Hannah More to her Sister-Dying Requests made by Dr. Johnson, of Sir J. Reynolds.

V.-DYING REQUESTS MADE BY DR. JOHNSON, OF SIR JOSHUA

REYNOLDS.

Hannah More to her Sister.

HAMPTON, December, 1784.

Poor dear Johnson! he is past all hope. The dropsy has brought him to the point of death. His legs are scarified; but nothing will do. I have, however, the comfort to hear that his dread of dying is in a great measure subdued; and now he says, "The bitterness of death is past." He sent the other day for Sir Joshua; and after much serious conversation, told him he had three favors to beg of him, and hoped he would not refuse a dying friend, be they what they would. Sir Joshua promised. The first was, that he never would paint on Sunday; the second, that he would forgive him thirty pounds that he had lent him, as he wanted to leave them to a distressed family; the third was, that he would read the Bible whenever he had an opportunity, and that he would never omit it on a Sunday. There was no difficulty but upon the first point; but at length Sir Joshua promised to gratify him in all. How delighted should I be to hear the dying discourse of this great and good man, especially now that faith has subdued his fears! I wish I could see him.

VI.-ON THE DEATH OF HIS WIFE.*

Thomas Gray to Mr. Mason

March 28th, 1767.

I break in upon you at a moment when we least of all are permitted to disturb our friends, only to say that you are daily

*This and the two following letters have been placed together without regard to date, from the kindred character of their subject matter.-H

Thomas Jefferson to John Adams-On the Death of Mrs. Adams.

and hourly present to my thoughts. If the worst be not yet past, you will neglect and pardon me; but if the last struggle be over; if the poor object of your long anxieties be no longer sensible to your kindness, or to her own sufferings, allow me (at least in idea, for what could I do, were I present, more than this?) to sit by you in silence, and pity from my heart, not her who is at rest, but you who lose her. May He who made us, the Master of our pleasures and of our pains, preserve and support you! Adieu.

I have long understood how little you had to hope.

VII. ON THE DEATH OF MRS. ADAMS.

Thomas Jefferson to John Adams.

MONTICELLO, Nov. 13th, 1818.

The public papers, my dear friend, announce the fatal event of which your letter of October 20th had given me ominous forebodings. Tried myself in the school of affliction, by the loss of every form of connection which can rive the human heart, I know full well and feel what you have lost, what you have suffered, are suffering, and have yet to endure. The same trials have taught me that for ills so immeasurable, time and silence are the only medicine. I will not, therefore, by useless condolences, open afresh the sluices of your grief, nor, although mingling sincerely my tears with yours, will I say a word more where words are vain, but that it is some comfort to us both

* "As this little billet (which I received at the Hot-Wells at Bristol) then breathed, and still seems to breathe, the very voice of friendship in its tenderest and most pathetic note, I cannot refrain from publishing it in this place. I opened it almost at the precise moment when it would necessarily be the most affecting."-Note of Mason, to Gray's Letters.

A. Humboldt to Varnhagen-"Love is above all."

that the time is not very distant at which we are to deposit in the same cerement our sorrows and suffering bodies, and to ascend in essence to an ecstatic meeting with the friends we have loved and lost, and whom we shall still love and never lose again. God bless and support you under your heavy affliction. THOMAS JEFFERSON.

VIII. "LOVE IS ABOVE ALL.”

A. Humboldt to Varnhagen.

BERLIN, Sunday, 6 o'clock A. M., April 5th, 1855.

You, my dear Varnhagen, who are not afraid of grief, but who trace its phases through the depths of sentiment, you should receive at this sorrowful time a few words expressing the love which both brothers feel for you. The release has not yet come. I left him last night at eleven o'clock, and I hasten to him again. The day yesterday was less distressing. A half lethargic condition, frequent though not restless slumber, and after each waking words of love, of comfort, but always the clearness of the great intellect, which penetrates and distinguishes every thing, and examines its own condition. The voice was very feeble, hoarse, and thin like a child's; leeches were therefore applied to the throat. Full consciousness! "Think of me," he said the day before yesterday, "but always with cheerfulness. I was very happy, and this day also was a beautiful one for me, for love is above all.' I will soon be with mother, and have an insight into a higher order of things." I have no shadow of hope. I never thought my old eyes had sc many tears! It has lasted near eight days.

* William Humboldt, then on his dying bed.

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

IX. ON HIS RECOVERY FROM TEMPORARY INSANITY.

Sir James Mackintosh to Robert Hall.

BOMBAY, 21st Sept., 1805.

MY DEAR HALL: I believe that, in the hurry of leaving England, I did not answer the letter which you wrote to me in December, 1803. I did not, however, forget your interesting young friend, from whom I have had one letter from Constantinople, and to whom I have twice written at Cairo, where he now is. No request of yours could, indeed, be lightly esteemed by me.

It happened to me a few days ago, in drawing up (merely for my own use) a short sketch of my life, that I had occasion to give a faithful statement of my recollection of the circumstances of my first acquaintance with you. On the most impartial survey of my early life, I could see nothing which tended so much to excite and invigorate my understanding, and to direct it toward high, though perhaps scarcely accessible objects, as my intimacy with you. Five-and-twenty years are now past since we first met; yet hardly any thing has occurred since, which has left a deeper or more agreeable impression on my mind. I now remember the extraordinary union of brilliant fancy with acute intellect, which would have excited more admiration than it has done, if it had been dedicated to the amusement of the great and learned, instead of being consecrated to the far more noble office of consoling, instructing, and reforming the poor and the forgotten. It was then too early for me to discover that extreme purity, which, in a mind preoccupied with the low realities of life, would have been no natural companion of so much activity and ardor, but which tho oughly detached

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;