338 MEMOIR OF GEORGE WILSON. CHAP. XI. 



rent. In the morning there was the petition for help, 

 support, guidance, and in the evening the calm offering 

 up of all the acts of the day, to be purified and accepted 

 for the sake of the great Mediator. Few mannerisms 

 marked his prayers, but two desires often found expres- 

 sion, " that in all things Christ might have the pre- 

 eminence," and that " having begun in Christ, we may 

 end in none else." Jesus was the " Alpha and Omega " 

 to him, and therefore did his light shine clearly before 

 his fellow-men. 



Reference has been made to preparation of lectures 

 during the Christmas week. They were the last he deli- 

 vered before the Philosophical Institution, four in number, 

 " On the Metals in their Industrial Relations." This was 

 the eighth course of lectures addressed to the audiences 

 of this Association, and it might have been imagined they 

 had had enough of him. Men of the highest eminence 

 were on their staff of lecturers, and many from a distance 

 to whom novelty lent a new charm ; yet so far from be- 

 coming weary of George Wilson during the fourteen years 

 that he appeared before them, they seemed to think the 

 last course better than the first. His own mind was ever 

 amassing fresh stores of knowledge, and he delighted to 

 make a feast of these for his brethren. Again and again, 

 too, did he come to their aid, on very brief notice, and at 

 considerable personal inconvenience, when a lecturer was 

 unable to fulfil his engagement to them ; and of this they 

 had a most grateful sense. 



After a professional visit to Newcastle in the beginning 

 of March, he tells Dr. Cairns, " Since I came back I 

 have been discoursing to Dr. Candlish's Bible-class, by 

 his request, on a physico-theological subject, and I have 

 promised a word to the Congregational Soiree of Lady 



