own completeness and consistency, gain rather than lose by
escaping the distractions and false lights of what is called
preferment.

The two features which strike us at the moment as characteristic of Mr.
Maurice as a writer and teacher, besides the vast range both of his
reading and thought, and the singularly personal tone and language of
all that he wrote, are, first, the combination in him of the most
profound and intense religiousness with the most boundless claim and
exercise of intellectual liberty; and next, the value which he set,
exemplifying his estimate in his own long and laborious course, on
processes and efforts, as compared with conclusions and definite
results, in that pursuit of truth which was to him the most sacred of
duties. There is no want of earnest and fervent religion among us,
intelligent, well-informed, deliberate, as well as of religion, to
which these terms can hardly be applied. And there is also no want of
the boldest and most daring freedom of investigation and judgment. But
what Mr. Maurice seemed to see himself, and what he endeavoured to
impress on others, was that religion and liberty are no natural
enemies, but that the deepest and most absorbing forms of historical
and traditional religion draw strength and seriousness of meaning, and
binding obligation, from an alliance, frank and unconditional, with
what seem to many the risks, the perilous risks and chances, of
freedom.

It was a position open to obvious and formidable cri