SIR JOHN R. SEELEY
EELEY was essentially a Cambridge mind. Lucidity, sound judgment, accurate knowledge, wide outlook, were his. But there was an absence of élan, an avoidance of the personal note, a refusal to appeal to the emotions or to be moved by them, which left his readers cold. He could convince, but not charm. His light, to use the expression of another great Cambridge man, was a dry one. It has been said that Cambridge produces great men, Oxford great movements, or, as another variant puts it, 'Cambridge breeds men; Oxford, Oxford men.' In other words, the great ones of Cambridge have not that personal charm which leads to widespread influence, taking the form of 'movements.' Seeley strikes one as having more intellectual calibre than either Jowett or Pater, yet he has left nothing like the stamp of a similar influence on Cambridge to that wielded at the other university by either of the latter names.
