A treatise on comforting afflicted consciences - The Digital Puritan

xxviMEMOIR OF THEgreat inquisitiveness, which led him to seek clear apprehensionsof every thing that was taught him ; a greatattachment to the pursuits of literature ; the capahilityof enduring great exertion with patience ; and was anattentive and silent auditor to the conversations ofothers, observing, and even noting down whatevernew ideas he collected from the observations of hiselders.He continued at school till he was nearly twentyyears of age, and then removed to Lincoln College,Oxford. The same success attended his studies at theUniversity. He acquired the notice of his superiors,and was rapidly rising in general respect in the xmiversity,when his father, who was of course his dependence,died, and his property seems for some unassignedreason to have entirely devolved to theelder brother of our author.It has been truly remarked, that difficulties whichoverwhelm inferior minds serve but to exercise thecourage and to elicit the resources of those of an oppositecharacter. There are few situations, perhaps,in which these qualities would be more needed than inthe case of a young man at the university, whosefinances are either confined or doubtful. To be ableunder these circumstances to sustain his mind fromdepression, and especially to devote himself steadily tothe studies of the place, shows him to be possessed ofthat consciousness of integrity, and of those mentalresources, which will inevitably lead to future eminence.The conduct of this author exhibits also his singularconscientiousness in avoiding debt at a period of lifewhen the mind does not always so fully recognize the