thought, that he took it up mainly to illustrate certain principles and confined his attention to the topics directly relevant to his purpose. One cannot feel that he had become a contemporary of Elizabeth as Macaulay had made himself a contemporary of Queen Anne. He has only made acquaintance with the actors in order to 'adorn the tale' which, as he is convinced, will point the desired moral. On the other hand, Macaulay's prejudices are less interesting. We can no longer accept the complacent Whig optimism which, according to Matthew Arnold, made him the prince of the Philistines. His political platform strikes us as narrow and obsolete, and we find it hard to do justice to the sound sense combined with so limited an insight. Froude had at least the advantage of being outside a little political clique; and if his common-sense was not trained like Macaulay's by active political experience, he had breathed a less confined atmosphere. He has ideals, political and religious, and does not mistake a particular political platform for a complete and satisfactory answer to the great enigmas of human conduct and history.
Then, however, the problem occurs, What was Froude's position, and how did he reach it? That
