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arranged, I met Mr. Philp in Manchester, and soon learned that the
prospects of the Sentinel were not so rosy as I expected. I, however,
commenced work with zeal, and a resolve to do my very best for the
paper. I attended meetings, and sent short accounts of them to London.
I distributed circulars and called on booksellers, newsagents, and
others in their homes or offices, in the interests of the paper. I
visited many of the towns in Lancashire and Cheshire on a similar
errand, and always traveled in railway trucks, or exactly as cattle
were taken from place to place. But I had great difficulty in getting
pay from London, and had to borrow small sums from my friends in Cornwall;
and even then I should have been stranded but for the kindness of
Mr. James Hibbert and his sister, who kept a little shop in Bridge
Street, and who, knowing my circumstances, allowed me to live with
them month after month on credit. |
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received only ten pounds from the Sentinel for fifteen months' devoted
service. The paper, in fact, was a commercial failure, and I had to
pick up a living as I best could in some other direction. Being a
teetotaler and a rather fluent talker, I offered my services as lecturer
to temperance societies in the Manchester district, at a few shillings
a lecture. In this way I managed to keep my head above water until
the latter part of 1845, when, after a visit to my parents and friends
in Cornwall, I came to London in the twenty-second year of my age,
to try my fortunes on a wider sea. |
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I had a rather rough time in Manchester, I enjoyed while there some
advantages, and among them was that of being a member of its Mechanics'
Institute. I there heard several well-known men lecture, men who were
popular at the time, but whose names now, "like streaks of morning
cloud, are melting into the infinite azure of the past." Among
them were Sheridan Knowles, Sir H. R. Bishop, Robert Haydon, Cowden
Clarke, and Dr. Robert Vaughan. Mr. Hibbert, who spontaneously befriended
me, lent me the works of Dr. Channing, which I first read with caution,
and afterwards with delight. Reading Channing prepared the way for
reading Emerson, which I regard as one of the chief privileges of
my life. I owe more to Emerson than to any other writer or teacher.
He occupies on the roll of fame a unique position as poet, philosopher,
humourist, teacher, and brave citizen. His son, in a recent number
of the Bookman, relates how, when he and his sisters were in bed,
his "father would come up and, sitting by us in the twilight,
chant, to our great delight, a good-night song, which he made up as
he sang, to the trees, the birds, the flowers, the members of the
family, and even the cow and the cat." Emerson lived a beautiful
and a useful life, and, whether employed in interpreting Nature or
the powers and possibilities of the human soul, and its necessary
affinity to all suns or systems; or lecturing to students; or teaching
the duties of lofty citizenship or, in his own words, "planting
the rose of beauty on the brow of chaos"; or chanting twilight
melodies to his children, he is worthy of admiration as one of the
luminaries of the human race. |
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From
the time I lived in Manchester, when and where I heard Cobden and
Bright address public meetings, I became an adherent of the Manchester
School. In after years I had many opportunities to come into active
contact with the leaders of the School, and the more I saw them and
knew them the more I esteemed and admired them. It has been supposed
by many that Cobden and Bright cared much more for the material prosperity
than for the moral progress of the people. This is a mistake. I speak
from experience, and say, without hesitation, that it mattered not
whether the question discussed, or the object to he promoted by them,
was domestic or international; it was always considered in the prevailing
light of justice between man and man, and nation and nation. I admired
these leaders for their great ability, still more for their unceasing
and disinterested activity, and more than all for their loyalty to
righteousness. I never knew an instance, or the fragment of an instance,
where they surrendered principle to expediency, or subordinated conviction
to party gain or personal popularity. They rendered immense service
to the State by the economic revolution they mainly assisted to produce,
and a service to mankind by advocating pacific methods to adjust international
differences. |
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service to the State was immediate, palpable, and lasting; their service
to mankind, though great, has, in a much greater degree, to be realised;
and it will be realised, as the ever-increasing necessities and aspirations
for peace will gradually more and more influence the convictions,
the conscience, and the conduct of nations. |
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