136 MEMORIAL SKETCH. 



Lecture Society, of which he was President, on November 

 4, 1877, in the autumn following his sister's death. 



The world has been most benefited by the labours of those 

 who have had the greatest desire to employ their powers for the 

 good of others, the greatest knowledge of the best mode of 

 doing so, and the greatest faith in the ultimate success of their 

 work. And I wish no better for myself than that 1 should here- 

 after be remembered as one who has endeavoured, in however 

 humble a degree, to transmit to those who may come after me 

 the earnest love of scientific truth which was the pre-eminent 

 characteristic of John Frederick Herschel, the unswerving 

 love of what was just and right and kind which animated the 

 course of George Grote, and the large-hearted and self-sacri- 

 ficing love of her fellow-creatures which gave to Mary Car- 

 penter a foremost place among the philanthropists of this or 

 any other time. 

 To his friends, also, as to the public men who only saw 

 him at a distance, singleness of aim seemed the most 

 striking quality of Dr. Carpenter's life. This had, indeed, 

 its severe and unsympathetic side to some who approached 

 him only for the first time, especially in any post of official 

 duty. He was charged to carry out certain rules, and they 

 must be fulfilled, whatever might be the cost to personal 

 convenience or pride. His life-long habit of acting on 

 fixed principles made him impatient of anything that 

 seemed to contravene them ; the strenuous effort of his 

 earlier years had partly deprived him of the elasticity of 

 nature which renders it easy for others to enter into fresh 

 relations ; and he had a difficulty in spontaneously adapt- 

 ing himself to varieties of character not formed after his 

 own model. As his circle of friendships widened, how- 

 ever, and a larger and more diverse experience gave him a 

 fuller insight into the perplexities of life, his judgments 

 towards his closing years became far gentler. He was not, 

 indeed, without his share of the combative impulse ; but 



