Chapter XLV: Letter XLIV: To Mr. M

July 23, 1777.

YES--too true it is--for the many (aye, and some of those many carry their heads high) too true for the miserable--the needy--the sick--for many, alas! who now may have no helper--for the child of folly poor S----, and even for thy worthless friend Sancho.--It is too true, that the Almighty has called to her rich reward--she who, whilst on earth, approved herself his best delegate.--How blind, how silly, is the mortal who places any trust or hope in aught but the Almighty!--You are just, beautifully just, in your sketch of the vicissitudes of worldly bliss.--We rise the lover--dine the husband--and too oft, alas! lay down the forlorne widower.--Never so struck in my life;--it was on Friday night, between ten and eleven, just preparing for my concluding pipe--the Duke of M----’s man knocks.--“Have you heard the bad news?”--No.--“The Dutchess of Queensbury died last night!”--I felt fifty different sensations--unbelief was uppermost--when he crushed my incredibility, by saying he had been to know how his Grace did--who was also very poorly in health.--Now the preceding day, Thursday (the day on which she expired) I had received a very penitential letter from S----, dated from St. Helena;--this letter I inclosed in a long tedious epistle of my own--and sent to Petersham, believing the family to be all there.--The day after you left town her Grace died;--that day week she was at my door--the day after I had the honour of a long audience in her dressing-room.--Alas! this hour blessed with health--crowned with honors--loaded with riches, and encircled with friends--the next reduced to a lump of poor clay--a tenement for worms!--Earth re-possesses part of what she gave--and the freed spirit mounts on wings of fire:--her disorder was a stoppage--she fell ill the evening of the Friday that I last saw her--continued in her full senses to the last.--The good she had done reached the skies long before her lamented death--and are the only heralds that are worth the pursuit of wisdom:--as to her bad deeds, I have never heard of them.--Had it been for the best, God would have lent her a little longer to a foolish world, which hardly deserved so good a woman;--for my own part, I have lost a friend--and perhaps ’tis better so.--“Whatever is,” &c. &c.--I wish S---- knew this heavy news, for many reasons.--I am inclined to believe her Grace’s death is the only thing that will most conduce to his reform.--I fear neither his gratitude nor sensibility will be much hurt upon hearing the news--it will act upon his fears, and make him do _right_ upon a _base_ principle.--Hang him! he teazes me whenever I think of him.--I supped last night with St----; he called in just now, and says he has a right to be remembered to you.--You and he are two old monkeys--the more I abuse and rate you, the better friend you think me.--As you have found out that your spirits govern your head--you will of course contrive every method of keeping your instrument in tune;--sure I am that bathing--riding--walking--in succession--the two latter not violent--will brace your nerves--purify your blood--invigorate its circulation:--add to the rest _continency_--yes, again I repeat it, _continency_;--before you reply, think--re-think--and think again--look into your _Bible_--look in _Young_--peep into your own breast--if your heart warrants what your head counsels--act then boldly.--Oh! _apropos_--pray thank my noble friend Mrs. H---- for her friendly present of C-- J--; it did Mrs. Sancho service, and does poor Billy great good--who has (through his teeth) been plagued with a cough--which I hope will not turn to the whooping sort;--the girls greet you as their respected school-master.--As to your spirited kind offer of a F----, why when you please--you know what I intend doing with it.

Poor Lady S----, I find, still lingers this side the world.--Alas! when will the happy period arrive, that the sons of mortality may greet each other with the joyful news, that sin, pain, sorrow, and death, are no more; skies without clouds, earth without crimes, life without death, world without end!--peace, bliss, and harmony, where the Lord God--All in all--King of kings--Lord of lords--reigneth--omnipotent--for ever--for ever!--may you, dear M----, and all I love--yea the whole race of Adam, join with my unworthy weak self, in the stupendous--astonishing--soul-cheering Hallelujahs!--where Charity may be swallowed up in Love--Hope in Bliss--and Faith in glorious Certainty!--We will mix, my boy, with all countries, colours, faiths--see the countless multitudes of the first world--the myriads descended from the--Ark--the Patriarchs--Sages--Prophets--and Heroes! My head turns round at the vast idea! we will mingle with them, and try to untwist the vast chain of blessed Providence--which puzzles and baffles human understanding. Adieu.

Yours, &c.

I. SANCHO.