It is now nearly forty years since this was written, and it is almost as applicable as ever. In 1828, in a debate in Parliament, Mr. Brougham used the memorable words, “The schoolmaster is abroad.” He next, in a speech of six hours’ delivery, moved for an inquiry into the state of the Law; the Repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, Catholic Emancipation, and the Charities Commission, were next advocated by him; and then, Parliamentary Reform, the Abolition of Punishment of Forgery by Death, Local Courts, and the Abolition of Slavery. In 1830 he was raised to the high office of Lord Chancellor. Mechanics’ Institutes, and the foundation of University College, and the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, were next advocated by Lord Brougham. His Chancellorship was brief. But he continued to labour for the next thirty years in Law Reform and Social Science, and in aiding the progress of liberal opinion. The universal energy which has marked Lord Brougham was thus ably summed up, on the publication of his volume of scientific Tracts, in 1860: If the fact of his scientific researches were less well known, there would be something quite startling in the announcement of a volume of mathematical tracts from the hand of a man who has had half a score of other occupations, each sufficient to engross the whole mind of an ordinarily constituted mortal. To be great as a circuit leader, all-powerful as a popular chief, triumphant as a reforming Chancellor—to be the prominent figure in the Anti-Slavery movement, the promoter of education, the concocter of law-reforming statutes almost without number—the statesman of all parties, the citizen of two countries, and the orator of a thousand platforms—might have sufficed most ambitions, without the renown of literary success and scientific effort. But, not content with the public achievements of his life, or the obscure glory of anonymous literature, Lord Brougham has striven to reproduce in an English dress the eloquence of Demosthenes, and to correct the real or supposed errors of no less a philosopher than Newton himself.... Philosophical theories may survive Lord Brougham’s attacks, and _savans_ may forget his speculations; but generations of Englishmen will long remember the career of a man who has exhibited in a thousand forms an amount of mental vitality which it would be difficult to parallel in the history of the most restless and eager aspirants to the glory of universal genius. It is impossible to reflect upon the politico-legal position of Lord Brougham when he sat upon the woolsack, without remembering that Brougham and Denman, at the trial of Queen Caroline, attacked with virulence, then generally condemned, the Prince from whose hands, as sovereign, ten years later, both received high legal office. This change in feeling is alike creditable to all.