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e him from lecturing. He was amused by one of his friends proposing to put him under trustees for the purpose of looking after his health. But he would not be restrained from working, so long as a vestige of strength remained. One day, in the autumn of 1859, he returned from his customary lecture in the University of Edinburgh with a severe pain in his side. He was scarcely able to crawl upstairs. Medical aid was sent for, and he was pronounced to be suffering from pleurisy and inflammation of the lungs. His enfeebled frame was ill able to resist so severe a disease, and he sank peacefully to the rest he so longed for, after a few days' illness: "Wrong not the dead with tears! A glorious bright to-morrow Endeth a weary life of pain and sorrow." The life of George Wilson--so admirably and affectionately related by his sister--is probably one of the most marvellous records of pain and longsuffering, and yet of persistent, noble, and useful work, that is to be found in the whole history of literature. His entire career was indeed but a prolonged illustration of the lines which he himself addressed to his deceased friend, Dr. John Reid, a likeminded man, whose memoir he wrote:-- "Thou wert a daily lesson Of courage, hope, and faith; We wondered at thee living, We envy thee thy death. Thou wert so meek and reverent, So resolute of will, So bold to bear the uttermost, And yet so calm and still." CHAPTER VIII.--TEMPER. "Temper is nine-tenths of Christianity."--BISHOP WILSON. "Heaven is a temper, not a place."--DR. CHALMERS. "And should my youth, as youth is apt I know, Some harshness show; All vain asperities I day by day Would wear away, Till the smooth temper of my age should be Like the high leaves upon the Holly Tree"--SOUTHEY. "Even Power itself hath not one-half the might of Gentleness" --LEIGH HUNT. It has been said that men succeed in life quite as much by their temper as by their talents. However this may be, it is certain that their happiness in life depends mainly upon their equanimity of disposition, their patience and forbearance, and their kindness and thoughtfulness for those about them. It is really true what Plato says, that
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