14 UNPUBLISHED LETTERS OF THE 



enable you according to yotir desire to continue walking as on 

 tlie verge of eternity, looking for and hasting to tlie coming of 

 th.e day of God. 



(In answer to the request contained in your last, I have to say 

 that) there are not many things in the world which I would 

 withold from you, but with respect to these compositions, [the 

 sermons for which you ask — W.^ which you ask for, (I 

 think) my mind must be changed before I send them (to you). 

 (The arguments you oifer to induce me seem not to possess that 

 force which I look for in your reasoning). Sermons cannot be 

 good memorials, because once read they are done with — 

 especially a young man's sermons, unless they possess a peculiar 

 simplicity and spirituality ; which I need not say are quaKties 

 not belonging to mine. I hope, however, that I am improving — - 

 and I trust that now I am removed from the contagion of 

 academic air, [and — TF.] I am in the way of acquiring a 

 greater knowledge of men and of my own heart, I shall 

 exchange my Jejune scholastic style for a simple spiritual 

 exhibition of profitable truth. Mr. Cecil has been taking a 

 great deal of pains with me. My insipid inanimate manner in 

 the pulpit he says is intolerable. Sir, said he, it is cupola- 

 painting not miniature, that must be the character [the aim — 

 ^.] of a man that harangues a multitude. (Lieut. Wynter 

 called on me last Saturday, and last night drank tea with 

 me. I cannot but admire his great seriousness. I feel greatly 

 attached to him. He is just the sort of person, of a sober 

 thoughtful cast, that I love to associate with. He mentioned 

 — Lydia, I do not know why, but he could not tell me half 

 enough about her while she was at Plymouth, to satisfy my 

 curiosity). Witsun-week was a time of the utmost distress to 

 me (on her account). (On the Monday at the Eclectic, Mr. 

 Cecil speaking of celibacy said, I was acting like a madman in 

 going out without a wife. So thought all the other ten or 

 eleven ministers present, and Mr. Foster among the rest, who is 

 unmarried. This opinion coming deliberately from so many 

 experienced ministers threw me into great perplexity, which 

 increased, as my affections began to be set more afloat, for then 

 I was less able than before to discern the path of duty. At last 

 I wrote to Simeon, stating to him the strongest arguments I 

 heard in favor of marriage in my case. His answer decided my 



