Page:Seventeen lectures on the study of medieval and modern history and kindred subjects.djvu/19

 him the prime mover of this generation. What Arnold might have done for the study of History in this place, had his time been given to it or been prolonged sufficiently to produce any appreciable effect on it, may be estimated by the effect of his work on other branches and in other places of education. I say it with diffidence, rather because I fear your criticism than because I have any doubt of the truth of the assertion, I believe that the one thing which Arnold wanted to perfect the balance of his admirable judgment, and to direct the current of his overflowing sympathies, was that experience of critical difficulties and moral incompatibilities which becomes practically, to the devoted student of History, a training in itself. Of Dr. Cramer I can say little. He was well furnished as a scholar and a most accomplished man: his contributions to literary history are exceedingly valuable: but his time here was short; he was not a young man when he undertook the office: he had other cares which took him away from Oxford. Most of all perhaps during the time of his holding this office all the thinking men of the University were engrossed in controversies on matters interesting, most interesting to all, in which, however much a historical training might have profited them, it was too late to forge their weapons when they were in the midst of battle. Of the two professors who preceded me, I must not, need not, say much: you are far better able than I am to appreciate their work here: but I may say that none of you can more sincerely than I do admire the learning, acuteness, earnestness and eloquence of Professor Goldwin Smith: learning, acuteness, earnestness, and eloquence never more signally admirable than when employed, as we have so often rejoiced to see them employed, on the behalf of Christian Truth against philosophic sciolism.

The circumstances under which I return to Oxford and begin my work here are, for many reasons, most encouraging; so encouraging as to afford, I think, some grounds of apprehension that the responsibility is heavier than I ought to have undertaken. In no respect does the Oxford I find on my return contrast more favourably with the Oxford I left sixteen years ago. At that time the professorship of Church History