"which to avoid would be of great importance "? " Surely,"he says, " we may contrive to write with more spirit and effect than either of them; with less formality, less caution; for Stewart seems terrified to place one foot before another." Then he would branch forth on taste and genius, which he was glad to find had been treated of by the Scotch moralists.Then comes the moral nature, the affections, and conscience, or whatever name that faculty may be called; and he anticipates that the passions and affections will furnish fine ground for description.Then there is the will and all its problems; " but here I am also in the dark." One more lecture on man's spiritual nature will make fifty-eight in all." I would fain hope that something different from the common metaphysical lectures will produce itself out of this plan." Then he would treat of duties to God and man; of virtues and vices, -- in all, 108 lectures.Such was his projected plan.In later years he modified it, giving more time to the moral faculty, on which he did not throw any light.
He was never very systematic in his course.He enlarged on subjects suited to him, and was always poetical, often eloquent.The writer of this article remembers the impression left as he passed one day into his class-room.
The students received him with applause.-- I believe they always did so; and he advanced in a rapid, genial manner, fresh as if he had just come from the Highlands or Lake country.He produced a roll of papers, some of them apparently backs of letters.I could not discover where he was in his course, but I soon found myself carried along pleasantly but irresistibly by a glowing description of faith, of its swaying and elevating influence.On another occasion I found him enlarging on the place which association has in forming our imaginations.I am not able to give his theory, but it seemed to me at the time fresh and original.His pupils felt that it was a stimulating thing to be under such a man."One indubitable advantage,"says Mr.Hill Burton, "was possessed by all Professor Wilson's students who had I eyes to see and ears to hear,'
viz., the advantage of beholding closely the workings of a great and generous mind swayed by the noblest and sincerest impulses, and of listening to the eloquent utterances of a voice which, reprobating every form of meanness and duplicity, was ever raised to its loftiest pitch in recommendation of high-souled honor, truth, virtue, disinterested love, and melting charity." Another pupil, Mr.
A.Taylor Innes, describes him: 'His appearance in his class-room it is far easier to remember than forget.He strode into it with the professor's gown hanging loosely on his arms, took a comprehensive look over the mob of young faces, laid down his watch so as to be out of the reach of his sledge-hammer fist, glanced at the notes of his lecture (generally written on the most wonderful scraps of paper), and then, to the bewilderment of those who had never heard him before, looked long and earnestly out of the north window towards the spire of the old Town Kirk, until, having at last got his idea, he faced round and uttered it with eye and hand and voice and soul and spirit, and bore the class along with him.As he spoke, the bright blue eye looked with a strange gaze into vacancy, sometimes sparkling with a coming joke, sometimes darkening before a rush of indignant eloquence, the tremulous upper lip curving with {414} every wave of thought or hint or passion, and the golden-gray hair floating on the old man's shoulders." He had no philosophy himself, and so could not impart it to his pupils.But at times he made a profound remark, as when, in the " Noctes,"he says: " Honesty is the best policy, but it is only the honest man who will discover this." Hamilton, who was ardently attached to the man praises his metaphysical acuteness as shown in a review of Brown's theory of cause and effect in " Blackwood" for 1837.
But his true merit consisted in creating a literary taste among his students.He was not a very rigid examiner or exacter of essays, and idle students passed through his class without much severe study.But he read conscientiously the papers given in to him, and was a discerning critic, particularly appreciative of excellence.The more ambitious youths cherished secretly or avowedly the idea that they might be asked by him to write a communication to dear old North for "Blackwood;" but Wilson had to consult the tastes of his readers, and their hopes had often to be disappointed.
Thus did be pass his rather lengthened life, ever looking after the magazine with which he identified himself, lecturing all winter to his students, taking excursions in the summer, and very often dining in company in the evening where the wine and the wit flowed freely, and where he was always the favorite.In 1850 his health began to break down.
He retained his universal sympathy all along.His ruling passion was strong in death." It was an affecting sight to see him busy, nay, quite absorbed, with the fishing tackle scattered about his bed where he lay propped up with pillows." " How neatly he picked out each elegantly dressed fly from its little bunch, drawing it out with trembling hand along the white coverlet, and then replacing it in his pocket-book; he would tell ever and anon of the streams he used to fish in of old." The prospect of death produced more solemn feelings, and he betook himself to the Bible, "for is not all human nature and all human life shadowed forth in these pages? " The tender and anxious question which he asked concerning Robert Burns, " Did he read his Bible?"may, perhaps, by some be asked about himself.On a little table near his bedside his Bible lay during his whole illness, and was read morning and evening regularly.His servant also read it frequently to him.Thus departed John Wilson, April 2, 1853.{415}