pupils. It was not until after he graduated that Pater emerged from his shell at Queen's and came to know some of the more interesting men in other colleges. In the beginning of 1863 he and Professor Bywater were elected members of the Old Mortality, an essay society which flourished at Oxford between 1858 and 1865. The principal resident members at that time were Thomas Hill Green [q. v.], Alfred Robinson, Henry Nettleship [q. v.], Professor Bryce, the present master of Balliol (Edward Caird), and Mr. Boyle of Trinity, with whom Pater had been reading. Pater's first essay was philosophical; one who was present describes it as a 'hymn of praise to the absolute.' Through the Old Mortality, Pater became acquainted with other non-resident or future fellows, such as John Nichol, Mr. Swinburne, and Sir Courtenay Ilbert. In 1864 he was elected a fellow of Brasenose College, and went into residence there, proceeding M.A. in 1865. It was as a non-clerical fellow that he took his place in the society.
On relinquishing his early project of entering the church of England, Pater had thought of becoming a unitarian minister. But this notion also he had abandoned by 1864. His interests were at the time, however, mainly philosophical. His early visits to Germany led him to value all things German. The influence of Jowett and T. H. Green served to strengthen this habit. Mr. Capes warned him against its excess, but his endeavour to attract his pupil to the lucidity and gaiety of French literature met at first with little success. In the year following his election to his fellowship, he paid, in company with Mr. C. L. Shadwell, fellow of Oriel College, his first visit to Italy, and at Ravenna, Pisa, and Florence formed those impressions of the art of the Renaissance which powerfully coloured his future work as an artist. With the accession of humanistic ideas, he gradually lost all belief in the Christian religion.
In 1866 Pater's first essay in composition, a fragment on Coleridge, was published in the ‘Westminster Review.’ His studies in philosophy naturally brought him to Goethe, and it was only natural that one so delicately sensitive to the external symbol as Pater was, should be prepared by the companionship of Goethe for the influence of a man who was Goethe's master in this one direction. The publication of Otto Jahn's ‘Life of Winckelmann’ in 1866 made a profound impression on Pater. His famous essay on Winckelmann was the result of this new enthusiasm. It was published in the ‘Westminster Review’ for January 1867. From this time forth he began to contribute essays to the larger periodicals, and particularly to the ‘Fortnightly Review.’ In 1868, inventing a name which has since sunk into disrepute, he composed an essay on ‘Æsthetic Poetry,’ in which the early work of Mr. William Morris received prompt and judicious analysis. Then followed the series which possess a potent and peculiar charm, the characteristic ‘Notes on Lionardo da Vinci,’ in November 1869; the ‘Fragment on Sandro Botticelli,’ in August 1870; the ‘Pico della Mirandula’ in October, and the ‘Michelangelo’ in November 1871. In 1873 most of these and others were published together in the memorable volume originally entitled ‘Studies in the History of the Renaissance.’
In 1869 he had become associated with the group of painters and poets known as the pre-Raphaelites, and particularly with Mr. Swinburne, but he remained domiciled in Oxford. He took a house at No. 2 Bradmore Road, and his sisters came to live with him. Once settled here, Pater became a familiar figure in academic society; but, although he had a large circle of pleasant acquaintances, his intimate friends were always few. His career was exceedingly quiet and even monotonous. He was occupied through term-time in tutorial work, and his long vacations were almost always spent abroad, in Germany or France, in the company of his sisters. He would walk as much as possible, and sometimes more violently than suited his health. He loved the north of France extremely, and knew it well; nor was it any sensible drawback to his pleasure that he spoke no language but his own, and even in French could scarcely make his wants understood. Once, in 1882, he spent the winter in Rome.
Always engaged in literary labour, his procedure was nevertheless so slow and so complicated that twelve years elapsed between the publication of his first book and his second. In February 1885 his romance of ‘Marius the Epicurean’ was published in two volumes. This is, without doubt, Pater's most valuable legacy to literature. It is written to illustrate the highest ideal of the æsthetic life, and to prove that beauty may be made the object of the soul in a career as pure, as concentrated, and as austere as any that asceticism inspires. ‘Marius’ is an apology for the highest epicureanism, and at the same time it is a texture which the author has embroidered with exquisite flowers of imagination, learning, and passion. Modern humanism has produced no more admirable product than this noble dream of a pursuit through life of the spirit of heavenly beauty.
