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266
Hereditary Genius
1. Melancthon, d, aet. 63, whose health required continual
management. 2. Calvin, d. aet. 55, faint, thin, and consumptive, but
who nevertheless got through an immense amount of work. Perhaps
we may say 3. Junius, d. aet. 47, a most infirm and sickly child, never
expected to reach manhood, but he strengthened as he grew, and
though he died young, it was the plague that killed him; he moreover
survived four wives. 4. Downe, d. aet. 61, a Somersetshire vicar,
who through all his life, “in health and strength, was a professed
pilgrim and sojourner” in the world. 5. George Herbert, d. aet. 42,
consumptive, and subject to frequent fevers and other infirmities,
seems to have owed the bent of his mind very much to his ill-health,
for he grew more pious as he became more stricken, and we can
trace that courageous, chivalric character in him which developed
itself in a more robust way in his ancestors and brothers, who were
mostly gallant soldiers. One brother was a sailor of reputation;
another carried twenty-four wounds on his person. 6. Bishop Potter,
d. aet. 64, was of a weak constitution, melancholic, lean, and
puritanical. 7. Janeway, d. aet. 24, found “hard study and work by far
an overmatch for him.” 8. Baxter, d. aet. 76, was always in wretched
health; he was tormented with a stone in the kidney (which, by the
way, is said to have been preserved in the College of Surgeons). 9.
Philip Henry, d. aet. 65, called the “heavenly Henry” when a young
clergyman, was a weakly child; he grew stronger as an adult, but
ruined his improved health by the sedentary ways of a student's life,
alternating with excitement in the pulpit, where “he sweated profusely
as he prayed fervently.” He died of apoplexy. 10. Harvey, d. aet. 30,
was such a weakly, puny object, that his father did not like his
becoming a minister, “lest his stature should render him despicable.”
11. Moth, d. aet. ? seems another instance. Hardly any personal
anecdote is given of him, except that “God was
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