ERASER OF KIRKHILL. 93 



leads men to seek their opponents at home and draws 

 their attention from abroad. And hence they may re- 

 main unwarned and disunited until warning and union 

 be of no avail. But forgive me, my Lydia, I am boring 

 you with politics ; remember, however, that I do not 

 often transgress in this way. 



' Poor Kirkhill ! I could hardly bring myself to 

 believe the story of his death. Even in the present age, 

 when every college student arrogates to himself the praise 

 of superior ability, men of real talent are very few. The 

 proportion, too, of the people who are cut off by accident 

 in a quiet well-regulated country like ours, is exceed- 

 ingly small ; and hence, in at least the later annals of 

 talent and genius, we find hardly an instance of other 

 than natural death. The lightning, says the proverb, 

 spares the laurel ; and Hume remarks that mankind 

 often lose more in the single philosopher, whom the 

 jealousy of a tyrant cuts off, than in the thousands who 

 perish in an earthquake or conflagration taking it for 

 granted, doubtless, that thousands may perish so without 

 there being a man of mark among them. But alas for the 

 poor minister of Kirkhill ! He has left few clearer heads 

 behind him in the Church. I have often wished, when 

 listening to him, that he mingled more of the philosopher 

 with the theologian ; that, instead of always strengthen- 

 ing one Scripture doctrine by showing its correspondence 

 with another not better established than itself, he might 

 have occasionally descended to the broad level of self- 

 evident truth. But no one could admire him more 

 than I did in his own peculiar field. Do you really 

 think our Tory Churchmen will be unable to forgive 

 him his Whiggism even in death ? ' 



Readers will recollect Finlay, the gentle rhyming 

 boy, who had been of the Marcus Cave band, and to 



