Page:Dean Aldrich A Commemoration Speech.djvu/8

 high qualities compel him to assume; who, whether Monmouth was fighting, or James was flying, or William was delivering, lived on his round of College duty, content if he could put in a good word when Papist grew rampant or Dissenter threatened, but never so happy as when dignity and glory could be tossed aside, and he could sit and study Italian scores, or edit a Classic for his scholars, or sing a catch with a friend, or smoke his everlasting pipe. It is a curious contrast: the one battered with hatred, worn with struggle, seared with strife; now 'floating in a sea of glory,' now 'left weary and old to the mercy of a rude stream that must for ever hide him:' the other, moving in peaceful settled ease along the even tenor of his way, enjoying the calm pleasure of graceful culture, the smooth placid flow of genial friendship and of unbroken affection, here among the dreaming spires and quiet meadows, admired, esteemed, beloved unto the end. If the former be the type of the strong rough energy by which institutions are created and founded, the latter is the type of that unceasing, steady growth, that tranquil, silent, hidden working which they foster and by which they live.

Henry Aldrich was born in Westminster in the year 1647, a year in which Westminster rang to the shouts of tumultuous apprentices, and St. James's Fields were noisy with drums, busy with enlistment, for Presbyterianism had sworn to die in harness against the Levellers of Fairfax and Cromwell. Strange weird noises to be sounding in a baby's ears! and it is this characteristic contrast of his birth, that gives a tone to his whole life, a life of unruffled innocent peace in the very heart of broil and turmoil. To illustrate this, I will go