It is with deep and sincere regret that we record
the death of Professor Henry Sidgwick, which occurred on Tuesday at Terling Place, Essex, the house of his brother-in-law, Lord Rayleigh. We do not wish to discount the value of Professor Sidgwick's books and occasional writings, for they were of high value, but we shall, we believe, have the agreement of most competent authorities when we say that he will be remembered chiefly as a great intellectual influence. His fine character and strong personal charm, added to his mental powers, which were ready and keen as well as deep and thorough, made his " view " on the numberless points of morals, politics, economics, and literature with which he dealt almost as useful to those who disagreed as to those who agreed with him. Nihil tetigit quod non illustravit would be a fitting epitaph for this true scholar,—using the word in its wider and better sense. If one had been asked to name a man from Oxford and a man from Cambridge who, during the last thirty years of the century, would serve as examples of the intellectual spirit of our Universities at their best, one must have named Green for Oxford and Sidgwick for Cambridge. One need say no more. Professor Sidgwick was married to a sister of Mr. Arthur Balfour, and to Mrs. Sidgwick he owed not a little in the matter of spiritual help and sympathy. They were co-workers in the region of psychical research, and it is not too much to say that it was to their combined influence that work of real value and importance in the region of psychology was done by the Psychical Society.
Previous page
