114 LIFE OF BENJAMIN SILLIMAN. 



cause at all. I should not care to be now a traveller on 

 tin- Continent. The case of those three young English 

 noblemen at Leghorn occurred while we were there, in 

 Julv, and it was feared by Americans that it would go hard 

 with tlu-tn. I have been hoping that we might visit you in 

 the progress of our approaching journey, but I think it will 



be impracticable, as we do not set out until Tuesday, 

 and shall stop in the cities, and I must be in Washington 

 on Friday. I will not, however, relinquish the hope that 

 we may meet once more in this world ; and if not before, I 

 will flatter myself that I may make an excursion in the 

 summer, if life and health are spared, and find you at Bur- 

 lington where I used to find my dear friend, Charles 

 Chauncey. Alas ! most of my early friends are now in the 

 other world. I am now seventy-two years and five months 

 old, and if I remember correctly, you are a few years in 

 advance- of me, and we have no right to make engagements 

 for distant periods of time. As to the destitution of per- 

 sonal piety among mankind, I believe you have pointed out 

 the true i au.es. God can emancipate man from his de- 

 pravity, and plant and invigorate faith in his mind, and 

 human means seem ineffectual and accomplish little ; 

 but al though we are weak and our minds dark, we are not 

 excused from exertion, and all may diffuse an influence 

 around them for good; and teachers of science, who are 

 indeed expounders of the svill of God, as it is recorded in 

 J1U \\oiks, should always live and breathe in a moral and 



us atmosphere, and draw their pupils within it that 



!>' inhale its precious influence. I think also, with 



that those who find the God of nature in His works 



id also lind the God of revelation in His word, and not 



ii a matter of doubt, whether they look to the Saviour 



'ir salvation. It seems almost as if nothing short of 



a miraculous interposition of God Himself could effectually 



uikind from their lethargy, or emancipate them 



. the bondage of sin. This state of things does not 



