George Douglas Campbell, the present head of the Ducal House of Argyll, unites in himself many of the most estimable qualities that enabled his ancestors, apart from the mere accident of birth, to achieve greatness. That he is one of the most exalted of Scotland's aristocracy, a great territorial magnate, and entitled to take a high place in the Council of the nation, are facts external and independent of his own intrinsic merits. But the same remark does not apply to the Duke's rare diplomatic and literary abilities, to the sageness of his wisdom, to the maturity end value of his experience, and to the kindly qualities of his heart. Pope spoke of an ancestor of his Grace as-- "Argyll, the State's whole thunder born to wield. And shake alike the Senate and the field;" but if the poet had applied his Muse to describe the living representative of the noble House he could justly have bestowed upon him a much greater meed of praise. It is a rare conjunction to find one who is born great, seek also to achieve greatness; but this His Grace has done in an eminent degree. The adventitious circumstances of his birth placed him in a position only a few removes from Royalty itself, but not content with mere physical greatness, and realising that "the mind's the standard of the man," he has applied himself diligently to the acquisition of wisdom, until both in the domain of politics and in the still more cosmopolitan sphere of _belles lettres_ he has, perhaps, made himself more conspicuous by his sheer native worth than any other member of the aristocracy of Scotland. Intimately associated from his earliest years with the civil and ecclesiastical affairs of his native country, he has been enabled, in his time, to do the State some service; and when the "history of Scotland in the nineteenth century" shall come to be written, the Duke of Argyll will be mentioned with honour and grateful regard. On these, and many other grounds that might be quoted, we are prepared to justify the incorporation in the present series of articles of such a name and of such a life--a name that is as familiar in the Church Courts as in the Councils of the nation, and a life that has been singularly pure, useful, and exemplary.