The True Gentleman

My Grandfather, 93, had a stroke last week which landed him in the hospital and then at the skilled nursing facility in his retirement community. He didn't allow anything of this unfortunate circumstance to deprive him of his gracious spirit, his hopeful outlook, or the twinkle in his eye. Obviously, you can't keep a good man down.

He is adored by everyone who knows him, and described as "sweet," "charming," "devoted," "faithful," and "love in action." But what people say to me most often is, "Your grandfather is a true gentleman." It reminds me of a verse I first heard a few years back, a description which suits him to a tee:

The True Gentleman

The True Gentleman is the man whose conduct proceeds from good will and an acute sense of propriety, and whose self-control is equal to all emergencies; who does not make the poor man conscious of his poverty, the obscure man of his obscurity, or any man of his inferiority or deformity; who is himself humbled if necessity compels him to humble another; who does not flatter wealth, cringe before power, or boast of his own possessions or achievements; who speaks with frankness but always with sincerity and sympathy; whose deed follows his word; who thinks of the rights and feelings of others, rather than his own; and who appears well in any company, a man with whom honor is sacred and virtue safe.

John Walter Wayland