And in his case eloquence was enforced by a noble presence. The beautiful portrait by Mr. Watts recalls, without exaggeration of dignity, the man himself as he stood there in the dimly lit chapel in Great Portland Street; and in gazing again at those chiselled features that seemed moulded by Nature to serve the speaker’s purpose, I can almost hear again the tones of that deep sonorous voice which, in its grave and impassioned utterances, stamped every separate word with something of the high fervour that so manifestly inspired the preacher. It was, I think, in virtue of this same quality of spiritual elevation that the oratory of John Bright stood beyond the reach of rivalry. Bright never attempted the complexity of thought that distinguished so many of Martineau’s essays in the pulpit. He laid no claim to the philosophical spirit as it was understood by Martineau, but he possessed, even in a greater degree, the power of lifting every topic he discussed into a higher spiritual atmosphere than any other speaker of his time could command. And yet this unsurpassed power which he wielded over an audience was secured by the simplest means, and often in the simplest language. In choice of the fitting word Bright was almost faultless. The great English poets, as we know, he had deeply studied, and, indeed, no one who was not sensitive to the finer moods of poetic feeling could have forged such exquisite prose. I remember my old schoolmaster, Dr. Hill, had been present at the public breakfast given to William Lloyd Garrison in the year 1867, in recognition of his efforts for the abolition of slavery. He told me there was a point in the speech where, after gathering in Miltonic catalogue the names of the many distinguished men who had been associated with the movement, Bright turned to his audience with the added sentence, “and of noble women not a few.” And Dr. Hill said that these simple words stirred his hearers to a feeling of deepest emotion, so magical had been the effect of Bright’s superb voice as it passed, in brief tribute of homage, from one name to another. This is an illustration, of which many more can be quoted, of how impossible it is in the case of an orator so great as Bright to realise that astounding influence from any mere printed record of his speeches. I myself was present and heard the great oration he delivered at St. James’s Hall, in 1866, on the subject of Reform. There had been some turbulent episodes during the Reform agitation in London, and on one occasion, when the right of meeting in the Park had been refused by the Government, the railings had been thrown down by the crowd, who had overborne the forces at the disposal of the authorities. In certain quarters John Bright had been accused of encouraging the populace to such acts of violence, and in the speech to which I refer there was a passage in which he indignantly hurled back upon his enemies this unworthy suggestion.