10 



INTRODUCTION. 



of twilight, dazzled as he must be by the blaze of the 

 16. risen sun ? We who live in the expectation of the light 



Contempor- 

 ary record which is to come, surrounded by the shadows, difficulties, 



of Thought ' 



more faith- an( j obstacles ; we who belong to the army, and are not 

 leaders, who live in, not after, the fight, we claim to be 

 better able to tell the tale of endless hopes and endeav- 

 ours, of efforts common to many, of the hidden intellec- 

 tual and moral work of our age. 1 



How far back we who have lived during the second 

 half of the present century may extend the period of 

 which we claim to have a personal knowledge, is a point 

 of further interest. Certain it is that in our parents and 

 immediate forefathers we have known the representatives 

 of a generation which witnessed and laboured in the in- 

 terests of the great Anti-Slavery, the Eeform, and the Anti- 

 Corn-Law movements, who experienced the revolutions 

 worked by the introduction of steam-power and gas, who 

 took part in the great work of national and popular edu- 

 cation abroad and in the reform of school-life in England. 

 They themselves went through the enthusiasm of the 

 anti-Napoleonic Eevolution in Germany, came under the 

 influence of Goethe's mature manhood, were fascinated by 

 the stories from the pen of the Wizard of the North, par- 



17. 



Events of 

 the imme- 

 diate past. 



1 Compare what A. de Tocqueville 

 says, ' CEuv. com p.,' vol. viii. p. 170 : 

 " Nous sommes encore trop pres des 

 dvenements pour en connaitre les 

 details. Cela parait singulier, mais 

 est vrai. Les details ne s'appren- 

 nent que par les re"ve"lations post- 

 humes, contenues dans les Me- 

 moires, et sont souvent ignores des 

 contemporains. Ce qu'ils savent 

 mieux que la posterite, c'est le 



mouvement des esprits, les pas- 

 sions ge"nerales du temps, dont ils 

 sentent encore les derniers fre'mis- 

 sements dans leur esprit ou dans 

 leur cocur ; c'est le rapport vrai des 

 principaux personnages et des prin- 

 cipaux faits entre eux. Voilh ce 

 que les voisins des temps racoute"s 

 aper9oivent mieux que ne fait la 

 posterite"." 



