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 LECTURES-HUMAN SOOT-WOMEN'S SUFFRAGE-LETTERS ON BOTANY-FRANCOPRUSSIAN WAR-WALLACE ON NATURAL SELECTION-MATTHEW ARNOLD AND HELLENISM-BABEL AND ASSYRIAN CITIES.

VOL. II.

U

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!

Far

"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. 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.

Resignation of Regius Professorship.

293

last one was on Comte. A young undergraduate thus refers to it:

"I take this opportunity of telling you-I have often wished to dothat the good you have done me, and I have no doubt many others, by your English lectures, is incalculable. Your whole series last term, and especially the grand concluding one on Comte, have made an impression. just at the moment when it was needed; and I hope you may go on lecturing for many years on the same or similar subjects, and thereby put into the minds of many young men the same living belief in a living God that David had; and so do an infinite good, just where it is wanted, to this generation, and, through it, to all others."

TO THE MASTER OF TRINITY COLLEGE.

April 1, 1869.

"I am bound, after your kind advice and sympathy in the matter of the professorship* (which I am not likely to forget), to tell you that I have obtained leave from the Queen to resign it at the end of the academic year, and have told Mr. Gladstone as much, and had a very kind reply from him. My brains, as well as my purse, rendered this step necessary. I worked eight or nine months hard for the course of twelve lectures which I gave last term, and was half-witted by the time they were delivered; and as I have to provide for children growing up, I owe it to them not to waste time (which is money) as well as brain, in doing what others can do better. Only let me express a hope, that in giving up this appointment I do not give up the friendships (especially yours) which I have found at Cambridge, a place on which I shall ever look with hearty affection; and that when I come up (which I shall do as often as I can find an excuse) I may come and see you and Mrs. Thompson.”

He left Cambridge with feelings of deep gratitude to men of all classes in the University, having received nothing but kindness on all sides from the authorities down to the undergraduates; dissatisfied only with his own work, but thankful to have had his knowledge of men, especially young men, enlarged by the experience of the last nine years, and glad to have more time from henceforth to devote to physical science. In a letter to

Two years before, when he offered to resign, and Dr. Thompson wished him to retain the office.