Page:Australia and the Empire.djvu/49

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ROBERT LOWE IN SYDNEY
17

words to the central authority, thereby saving both time and money as well as a wearisome journey, and a still more wearisome flow of words. But I admit that to keep the various parts of the Empire in touch with each other, it would be well to hold consultative councils of delegates from its various sections, something like the Church Congresses, and like them these Councils should meet each time in a different centre.

Some cynic has said that "the last infirmity of noble minds" is theology. Certainly, to judge from Robert Lowe's contributions to the Atlas, he, in the years 1844-45, gave no inconsiderable amount of thought to that remarkable religious revival in England, generally known under the name of "Puseyism." As an antidote to the sacerdotal doctrines of Newman, Pusey, and Keble, whom he appears to have equally detested, we find him expatiating, week after week, on the theological and philosophical excellencies of Dr. Arnold of Rugby.[1] Like many Liberal Churchmen of half-a-century ago he failed to realise that the amazing development of modern physical science would shatter any creed raised on a quasi-rationalistic basis, like that

  1. He even reprinted in extenso the once famous article from the Edinburgh Review, on "Oxford Malignants," by Dr. Arnold, to the amazement, one would think, of the remote Colonial reader.