The most foolish things we say are said from another person’s point of view and not from our own. * * * * * On a siding at one of the stations on the Great Western Railway were a number of old engines waiting to be broken up. There they stood, uncleaned, their bright parts rusted and indistinguishable from the others. Some were back to back and some front to front. There they stood and saw the expresses rush past them with their new engines. * * * * * Went out this afternoon to call on C. and his wife. They are certainly the most cultivated people I know. They travel a good deal, and each of them can speak two or three languages besides English. They read the best books, and do not read those which are bad. Some friends were there, and I was entertained with intelligent criticism of literature, music, and pictures, and learned much that was worth knowing. But I came away unsatisfied, and rather dazed. On my way back—it was a singularly warm, clear evening in February—I turned in to see an old lady who lives near me. She was sitting wrapped up at her wide-open window, looking at the light that was still left in the south-west. I said, of course, that I hoped she would not take cold. ‘Oh no,’ she replied, ‘I often sit here, and so long as I keep myself warm I come to no harm. I cannot read by candlelight, and I am thankful that this room faces the south. I know the stars much better than when I was young.’ I took the chair beside her, and for ten minutes neither of us spoke, but I was not conscious for an instant of the disagreeable feeling that silence must be broken, and search be made for something with which to break it. If two persons are friends in the best sense of the word, they are not uncomfortable if they do not talk when they are together. Presently she told me that she had received news that morning of the birth of a granddaughter. She was much pleased. The mother already had two sons and desired a girl. I stayed for about half an hour, and went home in debt to her for peace. * * * * * Bacon observes that whatever the mind seizes and dwells upon with peculiar satisfaction is to be held in suspicion. Naturally so, because it is nearly certain to be something merely personal to ourselves. * * * * * Excepting in one word, the betrayal of Jesus, the defection of Peter, the examination before Pilate and Herod, and the crucifixion, are recorded, as Spedding notices, without any vituperation. The excepted word, not named by Spedding, is ‘blasphemously’ (Luke xxii. 65). {250} * * * * * Coleridge says that great minds are never wrong but in consequence of being right, which is perfectly true; but it may be added that they are also right through being wrong. * * * * *