SPRINGFIELD, MASS., March
7, 1844.
MY DEAR MARY, — It is once more Sabbath evening, and nothing
so much accords with my feelings as to spend a portion of it in conversing with
the partner of my choice, and the sharer of my poverty, trials, discredit, and
sore afflictions, as well as of what comfort and seeming prosperity has fallen
to my lot for quite a number of years. I would you should realize that,
notwithstanding I am absent in body, I am very much of the time present in
spirit. I do not forget the firm attachment of her who has remained my fast and
faithful affectionate friend, when others said of me, "Now that he lieth,
he shall rise up no more." . . . I
now feel encouraged to believe that my absence will not be very long. After
being so much away, it seems as if I knew pretty well how to appreciate the
quiet of home. There is a peculiar music in the word which a half-year's
absence in a distant country would enable you to understand. Millions there are
who have no such thing to lay claim to. I feel considerable regret by turns
that I have lived so many years, and have in reality done so little to increase
the amount of human happiness. I often regret that my manner is no more kind
and affectionate to those I really love and esteem; but I trust my friends will
overlook my harsh, rough ways, when I cease to be in their way as an occasion
of pain and unhappiness. In imagination I often see you in your room with
Little Chick and that strange Anna. You must say to her that father means to
come before long and kiss somebody. I will close by saying that it is my
growing resolution to endeavor to promote my own happiness by doing what I can
to render those about me more so. If the large boys do wrong, call them alone
into your room, and expostulate with them kindly, and see if you cannot reach
them by a kind but powerful appeal to their honor. I do not claim that such a
theory accords very well with my practice; I frankly confess it does not; but I
want your face to shine, even if my own should be dark and cloudy. You can let
the family read this letter, and perhaps you may not feel it a great burden to
answer it, and let me hear all about how you get along.
Affectionately yours,
JOHN BROWN
SOURCE: Franklin B. Sanborn, The Life and Letters of
John Brown, p. 60-1
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