The Life of William Roscoe
Chapter VII. 1799-1805
William Roscoe to Hector Macneil, [September? 1805]
“Be assured, my dear Sir, that in our common attachment
to our late much loved and lamented friend, I feel an additional bond of union between ![]()
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us. His influence yet survives, and forms fresh motives of
confidence and friendship. * * * You will already, perhaps, have heard that the
sufferings of our late excellent friend, towards the close of his life, were
uncommonly severe; but it may be some satisfaction to you to know, that the
firmness of his mind was equal to the trial, and that, amidst the most painful
conflicts of his disorder, he was employed in an abstract attention to the
nature of his symptoms, as if he had been making observations on the case of
another person. Such a decided superiority of mind to body has seldom been
exhibited, and reminds me of a most striking passage in a letter of Dr. Reid, given in Mr. Stewart’s Life of that eminent
man. ‘To think that the soul perishes in that fatal moment, when it is
purified by this fiery trial, and fitted for the noblest exertions in
another state, is an opinion which I cannot help looking down upon with
contempt and disdain.’ On this subject, I cannot refrain from
communicating to you some other circumstances attending his last moments, which
afford an additional proof of the warmth of his affections, and the unbroken
vigour of his mind. Whilst confined to his bed, he was accustomed to dictate to
his son Wallace, who constantly attended
on him, such sentiments as occurred to him respecting those matters in which he
was most deeply interested—his family, his friends, his writings, ![]()
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and his opinions. This practice was continued to the very
extreme of his rational powers, and was even renewed in the intervals of
delirium immediately preceding his death. Some of these written memorials have
since been communicated to me; and you will readily conceive what my feelings
must have been, on finding one of them addressed to myself, tremulously signed
with his own hand, intended to convey to me and mine his last blessing, and to
give me some account of the state of his feelings on the most important of all
topics, so far as he had then proceeded in what he himself denominates
‘the valley of the shadow of death.’ Such a pledge of
affection more nearly resembles a communication from the world of spirits, than
a message from a fellow mortal; and I shall, accordingly, preserve it as an
inestimable memorial of the friendship of a man of high intellectual
endowments, inflexible energy, and unbounded goodness of heart.”
James Currie (1756-1805)
Scottish physician educated at Glasgow University; he practised in Liverpool and was the
editor and biographer of Robert Burns.
William Wallace Currie (1784-1840)
The son of the biographer of Robert Burns; he was mayor of Liverpool (1833-36).
Thomas Reid (1710-1796)
Scottish moral sense philosopher who taught at King's College, Aberdeen, and Glasgow
University; he wrote
Inquiry into the Human Mind (1764).
