historical research, and to his devout admiration of Bacon, whose
works he was at that time studying with intense attention. There
can, however, be little doubt that he was also provoked by the
pretensions of some members of a sect which then commonly went by
the name of Benthamites, or Utilitarians. This sect included
many of his contemporaries, who had quitted Cambridge at about
the same time with him. It had succeeded, in some measure, to
the sect of the Byronians, whom he has described in the review of
Moore's Life of Lord Byron, who discarded their neckcloths, and
fixed little models of skulls on the sand-glasses by which they
regulated the boiling of their eggs for breakfast. The members
of these sects, and of many others that have succeeded, have
probably long ago learned to smile at the temporary humours. But
Macaulay, himself a sincere admirer of Bentham, was irritated by
what he considered the unwarranted tone assumed by several of the
class of Utilitarians. "We apprehend," he said, "that many of
them are persons who, having read little or nothing, are
delighted to be rescued from the sense of their own inferiority
by some teacher who assures them that the studies which they have
neglected are of no value, puts five or six phrases into their
mouths, lends them an odd number of the Westminster Review, and
in a month transforms them into philosophers;" and he spoke of
them as "smatterers, whose attainments just suffice to elevate
them from the insignificance of dunces to the dignity of bores,
and to spread dismay among their pious aunts and grand mothers."
The sect, of course, like other sects, comprehended some
pretenders, and these the most arrogant and intolerant among its
members. He, however, went so far as to apply the following
language to the majority:--"As to the greater part of the sect,
it is, we apprehend, of little consequence what they study or