LETTER TO CHANCELLOR KENT. 251 



PROFESSOR SILLIMAN TO CHANCELLOR KENT. 



NEW HAVEN, April 30, 1810. 



DEAR SIR, I have the pleasure of acknowledging your 

 favor of the llth inst, and you will do me the justice to 

 believe that uncommon occupation and not insensibility to 

 your kindness has alone prevented me from thanking you 

 before for an honor which was as unexpected as gratifying. 

 Although I have not been so happy as to enjoy your ac- 

 quaintance I am not ignorant of the character which you 

 have long sustained, nor of the enhanced value attached to 

 a spontaneous commendation flowing from such a source. 

 There is something in the manner of a kindness which is 

 often as important as the substance, and you will allow me 

 to say, sir, that no mark of approbation could have been 

 communicated in a way more delicate and generous, or have 

 been more grateful to my feelings. Although I was sup- 

 ported by the opinions of friends whose judgment I re- 

 spected, I dismissed the Journal with unfeigned diffidence, 

 and endeavored to prepare myself for the sneers of fastid- 

 ious criticism, if not for the condemning sentence of the 

 candid and discerning. But when you, sir, assure me that 

 you have found my book " one of the most instructive and 

 interesting views of England that any single traveller has 

 ever presented," and, more than all, that " it has preserved 

 virtue in its dignity, and taught innocence not to be 

 ashamed," I confess I feel my courage so much fortified 

 that I can look forward with composure to treatment of a 

 different character. Should I ever visit Albany again, it 

 will give me great pleasure to avail myself of your kind- 

 ness, and I shall take as much pleasure in receiving the 

 polite and useful attentions which you offer as I should in 

 returning or advancing them should you visit New Haven, 

 or should circumstances ever allow me the pleasure of 

 meeting you at another place. Whatever may be the gen- 

 eral voice respecting the Journal, it can never be worthless 



