Scott, “Old Mortality.”
A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty
Is worth a whole eternity in bondage.
Addison, “Cato.”
The life of a man of virtue and talent, who should die in his thirtieth year, is, with regard to his own feelings, longer than that of a miserable, priest-ridden slave who dreams out a century of dulness.
Shelley, “Notes to Queen Mab.”
The most striking scene in “Ivanhoe” is where Rebecca, pursued by Front de Bœuf on the tower of the castle, threatens to throw herself from the battlement saying, that “the Jewish maiden would rather trust her soul with God than her honor to the Templar.” Sir David Dundas tells a story of a Scotch laird who, to escape a criminal indictment, disappeared in 1715. Thirty years afterwards, 1745, he returned, and was arrested and tried for his life. The prosecution relied on the evidence of an ex-bailiff of the laird, who had undertaken to identify him. After gazing at him, he told the judge that he was “verra like his maister,” but on looking at him “weel he doubted, indeed he felt sure that he was not his maister at all,” and as there were no other witnesses, the case broke down. The Presbyterian minister of the place vented his indignation on the witness in the strongest terms,—
“Where, you perjured villain, do you expect to go after death, lying to God as you have done to-day?”
“Weel, weel, meenister,” was the reply, “what you say may be a’ verra true, but you see I’d raither trust my soul with my Maker than my maister with thae fellows.”
In the altercation between Dr. Johnson and Beauclerk (April 16, 1779) as reported by Boswell, Beauclerk said: