Once more I ask you to consider how common it seems in human nature that people will give what they are asked for and bothered about, rather than what they can afford. However much this weakness may be taken advantage of in the charitable world, it is most desirable that it should be kept out of family life. Some people even put forward the objection that allowances check the growth of generosity. As a matter of fact, the very essence of generosity is to give what is your own, and, in the highest sense, there is no generosity without self-denial. Often no one appears so generous as the worldly spendthrift, who gives with a free hand what in fact he owes to his tradespeople. Another idea is that the independence resulting from freedom in money matters increases the difficulty of home life. This is markedly more the case in England than in other European countries. Nations are so unconsciously steeped in the atmosphere of their literature that I have often wondered whether 'King Lear' has helped to bring about the state of mind in parents who, though most anxious to leave money to their children after death, yet so grudgingly deal it out to them, either in allowance or capital, during their lifetime. One of the amusing anomalies of the new succession duties is that they have induced many parents, who have never thought of it before, to pay over while they are still alive a portion of their capital to their children. This gives a young man an experience in money management which he could not have gained while only receiving an allowance.

A frequent mistake of parents, even when they think a great deal about their children, is the conviction that they know them so well. After a child grows up and his nature develops, his one idea is to go forth and make his own friends and start his own life; and when he comes back to the home, however much his heart warms to it when he is away, he re-enters it with different eyes, and often with a critical spirit. This seems very hard to the parents, who have changed but little. The best way of making their love appreciated is not to exact more than they get. The real time of trial to parents is when their children are between seventeen and twenty-one. They would do well to realise how little they know of the change that is going on in their sons. They can only cultivate them, humour them, and, if possible, win them. Till this has been done, it is absolutely useless to expect their confidence or to resent the fact that it is withheld. The more openly a child has been brought up and encouraged to speak his mind, the more odious and critical his language will appear at this age to outsiders who do not realise how far better it is that he should express his views without reserve at home than that he should disguise his feelings there and speak openly abroad. It should only be impressed upon children that it is in better taste and more according to the rules of society to keep their criticisms for the privacy of family life.

The judicious management of parents by good sons and daughters often makes a home seem happy for a time; but I think a few open and even angry discussions are wholesomer for the characters of the young than a trained duplicity implying peace where there is no peace. In our present civilisation, no one being can rule the destiny of another by force, not even in the case of a lather and his children. I think it well to remember in our homes Swift's saying that 'Government without the consent of the governed is the very definition of slavery, though eleven men well armed will certainly subdue one single man in his shirt.' A father cannot get the eleven men, so he had better not try to govern in this spirit. His only power, if he loses the affection and respect of his children, is that base and ignoble one given by money, which-in the case of men, at any rate-is powerless against the noblest and best. All people, both young and old, should remember the wise saying that we never feel so much at ease with our consciences as when we are dwelling complacently on the faults of others.

There will always be men and women, but perhaps more men than women, who all through life believe in luck-those who think when 'things go wrong that they have been cheated and frustrated by others, whereas nothing has happened but what was bound to happen. Men of this stamp often endure life heroically and are clever, inventive, interesting human beings; but they are ruled by circumstances, instead of ruling them: they submit to life, instead of making it.

I must not omit to mention a book, called 'Notes from Life,'by Sir Henry Taylor. It is out of fashion and forgotten now, but it made a very great impression upon me in my youth. Sir Henry Taylor, as everyone knows, was the author of 'Philip Van Artevelde: a Dramatic Romance.' This work made him famous at the time of its publication; it is still read by students of English literature, and there is no grander subject for a dramatist than the moulding of tough natures. I believe it was never put on the stage; and, after all, an unactable play must always remain a kind of literary mule. Sir Henry Taylor bound himself to us most tenderly by writing a poem in memory of my father, who died at Nice in 1843. It was reprinted in Sir Henry's autobiography a few years ago. One of the most distinguished of our Lord Chancellors described it to me as the finest memorial poem in the English language. What little worldly philosophy I acquired in my youth I learnt from Sir Henry. The 'Notes from Life 'are on Money, Humility, and Independence, Choice in Marriage, Wisdom, Children, The Life Poetic, and The Ways of the Rich and Great. In spite of all that has been written on such subjects since, I still think the book well worth reading. The tone of the articles is more religious than would be the case now if written by a man who held the same broad and elastic views that he did. He belonged essentially to that large band of good and wise men who never tell their religion, but his language in these essays is that of the fashion of his time. The essays called 'Money,"Marriage,' and 'Children 'seem to me now as interesting and suggestive as when I first read them.