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No. 13. Dorchester, January 1st. 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 sunshine 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 & usefulness, 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, anticpated the time, when he would relieve them from misfortune & preserve them from want. See, my friend, the uncertain tenure of earthly enjoyments, & the precarious nature of human 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 mortals 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.
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Forgive the desultory thoughts, wh flow from a heart more than commonly impressed.
Last Evening were celebrated the nuptials of Miss E. Blake the lady, who once called at H. to leave you a letter from me. Notwithstanding the festivity of the occasion & the amusements, wh were introduced, my heart was in the house of mourning. I could not suspend, for one hour, those mournful thoughts, wh involuntarily rushed into my mind. Never did I more forcibly realize, that "It is better to go to the house of mourning, than to "the house of feasting;" although I wished to adapt myself to the company.
Your last letter, my friend, came very opportunely, tho, at a late period after its date. I did not receive it, till the evening before last; wh was the time I heard of Prince's death. It was principally employed, if you recollect, on the subject of mortality. You point out one painful office of your profession, & bid me not to "start back from it, as entirely gloomy." I do not, my dear Sir; but think, if it ever fall to my lot to be a settled minister shall take peculiar pleasure in the necessary acts of condolenc[...] The throat distemper, wh prevails with you, has found its way into this town. The oldest child of one, who has lately lost three by other disorders, has fallen a victim to its rage. What renders the situation of this family peculiarly distressing is, that the father is dangerously affected by the same disorder, & the mother is, by this complication of troubles, rendered delirious. This distemper, I am informed, rages in some parts of Boston.
Since beginning this letter, I have attended an occasional lecture of Mr H. in wh he succeeded much better, than when you heard him. He delivered an admirable discourse from the 3d. Epistle of John, 2d verse. Beloved, &c. He first informed us, that in the Syriac, Coptic, & Ethiopic versions, above all things is rendered in all things. He then descanted upon the great blessings of prosperity, health, & a good conscience, &, after applications suitable to the occasion, he informed us, that 46 have died in town the past
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year, wh is the greatest number, who have ever died, in a year, in this town except 1776 & 1777, in the former of wh 71, & in the latter 56 died. For these 60 years, the average number of deaths has been 27 in a year. The town now contains about 500 ratable polls.
I thank you for your advice respecting the method of sermonizing & the importance of studying the scriptures. Coming from one, who is fresh in experience, I esteem it more, than the theory of a Newton. Every hint of the kind, wh occurs to you, I would gladly & gratefully receive. Among other error, to wh I am liable, I fear, stiffness & ambiguity of expression will characterize & disgrace my compositions. I wish, Labor omnia vincit were true. "Poeta mascitur"; Sed heu! ingeni- um non "fit".
You startle at six years. To confess the truth, the term was dictated rather by my fears, than my wishes. I do not expect to be popular. "I cannot dig. To beg I am ashamed." What better resolution, than to make a virtue of necessity.
"Orton's lettters" was the first book I read after commencement. [...] was pleased with the caholicism & most of the sentiments, [ ] I [...]ther. I am told, he has written an exposition of the Old [ ] [...]ccommodated to Doddridge on the New. You find, he is a [ ]
Have you read Paley's horæ Paulinæ? You must adm[ ]t. It is an attempt, (& a very forceful one, in my opinion) to establish the authenticity of the Xn system from the undesigned coincidences of St Paul's epistles with the Acts, & with one another. Dr Priestly, in his answer to Paine, pays it a high compliment, tho the author is a churchman & appears, by his various publications, aiming at the Episcopal See. It contains 426 pages 8 vo; & so free is it from party aspersions, that you could can not determine, through the whole volume, whether the author be a Quaker, Roman Caholic, or Episcopalian.
I like my situation too well to wish an immediate removal. Plenty of books, a sermon a fortnight & good society are blessings too great to be resigned for the wandering life of a pilgrim. But my finances are low; my credit I have to establish. I must, therefore, soon usher forth in quest of adventures. I thank you for your good wishes of success. Not one word of E.! O, yes. Last evening I had the pleasure of seeing her.
"I saw her charming: but I saw not all "the charms her downcast modesty concealed."
Your fancy may supply the rest. I have room only to declare myself your's,
Philos.
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No 14. Dorchester. March 9th 1796.
My good friend,
On leaving H. I made something like a promise to write the next week. But as you did not very strenuously insist on its performance, & as my mind has been in a state of unusual anxiety, you will not think me unreasonable. You will not wonder at the cause of my anxiety, when I inform you, that, for these ten days, I have had the measles . . . . in expectancy. But just as my apprehensions were subsiding, & I began to think myself so fortunate, or rather unfortunate as to have escaped the disorder, my little brother broke out with it. So I have only to have it over again. I wish that, like other people, I could have the measles but once. For I have had them so many times, in imagination, that I almost dread the reality.
Another cause of my *flusteration was the thought of preaching. Will you believe me? I had engaged to preach for Mr Harris, the first Sabbath in March, if not confined by sickness. The *Vide vulg. dictionary.
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day came, & I, without informing even my father's family of my design, mounted the Sacred Rostrum. The unexpectedness of the event, the singularity of the circumstance, and their diffidence of my success threw confusion into the countenances of all my friends. Even Mr H. trembled, as if an ague fit was upon him. Wherever I cast my eye, I thought, I saw looks of pity. What could I, amid this general distrust of me, but distrust myself. I had formed, in my opinion, pretty strong resolutions of self command. At the critical moment they all failed; my knees smote together, like Belshazzan'; & my heart beat, as if too confined within its usual sphere. How I looked, no mortal can tell! For some said I was white; others, red; & some, forsooth, seriously declared, I looked black. Be that as it may. I honestly believe, that at my first breaking silence, I should have been an amusing subject for a caricature. They might have represented me with every nerve in my frame upon a dance. Indeed as it is, were I antifeder-