Miss Protheroe
I have never entered into the dispute concerning the comparative powers of the sexes. We naturally and unavoidably judge of the whole by parts, and of course by those parts which come within the circle of our own observation. Either (which I have no reason to believe) I have met with a series of very favourable exceptions, or I ought to think highly of the female character. I am sure I cannot be mistaken with regard to many with whom I have been intimately acquainted in various seasons and circumstances of my life. I have found in them a kindness, a tenderness, a purity of affection, a disinterestedness of friendship, a readiness to oblige, to serve, and to sacrifice; and these, with their gentle manners and lively conversation, and sprightly correspondence, (next to the influence of the dearest of all connexions,) have been my peculiar excitement and solace, under anxious duties and trying afflictions, and a tendency to depression of spirit, to which, though perhaps little suspected, I have been always liable.
As my children had all left me by death, marriage, or professional engagement, and as my beloved wife had some growing indispositions which limited her activities, I much wished for what I soon obtained, in a very valuable and inestimable friend. This was Miss Eliza Protheroe, whose uncle was member of Parliament for Bristol, and whose cousin is member for Halifax.
‘I knew her first by visiting her as a minister, when she was suffering under an enervating malady, which had much reduced her. She was then under medical care in Bath. Upon her recovery she left this place for Cheltenham; but she soon returned, and we had frequent interviews with her. These prepared Mrs. Jay and myself for a more intimate connexion. So she accompanied us to the sea as our only companion; and this excursion of six weeks together gave us such an insight into her qualities, that after our return home she soon became an inmate under our roof. She was well brought up, genteel in her manners, very intelligent, an excellent reader, pleasingly sociable, with a degree of the humorous and comic in her conversation. Above all she was truly pious, entirely free from everything low and mean, and singularly unselfish and generous, never seeming to be so much in her element as when denying herself to do good to others. What a treasure did we find in her! What a companion, helper, and comforter did she prove! And what a mutual regard did we all increasingly feel towards each other!
The most pleasing weeks I ever spent on earth were passed in four successive excursions to Lymouth, in the north of Devon. No little of the exquisite pleasure I experienced was derived from the mixed, sublime and beautiful scenery, and from the solitude and tranquil retirement; but how much of it did our associate contribute in our mutual walks, and readings, and discourse! And not only so. Here I prepared my Lectures on the Christian Character for the press, and wrote the long preface prefixed to it. And here also I wrote many of my Morning and Evening Exercises, one of which, as I wrote them, I daily read at our family worship. These familiar compositions, which have had such an extensive circulation, I owe much to her stimulation and encouragement; without ^liich I much question whether I should have persevered.
Watts tells us,..:
““We should suspect some danger near
Where we possess delight;”
and Cowper tells us,
“Full bliss is bliss divine.”
My entirely esteemed wife, while at Ijynmouth, was unable fully to enjoy the attractions of the retreat, and the week after our return home from the last visit, she was seized with apoplexy and paralysis, and which, though life was spared, hroke up much of my domestic happiness. Our friend was so attached and devoted to us, that she was ready to die for us — yea, I cannot but think that this was the case, in a great degree at least; for, in consequence of my affliction, I immediately wrote to her at Cheltenham, whither she had gone for a few days to see her mother; upon which she instantly hastened back while under a medical treatment and considerable indisposition, and much mental suffering from affection and fear; so that the day after her arrival, she was seized with dehrium, and after a week of frenzy, she expired. At the time my wife was insensible, and, so, ignorant of an affliction that would have exceedingly added to her own, and which did add so much to it, when she became capable of learning the event. As for myself, I hardly felt more at the death of my own daughter, by whose side she lies in my own family vault.
After mentioning several natural relations, Moses says, —” Or thy friend which is as thine own soul.’^ Is this an anticlimax? or does he mean to say that sometimes friendship rises above Jdndred?
“The tear
That drops upon this paper is sincere.”
Few deaths could have affected me more. It was the termination of a life of perfect unselfishness, no little of which had been lived for the welfare of myself and mine.” Scarcely for a
righteous man will one die; yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die/^ Power may cause a man to be feared; learning, to be admired; wealth, to be flattered; but goodness naturalizes one heart in another, and renders it ^’ more blessed to give than to receive.^^ Mrs. Jay was equally affected when recovered enough to be able to bear the report of our loss.
‘” Friend after friend departs.
Who has not lost a friend?
There is no union here of hearts,
That finds not here an end.
Were this frail world our final rest,
Living or dying none were blest.
“There is a world above,
Where parting is unknown;
A long eternity of love,
The good enjoy alone;
And faith beholds them, dying here.
Translated to that glorious sphere.”