"Of the wonderful love of his home-life I must not, cannot speak. It was the very lever of his life, the very soul of all his joy, the very key-note of his being. He has told it all himself to those who have ears to hear in every book he wrote, and to those who knew him well his every look and every action told the fact yet more emphatically. It was the same boy-frankness which I have before noted showing itself in its very perfection. Some men take pains to conceal their love. It seemed his pride to declare it. How often has he said to me—and I venture to record it because I know he would wish it to be recordedthat whatever he had done or achieved was due to the love that had come to him at a great crisis to guide and to strengthen and to glorify his life." CHAPTER XXVI. 1869-1870. AGED 50-51. RESIGNATION OF PROFESSORSHIP-WOMEN'S SUFFRAGE QUESTION-LETTERS TO MR. MAURICE, JOHN STUART MILL, DR. CARPENTER, MR. LIONEL TOLLEMACHE-CANONRY OF CHESTER-SOCIAL SCIENCE MEETING AT BRISTOLLETTER FROM DR. E. BLAckwell-MedICAL EDUCATION FOR WOMEN -WEST INDIAN VOYAGE-LETTERS FROM TRINIDAD-RETURN HOMEEVERSLEY A CHANGED PLACE-FLYING COLUMNS-HEATH FIRES-THE BRAMO SOMAJ-LETTERS TO SIR C. BUNBURY-MR. W. H. CALLCOTT — FIRST RESIDENCE AT CHESTER-BOTANICAL CLASS-FIELD LECTURESHUMAN SOOT-WOMEN'S SUFFRAGE - - LETTERS ON BOTANY-FRANCOPRUSSIAN WAR-WALLACE ON NATURAL SELECTION-MATTHEW ARNOLD AND HELLENISM-BABEL AND ASSYRIAN CITIES. "BUT let my due feet never fail To walk the studious cloister's pale, As may with sweetness, through mine ear And bring all Heaven before mine eyes." MILTON. CHAPTER XXVI. THE year 1869, which closed his professorial work at Cambridge, saw the beginning of a new chapter of his life as Canon of Chester. It was a year of severe intellectual work and great activity. He decided to resign the Professorship, and gave his last series of lectures at Cambridge. He completed his volume on the Hermits for the Sunday Library course. The "Lessons on Earth Lore for Children, Madam How and Lady Why," which had been coming out in "Good Words for the Young," was published as a volume. He wrote an article in "Macmillan's Magazine," on Women and Politics, to help the question which was just then brought into discussion. He attended the first "Woman's Suffrage" Meeting in London with Mr. J. Stuart Mill. He gave two lectures* on "Thrift" and "Breath" in a course for ladies, at Winchester, arranged by Mrs. C. A. Johns, the wife of his old friend and tutor. He made speeches at various Industrial and Mechanics' Institutions in the diocese. He joined the Education League, and was elected President of the Education Section of the Social Science Congress at Bristol. He lectured on Natural Science to the boys of Wellington College and Clifton College. His parish prospered; the Penny Readings and entertainments for the labourers, greatly helped by the musical talent of his curate, became more popular, once, as many as one hundred and fifty of his parishioners being present at the National School. The resignation of his professorial work relieving his mind from a heavy load of responsibility, and the prospect of a voyage to the West Indies, on the invitation of Sir Arthur Gordon, then Governor of Trinidad, fulfilling one of the dreams of his life, all helped to carry him through the active labours and anxieties of the year. * Since published in "Health and Education." TO REV. F. D. MAURICE. EVERSLEY, January 16, 1869. "Your letter comforted me, for I had heard you were ill. You must rest and take care of yourself, and must not do (as I hear you do) other people's work whenever you are asked. You have enough, and too much to do of your own. And either, 1. You are necessary to Providence; and then you have no right to kill yourself by overwork; or, 2. You are not necessary to Providence; and then you have no need to kill yourself by overwork. I put that dilemma to you in all seriousness, and leave you to escape it if you can. It was a real pleasure to me to hear from you that you had read my clumsy and silly little papers.* I wished to teach children-my own especially-that the knowledge of nature ought to make them reverence and trust God more, and not less (as our new lights inform us). And they are meant more as prolegomena to natural theology, than as really scientific papers, though the facts in them are (I believe) true enough. I know very little about these matters, and cannot keep myself 'au courant' of new discoveries, save somewhat in geology, and even in that I am no mineralogist, and paleontologist. Science is grown too vast for any one head. But "The Powles's have been staying here, making themselves very delightful, and their visit has ended in his offering to take on a lease a new house in the parish. May it so happen! I leave you to conceive the pleasure and comfort their presence here would be to us. "We are going soon to Cambridge. At first we stay at Barton with the Bunburys, I coming to and fro for my lectures. R. and I now mean to sail, if God permits (for one must say that very seriously in such a case), by the April mail; but our plans may alter. Ah! that you were coming too, and could be made to forget everything for a while, save flowers and skies and the mere sensation of warmth, the finest medicine in the world! "What you say about not basing morality on psychology I am most thankful for. I seem to get a vista of a great truth far away. Far away enough from me, Heaven knows. But this I know that I want to re-consider many things, and must have time to do it; that I should like to devote the next twenty years to silence, thought, and, above all, prayer, without which no spirit can breathe." His concluding lectures at Cambridge were crowded; the * "Madam How and Lady Why," dedicated to his son Grenville. |