carbonic acid to my scholars, that I fill the lungs of their souls with nitrogen only—a long category of negatives.” “What you teach matters little. The great fact of your kindness and sympathy and sense of duty remains undisturbed, unassailable,” said Lord Lamerton. “My dear,” said her ladyship, “I wish I could be of more use than I am; but I am like Mrs. Quickly in the ‘Merry Wives of Windsor,’ who held commissions simultaneously for Doctor Caius, Slender and Fenton, and wished each and all success in his suit for sweet Anne Page. I am not a power, or anything appreciable, because my judgment hangs ever in suspense and flickers like a needle in a magnetic storm. When I hear our dear good rector lay down the law with thump of cushion in the pulpit, I know he is thoroughly sincere and that sincerity is the outcome of conviction. All this emphasis would go were he to read such-or-such an article in the _Westminster Review_, because his conviction would be sapped. But, without his conviction would he be of much use? Would he carry weight with his rustic audience? They value his discourses as the Israelite valued the strong blast that brought quails. If his mighty lungs blew nothing but vagueness, would they care to listen, or if they listened would they pick up anything where nothing was dropped? I am sure that the great leaders of men were men of one idea. Look at the apostles, illiterate fishermen, but convinced, and they upset heathendom. Look at Mahomet, an epileptic madman, believing absolutely in only one thing—himself, and he founded Islam. Calvin, Luther, St. Bernard, Hildebrand, all were men of one idea, allowing of no _Ifs_ and _Buts_ to qualify. That was the secret of their strength. It is the convex glass that kindles a fire, not that which is even.” “The narrow can only influence the ignorant.” “The narrow will always influence the bulk of men, for the bulk of mankind is ignorant, not perhaps of the three R’s, but of the compensating forces which keep the social and political systems from flying to pieces.” “Thank heaven, Julia, the country is not in the hands of fanatics to whirl her to destruction.”