454 PROCEEDINGS OE THE AMERICAN ACADEMY 



English Church, with almost unrivalled powers of clear statement and 

 forcible argumentation, and a great mastery of English style, he either 

 obtained an easy victory over his eminent opponents, or, even in the 

 judgment of their disciples and admirers, left them no cause for 

 triumph. Yet he was modest and candid in manner, an urbane and 

 dignified controversialist, disarming his assailants as much by his flow- 

 ing courtesy and frank acknowledgment of their claims to respect, as 

 by his dialectical skill and abundant erudition. Once only, when pro- 

 voked by continuous misrepresentations no less than by coarse invec- 

 tive and sneers, he retorted with terrible severity, and compelled his 

 opponent to make an apologetic defence. This was the only unpleasant 

 episode in Mr. Mansel's brilliant and prosperous career. His genial 

 manners, ready wit, and quick sympathy with others, made him a great 

 favorite in a large circle of acquaintances and friends. Even as a 

 politician — and he was for years a leader of the conservative party at 

 Oxford — he incurred no enmities and gave no personal offence. The 

 manliness and simplicity of his character allowed no hold for envy or 

 jealousy; and it cost him no effort to gain and preserve great personal 

 popularity. 



The family of Dean Mansel was distinguished before his time both 

 in the universities and the Church. One member of it had been Mas- 

 ter of Trinity College, Cambridge, and another was Bishop of Bath 

 and Bristol. His father was Rector of Cosgrove, Northamptonshire, 

 a family living, where the late Dean was born on the 6th of October, 

 1820. Educated at Merchant Taylors' School, he became the leader 

 of his class at that institution, and thus, in 1839, acquired a Junior 

 Fellowship at St. John's College, Oxford, and was graduated four 

 years afterwards as Double First, or with the highest rank both in the 

 classical and the mathematical list. This success obtained for him a 

 tutorship in the College, and his lectures upon logic soon made 

 him famous in the University. In 1849 he published Aldrich's " Rudi- 

 ments of Logic," with an Introduction and copious Notes, of which Sir 

 William Hamilton observed that la sauce vaut mieux que le poisson. 

 The work passed rapidly through three editions, and made its author 

 known as one of the ablest and most learned logicians of the age. 

 Two years afterwards appeared his Prolegomena Logica, which was 

 based upon the philosophy of Kant, and contained the germs of all his 

 subsequent speculations. It was reprinted in this country in 1860, 

 from the second English edition, and has been a standard work in the 



