For I am unworthy to call any good man friend--much less you, whose
hospitality and love I have abused; accept, however, my entreaties for
your forgiveness, and for your prayers.
Conceive a poor miserable wretch, who for many years has been
attempting to beat off pain, by a constant recurrence to the vice that
reproduces it. Conceive a spirit in hell, employed in tracing out for
others the road to that heaven, from which his crimes exclude him! In
short, conceive whatever is most wretched, helpless, and hopeless, and
you will form as tolerable a notion of my state, as it is possible for
a good man to have.
I used to think the text in St. James that 'he who offendeth in one
point, offends in all,' very harsh; but I now feel the awful, the
tremendous truth of it. In the one crime of OPIUM, what crime have
I not made myself guilty of! Ingratitude to my Maker! and to my
benefactors--injustice! _and unnatural cruelty to my poor children!
_--self-contempt for my repeated promise-breach, nay, too often,
actual falsehood!
After my death, I earnestly entreat that a full and unqualified
narration of my wretchedness, and of its guilty cause, may be made
public, that, at least, some little good may be effected by the
direful example!
May God Almighty bless you, and have mercy on your still affectionate,
and, in his heart, grateful