DEATH OF RICHARD HOLT HUTTON.

Otago Witness, Issue 2273, 23 September 1897, Page 52

DEATH OF RICHARD HOLT HUTTON.

A REMARKABLE MAN.

A cablegram announced the other day the death of Richard Holt Hutton. Such a man should not be allowed to slip from the company of the living on earth without a word of recognition. Mr Hatton was in some respects a most remarkable mas. None among those now left to ua has been more potent in moulding the bast thought of this generation. He was the son of the Rev. Dr Hutton, minister of the Unitarian Chapel, in Carter Lane, London. He was himself for a while a Unitarian minister, but on his appointment to the Principalship of University Hall, Gordon Square, he ceased to take ministerial doty. After a time his health broke down, i He then went to the West Indies, where ha recovered his health, bub lost his wife. He came back to England ; read for the Bar, assumed thß editorship of the " Inquirer," and began the contribution of those notable articles on which his fame now rests. Oae of these appeared in '• The Prospective Review." Ifc was a masterly critique of the Theological .Essays of Frederick D. Maurice. It led to an introduction, and the acquaintanceship tbas i begun ripened into a life-long friendship. j Tyndall once said his greatest discovery was ! Michael Faraday. Hutton wonld have said | the same regarding Maurice. H« has been the interpreter of Maurice to" an age that stoned its prophets. It was largely due, we believe, to the influence of Maurice that Hubson changed or, afc any rate, consolidated his theological position. After long and serious' thought be passed over into the Anglican Church. la his "Theological Essays," especially the one on "The locar-. nation and the Principles of Evidence," Hufcton details the reasons that slowly drove him out of the creed and camp of Utiitariauism. H>j did not take orders ; he went into journalism. ! A mutual friend, Mr Solly, once lamented over this declension to Maurice, " I Wfcll renrember," he saya, " the acorn ! with which Maurice then epoke of the clerical profession compared to the position i Mr Hutlon had taken. . . . He is, said : Maurice, infinitely more influential where ha is than he could have been as a clergyman." j Maurice was undoubtedly correct. The journal whosß fortunes Mr Hutton had | undertaken was the Spectator. In 1861, ! when that paper was at a very low ebb, Mr i Meredith Townaend and Mr Hutton took ! charge. Ever since then they have remained at this post. More recently Mr St. Loe Strachey joined them. Under this editorial trinity the Spectator hss advanced to the front place of all English weekiiep. New competitors have appeared in the field ; old ones have tacked and changed and rechanged, but the Spectator has steadily held on its course. It ,has advanced from ebb to what may fairly be called a flood tido of prosperity. It ie perhaps the only one of the great weeklies that is genuinely successfal, and that has won its success in a thoroughly legitimate way. Amid the temptations to surrender principles for popularity it has remained steadfast. It has never condescended to unworthy methods for the sake of what must have been ephemeral applause. Its articles, both political and literary, have ever been distinguished by an insight, a dignity, a self-restraint, and a justice, combined in a degree as rare as it is commendable in journals of its class. The smart, the ssseericg, or the slating kind of .criticism are never found in its pages, and in this it exhibits the true spirit of criticism. For the great critic keeps his temper, or if he must now and t gain nail vermin to the barn door by way of example he does it seriously and not gleefully.

The Spectator has also been distinguished for its foresight in recognising the worth of new writers. Many named might be quoted who owe their first real start in literature to the generous appreciation and keen insight of the Spectator. Oie of the most capable of living journalists, discussing recently the qualification for the editorship of the Spectator, said he should profess the following :—(1): — (1) Thoughtfuloess, (2) moderation, (3) omniscience, (4) an appreciation of literature from an ethical point of view, (5) an appreciation of the Eastern and especially of the Indian mind, (6) a deep and Bincere religiousness, (7) something of the old woman. By this last ia meant nothing disrespectful. It is a brief way of describing that type of character in which venerable wisdom, garrulity, kindness, and the power to say a true and fi'ting thing at every crisis of life, are combined. The burden of the Spectator will henceforth lie mainly on Mr S:rachey, who has just surrendered the editorship of the "Cornhill Magazine" owing to this extra work.

It is now a matter of deep regret that the man who united so many of these in his evvn personality, whose thoughtfulness, moderatioD, appreciation of literature from an ethical point of view, and deep and sinoere religiousness, laid all his readers under lasting obligation, has been withdrawn from us. Hie associate, Mr Meredith Townsend, still remains with us, but he has reached the three score and ten.

But every confirmed reader of the Spectator — and the present writer has been such for over 20 years — will miss from its pages henceforth those literary and philosophico-religious articles to which week after week he turned with unfailing delight. It was not difficult to locate Mr Hatton. His style betrayed him even more than his subjects. His Eentences were occasionally a little involved, but one forgot that in the depth, the comprehensiveness, the snbtilty, and yet the lucidity of his thonght. It is a matter of thankfnlness that Mr Hutton has pub into a more permanent form a good dßal of his contribution to the Spectator and other reviews. It is now 26 years since " Essays, Theological and Literary," in two volumes, appeared. Ib 1877, "Modem Guid«s in English Thought in Matters of Faith " w«s published. To the series of " Eaglish Leaders of Religion " he contributed a study of Cardinal Newman. Thirteen years ago two volumes entitled " Contemporary Thought and Thiukers " were added to the list. These last consist of articles selected from the

Spectator by his nephew. It is to be hoped that a further selsction will be made, p,nd that articles of permanent value will nolf ba left embalmed for the few in the columns of a paper which, in the natural course, joins the great stream of things moving to oblivion. The writings of no living man better deserve preservation in an enduring form than those of Richard Holt Hutton. Meanwhile, we are thankful for what we do possess. In the pages of the works mentioned readers will find the highest intellectual and moral stimulus. From a theological point of view, the reasons which led Hutton to pass from Uuitarianism to orthodoxy must ever be of profound interest. ' Bat of even greater importance are his ethical and literary essays. These deal with subjects of perennial interest. Almost all the men and women whose thought has moulded the life of this generation .are passed in review in these volume* Browning, George Eliot, Maurice, Martinaan, Matthew Arnold, Wordsworth, Tennyson Newman, Goethe, Clougb, Shelley, Oarlyle, Dean Ohurcb, Huxley, Wilfred Ward, and many others. No other critic known to as is a safer, a more sympathetic and lucid interpreter of the great thought and thinkers of this generation. An accomplished American writer, Mr Brander Matthews', has said the "duty of the criticis to .help the reader to gab the -beat, to choose it, to understand it, to enjoy it." They will got all this in Hutton'a writings. Ifc is only the beat -with which he deals. Bat the best are not necessarily those who beloEg to the past. Natura is ever renewing herself, and what is neaded most of all is tha critic who can briog out of hia treasures things new as well as old. Mr Hutton's eyes are not, like a fool's, in tho ends of the earth, not even when these ends are with the "dead hours far away which we baptise with the ethereal name of yesterday." No man ia more sympathetic towards a new aspirant, and from none do such get fairer judgment. He helpa hi* readers not only to get the best, but to understand it — a much rarer thing, — and not only to understand it but to enjoy it — tha rarest of all. He communioates to us bis own enthusiasm in what is good. It is nob simply that be creates around ns an intellectual atmosphere, in which we see the springs of action, and penetrate to the heart of the subject with which he deals. That is much, but there are other critics who can do that too. Mr Hutton's differentia is that he adds the sunshine to daylight ; he infects ns with sympathy by the exquisite record of his own delights. We may, in short, apply to Mr Hutton the words with which, 20 years ago, he closed his estimate of Walter 13agehot — a man in many respects akin to him. Toose who knew him as a man and a writer will " hardly find again in this world a atora of intellectual sympathy ot so high a stamp, bo wide in its raoge and so full of original and fresh suggestion ; a judgment to lean on so real and so sincere ; or a friend so frank and ao CDnstanr, with sj vivid and tenacious a memory for, the happy- associations of a common good,and"so generous, in recognising the independent value of divergent convictions in the less pliant present."

— At whatever period the plutocrat has appeared in- England, he has always, if he has preserved hig weakh, been eventually transformed into the aristocrat. In other words, to put the matter mo'e bluntly, all arittocracy in this country has, sinee 'the Middle Ages, been a modified form of plutocracy. — Biitwh Review.

— Th 3 record For royal travel is held by the Qaeeu. Since 18*2, the year the Queen firafc entered a railway carriage, ahe'h&s travelled aomethin-j like 2,000, 0(W miles. This beats the Prince of Wales by about 500,000 miles, and the next greatest rojal traveller, the Dake •£ Cambridge, by nearly 1,000,000 miles.

—To add to the muraber of astonishing things that are made .of p*ppr, Krupp, tho great German manufacturer of osnnoo, has lately compkted a number of paper field pieces for tha use of the Germau infantry. They are intended for use in situations where the movement of field artillery would be impracticable.