University of Virginia Library

LETTER XXI.

How welcome to me, my dear Eliza,
are the tidings of your return? My widowed
heart has mourned your absence, and languished
for the company of its now, dearest connection.
When stript of one dependence, the mind naturally
collects, and rests itself in another. Your father's
death deprived me, for a while, of every
enjoyment. But a reviving sense of the duties
which I owed to a rising family, roused me
from the lethargy of grief. In my cares I found
an alleviation of my sorrows. The expanding virtues
of my children soothed and exhilerated my
drooping spirits; and my attention to their education,
and interest, was amply rewarded by
their proficiency and duty. In them, every hope,
every pleasure now centres. They are the axis
on which revolves the temporal felicity of their
mother. Judge then, my dear, how anxiously
I must watch, how solicitously I must regard
every circumstance which relates to their
welfare and prosperity! Exquisitely alive to
these sensations, your letter awakens my hopes

and my fears. As you are young and
charming, a thousand dangers, lurk unseen around
you. I wish you to find a friend and
protector, worthy of being rewarded by your
love and your society. Such a one, I think,
Mr. Boyer will prove. I am, therefore, sorry,
since there can be no other, that his profession
should be an objection in your mind. You say,
that I have experienced the scenes of trial, connected
with that station. I have, indeed; and
I will tell you the result of this experience. It
is, that I have found it replete with happiness.
No class of society has domestic enjoyment
more at command, than clergymen. Their
circumstances are generally a decent competency.
They are removed alike from the perplexing
cares of want, and from the distracting
parade of wealth. They are respected by all
ranks, and partakers of the best company.
With regard to its being a dependent situation,
what one is not so? Are we not all links in the
great chain of society, some more, some less important;
but each upheld by others, throughout
the confederated whole? In whatever situation
we are placed, our greater or less degree
of happiness must be derived from ourselves.
Happiness is in a great measure the result of our
own dispositions and actions. Let us conduct
uprightly and justly; with propriety and steadiness;
not servilely cringing for favor, nor arrogantly
claiming more attention and respect than
our due; let us bear with fortitude the providential,
and unavoidable evils of life, and we
shall spend our days with respectability and contentment,
at least.

I will not expatiate on the topic of your
letter, till we have a personal interview, for
which I am, indeed, impatient. Return, my
daughter, as soon as politeness will allow, to
your expecting friends; more especially, to the
fond embraces of your affectionate mother,