In the government of his diocese, Manning showed himself a finished ruler and manager of men, flexible in his power of adapting himself to any character or society, yet inflexible when firmness was needed, usually tactful if not always gentle in his methods, but tenacious in his purposes, demanding rightfully from others the simplicity of life and the untiring industry of which he set an example himself. Over women his influence was still greater than over men, because women are more susceptible to the charm of presence and address; nor could any other ecclesiastic count so many conversions among ladies of high station, his dignified carriage and ascetic face according admirably with his sacerdotal rank and his life of strict observance. For some years it was his habit to go to Rome early in Lent and remain till after Easter. Promising subjects, who had doubts as to their probabilities of salvation in the Anglican communion, used to be invited to dinner to meet him, and they fell in swift succession before his skilful presentation of the peace and bliss to be found within the Roman fold. In his public appearances, it was neither the solid substance of his discourses nor the literary quality of their style that struck one, but their judicious adaptation to the audience, and the grace with which they were delivered. For this reason--originality being rarer and therefore more precious in the pulpit, where well-worn themes have to be handled, than on a platform, where the topic is one of the moment--his addresses at public meetings were better than his sermons, and won for him the reputation of a speaker whom it was well worth while to secure at any social or philanthropic gathering. At the Vatican OEcumenical Council of 1870 it was less by his speeches than by his work in private among the assembled prelates that he served the Infallibilist cause. Himself devoted, and, no doubt, honestly devoted, to Ultramontane principles, he did not hesitate to do violence to history and join in destroying what freedom the Church at large had retained, in order to exalt the Chair of Peter to a position unheard of even at Trent, not to say in the Middle Ages. His activity, his assiduity, and his tireless powers of persuasion contributed largely to the satisfaction at that Council of the wishes of Pius IX., who presently rewarded him with the Cardinalate. But the opponents of the new dogma, who were as superior in learning to the Infallibilists as they proved inferior in numbers, carried back with them to Germany and North America an undying distrust of the astute Englishman who had shown more than a convert's proverbial eagerness for rushing to extremes and forcing others to follow. I remember to have met some of the anti-Infallibilist prelates returning to America in the autumn of 1870; and in our many talks on shipboard they spoke of the Archbishop in terms no more measured than Nestorius may have used of St. Cyril after the Council of Ephesus.