Letter to W.G.  Anderson.  Lawrenceville, Illinois.  October 31, 1840

Dear Sir, Your note of yesterday is received.  In the difficulty between us of which you speak, you say you think I was the aggressor.  I do not think I was.  You say my “words imported insult.”  I meant them as a fair set-off to your own statements, and not otherwise; and in that light alone I now wish you to understand them.  You ask for my present “feelings on the subject.”  I entertain no unkind feelings to you, and none of any sort upon the subject, except a sincere regret that I permitted myself to get into such an altercation.

Extract from a Letter to John T. Stuart.  Springfield Illinois.  January 23, 1841

For not giving you a general summary of news, you must pardon me; it is not in my power to do so.  I am now the most miserable man living.  If what I feel were equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on earth.  Whether I shall ever be better, I cannot tell; I awfully forebode I shall not.  To remain as I am is impossible; I must die or be better, it appears to me.  The matter you speak of on my account you may attend to as you say, unless you shall hear of my condition forbidding it.  I say this because I fear I shall be unable to attend to any business here, and a change of scene might help me.  If I could be myself, I would rather remain at home with Judge Logan.  I can write no more.

From an Address before the Washingtonian Temperance Society.  Springfield, Illinois.  February 22, 1842

Although the temperance cause has been in progress for nearly twenty years, it is apparent to all that it is just now being crowned with a degree of success hitherto unparalleled.

The list of its friends is daily swelled by the additions of fifties, of hundreds, and of thousands.  The cause itself seems suddenly transformed from a cold abstract theory to a living, breathing, active and powerful chieftain, going forth conquering and to conquer.  The citadels of his great adversary are daily being stormed and dismantled; his temples and his altars, where the rites of his idolatrous worship have long been performed, and where human sacrifices have long been wont to be made, are daily desecrated and deserted.  The trump of the conqueror’s fame is sounding from hill to hill, from sea to sea, and from land to land, and calling millions to his standard at a blast.

* * * * *

“But,” say some, “we are no drunkards, and we shall not acknowledge ourselves such by joining a reform drunkard’s society, whatever our influence might be.”  Surely no Christian will adhere to this objection.