In three years after his settlement in London he had produced the first volume of the _Decline and Fall_: an amount of diligence which will not be underrated by those who appreciate the vast difference between commencing and continuing an undertaking of that magnitude.

"At the outset," he says, "all was dark and doubtful; even the title of the work, the true aera of the decline and fall of the empire, the limits of the Introduction, the division of the chapters, and the order of the narrative,--and I was often tempted to cast away the labour of seven years;"-- alternations no doubt of hope and despair familiar to every sincere and competent student.

But he had taken the best and only reliable means of securing himself from the danger of these fluctuations of spirit.

He finished his reading and preparation before he began to write, and when he at last put pen to paper his course lay open before him, with no fear of sudden and disquieting stoppages arising from imperfect knowledge and need of further inquiry.

It is a pity that we cannot follow the elaboration of the work in detail.