"Don't be surprised," he wrote to a friend, "if any morning at breakfast you hear that I am gone." But while he said so, he did not in the least degree indulge in the feeling of sickly sentimentality.

He worked on as cheerfully and hopefully as if in the very fulness of his strength.

"To none," said he, "is life so sweet as to those who have lost all fear to die." Sometimes he was compelled to desist from his labours by sheer debility, occasioned by loss of blood from the lungs; but after a few weeks' rest and change of air, he would return to his work, saying, "The water is rising in the well again!" Though disease had fastened on his lungs, and was spreading there, and though suffering from a distressing cough, he went on lecturing as usual.

To add to his troubles, when one day endeavouring to recover himself from a stumble occasioned by his lameness, he overstrained his arm, and broke the bone near the shoulder.
But he recovered from his successive accidents and illnesses in the most extraordinary way.

The reed bent, but did not break: the storm passed, and it stood erect as before.
There was no worry, nor fever, nor fret about him; but instead, cheerfulness, patience, and unfailing perseverance.