150 LIFE OF GEORGE WILSON. CHAP. VII. 



of his life. To him, James Russell owed deliverance from 

 many doubts ; and for some years he had been on a 

 footing of intimacy in the household. Now, he was as the 

 ministering angel of George's sick chamber, and with the 

 tender love of a brother did he commune with him on the 

 high theme which entirely engrossed George's thoughts ; 

 meeting difficulties, and in every way soothing the dis- 

 tressed and burdened spirit of the sufferer. Afterwards, we 

 shall find George speaking of him as his " spiritual father ; " 

 so that it is not to be wondered at, that the relations 

 subsisting between them, continued to be most tender and 

 true. 



On the morning of the operation, with a "trembling 

 hope in Christ " in his heart, he performed his toilet with 

 unusual care, in order to disarm the apprehensions of those 

 beside him, in whose hearts an instinctive fear lurked, 

 knowing that the surgeons were to come that day. How- 

 ever, the ruse was successful, and the truth was only 

 revealed to them by the irrepressible cries of agony from 

 the sufferer. 



" During the operation," George says, " in spite of the 

 pain it occasioned, my senses were preternaturally acute. 

 I watched all that the surgeons did with a fascinated 

 intensity. Of the agony it occasioned, I will say nothing. 

 Suffering so great as I underwent cannot be expressed in 

 words, and thus fortunately cannot be recalled. The par- 

 ticular pangs are now forgotten; but the black whirlwind 

 of emotion, the horror of great darkness, and the sense of 

 desertion by God and man, bordering close upon despair, 

 which swept through my mind and overwhelmed my heart, 

 I can never forget, however gladly I would do so." 1 



The object in recalling such painful emotions was to 

 1 Letter to Dr. Simpson. 



