Doubtless he attempted too much here, for he was an enthusiast on the subject of common schools and common school instruction. And yet, under almost any circumstances of school-keeping, dyspepsia, nurtured as it was by every physical habit, would most certainly have assailed him. With regard to his food and drink he was very unwise. It contributed largely to an extreme of irritability, which was unfavorable, and which at the end of a single term compelled him to resign his place and seek some other employment. This was a grievous disappointment to Mr. Gray, and, as some of his friends believe, was the mountain weight that crushed him. The horrors of the abyss into which he believed he had plunged himself, were the more intolerable from the fact that he now, for the first time, began to despair of being able to consummate a plan by means of which both his sorrows and joys, especially the latter, would have been shared by another. Yet, even here, he did not absolutely despair. Hope revived when he found himself, a third time, my patient. I did all in my power to encourage him till I had at length, to my own surprise as well as his, the unspeakable pleasure of finding him again returning to the path of health and happiness. It is indeed true, that a capricious appetite still retained its sway, in greater or less degree, and whenever he was not awed by my presence, he would indulge himself in the use of things which he knew were injurious to him, as well as in the excessive, not to say gluttonous, use of such good things as were tolerated. He occasionally confessed his impotence, and begged us to keep every thing out of his way, even those remnants which were designed for the domestic animals! And yet, after all, strange to say, he absented himself very frequently, as if to seek places of retirement, where he could indulge his tyrannical appetite. I saw most clearly his danger, and spoke to him concerning it. I appealed to his fears, to his hopes, to his conscience. I reminded him of the love he bore to humanity, and the regard he had for Divinity. Once more, being partly recruited, he resumed his labors as a teacher. This was doubtless a wrong measure, and yet I was not aware of the error at the time, or I should not have encouraged the movement, or assisted him as I did in procuring a situation. But I then thought he had been punished so effectually for his transgressions, that he would at length be wise. Besides he was exceedingly anxious to be at work, and to avoid dependence, a desire in which his friends participated, and in regard to which they were so unwise as to express their over anxiety in his hearing.