 | Letters of Mrs. Adams, |  |
TO JOHN ADAMS.
I have lived to see the close of the third year of our
separation. This is a melancholy anniversary to
me, and many tender scenes arise in my mind upon
the recollection. I feel unable to sustain even the
idea, that it will be half that period ere we meet
again. Life is too short to have the dearest of its
enjoyments curtailed; the social feelings grow callous
by disuse, and lose that pliancy of affection
which sweetens the cup of life as we drink it. The
rational pleasures of friendship and society, and
the still more refined sensations of which delicate
minds only are susceptible, like the tender blossom,
when the rude northern blasts assail them, shrink
within and collect themselves together, deprived of
the all-cheering and beamy influence of the sun.
The blossom falls and the fruit withers and decays;
but here the similitude fails, for, though lost for the
and the blossom again puts forth.
But, alas! with me, those days which are past
are gone for ever, and time is hastening on that
period when I must fall to rise no more, until mortality
shall put on immortality, and we shall meet
again, pure and disembodied spirits. Could we live
to the age of the antediluvians, we might better support
this separation; but, when threescore years and
ten circumscribe the life of man, how painful is the
idea, that, of that short space, only a few years of
social happiness are our allotted portion.
Perhaps I make you unhappy. No. You will
enter with a soothing tenderness into my feelings.
I see in your eyes the emotions of your heart, and
hear the sigh that is wafted across the Atlantic to
the bosom of Portia. But the philosopher and the
statesman stifles these emotions, and regains a firmness
which arrests my pen in my hand.
I received from France by the Alexander yours,
bearing no date, but, by the contents, written about
the same time with those I received by Mr. Guild.
Shall I return the compliment, and tell you in a
poetical style,
Himself, his world, his throne, I 'd scorn them all."
No. Give me the man I love; you are neither
a court, or the smiles of princesses. I never suffered
an uneasy sensation on that account. I know
I have a right to your whole heart, because my own
never knew another lord; and such is my confidence
in you, that, if you were not withheld by the
strongest of all obligations, those of a moral nature,,
your honor would not suffer you to abuse my confidence.
But whither am I rambling? We have not any
thing in the political way worth noticing. The fleet
of our allies still remains with us.
Who is there left that will sacrifice as others have
done? Portia, I think, stands alone, alas, in more
senses than one. This vessel will convey to you the
packets designed for the Firebrand. I hope, unimportant
as they are, they will not be lost.
Shall I close here, without a word of my voyage?
I believe it is best to wait a reply, before I say any
thing further. Our friends desire me to remember
them to you. Your daughter, your image, your superscription,
desires to be affectionately remembered
to you. O, how many of the sweet domestic joys
do you lose by this separation from your family, I
have the satisfaction of seeing my children thus far
in life behaving with credit and honor. God grant
the pleasing prospect may never meet with an alloy,
and return to me the dear partner of my early years,
rewarded for his past sacrifices by the consciousness
of having been extensively useful, not having lived
to himself alone; and may the approving voice of his
in the affectionate bosom of
| Letters of Mrs. Adams, | |