audience of the first prince in Europe. That woman is a blessing to me, and I never see her without being the better for her company. I am treated in the family as if I was a near relation, and have been repeatedly invited to call upon them at all times. You know what a shy fellow I am; I cannot prevail with myself to make so much use of this privilege as I am sure they intend I should; but perhaps this awkwardness will wear off hereafter. It was my earnest request, before I left St Albans that wherever it might please Providence to dispose of me, I might meet with such an acquaintance as I find in Mrs Unwin. How happy it is to believe, with a steadfast assurance, that our petitions are heard even while we are making them! and how delightful to meet with a proof of it in the effectual and actual grant of them! Surely it is a gracious finishing given to those means, which the Almighty has been pleased to make use of for my conversion. After having been deservedly rendered unfit for any society, to be again qualified for it, and admitted at once into the fellowship of those whom God regards as the excellent of the earth, and whom, in the emphatical language of Scripture, he preserves as the apple of his eye, is a blessing which carries with it the stamp and visible superscription of divine bounty -a grace unlimited as undeserved; and, like its glorious author, free in its course, and blessed in its operation!

My dear cousin! Health and happiness, and above all, the favour of our great and gracious Lord, attend you! While we seek it in spirit and in truth, we are infinitely more secure of it than of the next breath we expect to draw. Heaven and earth have their destined periods; ten thousand worlds will vanish at the consummation of all things; but the word of God standeth fast; and they who trust in him shall never be confounded. My love to all who inquire after me.-Yours affectionately, W. C.

12. TO MAJOR COWPER.*

EXCUSING SILENCE-DEPENDENCE UPON PROVIDENCE SOCIETY AT

HUNTINGDON.

HUNTINGDON, October 18, 1765. MY DEAR MAJOR, -I have neither lost the use of my fingers nor my memory, though my unaccountable silence might incline you to suspect that I had lost both. The history of those things which have, from time to time, prevented my *The poet's uncle.

scribbling, would not only be insipid, but extremely voluminous; for which reasons they will not make their appearance at present, nor probably at any time hereafter. If my neglecting to write to you were a proof that I had never thought of you, and that had been really the case, five shillings a-piece would have been much too little to give for the sight of such a monster: but I am no such monster, nor do I perceive in myself the least tendency to such a transformation.

You may recollect that I had but very uncomfortable expectations of the accommodation I should meet with at Huntingdon. How much better is it to take our lot where it shall please Providence to cast it, without anxiety! Had I chosen for myself, it is impossible I could have fixed upon a place so agreeable to me in all respects. I so much dreaded the thought of having a new acquaintance to make, with no other recommendation than that of being a perfect stranger, that I heartily wished no creature here might take the least notice of me. Instead of which, in about two months after my arrival, I became known to all the visitable people here, and do verily think it the most agreeable neighbourhood I ever saw.

Here are three families who have received me with the utmost civility; and two in particular have treated me with as much cordiality, as if their pedigrees and mine had grown upon the same sheepskin. Besides these, there are three or four single men who suit my temper to a hair. The town is one of the neatest in England; the country is fine for several miles about it; and the roads, which are all turnpike, and strike out four or five different ways, are perfectly good all the year round. I mention this latter circumstance chiefly because my distance from Cambridge has made a horseman of me at last, or at least is likely to do so. My brother and I meet every week, by an alternate reciprocation of intercourse, as Sam Johnson would express it; sometimes I get a lift in a neighbour's chaise, but generally ride. As to my own personal condition, I am much happier than the day is long, and sunshine and candle-light alike see me perfectly contented. I get books in abundance, as much company as I choose, a deal of comfortable leisure, and enjoy better health, I think, than for many years past. What, then, is wanting to make me happy? Nothing, if I can but be as thankful as I ought; and I trust that He who has bestowed so many blessings upon me, will give me gratitude to crown them all. I beg you will give my love to my dear cousin Maria,* and to every body at the Mrs Cowper, the poet's correspondent.

Park. If Mrs Maitland is with you, as I suspect by a passage in Lady Hesketh's letter to me, pray remember me to her very affectionately. And believe me, my dear friend, ever yours. W. C.

13. TO JOSEPH HILL, Esq.

SOUTHAMPTON-THE UNWINS -ROUSSEAU THE ERROR OF CONFINING MERIT TO OUR OWN ACQUAINTANCE.

October 25, 1765.

the

DEAR JOE,—I am afraid the month of October has proved rather unfavourable to the belle assemblée at Southampton; high winds and continual rains being bitter enemies to that agreeable lounge, which you and I are equally fond of. I have very cordially betaken myself to my books and my fireside; and seldom leave them, unless for exercise. I have added another family to the number of those I was acquainted with when you were here. Their name is Unwin, most agreeable people imaginable; quite sociable, and as free from the ceremonious civility of country gentlefolks as any I ever met with. They treat me more like a near relation than a stranger, and their house is always open to me. The old gentleman carries me to Cambridge in his chaise. He is a man of learning and good sense, and as simple as Parson Adams. His wife has a very uncommon understanding, has read much to excellent purpose, and is more polite than a duchess. The son, who belongs to Cambridge, is a most amiable young man; and the daughter quite of a piece with the rest of the family. They see but little company, which suits me exactly; go when I will, I find a house full of peace and cordiality in all its parts, and am sure to hear no scandal, but such discourse instead of it as we are all better for. You remember Rousseau's* description of an English morning; such are the mornings I spend with these good people; and the evenings differ from them in nothing, except that they are still more snug and quieter. Now I know them, I wonder that I liked Huntingdon so well before I knew them, and am apt to think I should find every place disagreeable that had not an Unwin belonging to it.

This incident convinces me of the truth of an observation I have often made, that when we circumscribe our estimate of

Jean Jacques Rousseau was born at Geneva in 1712, and died in 1778. A writer of great eloquence, but of a morbid sensibility and ill regulated mind. The passage here referred to occurs in Emilius, the work for which he was banished from France.

all that is clever within the limits of our own acquaintance, (which I at least have been always apt to do,) we are guilty of a very uncharitable censure upon the rest of the world, and of a narrowness of thinking disgraceful to ourselves. Wapping and Redriff may contain some of the most amiable persons living, and such as one would go to Wapping and Redriff to make acquaintance with. You remember Gray's stanza,— Full many a gem of purest ray serene The deep unfathom'd caves of ocean bear; Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, Aud waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Yours, dear Joe,

W. C.

14. TO LADY HESKETH.

PLEASURES OF SOLITUDE TO THE PIOUS-COMFORTS OF DIVINE COMMUNION AND CHRISTIAN SOCIETY.

me.

HUNTINGDON, March 6, 1766. MY DEAR COUSIN,-I have for some time past imputed your silence to the cause which you yourself assign for it, namely, to my change of situation; and was even sagacious enough to account for the frequency of your letters to me, while I lived alone, from your attention to me in a state of such solitude as seemed to make it an act of particular charity to write to I bless God for it, I was happy even then; solitude has nothing gloomy in it, if the soul points upwards. St Paul tells his Hebrew converts, " Ye are come (already come) to Mount Sion, to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly of the first-born, which are written in Heaven, and to Jesus, the mediator of the new covenant."* When this is the case, as surely it was with them, or the Spirit of Truth had never spoken it, there is an end of the melancholy and dulness of a solitary life at once. You will not suspect me, my dear cousin, of a design to understand this passage literally; but this, however, it certainly means, that a lively faith is able to anticipate in some measure the joys of that heavenly society, which the soul shall actually possess hereafter.

Since I have changed my situation, I have found still greater cause of thanksgiving to the Father of all mercies. The family with whom I live are Christians; and it has pleased the Almighty to bring me to the knowledge of them, that I may want no means of improvement in that temper and conduct which he is pleased to require in all his servants.

Heb. xii. 22.

My dear cousin! one half of the Christian world would call this madness, fanaticism, and folly: but are not these things warranted by the word of God, not only in the passages I have cited, but in many others? If we have no communion with God here, surely we can expect none hereafter. A faith that does not place our conversation in heaven-that does not warm the heart, and purify it too-that does not, in short, govern our thought, word, and deed, is no faith, nor will it obtain for us any spiritual blessing here or hereafter. Let us see, therefore, my dear cousin, that we do not deceive ourselves in a matter of such infinite moment. The world will be ever telling us that we are good enough; and the world will vilify us behind our backs. But it is not the world which tries the heart; that is the prerogative of God alone. My dear cousin! I have often prayed for you behind your back, and now I pray for you to your face. There are many who would not forgive me this wrong; but I have known you so long, and so well, that I am not afraid of telling you how sincerely I wish for your growth in every Christian grace, in every thing that may promote and secure your everlasting welfare.

I am obliged to Mrs Cowper for the book, which you perceive arrived safe. I am willing to consider it as an intimation on her part that she would wish me to write to her, and shall do it accordingly. My circumstances are rather particular, such as call upon my friends-those I mean who are truly such-to take some little notice of me; and will naturally make those who are not such in sincerity rather shy of doing it. To this I impute the silence of many with regard to me, who, before the affliction that befell me, were ready enough to converse with me.Yours ever, W. C.

15.

- TO MRS COWPER. *

HIS PRESENT AGREEABLE SITUATION-THE UNWINS HIS COUSIN

MARTIN MADAN.

MY DEAR COUSIN, -I am much obliged to you for Pearsall's Meditations, especially as it furnishes me with an occasion of writing to you, which is all I have waited for. My friends must excuse me, if I write to none but those who lay it fairly in my way to do so. The inference I am apt to draw from their silence is, that they wish me to be silent too.

I have great reason, my dear cousin, to be thankful to the * His cousin Maria, married to Major Cowper.