But first permit me to put myself in the right.  I owe you an answer to your former letter.  It did not desire one, but it deserved it.  If not for an answer, it called for an acknowledgment.  It was a new favor; and, indeed, I should be worse than insensible, if I did not consider the honors you have heaped upon me with no sparing hand with becoming gratitude.  But your letter arrived to me at a time when the closing of my long and last business in life, a business extremely complex, and full of difficulties and vexations of all sorts, occupied me in a manner which those who have not seen the interior as well as exterior of it cannot easily imagine.  I confess that in the crisis of that rude conflict I neglected many things that well deserved my best attention,—­none that deserved it better, or have caused me more regret in the neglect, than your letter.  The instant that business was over, and the House had passed its judgment on the conduct of the managers, I lost no time to execute what for years I had resolved on:  it was, to quit my public station, and to seek that tranquillity, in my very advanced age, to which, after a very tempestuous life, I thought myself entitled.  But God has thought fit (and I unfeignedly acknowledge His justice) to dispose of things otherwise.  So heavy a calamity has fallen upon me as to disable me for business and to disqualify me for repose.  The existence I have I do not know that I can call life.  Accordingly, I do not meddle with any one measure of government, though, for what reasons I know not, you seem to suppose me deeply in the secret of affairs.  I only know, so far as your side of the water is concerned, that your present excellent Lord Lieutenant (the best man in every relation that I have ever been acquainted with) has perfectly pure intentions with regard to Ireland, and of course that he wishes cordially well to those who form the great mass of its inhabitants, and who, as they are well or ill managed, must form an important part of its strength or weakness.  If with regard to that great object he has carried over any ready-made system, I assure you it is perfectly unknown to me:  I am very much retired from the world, and live in much ignorance.  This, I hope, will form my humble apology, if I should err in the notions I entertain of the question which is soon to become the subject of your deliberations.  At the same time accept it as an apology for my neglects.

You need make no apology for your attachment to the religious description you belong to.  It proves (as in you it is sincere) your attachment to the great points in which the leading divisions are agreed, when the lesser, in which they differ, are so dear to you.  I shall never call any religious opinions, which appear important to serious and pious minds, things of no consideration.  Nothing is so fatal to religion as indifference, which is, at least, half infidelity.  As long as men hold charity and justice to be essential integral parts of religion, there