[7] Not to break away from my text too long, I add one or two farther points worth notice, here:—
“Boerhaave lost none of his hours, but when he had attained one science attempted another. He added physick to divinity, chemistry to the mathematicks, and anatomy to botany.
“He knew the importance of his own writings to mankind, and lest he might, by a roughness and barbarity of style too frequent among men of great learning, disappoint his own intentions, and make his labours less useful, he did not neglect the politer arts of eloquence and poetry. Thus was his learning at once various and exact, profound and agreeable.
“But his knowledge, however uncommon, holds in his character but the second place; his virtue was yet much more uncommon than his learning.
“Being once asked by a friend, who had often admired his patience under great provocations, whether he knew what it was to be angry, and by what means he had so entirely suppressed that impetuous and ungovernable passion, he answered, with the utmost frankness and sincerity, that he was naturally quick of resentment, but that he had, by daily prayer and meditation, at length attained to this mastery over himself.” [↑]
[10] His own words to Mr. Skene of Rubislaw, vol. i., p. 83, spoken while Turner was sketching Smailholm Tower, vol. vii., p. 302. [↑]
[11] The Ballad of Hardiknute is only a fragment—but one consisting of forty-two stanzas of eight lines each. It is the only heroic poem in the Miscellany; of which—and of the poem itself—more hereafter. The first four lines are ominous of Scott’s own life:—
“Stately stept he East the wa’,