(The above is on a flat stone in the cathedral.)
And is this the memorial of the interesting and pious Unwin? Shall no monumental tablet record that he was "the endeared and valued friend of Cowper?" We have seldom seen so cold and jejune an epitaph to commemorate a man distinguished by so many virtues, and associated with such interesting recollections. We are happy in being enabled to furnish a testimony more worthy of him in the following letter, addressed by Cowper to the present Lord Carrington.
TO ROBERT SMITH, ESQ.[775]
Weston-Underwood, near Olney, Dec. 9, 1786.
My dear Sir,—We have indeed suffered a great loss by the death of our friend Unwin; and the shock that attended it was the more severe, as till within a few hours of his decease there seemed to be no very alarming symptoms. All the account that we received from Mr. Henry Thornton, who acted like a true friend on the occasion, and with a tenderness toward all concerned that does him great honour, encouraged our hopes of his recovery; and Mrs. Unwin herself found him on her arrival at Winchester so cheerful, and in appearance so likely to live, that her letter also seemed to promise us all that we could wish on the subject. But an unexpected turn in his distemper, which suddenly seized his bowels, dashed all our hopes, and deprived us almost immediately of a man whom we must ever regret. His mind having been from his infancy deeply tinctured with religious sentiments, he was always impressed with a sense of the importance of the great change of all; and, on former occasions, when at any time he found himself indisposed, was consequently subject to distressing alarms and apprehensions. But in this last instance his mind was from the first composed and easy; his fears were taken away, and succeeded by such a resignation as warrants us in saying, "that God made all his bed in his sickness." I believe it is always thus, where the heart, though upright toward God, as Unwin's assuredly was, is yet troubled with the fear of death. When death indeed comes, he is either welcome, or at least has lost his sting.
I have known many such instances, and his mother, from the moment that she learned with what tranquillity he was favoured in his last illness, for that very reason expected it would be his last. Yet not with so much certainty, but that the favourable accounts of him at length, in a great measure, superseded that persuasion.
She begs me to assure you, my dear sir, how sensible she is, as well as myself, of the kindness of your inquiries. She suffers this stroke, not with more patience and submission than expected, for I never knew her hurried by any affliction into the loss of either, but in appearance at least, and at present, with less injury to health than I apprehended. She observed to me, after reading your kind letter, that, though it was a proof of the greatness of her loss, yet it afforded her pleasure, though a melancholy one, to see how much her son had been loved and valued by such a person as yourself.
Mrs. Unwin wrote to her daughter-in-law, to invite her and the family hither, hoping that a change of scene, and a situation so pleasant as this, may be of service to her, but we have not yet received her answer. I have good hope, however, that, great as her affliction must be, she will yet be able to support it, for she well knows whither to resort for consolation.
The virtues and amiable qualities of our friends are the things for which we most wish to keep them; but they are, on the other hand, the very things that in particular ought to reconcile us to their departure. We find ourselves sometimes connected with, and engaged in affection, too, to a person of whose readiness and fitness for another life we cannot have the highest opinion. The death of such men has a bitterness in it, both to themselves and survivors, which, thank God! is not to be found in the death of Unwin.