Essays Biographical And Chemical

satisfied and cheerful; reaching forward into the future, and managing accordingly; not neglecting the least concerns, but all without hurry, or being embarrassed.' Such a character had Joseph Black. Dr. Robison, the editor of his lectures, his successor in Glasgow University, and his biographer, wrote: ' As he advanced in years his countenance continued to preserve that pleasing expression of inward satisfaction, which, by giving ease to the beholder, never fails to please. His manner was perfectly easy and unaffected and graceful. He was of most easy approach, affable, and readily entered into conversation, whether serious or trivial. His mind being abundantly furnished with matter, his conversation was at all times pertinent and agreeable. He was a stranger to none of the elegant accomplishments of life.' His friend Dr. Ferguson said of him: ' As Dr. Black had never anything for ostentation, he was at all times precisely what the occasion required, and no more. Never did any one see Dr. Black hurried at one time to recover matter which had been improperly neglected on a former occasion. Everything being done in its proper season and place, he ever seemed to have leisure in store; and he was ready to receive his friend or acquaintance, and to take his part with cheerfulness in any conversation that occurred.' His successor, Dr. Thomas Thomson, found Dr. Robison's estimate of Black's character so just that he appropriated it almost verbatim in his History of Chemist...