450 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. 



soul's friend " is too sacred for publication, and no one 

 would have shrunk more from &nf manifestation of his 

 religious feeling than he. Still it is due to the cause 

 of truth in this sceptical age, that I should put on 

 record the impressions which a series of years of 

 affectionate intercourse with Principal Forbes have left 

 upon me. 



' Of all the characters I have read of in history, no 

 nature seems to me so like that of my friend, as that of 

 Blaise Pascal, with many important modifications be 

 it said. There was the same sensitive organization ; the 

 same intense love of truth for its own sake ; the same 

 fearlessness in facing facts, however they might militate 

 against preconceived notions, or established theories ; the 

 same bright intelligence which to the end triumphed 

 over the exhaustion of the bodily frame ; the same 

 unquestioning submission of will and intellect to the 

 Supreme Being ; the same lowly acceptance of the super- 

 natural truths of religion, how incomprehensible soever to 

 man's weakness. On the other hand, there was absent 

 from him that dark and ascetic side which distinguished 

 Pascal there was nothing of jansenistical rigour about 

 him ; his was a religion rather of hope than of fear. I 

 never saw in any man such fearlessness in the path of 

 duty. The one question with him was, Is it right ? No 

 dread of consequences, and consequences often bitterly 

 felt by him, and wounding his sensitive nature, ever 

 prevented him from doing that to which conscience 

 prompted. His sense of right amounted to chivalry. 



' I cannot be silent with regard to that exquisite ten- 

 derness that ran through all his home relations. To see 

 him at the head of his own table, surrounded by his 

 family that adored him, after a .day of hard mental work, 

 or of worrying College business, and to observe how, in 

 the sanctities of home, he took interest in the sports and 

 occupations and studies of the children, was what can 

 never be forgotten by me. Neither can I fail to re- 

 member the intelligence and eagerness with which he 



O O 



threw himself into lines of thought foreign from his own 



