Evangelical magnates, when he went on his annual tour to the
South Coast or the Scotch mountains, would take with him some
Independent or Wesleyan minister who was in need of a holiday;
and his followers in the next generation had the most powerful
motives for maintaining the alliance which he had inaugurated.
They could not neglect such doughty auxiliaries in the memorable
war which they waged against cruelty, ignorance, and irreligion,
and in their less momentous skirmishes with the votaries of the
stage, the racecourse, and the card-table. Without the aid of
nonconformist sympathy, and money, and oratory, and organisation,
their operations would have been doomed to certain failure. The
cordial relations entertained with the members of other
denominations by those among whom his youth was passed did much
to indoctrinate Macaulay with a lively and genuine interest in
sectarian theology. He possessed a minute acquaintance, very rare
among men of letters, with the origin and growth of the various
forms of faith and practice which have divided the allegiance of
his countrymen; not the least important of his qualifications for
writing the history of an epoch when the national mind gave
itself to religious controversy even more largely than has been
its wont.

The method of education in vogue among the Clapham families was
simple, without being severe. In the spacious gardens, and the
commodious houses of an architecture already dating a century
back, which surrounded the Common, there was plenty of freedom,
and good fellowship, and reasonable enjoyment for young and old
alike. Here again Thackeray has not done justice to a society
that united the mental culture, and the intellectual activity,
which are developed by the neighbourhood of a great capital, with