552 NATHANIKL HOLMES. 



to discern the congruities of things. In the midst of the most serious 

 development of an idea, it was often a flash of wit that lit up the obscure 

 point so that it remained clear forever. Quite in harmony with his wide 

 human interest was also his love of outward Nature, and the use he 

 made of it in his writing. All experience contributed with him to the 

 interpretation of that religious instinct which in turn gave to experience 

 its meaning and its purpose. 



Ephraim Emerton. 



NATHANIEL HOLMES. 



Nathaniel Holmes was born at Peterborough, N. H., July 2, 1814. 

 His paternal gi'andfather was an emigrant from Antrim County, Ireland ; 

 afterwards a soldier in the Revolution and a Deacon in the Presbyterian 

 Church. His mother was a daughter of a Presbyterian clergyman, Rev. 

 David Annan, a native of Fifeshire, Scotland. As a boy he worked in 

 a machine shop and on his father's farm. From 1831 to 1833 he was a 

 student in Phillips-Exeter Academy ; and he graduated at Harvard in 

 1837. After spending a year in Maryland as a private tutor, he studied 

 law at the Harvard Law School and in the office of Henry H, Fuller, 

 Esq., in Boston. In 1839 he began practice at St. Louis, Mo. In 18G5 

 he was appointed one of the Judges of the Supreme Court of Missouri, 

 serving until 1868. His judicial opinions are contained in Volumes 36 

 to 42 (inclusive) of the INIissouri Reports. In 1868 he gave up his 

 position on the bench to accept the Royall Professorship of Law in the 

 Harvard Law School. In 1872 he resigned the professorship and re- 

 turned to the practice of law in St. Louis, where he remained eleven 

 years. In 1883 he returned to Cambridge, and made his home there 

 until his death, on February 26, 1901. 



Outside the legal profession, Judge Holmes is best known by his 

 book entitled " The Authorship of Shakespeare," a work designed to 

 prove that the plays attributed to Shakespeare were written by Bacon. 

 This book was first published in 1866, and went through three editions. 

 One of the ablest opponents of the view taken by Judge Holmes has 

 recently said of the latter's book: " This contains the fullest and strongest 

 presentation of the argument in favor of Bacon's authorship which has 

 yet appeared, and it is also marked for its fairness and candor." (Notes 

 on the Bacon-Shakespeare Question, by Hon. Charles Allen, pp. 1 and 2.) 



Judge Holmes also published, after his return to Cambridge, a work 



