We have frequently in our time heard him compared by turns with Theodore Hook and Sidney Smith. But he was, in our opinion, infinitely superior to either of those luminaries in the Metropolitan world of wit; and, had he shone in the same sky, our belief is that their lesser rays would have paled before his greater brilliancy, as the stars go out and tapers glow dull and dim when the sun is up and dazzling us with his glory. Dr. Shepherd was a thorough and solid scholar; an advantage not possessed by either of his rivals. Hook’s education was notoriously deficient. Smith had not accumulated equal stores of learning from his. Hook, when not running riot as a _roué_, a debauchee, mad with dissipation, and intoxicated with the flattery of the circle in which he moved, never soared to anything beyond the character of a first class Jack Pudding. His practical jokes were those of a boy blackguard. His jokes uttered were almost invariably of the coarsest kind, which derived a momentary zest and relish, not from their own intrinsic value, but from the political excitement which then prevailed, and which they were generally intended to subserve. Friendship has indeed sought, in more than one biography, to rescue him from such a character. But friendship would have been more friendly, so to speak, if it would have allowed him to be forgotten. There is no advocate so eloquent as oblivion for some reputations. With Sidney Smith, again, it was “Figaro here, Figaro there, Figaro everywhere.” His whole life was one long, enduring, universal jest.
He never seems to have been serious. In all his conversations, and most of his writings, puns and points, often not soaring to sparkling antithesis or dazzling epigram, beset you, like “man traps and spring guns,” at every turn in the road, until you become weary and exhausted. Man cannot always be laughing. A perpetual joker must sometimes excite a yawn. But we never found Dr. Shepherd guilty on this head, and in this fashion. He was witty in season, but not out of season. He could be the man of business. He could bring gravity to the discussion of grave affairs, and treat things serious with seriousness. But when in the social circle, and amongst his friends, it was the season for relaxing, then came forth the mighty stream of his wit, rolling like another Mississippi, in its glorious, resistless course, and sweeping all before it, and as remarkable for its point, polish and elegance, as for its strength and poignancy. There were few who could keep the saddle in the intellectual tournament with him. Before that terrible lance, adversary after adversary went down, like chaff before the wind. Nor do we recollect any greater treat than a perusal of the correspondence with which the Doctor used, from time to time, to season our newspaper reading. Upon whatever controversy he entered, he was sure to come off victorious. The very opposite to Mrs. Chick, whose maxim was to carry everything by “an effort,” he never seemed to make any effort at all. It was the very ease with which he crushed the most daring of his foes which was so annoying to them, and so amusing to the spectators. How he would bowl down a whole string of sophistries, which had been boldly set up before the world as so many philosophical conclusions not to be overturned! How he would turn a fallacy inside out! How he would scatter every kind of mystification, and expose every attempt at falsehood and imposition! How he would strip every jackdaw of his borrowed plumes, and raise the laugh against every presuming quack! Yes! He was wit, scholar, philosopher, author, controversialist, all in one, and good in all. But he was something more. We believe Dr. Shepherd’s charity, for his means, to have been something wonderful. We have heard of acts of kindness on his part which would have been pronounced noble had they been performed by the wealthiest of our merchant princes, or the highest in the land. What, then, were they, when done by one of his limited income and resources? His heart was a bank, upon which misery had only to draw, and its drafts were sure to be accepted and honoured. All respect to his name and memory! We know few men who have lived more esteemed; we know of none who have done more good in their time. Let his surviving friends join with us in offering this tribute to one of the giants of the past.