This subdued air came to a certain extent from the circumstances of his life, but still more from a deep-seated reclusiveness, rather than humility of nature. Indeed, it may be said that, with all his gentleness, he was not innately humble. What often appeared to be humility was, in reality, an intense dislike of opposition. A consciousness of antagonism irritated him so intensely, that he often preferred to withdraw both what he had said and written, rather than provoke contradiction and argument. It was not that he was diffident about his intuitions; he was rather diffident about his power of defending and recommending them. He was little inclined to dogmatise, and realised most sympathetically the differences of temperament; but the path which he had chosen was the only path for him; and though he might seem to yield to argument and remonstrance, he was never converted, except by reflection. He was probably never fully appreciated at Oxford. Busy, effective, academical natures tended to think of him as a secluded dreamer of dreams; his fame grew so insensibly and secretly, and was, even so, confined so much to the συνετοὶ, the connoisseurs, that there never came that revulsion of feeling that has sometimes lifted a man suddenly on to a pinnacle of unquestioned reputation. Moreover, it is fair to say that the air of the Universities is not at the present moment favourable to the pursuit of _belles lettres_ and artistic philosophies. The praise of academical circles is reserved at the present time for people of brisk bursarial and business qualifications, for men of high technical accomplishment, for exact researchers, for effective teachers of prescribed subjects, for men of acute and practical minds, rather than for men of imaginative qualities. This is the natural price that must be paid for the increased efficiency of our Universities, though it may be regretted that they maintain so slight a hold upon the literary influences of the day. The whole atmosphere is, in fact, sternly critical, and the only work which is emphatically recognised and approved is the work which makes definite and unquestionable additions to the progress of exact sciences. A genial epigrammatist once said that if a man desired to court unpopularity in academical circles he had but to enjoy an outside reputation, to write a good literary style, and to make it his business to see something of undergraduates, to gain his end with entire celerity.