as he did—­that was to keep company with the intention of getting married.  This was not the communion that I wanted or that was congenial to my life.  Marrying would not, I am convinced, have had any permanent effect.  It was not that which controlled me, then or now.  It is altogether different; it is a life in me which requires altogether different circumstances to live it.  This is no dream; or, if it is, then have I never had such reality. . . .

“When I wrote last it struck me I might secure what I need at Brook Farm, but that would depend greatly upon how you answer my letter.  If you do as perhaps you may, I will go and see whether I could be satisfied and how it is, and let you know.

“So far had I written when your letter came. . . .  You appear to ask this question:  What object have you in contemplation? None further than to live a life agreeable to the mind I have, which I feel under a necessity to do."

“Chelsea, December 30, 1842.—­TO MOTHER:  I am sorry to hear that you feel worried.  My health is good, I eat and sleep well.  That my mind is not settled, or as it used to be, is no reason to be troubled, for I hope it is not changing for the worse, and I look forward to brighter days than we have seen in those that are gone.  I was conscious my last letter was not written in a manner to give you ease; but to break those old habits of our accustomed communion was to me a serious task, and done under a sense of duty, to let you know the cause of the disease I was supposed to labor under.  That is past now, and I hope we shall understand each other, and that our future will be smooth and easy.  The ice has been broken.  That caused me some pain but no regret, and instead of feeling sorrow, you will, I hope, be contented that I should continue the path that will make me better.”

Concerning Isaac Hecker’s residence at Brook Farm, which was begun about the middle of the following January, we shall have more to say hereafter.  At present our concern is chiefly with those explanations of his conduct and motives which the anxieties of his family continually forced him to attempt.  There is, however, among the papers belonging to this period one which, although found with the letters, was evidently so included by mistake, and at some later date.  It is an outpouring still more intimate than he was able to make for the enlightenment of others, and is the first vestige of a diary which has been found.  But it seems plain that his longing for what he continually calls “communion,” and the effort to divine the will of Providence in his regard, must frequently have urged him to that introspective self-contemplation so common to natures like his before their time for action has arrived.  We make some brief extracts from this document which illustrates, still more plainly than any of the letters, the fact that the interior pressure to which he was subjected had for its uniform tendency and result his vivid realization of the Incarnation of God in Jesus Christ.  It is written in a fine, close hand on a sheet of letter-paper, which it entirely covers, and bears date January 10, 1843: