He had read much, and, though he generally forgot what he read, there were left with him from his readings certain nebulous lights, begotten by other men's thinking, which enabled him to talk on most subjects.

It cannot be said of him that he did much thinking for himself;--but he thought that he thought.

He believed of himself that he had gone rather deep into politics, and that he was entitled to call many statesmen asses because they did not see the things which he saw.
He had the great question of labour, and all that refers to unions, strikes, and lock-outs, quite at his fingers' ends.

He knew how the Church of England should be disestablished and recomposed.

He was quite clear on questions of finance, and saw to a "t" how progress should be made towards communism, so that no violence should disturb that progress, and that in the due course of centuries all desire for personal property should be conquered and annihilated by a philanthropy so general as hardly to be accounted a virtue.