You were right, I had heard of the resolution submitted to Congress, etc.  Mr. Cooper wrote me about it.  I have not much faith in Congress, however.  I will confess that, when the spectre Debt has leaned over my pillow of late, and, smiling ghastlily, has asked if she and I were not intended as companions through life, I snap my fingers at her and tell her that Brother Jonathan talks of adopting me, and that he won’t have her of his household.  “Go to London, you hag,” says I, “where they say you’re handsome and wholesome; don’t grind your long teeth at me, or I’ll read the Declaration of Independence to ye.”  So you see I make uncertain hopes fight certain fears, and borrow from the generous, good-natured Future the motives for content which are denied me by the stinted Present...

What shall I say in answer to your remarks on my opinions?  Shall I go all over the ground again?  It were useless.  That my heart is wrong in a thousand ways I daily feel, but ’t is my stubborn head which refuses to comprehend the creation as you comprehend it.  That we should be grateful for all we have, I feel—­for all we have is given us; nor do I think we have little.  For my part I would be blest in mere existence were I not goaded by a wish to make my one talent two; and we have Scripture for the rectitude of such a wish.  I don’t think the stubborn resistance of the tide of ill-fortune can be called rebellion against Providence.  “Help yourself and Heaven will help you,” says the proverb....

There hangs before me a print of the Bunker Hill Monument.  Pray be judge between me and the building committee of that monument.  There you observe that my model was founded solidly, and on each of its square plinths were trophies, or groups, or cannon, as might be thought fit. (No.  I.)

Well, they have taken away the foundation, made the shaft start sheer from the dirt like a spear of asparagus, and, instead of an acute angle, by which I hoped to show the work was done and lead off the eye, they have made an obtuse one, producing the broken-chimney-like effect which your eye will not fail to condemn in No.  II.  Then they have enclosed theirs with a light, elegant fence, a la Parigina, as though the austere forms of Egypt were compatible with the decorative flummery of the boulevards.  Let ’em go for dunderheads as they are....

I congratulate you on your sound conscience with regard to the affair that you wot of.  As for your remaining free, that’s all very well to think during the interregnum, but a man without a true love is a ship without ballast, a one-tined fork, half a pair of scissors, an utter flash in the pan....  So you are going home, my dear Morse, and God knows if ever I shall see you again.  Pardon, I pray you, anything of levity which you may have been offended at in me.  Believe me it arose from my so rarely finding one to whom I could be natural and give loose without fear of good faith or good nature ever failing.  Wherever I am your approbation will be dearer to me than the hurrah of a world.  I shall write to glorious Fenimore in a few days.  My love to Allston and Dana.  God bless you,