This is no doubt a true picture of the writer’s own inner mood, a forecast of the later years in which the excitement of the quest for new ideas, new experiences, dies down; and a man begins to rediscover for himself the humanity, the reality, of the old and constant stock of mortal tradition; the thoughts that have tortured, comforted, attracted, satisfied, the great company of mankind. When he lived in London he was fond of attending St. Paul’s Cathedral, St. Albans, Holborn, and other high Anglican Churches; and he was sometimes seen at the Carmelites’ Church in Kensington; but there is no sort of evidence that he had any thought of Anglican orders, or that he was tending towards Roman Catholicism. He found in religion a deep and tranquillising force, and recognised the religious instinct, the intuitions of faith, as a Divine influence even more direct and unquestionable than the artistic or the intellectual influence. And thus we may think of him as one who, though his intellectual subtlety prevented his aiming at any very precise definition of his creed, was yet deeply penetrated by the perfect beauty and holiness of the Christian ideal, and reposed in trembling faith on ‘the bosom of his Father and his God.’ Much that is beside the mark has been written and said about Pater’s precise habits of composition. The truth is that they were in no way unusual. The common tradition is that he wrote words and sentences upon cards, and then when he had accumulated a sufficient store, he dealt them out as though he were playing a game of patience, and made them into a species of mosaic. The real truth is much simpler. When he was studying a subject he took abundance of notes, but instead of making them in a note-book, he preferred slips of paper, for the greater convenience of sorting them, and arranged them in order so that they might illustrate the divisions of his subject. Mr. Gosse, to whom was entrusted the task of deciphering the fragmentary manuscript of the “Pascal,” gives one or two interesting instances of these notes, most of which are of the nature of passing thoughts, captured for future reference. One runs:— “Something about the gloomy Byzantine archit., belfries, solemn night come in about the birds attracted by the Towers.” And again:— “? did he suppose predestination to have taken place, only _after_ the Fall?” When he had arranged his notes he began to write on ruled paper, leaving the alternate lines blank; and in these spaces he would insert new clauses and descriptive epithets. Then the whole was re-copied, again on alternate lines, which would again be filled; moreover, he often had an essay at this stage set up at his own expense in print, that he might better be able to judge of the effect; the same device that Tennyson so often used.