impression made on a mind which knew Darwin, and physical speculations in
general, merely in the vague popular way. Mr. Green's pupils could
generally write in his own language, more or less, and could "envisage"
things, as we said then, from his point of view. To do this was
believed, probably without cause, to be useful in examinations. For one,
I could never take it much more seriously, never believed that "the
Absolute," as the _Oxford Spectator_ said, had really been "got into a
corner." The Absolute has too often been apparently cornered, too often
has escaped from that situation. Somewhere in an old notebook I believe
I have a portrait in pencil of Mr. Green as he wrestled at lecture with
Aristotle, with the Notion, with his chair and table. Perhaps he was the
last of that remarkable series of men, who may have begun with Wycliffe,
among whom Newman's is a famous name, that were successively accepted at
Oxford as knowing something esoteric, as possessing a shrewd guess at the
secret.

"None the less
I still came out no wiser than I went."

All of these masters and teachers made their mark, probably won their
hold, in the first place, by dint of character, not of some peculiar
views of theology and philosophy. Doubtless it was the same with
Socrates, with Buddha. To be like them, not to believe with them, is the
thing needful. But the younger we are, the less, perhaps, we see this
clearly, and we persuade ourselves that there is some mystery in these
men's possession, some piece of knowledge, some method of thinking which
will lead us to certainty and to peace. Alas, their secret is
incommunicable, and there is no more a philosophic than there is a royal
road to the City.