Reviews and Notices of Booh. 391 



things, were frequent, not in the form of a pious deduction dragged 

 in uncomfortably at the end of a lecture, but as the natural reflec- 

 tions of a mind thoroughly embued with the love of God and man, 

 and accustomed to refer every good gift to the Father of Lights. 

 In his addresses to medical or other students, he delighted to draw 

 attention to the great facts of the spiritual world ; but his ' Che- 

 mical Final Causes'^ is the only one of his scientific writings 

 which has a deliberately theological character. In it he attempts 

 to add to the ever-accumulating proofs of design, by showing 

 especially that phosphorus, nitrogen, and iron, are the best 

 adapted of the known elements for the pur^Doses they are required 

 to fulfil in animal organisms." 



" As to Dr. Wilson's aesthetic taste, he was an instance that a 

 chemist is not one (to quote his own humorous description^ ) 

 whose " vocation has been so prowl around, like a very demon, 

 seeking what of the poet's property he might lay hands on and 

 devour ; to prove himself a man of the earth, earthy alike by 

 profession and by relish for the work of a disenchanter, to whom 

 a mystery is interesting only because it may be explained, and 

 an object beautiful because the cause of its beauty may be dis- 

 covered." The popular impression about some chemists, that 

 " the aquafortis and the chlorine of the laboratories have as effec- 

 tually bleached the poetry out of them, as they destroy the 

 colours of tissues exposed to their action," certainly never arose 

 from an acquaintance with Dr. Wilson. In his writings there is 

 often a rhythmical charm and balance of expressions which suit 

 well with the poetic quotations in which he sometimes freely in- 

 dulges. As instances, I take almost at random from his discourse 

 on the Progress of the Telegraph : — " We nicely discuss whether 

 telegram is a proper word or not, and invoke the heroes of Homer 

 to side with us for or against a term which would have tried 

 every Greek tongue in its utterance, and vexed every Greek ear 

 in its hearing ; and all the while the bees who rejoice amidst the 

 sugar plantations of our heather warn and welcome each other in 

 songs which the bees of Hymettus sang to each other : and the 

 grasshoppers signal from meadow to meadow as they did of old, 

 when the musical shiver of their wings rang over Greece as its 

 cradle-psalm." And again, speaking of the compass-needle " as 

 the guide of Vasco de Gama to the East Indies, and of Columbus 



1 ' Edin. Univ. Essays,' 1856. 



^ In ' The alleged Antagonism between Poetry and Chemistry.' 



