A LETTER FROM MISS BREMER. Ixlii 



tft John and St. Theresa, I used to have a little pride 

 in my disdain of things that the greater part of the world 

 look upon as most desirable. Still, I could not but believe 

 that things beautiful and refined yea, even the luxuries 

 of life, had a right to citizenship in the kingdom of God. 

 And I had said to myself, as the young Quakeress said to 

 her mother, when reproached by her for seeking more the 

 gayeties of this world than the things made of God ; 



" He made the flowers and the rainbow." 



But again, the saints and the Puritans after them, had 

 said, " Beauty is Temptation," and so it has been at all 

 times. 



When I came to the New World, I was met on the 

 shore by A. J. Downing, who had invited me to his house. 

 By some of his books that I had seen, as well as by his let- 

 ters, I knew him to be a man of a refined and noble miml. 

 When I saw him, I was struck, as we are by a natural ob- 

 ject of uncommon cast or beauty. He took me gently by 

 the hand, and led me to his home. That he became to me 

 as a brother, that his discerning eye and mind guided my 

 untutored spirit with a careless grace, but not the less im- 

 pressively, to look upon things and persons most influential 

 and leading in the formation of the life and mind of the 

 people of the United States, was much to me ; that he 

 became to me a charming friend, whose care and attention 

 followed me every where during my pilgrimage, that he 

 made a new summer life, rich with the charm of America's 

 Indian summer, come in my heart, though the affection 

 with which he inspired me, was much to me ; yet what was 

 still more, was, that in him I learned to understand a new 

 nature, and through him, to appreciate a new realm of 

 life. 



