SUMMARY OF CONTENTS.

CHARACTERISTICS.

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THE healthy know not of their health, only the sick. Unity, agree-
ment, always silent or soft-voiced; only discord noisily proclaims itself.
(p. 5). — Happy Unconsciousness of childhood: The beginning of Inquiry
is Disease. Life itself a disease, a working incited by suffering. Con-
scious and Unconscious domains of human activity: Meditation. Genius
ever a secret to itself. The healthy understanding, not Logical or argu-
mentative, but Intuitive: Unconscious Spontaneity the characteristic of
all right performance. Virtue, when it can be philosophised of, or has
become aware of itself, is sickly and beginning to decline: The barren-
est of all mortals, the Sentimentalist. (6). — In Society man first feels
what he is, first becomes what he can be. To figure Society as endowed
with life, the statement of a fact rather than a metaphor. What the ac-
tual condition of Society? a difficulty for the wisest. In all vital things,
an Artificial and a Natural. The vigorous ages of a Roman Common-
wealth, and of all Commonwealths. Man's highest and sole blessedness
to toil, and know what to toil at. Healthy Literature, and unhealthy: So
soon as Prophecy and inspired Poetry cease, Argumentation and jangling
begin. (15). Silence and Mystery: Hymns to the Night: What mortals
call Death, properly the beginning of Life. In the rudest mind some in-
timation of the greatness there is in Mystery. (20). — Society in our days
boastfully and painfully conscious of itself: So-called March of Intellect.
Our whole relations to the Universe become an Inquiry, a Doubt. Self-
consciousness not the disease, but the symptom and attempt towards cure.
The outward or Physical diseases of our Society; a whole nosology of
them. Our Spiritual condition no less sickly than our Physical. Instead
of heroic martyr Conduct, we have Discourses on the Evidences;' en-
deavouring to make it probable such a thing as Religion exists. Liter-
ature but a branch of Religion, always participating in its character: The
modern sin of View-hunting and scene-painting. Literature fast becom-
ing one boundless self-devouring Review, like a sick thing listening to
itself.' (22). — Philosophy, except as Poetry and Religion, should have no
being. The disease of Metaphysics. Doubt, the inexhaustible material
whereon Action works; which only earnest Action can fashion into Cer-

tainty. How, by merely testing and rejecting what is not, shall we ever attain possession of what is? The profitable Speculation, — What is to be done; and How to do it? Only in free Effort can any blessedness be imagined for us. Eras of Faith; and our own era of Faithlessness: The Godlike vanished from the world. To the better order of minds any mad jov of Denial has long since ceased. The Old has passed away, and Time still in pangs of travail with the New. (29). - Friedrich Schlegel's Lectures, and Mr. Hope's Essay, symbols of the two Extremes of our whole modern system of Thought; its effete Spiritualism, and dead decomposi tion of Materialistic jargon. Human Progress: Universal law of Change and Growth. This age also not wholly without its Prophets. Utilitarian problems and failures: Given a world of Knaves, to produce an Honesty from their united action. Strange light-gleams: Age of Miracles; as it ever was, is, and will be. He that has an eye and a heart can even now sayWhy should I falter? Behind and before each one of us lies a whole Godlike Eternity, of inheritance and of possibility. (37).

GOETHE'S PORTRAIT.

Goethe, a man well worth looking at. His kingly Head a very palace of Thought. A most royal work appointed to be done there. This RagFair of a world all transfigured, and authentically revealed to be still holy, still divine. (p. 49). — Two great men sent among us: Bonaparte, like an all-devouring earthquake, hurling kingdom over kingdom; Goethe, the mild-shining, inaudible Light, making Chaos once more into a creation. The poorest Life no idle dream, but a solemn, earnest reality. (50).

BIOGRAPHY.

Biography, or human insight into human personality, the basis of all that can interest a human creature. (p. 52).- Conversation, almost wholly biographic and autobiographic. Even in Art and highest Art, we can nowise forget the Artist; the biographic interest inevitably comprising its deepest and noblest meaning. History, in its best and truest form, the essence of innumerable Biographies. Modern Histories of the Philosophic kind; and their dreary interminable vacuity. Fictitious Narratives, or mimic Biographies: The inspired Speaker, and the uninspired Babbler. The Foolishest of existing mortals. (53). — Sauerteig on the indispensability and significance of Reality. The old Mythologies were once Philosophies, and the old Epics believed Histories. Imagination but a poor affair when it has to part company with Understanding. Belief, the first condition of all spiritual Force whatsoever. Dreary modern Epics; and their uncredited, incredible Supernatural Machinery.' Even the probable, however skilfully wrought, is but the Shadow of some halfseen Reality. A whole epitome of the Infinite lies enfolded in the Life of

every Man. Not the material, only the Seer and Poet wanting. Great is Invention, but that is but a poor sort with which Belief is not concerned: Its highest exercise, not to invent Fiction; but to invent or bring forth new Truth. Interest of the smallest historical fact, as contrasted with the grandest fictitious event: Momentary glimpse of an actual, living Peasant of the year 1651: The Past all holy to us: The poorest adventure of some poorest Outcast, after seventy years are come and gone, has meaning and unfathomable instruction for us. (57). - Secret for being graphic: An open loving Heart the beginning of all knowledge. Literary froth, and literary substance: The multitudinous men, women and children, that make up the army of British Authors. James Boswell: White of Selborne. One good Biography in England, Boswell's Johnson. (65).

BOSWELL'S LIFE OF JOHNSON.

Mr. Croker's editorial peculiarities and deficiencies. (p. 70). - Boswell, a man whose bad qualities lay open to the general eye: What great and genuine good was in him, nowise so self-evident. His true Hero-worship for poor rusty-coated, rough old Samuel Johnson. His uncouth symbolic relation to his decrepit, death-sick Era. That loose-flowing, careless-looking Work of his, a picture by one of Nature's own Artists. His grand intellectual talent an unconscious one, of far higher reach and significance than Logic. Poor Bozzy an ill-assorted, glaring mixture of the highest and the lowest. Johnson's own Writings stand on a quite inferior level to this Johnsoniad of Boswell: It shows us objects that in very deed existed; it is all true. (76). What a pathetic, sacred, in every sense poetic meaning is implied in that one word, Past! This Book of Boswell's will give us more real insight into the History of England during those days, than any book taking upon itself that special aim. Robertson's History of Scotland.' How Histories' are written. Boswell's conversational jottings, no infringement of social privacy. Man properly an incarnated Word: Out of Silence comes strength. Thinkest thou that because no Boswell is there to note thy jargon, it therefore dies and is harmless? (87). — Our interest in Biography considerably modified by the dull servile imitancy of mankind. Significant resemblances of Men and Sheep. Mystic power of Imitancy and Association. Amid the dull millions are scattered here and there leading, original natures; with eye to see, and will to do. Such Men properly the synopsis and epitome of the age in which they live; whose Biographies are above all things worth having. Of such chosen men, although of their humbler ranks, was Samuel Johnson; his existence no idle Dream, but a Reality which he transacted awake. As the highest Gospel was a Biography, so is the Life of every good man still an indubitable Gospel. (94). — The Contradiction of Inward and Outward, which yawns wide enough in every Life, in Johnson's wider than in most. His calling by nature, rather towards Active than Speculative life; as a Doer of Work, he had shone even more than as Speaker of the Word. His dis

position for royalty in his early boyhood. College life; proud as the proudest, poor as the poorest: Mistaken' estimate of Christian Scholarship. Ushership at Market Bosworth: Bread and water of affliction, so bitter that he could not swallow them. Tries Literature. His kind, true, bravehearted Wife. Young gentlemen boarded, and taught. Privations and trials of Authorship: Its transition period, from the protection of Patrons to that of the Public. Johnson the first Author of any significance, who faithfully lived by the day's work of his craft: His sturdy rebellion against the Chesterfield 'encumbrances.' (99). —Johnson's Era wholly divided against itself. How was a noble man, resolute for the Truth, to act in it? Glory to our brave Samuel, who once more gave the world assurance of a Man! Wrong, not only different from Right, but infinitely different: Johnson's Religion as the light of life to him. His rugged literary labours: His insignificant-looking Parliamentary Debates,' the origin of our stupendous Fourth Estate. So poor is he, his Wife must leave him, and seek shelter among other relations: Could not remember the day he had passed free from pain: Manfully makes the best of his hard lot. The fantastic article called 'Fame,' of little other than a poor market value. Thy Fame! Unhappy mortal, where will it and thou be in some fifty years? (112). — Gradually a little circle gathers round the Wise man. In his fifty-third year, he is beneficed by royal bounty. Real Primate of all England. The last of many things, Johnson was the last genuine English Tory. The highest Courage not the Courage to die decently, but to live manfully. Johnson's talent of silence: Where there is nothing farther to be done, there shall nothing more be said. His thorough Truthfulness, and clear hatred of every form of Cant. Few men have had a more merciful, tenderly affectionate nature than rough old Samuel. Catherine Chambers's death-bed: The market-place at Uttoxeter. Johnson's Politeness: His Prejudices: His culture and sympathies wholly English. Samuel Johnson and David Hume, embodiments of the two grand spiritual Antagonisms of their time: Whoso should combine the intrepid Candour, and decisive scientific Clearness of the one, with the Reverence, Love and devout Humility of the other, were the whole man of a new time. (126).

DEATH OF GOETHE.

Goethe died at Weimar, 22d March 1882: His last words, a greeting of the new-awakened Earth; his last movement, to work at his appointed task. A death full of greatness and sacredness: If his course was like the Sun's, so also was his going down. In the death of a good man, Eternity seen looking through Time. (p. 145). — A New Era began with Goethe, the ulterior tendencies of which are yet unmanifested. The real Force, which in this world all things must obey, is Insight, Spiritual Vision and Determination. Honour to him who first through the impassable paves a road.' Goethe's Works. To how many hearers, languishing, nigh dead,

in the airless dungeons of Unbelief, has the assurance of such a man come like tidings of deliverance! The unwearied Workman now rests from his labours; while the fruit of them is growing, and to grow. (147).

GOETHE'S WORKS.

The greatest epoch in a man's life, not always his death; yet it is always the most noticeable. A transition, out of visible Time into invisible Eternity. (p. 156). — The Greatness of Great Men. Hero- Worship, the only creed which can never grow obsolete. Man never altogether a clotheshorse; under the clothes is always a body and a soul. Difference between God-creation and Tailor-creation. The Great Man of an age, the most important phenomenon therein. Women, born worshippers of Greatness, either real or hypothetical. Of all rituals, that of Self-worship the most faithfully observed. (158). Greatness of Bonaparte and of Goethe contrasted. Parliamentary woolgathering: The great desideratum, to produce a few members worth electing. Modern funeral celebrations, little better than solemn parodies. (169). The summary of each man's works, the Life he led. Goethe's Wahrheit und Dichtung. At no period of the World's History can a gifted man be born when he will not find enough to do: Goethe's peculiar perplexities and victories. His riant, joyful childhood; kind plenty in every sense encircling him: A beautiful Boy; the picture of his early years among our most genuine poetic Idyls. His parents. The Victory at Bergen: His Father's grim defiance and hatred of the French. His Father, with occasional subsidiary tutors, his schoolmaster. Old Frankfort notabilities: The Judengasse: Von Reineck: Hofrath Huisgen: Workmen and workshops. Beautiful Gretchen, and Goethe's first experience of natural magic. (173). — At Leipzig University: Interview with Gottsched: Religious perplexities; sickness; returns home. The World-Poet, destined by paternal judgment for a Lawyer. To Strasburg. The good Frederike: Is Goethe a bad man, or not a bad man? Jung Stilling's testimony. His goodness' and 'badness' not quite easily taken stock of. Intercourse with Herder. The German intellectual Chaos: Goethe's allotted task therein. His first literary productions. Established at Weimar. (188). The inward life of Goethe nobly recorded in the long series of his Writings. Faust, the passionate cry of the world's despair, proclaiming, as amid the wreck of Time, - It is ended! Wilhelm Meister, an emblem of warm, hearty, sunny human Endeavour; with as yet no recognition of Divinity: In the Wanderjahre, melodious Reverence becomes once more triumphant; and deep all-pervading Faith both speaks and sings. A tribute of gratitude from Fifteen Englishmen.' Goethe the Uniter and victorious Reconciler of the most distracted age since the Introduction of Christianity. What Strength actually is, and how to try for it. Goethe's noble power of insight: For him, as for Shakspeare, the world lies all translucent, encircled with Wonder: His figurativeness lies in the very centre of his being: The majestic Calmness of both; perfect