Chap­ter IV – Opin­ions of the Bench begins in the shad­owy qui­et of evening, as Archie arrives at Lord Glenalmond’s home with a rest­less ener­gy that sug­gests inner con­flict. The vis­it, though unan­nounced, is not unex­pect­ed. Gle­nal­mond, calm and thought­ful, receives him with kind­ness, insist­ing gen­tly that Archie first eat, know­ing well that trou­bled minds are not soothed on emp­ty stom­achs. Though Archie resists at first, pre­fer­ring to move straight to the mat­ter, his host main­tains a calm pres­ence, giv­ing him space to set­tle. This ini­tial exchange, brief and mea­sured, reflects not only Glenalmond’s wis­dom but the emo­tion­al fatigue Archie car­ries. Once alone, the young man con­fronts the heart of his visit—his sus­pi­cion that Gle­nal­mond had betrayed him to his father. But Gle­nal­mond deflects the accu­sa­tion with­out anger, point­ing instead to anoth­er source and open­ing the door to a deep­er con­ver­sa­tion about jus­tice, fam­i­ly, and the bur­dens they car­ry.

As the fire flick­ers and wine is poured, the tone shifts from con­fronta­tion to con­fes­sion. Archie opens up about the emo­tion­al tur­moil caused by his father’s judi­cial severity—how wit­ness­ing such harsh judg­ment in court left him both ashamed and wound­ed. There’s no denial of Lord Hermiston’s com­pe­tence; it is his cold­ness that haunts Archie most. The tri­al, which should have been a demon­stra­tion of law, felt to Archie like a dis­play of cru­el­ty. Gle­nal­mond lis­tens with the grace of some­one who under­stands both men well. He doesn’t try to con­tra­dict Archie’s feel­ings. Instead, he chal­lenges the nar­row­ness of Archie’s view, urg­ing him to con­sid­er his father as a full man—not just as a judge, but as a father shaped by duty and restraint. He reminds Archie that mis­un­der­stand­ing often aris­es from expect­ing emo­tion­al warmth in places where duty has trained detach­ment.

As their dis­cus­sion turns philo­soph­i­cal, the issue of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment emerges as a sym­bol­ic clash between moral instinct and insti­tu­tion­al jus­tice. Archie finds it dif­fi­cult to rec­on­cile per­son­al com­pas­sion with the dis­pas­sion­ate demands of law. Gle­nal­mond offers not jus­ti­fi­ca­tion, but context—pointing out that the bur­den of pass­ing sen­tence is a weight many nev­er under­stand until they must bear it. He shares that judg­ment, espe­cial­ly when it involves life and death, demands a kind of emo­tion­al dis­ci­pline that looks like cold­ness but may actu­al­ly be a form of mer­cy. This per­spec­tive chal­lenges Archie to shift his focus from con­dem­na­tion to com­pre­hen­sion. In a way, Gle­nal­mond becomes a bridge between Archie’s ide­al­ism and Lord Hermiston’s real­ism, show­ing that truth lies not in extremes but in the space between them. The con­ver­sa­tion doesn’t set­tle the mat­ter, but it opens a new lens through which Archie might view his father—and per­haps, him­self.

By the end of the evening, some­thing has soft­ened in Archie. Though unre­solved in heart, he is no longer con­sumed by bit­ter­ness. Gle­nal­mond pro­pos­es a toast—not to him­self or to Archie—but to Lord Her­mis­ton. It is an unex­pect­ed ges­ture, and yet Archie joins, not with mock­ery, but with qui­et reflec­tion. That shared moment, brief and respect­ful, marks a sub­tle reconciliation—not with his father, but with the idea that respect can exist even where close­ness can­not. It acknowl­edges that rela­tion­ships, espe­cial­ly between fathers and sons, are often more com­plex than either side admits. Their peace, how­ev­er, is soon dis­rupt­ed by the sud­den entrance of Lord Glenkindie, intox­i­cat­ed and bois­ter­ous, break­ing the silence with laugh­ter and care­less­ness. His arrival, jar­ring and ungrace­ful, serves as a reminder of the pub­lic world Archie must still navigate—a world that demands appear­ances but rarely offers under­stand­ing.

This chap­ter peels back lay­ers of char­ac­ter and con­flict with care, pre­sent­ing not a res­o­lu­tion, but a turn­ing point. Archie is forced to con­front the dis­com­fort of see­ing jus­tice through another’s eyes and to wres­tle with his ide­al­ism in the face of duty. Gle­nal­mond nev­er push­es Archie to change his beliefs, but rather to think more deeply and more com­pas­sion­ate­ly. It’s a moment of men­tor­ship that speaks to the impor­tance of empa­thy, not only in judg­ment but in rela­tion­ships. The chapter’s strength lies in its will­ing­ness to leave things unset­tled, because real under­stand­ing rarely comes all at once. In the end, Archie leaves with more ques­tions than answers, but also with a sense that dia­logue, even dif­fi­cult dia­logue, can open the door to growth. The win­ter night that holds their exchange feels less cold than when he arrived, warmed not by the fire, but by the human courage to lis­ten and be heard.