Whatever may be the ultimate verdict upon Goldsmith's greatest poem, one thing is as significant as it is certain. These poetic yearnings were long in his heart ere he gave them utterance. A wayward, careless lad, heedless of all responsibility, he seems purposeless and perplexing to the last degree, yet the profoundest meditations of his life moved his soul. The very spell of poetry was upon him. This Divine revealing may have accounted for that outward want of earnestness of the character, and the career that troubled others if it did not trouble him. The hold upon the inward and the hidden spirit absorbed and stagnated the outward movements and the conventional plans of common existence. It is right to be implicitly imbued with the honour due to honour, and that tribute which must in every issue be humbly paid to elemental guiding and essential greatness. Amid the inconsequent and eccentric variations of evolving genius, the Uncle Contarine possessed inexhaustible patience. If he had very possibly not a complete confidence in his wayward nephew, he had an affection for the lad, and a devotion to his welfare that nothing could diminish. This good old man often thought of the poor widow and her boy. He saw that the provision for a grown lad, ripening into manhood, with no visible means of independent subsistence, and no ostensible desire for any conceivable occupation, was a burden too great for the fondest of mothers to bear when she was very poor. Contarine had been deeply moved when Oliver came home again that last time thoroughly ashamed and broken-hearted. This contrition touched the very depths of all the old man's sympathy. He must have been a man of few words--so few that he had none to spare for reproaches. He saw to the full the embarrassments of the situation, and came once more swiftly to the rescue. His manner was at all times persuasive rather than peremptory. His plans were practical and immediate. Sudden action stayed the possibility of growing bitterness. Forthwith Goldsmith was despatched to Edinburgh to qualify for the medical profession. He was twenty-four years of age. Although he loved his family dearly, and cherished the land of his birth with all its pathos and its poetry, he never saw Ireland again, nor the kinsmen and kinswomen to whom, in his heart, he lived his days mid fault and failure, sorrow and success, joy and pain, endlessly devoted. From the earliest days to the last, throughout the whole career of Oliver Goldsmith, there were deep emotions in the mind and high motives in the life and character of this great man that few in his own times even dimly perceived. Impenetrable love was hidden in that laughter-laden heart, with its outward concealing and dissimulating vanities.