Quite content that, having a better education than himself, his son should
both be and show himself superior, he could not help feeling that these his
ways of asserting himself were signs of mere foolishness, and especially as
conjoined with his wish to be a minister--in regard to which Peter but
feebly sympathized with the general ambition of Scots parents. Full of
simple paternal affection, whose utterance was quenched by the behaviour of
his son, he was continuously aware of something that took the shape of an
impassable gulf between James and his father and mother. Profoundly
religious, and readily appreciative of what was new in the perception of
truth, he was, above all, of a great and simple righteousness--full, that
is, of a loving sense of fairplay--a very different thing indeed from that
which most of those who count themselves religious mean when they talk of
the righteousness of God! Little, however, was James able to see of this,
or of certain other great qualities in his father.
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