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than Traherne could not be. Nor has the Church, I firmly believe, ever had an advocate whose life and whose works could plead more eloquently in its favour than the life and the works of the author of " Centuries of Meditations."

Here I must end. I am well aware how lamely and how imperfectly I have dealt with my theme. Perhaps I should have entrusted the task to some more competent and sympathetic hand ; but I preferred to try how far it was possible for me, whose opinions differ so widely from Traherne's, to do justice to so fine a spirit and so admirable a writer. Whether I have altogether failed I do not know : but if I have, it will matter little. It is not by any words of another that Traherne will be finally judged. If his own words still have the fire of life in them—as I firmly believe they have—they will carry their message to the ears of those fitted to receive it during many coming generations : may I not say indeed even as long as the language of Shakespeare and Milton endures ?

NOTE

A friend, who has been kind enough to look over the proof-sheets of this book, thinks that I have somewhat misapprehended the author's meaning in my comments upon the passage in which Traherne, as I understand him, seems to assert that the happiness of the blessed will be enhanced by the thought that others are suffering eternal torments I should, of course, be very glad

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