Sir James Mackintosh to Robert Hall-On his Recovery from temporary Insanity.

you from the world, and made you the inhabitant of regions where alone it is possible to be always active, without impurity, and where the ardor of your sensibility had unbounded scope, amid the inexhaustible combinations of beauty and excellence.

It is not given to us to preserve an exact medium. Nothing is so difficult as to decide how much ideal models ought to be combined with experience; how much of the future should be let into the present, in the progress of the human mind. To ennoble and purify, without raising us above the sphere of our usefulness-to qualify us for what we ought to seek, without unfitting us for that to which we must submit-are great and difficult problems, which can be but imperfectly solved.

It is certain the child may be too manly, not only for his present enjoyments, but for his future prospects. Perhaps, my good friend, you have fallen into this error of superior natures. From this error has, I think, arisen that calamity with which it has pleased Providence to visit you, which, to a mind less fortified by reason and religion, I should not dare to mention, but which I really consider in you as little more than the indignant struggles of a pure mind with the low realities which surround it-the fervent aspirations after regions more congenial to itand a momentary blindness, produced by the fixed contemplation of objects too bright for human vision. I may say, in this case, in a far grander sense than that in which the words were originally spoken by our great poet:

And yet

The light which led astray was light from heaven."

On your return to us you must surely have found consolation in the only terrestrial produce which is pure and truly exquisite ;

Sir James Mackintosh to Robert Hall-On his Recovery from temporary Insanity.

you

in the affections and attachments you have inspired, which were most worthy to inspire, and which no human pollution can rob of their heavenly nature. If I were to prosecute the reflections and indulge the feelings which at this moment fill my mind, I should soon venture to doubt whether for a calamity derived from such a source, and attended with such consolations, I should so far yield to the views and opinions of men as to seek to condole with you. But I check myself, and I exhort you, my most worthy friend, to check your best propensities, for the sake of attaining their object. You cannot live for men without living with them. Serve God, then, by the active service of men. Contemplate more the good you can do, than the evil you can only lament. Allow yourself to see the loveliness of virtue amid all its imperfections; and employ your moral imagination, not so much by bringing it into contrast with the model of ideal perfection, as in gently blending some of the fainter colors of the latter with the brighter hues of real experienced excellence, thus heightening their beauty, instead of broadening the shade which must surround us till we awaken from this dream in other spheres of existence.

My habits of life have not been favorable for this train of meditation. I have been too busy, or too trifling. My nature, perhaps, would have been better consulted, if I had been placed in a quieter station, where speculation might have been my business, and visions of the fair and good my chief recreations. When I approach you I feel a powerful attraction toward this which seems the natural destiny of my mind; but habit opposes obstacles, and duty calls me off, and reason frowns on him who wastes that reflection on a destiny independent of him, which he ought to reserve for actions of which he is the master.

Robert Hall to W. Hollick-On his Recovery from a second attack of Insanity.

In another letter I may write to you on miscellaneous subjects; at present I cannot bring my mind to speak of them. Let me hear from you soon and often.

Farewell, my dear friend.

Yours ever most faithfully,

JAMES MACKINTOSH.

X.-ON HIS RECOVERY FROM A SECOND ATTACK OF INSANITY.

Robert Hall to W. Hollick.

February 1st, 1806.

MY DEAR FRIEND: Accept my sincere thanks for your kind letter. Every assurance of respect from old friends, and especially from one whose friendship has been so long tried, and evinced on so many occasions, must afford much satisfaction to a person in any situation. Though Providence has produced a separation, which will probably be of long continuance (and, in one sense, final), nothing I am certain can efface from my mind those impressions of gratitude and esteem with which I shall ever look back upon my connections at Cambridge and its vicinity. With the deepest submission, I wish to bow to the mandate of that awful, yet I trust paternal Power, which, when it pleases, confounds all human hopes, and lays us prostrate in the dust. It is for Him to dispose of His creatures as he pleases; and, if they be willing and obedient, to work out their happiness, though by methods the most painful and afflictive. His plans are infinitely extended, and His measures determined by views of that ultimate issue, that final result which transcends our comprehension. It is with the sincerest gratitude I would acknowledge the goodness of God in restoring me. I am, as far as I can

Robert Hall to W. Hollick-On his Recovery from a second attack of Insanity.

judge, as remote from any thing wild and irregular in the state of my mind, as I ever was in my life; though I think, owing probably to the former increased excitation, I feel some abatement of vigor. My mind seems inert. During my affliction I have not been entirely forsaken of God, nor left destitute of that calm trust in His providence which was left to support me ; yet I have not been favored with that intimate communion, and that delightful sense of His love, which I have enjoyed on former occasions. I have seldom been without a degree of composure, though I have had little consolation or joy. Such, with little variation, has been my mental state, very nearly from the time of my coming to the Fish-ponds; for I had not been here more than a fortnight before I found myself perfectly recovered, though my pulse continued too high. It has long subsided, and exhibits, the doctor assures me, every indication of confirmed health.

With respect to my future prospects and plans, they are necessarily in a state of great uncertainty. I am fully convinced of the propriety of relinquishing my pastoral charge at Cambridge, which I shall do in an official letter to the Church, as soon as I leave Dr. Cox, which I believe will be at the expiration of the quarter from my coming. My return to Cambridgeshire was extremely ill-judged, I am convinced; nor had I the smallest intention of doing it, until I was acquainted with the generous interposition of my friends, to which it appeared to me that my declining to live among them would appear a most ungrateful return. I most earnestly request that they will do me the justice to believe the intention I have named, of declining the pastoral charge, does not proceed from any such motive, but from the exigencies of my situation and a sense of duty. I propose to lay aside preaching for at least a twelvemonth.

John Sheppard to Lord Byron-Transmitting a Prayer found among his Wife's Papers.

Please to remember me affectionately and respectfully to your cousin, and all inquiring friends, as if named.

I am, my dear sir, your affectionate and obliged friend,

ROBERT HALL.

P. S. Please to present my best respects to Mrs. Hollick and your daughter.

XI.-TRANSMITTING A PRAYER FOUND AMONGST THE PAPERS OF HIS DECEASED WIFE.

John Sheppard to Lord Byron.

FROME, SOMERSET, Nov. 21st, 1821.

MY LORD: More than two years since a lovely and beloved wife was taken from me by lingering disease, after a very short union. She possessed unvarying gentleness and fortitude, and a piety so retiring as rarely to disclose itself in words, but so influential as to produce uniform benevolence of conduct. In the last hour of life, after a farewell look on a lately born and only infant, for whom she had evinced inexpressible affection, her last whispers were, "God's happiness! God's happiness!" Since the second anniversary of her decease, I have read some papers which no one had seen during her life, and which contain her most secret thoughts. I am induced to communicate to your Lordship a passage from these papers, which there is no doubt refers to yourself, as I have more than once heard the writer mention your agility on the rocks at Hastings.

"Oh, my God, I take encouragement from the assurance of Thy Word, to pray to Thee in behalf of one for whom I have lately been much interested. May the person to whom I allude (and who is now, we fear, as much distinguished for his neglect