remember that man does not live by parliamentary rule nor by accuracy of information, but by the power of his own emotions and the strength of his own self-control, we can be readily mistaken as to the true value of his lessons. "A nation with whom sentiment is nothing," observes Mr. Froude, "is on its way to become no nation at all;" and it has been well said that Nelson's signal to his fleet at Trafalgar, that last pregnant and simple message sent in the face of death, has had as much practical effect upon the hearts and the actions of Englishmen in every quarter of the globe, in every circumstance of danger and adventure, as seven eighths of the Acts of Parliament that decorate the statute-book. Yet Dr. Bright, in a volume of more than fourteen hundred pages, can find no room for an incident which has become a living force in history. He takes pains to omit, in his lukewarm account of the battle, the one thing that was best worth the telling.
It has become a matter of such pride with a certain school of modern historians to be gray and neutral, accurate in petty details, indifferent to great men, cautious in praise or
