The world is governed by logic. Truth as well as Providence is always
on the side of the strongest battalions. An illogical opinion only
requires rope enough to hang itself.

Middle men may often seem to be earning for themselves a place in
Universal Biography, and middle positions frequently, seem to afford
the final solution of vexed questions; but this double delusion seldom
outlives a generation. The world wearies of the men, for, attractive
as their characters may be, they are for ever telling us, generally at
great length, how it comes about that they stand just where they do,
and we soon tire of explanations and forget apologists. The positions,
too, once hailed with such acclaim, so eagerly recognised as the true
refuges for poor mortals anxious to avoid being run over by fast-driving
logicians, how untenable do they soon appear! how quickly do they grow
antiquated! how completely they are forgotten!

The Via Media, alluring as is its direction, imposing as are its
portals, is, after all, only what Londoners call a blind alley,
leading nowhere.

'Ratiocination,' says one of the most eloquent and yet exact of modern
writers,[*] 'is the great principle of order in thinking: it reduces a
chaos into harmony, it catalogues the accumulations of knowledge; it
maps out for us the relations of its separate departments. It enables
the independent intellects of many acting and re-acting on each other
to bring their collective force to bear upon the same subject-matter.
If language is an inestimable gift to man, the logical faculty
prepares it for our use. Though it does not go so far as to ascertain
truth; still, it teaches us the _direction_ in which truth lies,