Tuesday night [8th January 1788]
I am delighted, charming Clarinda, with your honest enthusiasm for
Religion. Those of either sex, but particularly the female, who are
lukewarm in that most important of all things, “0 my soul, come
not thou into their secrets!” _I feel myself deeply interested in
your good opinion, and will lay before you the outlines of my belief.
He, who is our Author and Preserver, and will one day be our Judge,
must be, (not for his sake in the way of duty, but from the native
impulse of our hearts,) the object of our reverential awe and grateful
adoration: He is almighty and all-bounteous, we are weak and
dependent; hence, prayer and every other sort of devotion—He is
not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to
everlasting life;’’ 2 consequently, it must be in every one’s power to
embrace His offer of ‘‘everlasting life;” otherwise He could not, in
justice, condemn those who did not. A mind pervaded, actuated and
governed by purity, truth and charity, though it does not merit
heaven, yet is an absolutely necessary pre-requisite, without which
heaven can neither be obtained nor enjoyed; and, by Divine promise,
such a mind shall never fail of attaining “everlasting life:” hence, the
impure, the deceiving, and the uncharitable, extrude themselves
from eternal bliss, by their unfitness for enjoying it. The Supreme
Being has put the immediate administration of all this, for wise and
good ends known to himself, into the hands of Jesus Christ, a great
Personage, whose relation to Him we cannot comprehend, but whose
relation to us is a Guide and Saviour; and who, except for our own
obstinacy and misconduct, will bring us all, through various ways
and by various means, to bliss at last.
These are my tenets, my lovely friend; and which, I think, cannot be
well disputed. My creed is pretty nearly expressed in the last clause
of Jamie Dean’s grace, an honest weaver in Ayrshire; “Lord grant
that we may lead a gude life! for a gude life maks a gude end, at least
it helps weel!”
I am flattered by the entertainment you tell me you have found in
my packet. You see me as I have been, you know me as I am, and
may guess at what I am likely to be. I too may say, “Talk not of
Love, &c.” for indeed he has “plung’d me deep in woe!” Not that I
ever saw a woman who pleased unexceptionably, as my Clarinda
elegantly says, “In the companion, the friend, and the mistress.” 4
One indeed I could except—One, before passion threw its mists over
my discernment I knew it, the first of women! Her name is indelibly
written in my heart’s core—but I dare not look in on it—a degree of
agony would be the consequence—oh, thou perfidious, cruel,
mischief-making demon, who president o’er that frantic passion—
thou mayst, thou dost poison my peace, but shall not taint my
honour—I would not for a single moment give an asylum to the most
distant imagination, that would shadow the faintest outline of a
selfish gratification, at the expence of her whose happiness is twisted
with the threads of my existence—May she be happy as she deserves!
And if my tenderest, faithfulest friendship can add to her bliss—I
shall at least have one solid mine of enjoyment in my bosom! Don’t
guess at these ravings!
I watched at our front window to-day, but was disappointed. It has
been a day of disappointments. I am just risen from a two-hours
bout after supper, with silly or sordid souls, who could relish
nothing in common with me—but the Port. “One”—’Tis now
“witching time of night;” and whatever is out of joint 6 in the
foregoing scrawl, impute it to enchantments and spells; for I can’t
lool< over it, but will seal it up directly, as I don’t care for tomorrow’s
criticisms on it.
Your are by this time fast asleep, Clarinda; may good angels attend
and guard you as constantly and faithfully as my good wishes do!
“Beauty, which whether waking or asleep,
“Shot forth peculiar graces—”
John Milton, I wish thy soul better rest than 1 expect on my pillow
to-night! 0 for a little of the cart-horse part of human nature! Good
night, my dearest Clarinda!
Sylvander
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