what has since come to be recognised. His judgments on the Reformers,
startling as they were at the time, are not so very different, as to the
facts of the case, from what most people on all sides now agree in; and
as to their temper and theology, from what most churchmen would now
agree in. Whatever allowances may be made for the difficulties of their
time, and these allowances ought to be very great, and however well they
may have done parts of their work, such as the translations and
adaptations of the Prayer Book, it is safe to say that the divines of
the Reformation never can be again, with their confessed Calvinism, with
their shifting opinions, their extravagant deference to the foreign
oracles of Geneva and Zurich, their subservience to bad men in power,
the heroes and saints of churchmen. But when all this is said, it still
remains true that Froude was often intemperate and unjust. In the hands
of the most self-restrained and considerate of its leaders, the movement
must anyhow have provoked strong opposition, and given great offence.
The surprise and the general ignorance were too great; the assault was
too rude and unexpected. But Froude's strong language gave it a
needless exasperation.

Froude was a man strong in abstract thought and imagination, who wanted
adequate knowledge. His canons of judgment were not enlarged, corrected,
and strengthened by any reading or experience commensurate with his
original powers of reasoning or invention. He was quite conscious of it,
and did his best to fill up the gap in his intellectual equipment. He
showed what he might have done under more favouring circumstances in a
very interesting volume on Becket's history and letters. But
circumstances were hopelessly against him; he had not time, he had not
health and strength, for the learning which he so needed, which he so
longed for. But wherever he could, he learned. He was quite ready to
submit his prepossessions to the test and limitation of facts. Eager and