gs
in the world but that single object that takes up one's fancy, to lose
all the quiet and repose of one's life in hunting after it, when there
is so little likelihood of ever gaining it, and so many more probable
accidents that will infallibly make us miss on't? And which is more than
all, 'tis being mastered by that which reason and religion teaches us to
govern, and in that only gives us a pre-eminence over beasts. This,
soberly consider'd, is enough to let us see our error, and consequently
to persuade us to redeem it. To another person, I should justify myself
that 'tis not a lightness in my nature, nor any interest that is not
common to us both, that has wrought this change in me. To you that know
my heart, and from whom I shall never hide it, to whom a thousand
testimonies of my kindness can witness the reality of it, and whose
friendship is not built upon common grounds, I have no more to say but
that I impose not my opinions upon you, and that I had rather you took
them up as your own choice than upon my entreaty. But if, as we have not
differed in anything else, we could agree in this too, and resolve upon
a friendship that will be much the perfecter for having nothing of
passion in it, how happy might we be without so much as a fear of the
change that any accident could bring. We might defy all that fortune
could do, and putting off all disguise and constraint, with that which
only made it necessary, make our lives as easy to us as the condition of
this world will permit. I may own you as a person that I extremely value
and esteem, and for whom I have a particular friendship, and you may
consider me as one that will always be

Your faithful.

This was written when I expected a letter from you, how came I to miss
it? I thought at first it might be the carrier's fault in changing his
time without giving notice, but he assures me he did, to Nan. My
brother's groom came down to-day, too, and saw her, he tells me, but
brings me nothing from her; if nothing of ill be the cause, I am
contented. You hear the noise my Lady Anne Blunt has made with her
marrying? I am so weary with meeting it in all places where I go; from
what is she fallen! they talked but the week before that she should have
my Lord of Strafford. Did you not intend to write to me when you writ to
Jane? That bit of paper did me great service; without it I should have
had strange apprehension, and my sad dreams, and the several frights I
have wake