1976. DEATH, Decay and.—
To me every
mail, in the departure of some contemporary, brings warning to be in readiness myself also,
and to cease from new engagements. It is a
warning of no alarm. When faculty after
faculty is retiring from us, and all the avenues
to cheerful sensation closing, sight failing
now, hearing next, then memory, debility of
body, torpitude of mind, nothing remaining
but a sickly vegetation, with scarcely the relief
of a little locomotion, the last cannot be
but a coup de grace.—
To Mr. John Melish. Washington ed. vi, 403.
(M.
1814)
