Brief memoir of the late Thomas Bateman, Esq. M.D.F.L.S. Physician to the public dispensary, and to the Fever Institution, London, and formerly President of the Royal Medical Society, Edinburgh.

  • Rumsey, James, 1778-1856.
Date:
1822
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Brief memoir of the late Thomas Bateman, Esq. M.D.F.L.S. Physician to the public dispensary, and to the Fever Institution, London, and formerly President of the Royal Medical Society, Edinburgh. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    science; and he had s< had his own reward” in the ho- nour and reputation which his success had procured for him*—a reward which he keenly enjoyed, and very high- ly prized. Those who have known only the pleasures which arise from worldly gratifications, surely ought to recollect, that, being confessedly ignorant of those spiritual enjoyments which they despise, they cannot be competent to decide upon their reality or their value: it belongs only to those who have experienced bolh, to appreciate either. And how did Dr Bateman appreciate them ?—In contrasting, as he frequent- ly did, his present happiness with all that he had formerly enjoyed and called happiness, he seemed al- ways at a loss to find words to express how poor, and mean, and despicable all earthly gratifications appeared to him, when compared with that “ joy and peace in believing,” which now filled his soul; and <c one par- ticle of which,” he sometimes said, “ ten thousand ■worlds would not tempt him to part with.” And it should be remembered, that this was not the evidence of a man disappointed in his worldly pursuits ; he had already, as before observed, “ had his reward” in the world—he had experienced the utmost success in this path which he had chosen—he had been keenly suscep- tible of intellectual pleasures; and of these, as well as of all inferior amusements, he had enjoyed more than a common portion: but when the only object that can satisfy the affections, and fill the capacities of a rational and immortal being was revealed to him—when he viewed, by the eye of faith, that life and immortality which are brought to light by the Gospel—earthly fame, and honour, and pleasure sunk into the dust; and, in reflecting upon his past life, the only thing that gave him satisfaction, was the hope that his labours might