(seq. 32)

[fol. 1r]

No. 13. Dorchester, January 1^st. 1796!

I wish you a very happy new year, my dear friend,
as, I think, it must be from the prospects before you. The last
year has left you in a situation, where you enjoy every earthly
comfort, but one. This year promises to supply that defect, and
render you completely happy. Far be it from me to obscure the sun-
shine of your enjoyment with one cloud of fear or anxiety; but
I cannot forbear inviting your attenton to a late melancholy
event, wh discovers the fallacy of human prospects. My dear
classmate Prince is dead! At the dawn of manhood & use-
fulness, when the pleasures of life were blooming in his view,
he is called to relinquish his connexion with earthly delights.
His disconsolate widowed mother & sorrowful sisters may well
deserve our sympathy. They have long promised themselves much
happiness in this dear object of their hopes; and, probably, an-
ticpated the time, when he would relieve them from misfor-
tune & preserve them from want. See, my friend, the uncertain
tenure of earthly enjoyments, & the precarious nature of hu-
man prospects. the event has awakened in me a serious train
of thought. I pray God, it may have a tendency to wean me
from inordinate attachment to earthly things. This evening
I received the intelligence of Rev. Hezikiah Hooper's death. He died
at Bridgewater of a consumption, wh has long been preying upon
him. How brittle is the thread of human life! We see mor-
tals falling, of all ages, on our right hand & and our left; &
yet too apt are we to neglect the interesting lesson. Too prone
are we to imagine that our life will be protracted, & that our
lot will be happy. This confines our affections to earthly objects
to the neglect of far more important concerns. My own experience
teaches me, that a long course of prosperity is dangerous: & that
adverse fate, by the blessing of God, eventually conduces to my benefit.