I had, however, a great fright while he was staying at our house. He had
evidently done too much, and after our first dinner party he had
feverish shivering fits, and the doctor whom I sent for declared at once
that he must keep perfectly quiet in bed, and attend no more parties of
any kind. This was a great disappointment to myself and to many of my
friends. But at his time of life the doctor’s warning could not be
disregarded, and I had, at all events, the satisfaction of sending him
off to Cambridge safe and sound. I had him several days quite to myself,
and there were few subjects which we did not discuss. We mostly agreed,
but even where we did not, it was a real pleasure to differ from him. We
discussed the greatest and the smallest questions, and on every one he
had some wise and telling remarks to pour out. I remember one long
conversation while we were sitting in an old wainscoted room at All
Souls’, ornamented with the arms of former fellows. It had been at first
the library of the college, then one of the fellows’ rooms, and lastly a
lecture-room. We were deep in the old question of the true relation
between the Divine and the Human in man, and here again, as on all other
questions, everything seemed to be clear and evident to his mind.
Perhaps I ought not to repeat what he said to me when we parted: “I have
had much talk with people in England; with you I have had a real
conversation.” We understood each other, and wondered how it was that
men so often misunderstood one another. I told him that it was the
badness of our language, he thought it was the badness of our tempers.
Perhaps we were both right. With him again good-bye was good-bye for
life, and at such moments one wonders indeed how kindred souls became
separated, and one feels startled and repelled at the thought that, such
as they were on earth, they can never meet again. And yet there is
continuity in the world, there is no flaw, no break anywhere, and what
has been will surely be again, though how it will be we cannot know, and
if only we trust in the Wisdom that pervades and overshadows the whole
Universe, we need not know.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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