THE MORAL PHILOSOPHY CHAIR. 211 



of a very great crime, had I been capable of recommending to the 

 Moral Philosophy Chair, a scoffer at religion or a libertine in mor- 

 als. But Mr. Wilson has still further, and, if possible, more strong 

 evidence in favor of his character, since he may appeal to every 

 line in those works which he has given to the public, and which are 

 at once monuments of Ins genius, and records of his deep sense of 

 devotion and high tone of morality. He must have, indeed, been a 

 most accomplished hypocrite (and I have not heard that hypocrisy 

 has ever been imputed to Mr. Wilson) who could plead with such 

 force and enthusiasm the cause of virtue and religion, whilo he was 

 privately turning the one into ridicule, and transgressing the dic- 

 tates of the other. Permit me to say, my Lord, that with the 

 power of appealing to the labors of his life on the one hand, and to 

 the united testimony of so many friends of respectability on the 

 other, Mr. Wilson seems well entitled to despise the petty scandid 

 which, if not altogether invented, must at least have been strongly 

 exaggerated and distorted, either by those who felt themselves at 

 liberty to violate the confidence of private society by first circula 

 ting such stories, or in their subsequent progress from tongue to 

 tongue. Indeed, if the general tenor of a man's life and of his 

 writings cannot be appealed to as sufficient contradiction of this 

 species of anonymous slander, the character of the best and wisest 

 man must stand at the mercy of every talebearer who chooses to 

 work up a serious charge out of what may be incautiously said in 

 the general license of a convivial meeting. I believe, my Lord, 

 there are very few men, and those highly favored both by temper- 

 ament and circumstances, or else entirely sequestered from the 

 world, who have not at some period of their life been surprised 

 both into words and actions, for which in their cooler and wiser 

 moments they have been both sorry and ashamed. The contagion 

 of bad example, the removal of the ordinary restraints of society, 

 must, while men continue fallible, be admitted as some apology for 

 such acts of folly. But I trust, that in judging and weighing the 

 character of a candidate, otherwise qualified to execute an impor- 

 tant trust, the public will never be deprived of his services by im- 

 posing upon him the impossible task of showing that he has been, 

 at aU times and moments of his life, as wise, cautious, and temper- 

 ate as he is in his general habits, and his ordinary walk through 

 the world. 



