A Giant's Death

W. Carl Ketcherside

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     A few days ago I was reading in The British Harbinger, for May 1, 1866, an account of the death of Alexander Campbell. It occurred to me that our readers might be interested, so what follows is an exact quotation:

     The closing hours of this great and good man's life were inexpressibly affecting to the group of tender friends and relatives that watched round his bedside. At times his mind would wander over old familiar scenes and he would recall them by name. He was oppressed with a longing for rest and quiet and home. He was weary with his long journey, and he spoke of his desire to be led to his friends and kindred and to be at peace. Not a murmur, not a complaint, once escaped him. He was gentle and meek and patient throughout. A letter dated from his chamber at half-past two o'clock of Saturday morning speaks thus of him:

     'I am sitting up tonight with our dear uncle. We fully thought this would be his last night on earth. But he has survived the turn of the night and may possibly wear through another day. His strength is wonderful. All this night I have thought as I watched him of a giant grasping with a desperate foe, or of some noble animal smuggling to be disentangled from the enemy's toils, chafed and fretted within its narrow boundaries. Death has no power to dim this great mind. His senses are as acute and clear as ever, and his beautiful nature shows the same in all things. His gentleness and patience mid his suffering break all our hearts. Such sweetness and submission to the slightest wish of others around with such kind consideration for every one who comes into his presence--his little expressions of greeting, and his inquiry after the welfare of those who come to see him, and such putting away of personal complaint or suffering, moves every beholder to tears.
     All this could never be seen in a character less great and grand than his. He is himself noble and good and great--to the very last. The commanding and fascinating elements of his character are intact in the midst of the wreck of matter. Such passages of Scripture as he has recited even in his wanderings, and such grand sentences as have fallen from his lips--such beautiful soliloquies upon 'the fleetness of time' and upon 'doing good while we can,' are wonderful to all of us. Humboldt, you know, looking upon the setting sun with his dying eyes, said 'Light! more light!' and Goethe dying at the same hour of the closing day, raised his hand and made as though he were writing in the air, according to his habit of describing all his sensations as they came. But these dying witnesses of the lives they had led, characteristic as they were, how tame, how meaningless compared with what our uncle expressed an evening or so ago

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in watching the glories of the departing sun. Its last rays were streaming through the windows directly in front of his bed, and fell upon it. A group of friends sat around him in silence, and he turning from them to the sinking sun repeated that passage from Malachi which had been so often on his lips during his life, running thus 'But unto you that fear my name shall the sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings.' What a beautiful testimony of the work of his long life was conveyed in that long quotation?"

     I may remind you that Alexander Campbell died on Sunday, March 4, just before midnight, the close of the same day on which the above letter was written. He was seventy-eight years of age.