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9 to hannah fayerwether tolman winthrop Plymouth January 31st 1774 Not any abatement of affection for my worthy friend has occasioned a silence longer than usual. After a long and painful application to public business the partner both of the cares and the joys of my life appears to be in such declining health as to alarm my fears beyond expression. To you who have often apprehended the dissolution of the tender tie, the dearest union instituted by heaven for the happiness of its creatures, I can speak my concern . After all the kind provision made for passing our days in tranquillity, so trancient is the nature of human felicity that we ought in the happiest moments to observe, “Just such a sober sence of joy “As Angels well might keep “A joy chastised by Piety “A joy prepared to weep.”1 Amidst innumerable blessings the beneficent hand of providence has bestowed, that of health to my family has been continued in an uncommon degree till lately. I have experienced many vicissitudes in life, yet death has never entered my habitation for more than twenty years that I have been a housekeeper till within a few days when I lost a faithful and affectionate servant that has been with me the most of that time. Unimportant as one in that station appears yet when they have acquitted themselves faithfully and fulfilled the duties of life, the distinctions made between the master and the servant, the prince and the peasant may be in favour of the latter. When these partition walls are broken down and the clogs of sense removed they may probably look down with ineffable contempt on Kings and Emperors as well as on the inferior votaries of ambition who daily prostitute conscience and all the sacred ties of humanity , for the pageantry of a day. The style of this may wear a graver cast than would be pleasing to every lady, but the scene I have lately witnessed naturally called up these reflections, and friendship always allows a reciprocal communication and demands a sympathetic tear under every adverse circumstance; yet I hope my letters will never wear so gloomy a cast as to damp the amiable cheerfulness of my friends. Hers we expect will be to hannah tolman winthrop, january 1774  23 fraught with more brilliant periods, fixed near the seat of science, of politicks , and polite intelligence, daily convening with the gay and the great; while my present retirement furnishes few companions whose hearts are replete with dignified or elegant sentiments, or whose manners exhibit the external graces of delicacy or politeness. Yet I hope the barrenness of the soil will not prevent your intended tour to this first residence of our heroic and pious ancestors; for you may be assured of as cordial a reception as was ever given either in the ancient days of simplicity and hospitality or in the modern schools of civilization and refinements. Let not my proposed visit retard yours; I shall make no journey till the rough[?] blasts of Boreas2 subside and grey Winter gives place to the bloom of Spring. Thus the expectation of future pleasure from that delightful converse that adds wings to the flying hours, and brightens the capacity of the mind, is a recent proof that hope is not only the companion of spring but that she aids even the autumn of life with her gentle aspect. Though the feeble texture of a very delicate frame gives hourly admonitions of mortality, yet I shall look forward to the period when I may expect to meet those friends whom placed at such a distance as to prevent the frequent social intercourse that may lead the mind from temporary enjoyments, and lift it to those objects that yield permanent and unmixed delight. If we may set our affections on anything below the stars, we shall surely find indulgence for our fond attachments to friends, whose rational and reciprocal affection, we have no reason to think will terminate with time. I hope my excellent friend Doctor Winthrop has recovered from his late dangerous illness, and that the same power which has restored will long continue him a blessing to the community and the brightest ornament of the society to which he belongs. But the man of science and virtue holds himself in readiness to quit every incumbrance and rise towards the celestial world he has so often explored;—thus when he no longer associates with...

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