Lectures, without expressing my hearty thanks for the great courtesy and
kindness which I have received in this my first visit to your most noble
and beautiful city; and often, I am proud to say, from those who differ
from me deeply on many important points; and also for the attention with
which I have been listened to while trying, clumsily enough, to explain
dry and repulsive subjects, and to express opinions which may be new, and
perhaps startling, to many of my hearers. If my imperfect hints shall
have stirred up but one hearer to investigate this obscure and yet most
important subject, and to examine for himself the original documents, I
shall feel that my words in this place have not been spoken in vain; for
even if such a seeker should arrive at conclusions different from my own
(and I pretend to no infallibility), he will at least have learnt new
facts, the parents of new thought, perhaps of new action; he will have
come face to face with new human beings, in whom he will have been
compelled to take a human interest; and will surely rise from his
researches, let them lead him where they will, at least somewhat of a
wider-minded and a wider-hearted man.
FOOTNOTES.
{3} These Lectures were delivered at the Philosophical Institution,
Edinburgh, in February, 1854, at the commencement of the Crimean War.
{127} Smith’s “Classical Dictionary.”