STATEN ISLAND, June 20, 1843.
MY VERY DEAR FRIEND,--I have only read a page of your letter, and have
come out to the top of the hill at sunset, where I can see the ocean,
to prepare to read the rest. It is fitter that it should hear it than
the walls of my chamber. The very crickets here seem to chirp around
me as they did not before. I feel as if it were a great daring to go
on and read the rest, and then to live accordingly. There are more
than thirty vessels in sight going to sea. I am almost afraid to look
at your letter. I see that it will make my life very steep, but it may
lead to fairer prospects than this.
You seem to me to speak out of a very clear and high heaven, where any
one may be who stands so high. Your voice seems not a voice, but comes
as much from the blue heavens as from the paper.
My dear friend, it was very noble in you to write me so trustful an
answer. It will do as well for another world as for this; such a voice
is for no particular time nor person, but it makes him who may hear it
stand for all that is lofty and true in humanity. The thought of you
will constantly elevate my life; it will be something always above the
horizon to behold, as when I look up at the evening star. I think I
know your thoughts without seeing you, and as well here as in Concord.
You are not at all strange to me.
I could hardly believe, after the lapse of one night, that I had such
a noble letter still at hand to read,--that it was not some fine
dream. I looked at midnight to be sure that it was real. I feel that I
am unworthy to know you, and yet they will not permit it wrongfully.
I, perhaps, am more willing to deceive by appearances than you say you
are; it would not be worth the while to tell how willing; but I have
the power perhaps too much to forget my meanness as soon as seen, and
not be incited by permanent sorrow. My actual life is unspeakably mean
compared with what I know and see that it might be. Yet the ground
from which I see and say this is some part of it. It ranges from
heaven to earth, and is all things in an hour. The experience of every
past moment but belies the faith of each present. We never conceive
the greatness of our fates. Are not these faint flashes of light which
sometimes obscure the sun their certain dawn?
My friend, I have read your letter as if I was not reading it. After
each pause I could defer the rest forever. The thought of you will be
a new motive for every right action. You are another human being whom
I know, and might not our topic be as broad as the universe? What have
we to do with petty rumbling news? We have our own great affairs.
Sometimes in Concord I found my actions dictated, as it were, by your
influence, and though it led almost to trivial Hindoo observances, yet
it was good and elevating. To hear that you have sad hours is not sad
to me. I rather rejoice at the richness of your experience. Only think
of some sadness away in Pekin,--unseen and unknown there. What a mine
it is! Would it not weigh down the Celestial Empire, with all its gay
Chinese? Our sadness is not sad, but our cheap joys. Let us be sad
about all we see and are, for so we demand and pray for better. It is
the constant prayer and whole Christian religion. I could hope that
you would get well soon, and have a healthy body for this world, but I
know this cannot be; and the Fates, after all, are the accomplishers
of our hopes. Yet I do hope that you may find it a worthy struggle,
and life seem grand still through the clouds.
What wealth is it to have such friends that we cannot think of them
without elevation! And we can think of them any time and anywhere, and
it costs nothing but the lofty disposition. I cannot tell you the joy
your letter gives me, which will not quite cease till the latest time.
Let me accompany your finest thought.
I send my love to my other friend and brother, whose nobleness I
slowly recognize.