I suppose
that comes from the fact that while he stores away in his
mind everything that is essential, and trusts to his memory
for that, he has not the time, which less busy men have, to
verify every unsubstantial detail before he speaks or writes.
Sir Thomas Browne put on record his opinion of such critics
in the "Christian Morals."
"Quotation mistakes, inadvertency, expedition and human Lapses,
may make not only Moles but Warts in learned Authors, who
notwithstanding, being judged by the capital matter, admit
not of disparagement. I should unwillingly affirm that Cicero
was but slightly versed in Homer, because in his Work _De
Gloria_ he ascribed those verses unto Ajax, which were delivered
by Hector. Capital Truths are to be narrowly eyed, collateral
Lapses and circumstantial deliveries not to be too strictly
sifted. And if the substantial subject be well forged out,
we need not examine the sparks which irregularly fly from
it."
When Dr. Hale was eighty years old, his countrymen manifested
their affection for him in a manner which I think no other
living man could have commanded.
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