132 The Wilson Bulletin— No. G4. 



"Milestown, July 23, 1800. ... It was about the middle of last 

 May, one morning- in taking my usual rounds, I was delighted 

 with the luxuriance of nature that everywhere smiled around 

 me. The trees were covered with blossoms, enclosing the in- 

 fant fruit that was, at some future day, to give existence to 

 others. The birds, in pairs, were busily engaged preparing 

 their nests to accommodate their little offspring. The colt 

 prances by the side of its dam ; the bleating lambs were heard 

 from every farm ; and insects, in thousands, were preparing to 

 usher their multitude into being. In short, all nature, every 

 living thing around me, seemed cheerfully engaged in fulfilling 

 that great command, ' multiply and replenish the earth,' ex- 

 cepting myself. I stood like a blank in this interesting 

 scene, like a note of discord in this universal harmony of 

 love and self-propagation ; everything I saw seemed to re- 

 proach me as an unsocial wretch separated from the great 

 chain of nature and living only for myself. No endear- 

 ing female regarded me as her other self, no infant called 

 me its father. I was like a dead tree in the midst of 

 a green forest, or like a blasted ear amidst the yellow for- 

 est." This thought seemed to please him and he continues in 

 a letter dated August 6, 1800 : "Time has always been ac- 

 counted among wise men the most precious gift of God to 

 man ; and has been, generally speaking, received and used as 

 the most worthless and despicable. . . . Rose half an hour be- 

 fore day. Sauntered abroad, surveying the appearance of the 

 fields, and contemplating the progressive advances of morning, 

 the appearance of the mcoUi etc., without suggesting or having 

 suggested one sentiment of grateful adoration to the great 

 Architect of the Universe, without learning one truth that I 

 was before ignorant of. Wrought one solitary problem before 

 breakfast, composed eight lines of rhyme at noon, and am now 

 writing these observations near evening. Thus fourteen hours 

 passed almost unimproved away, and thus have thousands of 

 precious hours perished! Niot one prayer said, not one thought 

 of matrimony entered nif mind. An old bachelor, verging to 

 the gloomy region of celibacy and old age, and clusters of 

 dimple-cheeked, soft-eyed females in every log hut around, and 



