And it is on loyalty, on justice to such fragments of truth, unaccounted for and unarranged, that for many men the trial of faith may turn. All is not lost, and everything is possible, so long as the mind refuses to doubt the reality of the light that has come, perhaps, as yet only in broken rays. Of such justice and loyalty George Romanes set a very high example. The strength and simplicity and patience of his character appeared in nothing else more remarkably, more happily, than in his undiscouraged grasp of those unseen realities which invade this world in the name and power of the world to come. The love of precision and completeness never dulled his care for the things that he could neither define, nor label, nor arrange; in their fragmentariness he treasured them, in their reserve he trusted them, waiting faithfully to see what they might have to show him. And they did not fail him. This is not the place in which to try to speak of the graces and the gladness which from such loyal sincerity passed into his life, nor of the clearer light that grew and spread before his wistful, hopeful gaze. But it hardly can be wrong to have said thus much of so noble and so timely a pattern of allegiance to all truth discerned; and of this great lesson in a life which seemed even here to have the earnest of that promise--'He that seeketh, findeth'--a life which seemed to be moving steadily towards the blessing of the pure in heart, the vision of Almighty God.[129] F. P. A letter from Mr. Gladstone cannot be omitted, and seems to come in fittingly at this place: 1 Carlton Gardens: June. Dear Mrs. Romanes,--My present circumstances are not very favourable to direct personal communication, and my personal intercourse with Mr. Romanes was so scanty in its quantity as hardly to warrant my present intrusion, but I cannot help writing a few words for the purpose of conveying my deep sympathy on the heavy bereavement you have sustained, and further of saying how deep an impression he left upon my mind in the point of character not less than of capacity. He was one of the men whom the age specially requires for the investigation and solution of its especial difficulties, and for the conciliation and harmony of interests between which a factitious rivalry has been created. Your heavy private loss is then coupled in my view with a public calamity; but while I can rejoice in your retrospect of his labour, I also trust it may please God in His wisdom to raise up others to fill up his place and carry forward his work. May you enjoy the abundance of the Divine consolations in proportion to your great need. Believe me, most truly yours, W. E. GLADSTONE.