"Time hath a wallet at his back
Wherein he puts alms for Oblivion."
Let the biographer keep his fingers off that sacred and merciful deposit,
and not renew for us the bores of a former generation as if we had not
enough of our own. But if he cannot forbear that unwise inquisitiveness,
we may fairly complain when he insists on taking us along with him in the
processes of his investigation, instead of giving us the sifted results
in their bearing on the life and character of his subject, whether for
help or hindrance. We are blinded with the dust of old papers ransacked
by Mr. Masson to find out that they have no relation whatever to his
hero. He had been wise if he had kept constantly in view what Milton
himself says of those who gathered up personal traditions concerning the
Apostles: "With less fervency was studied what Saint Paul or Saint John
had written than was listened to one that could say, 'Here he taught,
here he stood, this was his stature, and thus he went habited; and O,
happy this house that harbored him, and that cold stone whereon he
rested, this village where he wrought such a miracle.'.... Thus while all
their thoughts were poured out upon circumstances and the gazing after
such men as had sat at table with the Apostles, ... by this means they
lost their time and truanted on the fundamental grounds of saving
knowledge, as was seen shortly in their writings.
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