LIFE OF JAMES DWIGHT DANA 



some account of his religious as well as political convic- 

 tions, he says that ' Since he has lived in retirement, he 

 has thought much about religion, and has become con- 

 vinced that it is the basis of every organized society. He 

 will therefore die believing in a God, one and eternal, the 

 Creator of all things, whose mercy he implores for his 

 soul.' 



" I quote this from a Paris letter in the New York 

 World ; I do not vouch for its accuracy. 



" He may have been composing this paper, or at least 

 thinking on this topic, when I saw him, as he said very 

 much the same thing to me, in the same conversation in 

 which he referred to you and your writings. 



" You may thus, it may be, have aided the faith of a 

 great French statesman. 



" If I had been able to attend the meeting of the Pea- 

 body Trustees in June, I should have been sure to tell 

 you of Thiers's compliment, and to have communicated 

 his respects to you. But it is only the reading of this 

 extract from his posthumous letter, which has recalled 

 the subject of his remarks during the same conversation. 



" I am sure you will be interested sufficiently in what 

 I have written to make due allowance for so long and 

 offhand a note. You may have had the same account 

 from Thiers himself, or from other sources." 



To this letter of Mr. Winthrop Dana replied : 



' Your letter of the iQth has been received, and I 

 hasten to acknowledge your kindness in thus writing me. 

 Its contents were a source of great surprise and also of 

 deep gratification. I must first thank you for the very 

 cordial expressions of your letter, and then for its revela- 

 tions. 



" I had not had the slightest suspicion that Thiers had 

 ever heard of my name or of my works, or that I had 

 written anything which could attract the attention of 

 the great statesman. Unsought praise from such a 

 source is certainly a rich reward for labor. 



' Your supposition, based on the turn in the conversa- 

 tion you had with him, that my writings had even had an 

 influence on his religious belief, I wish I could think 



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