Yet this man whom the Government, the Pulpit, and the Press co-operated thus to describe, was human, and not devoid of generous filial affection. When in Dorchester Gaol, in 1820, a letter came sealed with black wax, which, Carlile suspecting to announce the death of his mother, he threw it aside for four hours—not finding resolution to open it. ‘I had hoped,’ said he, ‘that her life would have been extended a few years, that she might have witnessed the result of my present career. But it affords me pleasure to think that she sunk calmly to sleep, neither tortured by priests nor superstitious notions. It affords me pleasure,’ cried he, exultingly, ‘that in spite of the efforts of the Society for the Suppression of vice, the Priests, and the Attorney-General of a wicked administration, I have still retained a roof to shelter her, and under which she died.’(1) The department of progress in which Carlile worked has not yet received recognition by society. Society only remembers the genius which is creative, not that which is practical—though it profits in its ulterior stages more by the practical than the creative. The world has been rich in theory ages ago, and would have realised universal happiness by this time had it encouraged those who reduce its theories to practice. When a great truth is proclaimed, it produces no fruit till society is ploughed and sown with it. The pioneer, the orator, and the journalist, are they who practicalise truth: and he who re-asserts it, who insists upon it, and re-echoes it by all the arts of repetition—he it is who really advances society. He is the worker; yet society accords him no distinction, no posthumous memory. Hence it requires more generosity of sentiment to be useful than to be great. He who seeks distinction may advance society as he achieves distinction: but the advancement of society is secondary with him—the advancement of himself is the primary consideration, and he is often careless whether society advances or retrogrades provided he lays hold of its renown and keeps it. Hence he who seeks fame is selfish—he who seeks utility is generous, because he is certain that society will neglect him, as it pays its honours to those who serve it least. The theorist provides for the future, but it is the worker who makes the future by realising the fulness of the present. It was in this department that Carlile laboured. He left no distinct book, he bequeathed no invention, he is the author of no famous theory; but his life was a poem of heroic and voluntary sacrifice, by which new freedom was won and secured to posterity; and men are now benefited through his exertions who remember him not, who know him not, and who would disown him or revile him if they did. Attorney-Generals delight to prate about the danger to society of dissemminating new opinions—the danger is to him alone who undertakes the task. Let him who thinks that mankind are to be set on change too rapidly, read the Life of Carlile.