; Life and Character of Nathaniel Bowditch. 31 
ard not only of your goods, but of your lives, if need be. What-* 
soever crosses this, is not authority, but a distemper thereof. This 
liberty is maintained and leis ina ii: amnion: to au- 
thority.’’* 
The lawless and flagrant dscantta upon robiecky aa life which 
have -occurred in this country within a few years past, casting 
upon its fair name a stain of dishonor, grieved him to the heart, 
and stirred his spirit within him. Conversing with him about 
one of the earliest and most wanton and unprovoked of Sieoiopt- 
rages,—I mean the conflagration of a religious house in the 
cinity of Boston, inhabited solely by women and ch ild ren, b ya 5 
ferocious mob at midnight,—he told me that had he been sum- ; 
moned, or had an opportunity, he would readily have shouldered 
his musket, and marched to the spot, and stood in defence of that 
edifice to the last drop of his blood. There was nothing, indeed, 
that stirred his indignation like oppression.+ 
| ‘Immediately after this outrage, he called on the Catholic bishop 
5 in Boston, and put into-his hands a sum of money, to buy clothes 
| for the women and children, who had lost every thing in the 
EE a 
ee eT ee ee. | 
flames. It is an agreeable circumstance, well worth recording, 
that as soon as the bishop heard of Dr. Bowditch’s illness, he sent 
and informed the family, that, to prevent his being disturbed, the 
bell of the cathedral, which is in the vicinity of his house, should 
not be rung during his illness, although it was the season of Lent, 
and. religious services were going on almost every day. It is 
pleasant to see kindness thus reciprocated, between divergent 
sects, and the middle wall of separation broken down by the hu- 
mane-and grateful feelings of a common nature. 
Pe Why is it, that all the youthful talent of this. country is ruins. 
madly into political life?. To how many of these aspirants may 
we apply, with literal truth, the remark of Lord Bacon, in ee 
. ence to himself, that “ they were born andintended for literature, 
rather than any thing else, and, by a sort of fatality, have been 
drawn, contrary to the bent of their own genius, into the walks © 
of gubee life.”"{ Is it nota great mistake, on ther Saiss to sup- 
ek ee 
a of New England, HH. 909. con alae sot 
t “ The Ursuline Convent,” on Mount Benedict, in Charlestown, about two 
miles from Boston, was burnt on the night of the Hth of August, 1834. 
. literas potius quam ad aliud quicquam natus, et ad res ae, nescio quo 
3 ’ contra genium suum abreptus.—De Aug. Sci. Lib. 8. Cap. 3. 
