Page:Eminent English liberals in and out of Parliament.djvu/165

 say, as did Oliver Cromwell in a somewhat similar case, "Sir, the state, in choosing men to serve it, takes no notice of their opinions: if they be willing faithfully to serve it, that satisfies. I advised you formerly to bear with men of different minds from yourself. &hellip; Take heed of being too sharp or too easily sharpened by others against those to whom you can object little, but that they square not with you in every opinion concerning matters of religion."

It is a work of some difficulty to summarize the checkered career of Mr. Bradlaugh. He himself has attempted it with indifferent success in a brief "Autobiography," clear enough so far as the narrative of events is concerned, but lacking somewhat in human interest.

He was born at Hoxton in 1833. His father was a struggling, indefatigable solicitor's clerk, who could but ill afford to give his son Charles the scanty education which he actually received. At seven years of age he attended a national school in Abbey Street, Bethnal Green. Subsequently he was sent to a small private school hi the same quarter, and in his eleventh year he completed his meagre educational curriculum at a boys' school in Hackney Road, having acquired little beyond a knowledge of the three R's. He is, consequently, for the most part a self-taught man; but he has taught himself to some purpose. His mind is in a splendid state of discipline. You can account for the fact when you see his library, which is as extensive as it is curious,—the well-worn accumulations of a life devoted to stormy controversy abroad and intense study at home. I never remember to have seen such a serviceable collection of argumentative shot and shell as on Mr. Bradlaugh's shelves.