56'2 



BLACKLOCK. 



JBUeUock. sed and exhausted spirits, he left tlie table and retired 

 I""' to bed, when the following extraordinary circumstance 

 occured, which merits particular notice as a cu- 

 rious fact relative to the state of the mind in sleep. 

 One of his companions, uneasy at his absence from 

 the company, went into his bed-room a few hours af- 

 terwards, and, finding him, as he supposed, awake, 

 prevailed upon him to return into the dining room. 

 When he entered the room, two of his acquaintances 

 were engaged in singing, and he joined in the concert, 

 modulating his voice as usual with taste and elegance, 

 without missing a note or a syllable ; and after the 

 words of the song were ended, he continued to sing, 

 adding an extempore verse, which appeared to the 

 company full of beauty, and quite in the spirit of the 

 original. He then went to supper, and drank a glass 

 or two of wine. His friends, however, observed him 

 to be occasionally absent and inattentive. By and 

 bye he was heard speaking to himself, but in 60 slow 

 ^ and confused a manner as to be unintelligible. At 

 last, being pretty forcbly roused by Mrs Blacklock, 

 who began to be alarmed for his intellects, he awoke 

 with a sudden start, unconscious of all that had hap- 



pened, having been the whole time fast asleep. The 

 principal part of these remarkable particulars, is men- 

 tioned by Dr Cleghorn in his Thesis De Somno. 

 Where the writer of this article has ventured to make 

 some additions to that account, he is supported by 

 the testimony of Mrs Blacklock, from whom he per- 

 sonally obtained the anecdote. 



Blacklock finding his situation in Kirkcudbright 

 exceedingly irksome and painful, resigned his right 

 to the living after a legal dispute of two years, and 

 accepted of a moderate annuity in its stead. With 

 this slender provision, he removed in 1764 to Edin- 

 burgh, where he adopted the plan of receiving a cer- 

 tain number of young gentlemen into his. house as 

 boarder?. In this situation he continued with much 



' success for23 years, directing the studies of his board- 

 ers with the most affectionate care, and improving 

 their minds by his enlightened conversation. " In 

 the occupation which he thus exercised for so many 

 years of his life," says the author of the Man of 

 Feeling, in the elegant memoir he has prefixed to 

 tlie posthumous edition of his poems, " no teacher was 

 perhaps ever more agreeable to his pupils, nor master 

 of a family to its inmates, than Blacklock. The 

 gentleness of his manners, the benignity of his dispo- 

 sition, and that warm interest in the happiness of 

 others, which led him so constantly to promote it, 

 were qualities which could not fail to procure him the 

 love and regard of the young people committed to his 

 charge ; while the society, which esteem and respect 

 for his character and his genius often assembled at 

 his house, afforded them an advantage rarely to be 

 fodnd in establishments of a similar kind." The 

 writer of this account has frequently been a witness 

 of the family scene at Dr Blacklock's ; has seen the 

 good man amidst the circle of his young friends, eager 

 to do him all the little offices of kindness which he 

 seemed so much to merit and to feel. In this society 

 he seemed entirely to forget the privation of sight, 

 and the melancholy which at other times it might 

 produce. He entered with the chearful playfulness 

 ef a you:: g man into all the sprightly narrative, the 



sportful fancy, the humourous jest, that rose around BlacldocV. 

 him. It was a sight highly gratifying to philan- \r~~-* 



thropy, to see how much a mind endowed with 

 knowledge, kindled by genius, %nd above all, lighted 

 up with innocence and piety, like Blacklock's, could 

 overcome the weight of its own calamity, and enjoy 

 the content, the happiness, and the gaiety of others. 

 Several of those inmates of Dr Blacklock's house, 

 retained in future life all the warmth of that impres- 

 sion which his friendship at this early period had made 

 upon them ; and in various quarters of the world he 

 had friends and correspondents, from whom no length 

 of time, and no distance of place, had ever estranged him. 



In 1766, upon the unsolicited recommendation of 

 his friend Dr Beattie, the degree of doctor of divi- 

 nity was conferred on him by the university of Aber- 

 deen. 



In 1787, finding that his time of life, and the state 

 of his health, required repose, he was induced to dis- 

 continue the receiving of boarders. In the mean time, 

 the infirmities^of age were rapidly and visibly advan- 

 cing. A constitutional lowness of spirits, to which", 

 even in the vigour of youth, the delicate sensibility of 

 his nerves had at times rendered him subject, began 

 to recur more frequently, and with greater severity ; 

 and a general indisposition both of body and mind, 

 indicated the near approach of that period beyond 

 which protracted life is often little more than pro- 

 tracted pain. Amidst these indispositions of body, 

 however, and disquietudes of mind, the gentleness of 

 his temper never forsook him, and he felt all that re- 

 signation to the will of the Supreme Being, and con- 

 fidence in his goodness, which, through every vicissi- 

 tude of life, had habitually supported his mind. la 

 summer 1791 he was seized with a feverish disorder, 

 which on the 7th July, after about a week's illness, 

 ended in his death. 



The character of Blacklock, whether we consider 

 the qualities of his heart, or the endowments of his 

 understanding, is worthy of admiration. To an eager 

 sensibility and quickness of feeling, which is the pe- 

 culiar temperament of poetic genius, he joined an un- 

 common gentleness and candour of mind. His vigor- 

 ous understanding, and his ardent pursuit of know- 

 ledge, were chastened and adorned by an amiable 

 modesty, and an innocent simplicity of manners. 

 Deprived of sight in early infancy, nature seems to 

 have compensated for this misfortune, by opening to 

 him many sources of enjoyment unknown to common 

 minds. As he was debarred from those amusements and 

 avocations which distract and embarrass the mental 

 powers, he devoted himself to learning, and success- 

 fully cultivated the elegant pleasures of taste and 

 fancy. Amidst disadvantages and discouragements 

 which would have overwhelmed a more feeble mind, 

 he was distinguished by his proficiency in classical 

 literature, in belles lettres, in metaphysics, and in all 

 the various branches of knowledge for which the age 

 is distinguished. As a poet, his merit has been long 

 known and acknowledged. The productions of his 

 muse are marked with such an elegance of diction, 

 such an ardour of sentiment, and 6uch a glow and 

 propriety of description, as must excite the approba- 

 tion, and affect the feelings, of every reader of taste. 

 What is particularly remarkable in the works of one 

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