40 MEMOTB OF JOHN WILSON. 



higher things." Many, doubtless, were his wild pranks and jovial 

 adventures, and for a brief space, as we shall find, he gave himself 

 up, in the agony of blighted hopes, to " unbridled dissipation," if 

 so he might drown the memory of an insupportable grief. All such 

 excess, however, was alien to his nature, which from childhood to 

 old age, preserved that freshness and purity of feeling imparted by 

 Heaven to all true poets, and in few instances utterly lost. 



His life at Magdalen College, and his arrangements in regard to 

 his studies, were marked by the same attention to order as had di- 

 rected his daily course when in Glasgow. It was not till some time 

 after he had left Scotland, that the agitation of harassing thoughts 

 caused a change in the steadiness of his habits, leading him into 

 strange eccentricities in search of peace. But the restlessness and 

 occasional deep depression of his spirit were never of long continu- 

 ance, otherwise the result might have been destructive. Fortu- 

 nately, the strength and buoyancy of his nature were too great to 

 be overcome, and he passed naturally from one condition of feeling 

 to another, according as his spirit was soothed or agitated by out- 

 ward circumstances. Thus, in the midst of all his sorrows, he is 

 found throwing himself not unfrequently into the full tide of the 

 life that surrounds him, as if he had no other thought ; while again 

 he springs off upon some distant walk that takes him miles away, to 

 seek solace in the solitude of the valleys, or drown care among the 

 crowds of a city. Nothing, however, damped his ardor in acquir- 

 ing knowledge, or in expressing admiration for those who inspired 

 it by their writings. The heroes he worshipped were numerous ; 

 and those he loved best have had their beauties recorded in essays 

 of much discriminating power and taste. 



One of his first steps for methodizing the results of his study, and 

 improving his mind, was the commencement of a commonplace- 

 book, a valuable exercise which he had already begun on a small 

 scale in Glasgow, probably by the advice of Professor Jardine. Of 

 these commonplace-books several volumes more or less complete 

 are still extant, giving evidence of an industry and a systematic 

 habit of study very inconsistent with the notion that the writer was 

 an idle or desultory student.* 



* "Volume I." is prefaced in the following philosophical style, a few days after his arrival in Ox 

 ford: the elaborate plan of study indicated was not, of course, rigidly adhered to: — 



"In the following pages I propose to make such remarks upon the various subjects of polite 

 literature as have been suggested to my mind during the course of my studies, by th*> perusal of 



