nothing of the sort has happened. The rascal is so symmetrical, and
his physiognomy, as it gleams upon us through the centuries, so happy,
that we cannot withhold our ducats, though we may accompany the gift
with a shower of abuse.

This only proves the profundity of an observation made by Mr. Bagehot
--a man who carried away into the next world more originality of
thought than is now to be found in the Three Estates of the Realm.
Whilst remarking upon the extraordinary reputation of the late Francis
Horner and the trifling cost he was put to in supporting it, Mr.
Bagehot said that it proved the advantage of 'keeping an atmosphere.'

The common air of heaven sharpens men's judgments. Poor Horner, but
for that kept atmosphere of his, always surrounding him, would have
been bluntly asked, 'What he had done since he was breeched,' and in
reply he could only have muttered something about the currency. As for
our especial rogue Cellini, the question would probably have assumed
this shape: 'Rascal, name the crime you have not committed, and
account for the omission.'

But these awkward questions are not put to the lucky people who keep
their own atmospheres. The critics, before they can get at them, have
to step out of the everyday air, where only achievements count and the
Decalogue still goes for something, into the kept atmosphere, which
they have no sooner breathed than they begin to see things
differently, and to measure the object thus surrounded with a tape of
its own manufacture. Horner--poor, ugly, a man neither of words nor
deeds--becomes one of our great men; a nation mourns his loss and
erects his statue in the Abbey. Mr. Bagehot gives several instances of
the same kind, but he does not mention Cellini, who is, however, in