Dear Son John,
— Forbes's letter to me of the 27th of January I enclose back to you, and will
be glad to have you return it to him with something like the following (unless
you can think of some serious objection), as I am anxious to draw him out more
fully, and would also like to keep him a little encouraged and avoid an open
rupture for a few weeks, at any rate. Suppose you write Forbes thus: —
“Your letter to my father, of 27th January, after mature
reflection, I have decided to return to you, as I am unwilling he
should, with all his other cares, difficulties, and trials, be vexed with what
I am apprehensive he will accept as highly offensive and insulting, while
I know that he is disposed to do all he consistently can for you, and will do
so, unless you are yourself the cause of his disgust. I was trying to send you
a little assistance myself, — say about forty dollars; but I must hold up till
I feel different from what I now do. I understood from my father that he had advanced
you already six hundred dollars, or six months' pay (disappointed as he has
been), to enable you to provide for your family; and that he was to give you one
hundred dollars per month for just so much time as you continued in his
service. Now, you in your letter undertake to instruct him to say that
he had positively engaged you for one year. I fear he will not accept it well
to be asked or told to state what he considers an untruth. Again, I
suspect you have greatly mistaken the man, if you supple he will take it kindly
in you, or any living man, to assume to instruct him how he should conduct his
own business and correspondence. And I suspect that the seemingly spiteful
letters you say you have written to some of his particular friends have not
only done you great injury, but also weakened his hands with them. While I
have, in my poverty, deeply sympathized with you and your family, who, I
ask, is likely to be moved by any exhibition of a wicked and spiteful temper on
your part, or is likely to be dictated to by you as to their duties?
“I ask you to look over your letter again. You begin with
saying, ‘With a little energy, all will yet be right.’ Is that respectful? and
does it come with a good grace from you to the man you thus address?
Look it all over; and if, after having done so, you wish him to have it, — go
on! you can do so. But as a friend I would advise a very different course.”
As I conclude Forbes does not hold you as deeply committed
to him, he may listen to you; and I hope he will. I want to see how a sharp but
well-merited rebuke will affect him; and should it have the desired effect, I
would like to get a draft for forty dollars, payable to his order, and remit
him at once. I do not mean to dictate to you, as he does to me; but I am
anxious to understand him fully before we go any further, and shall be glad of
the earliest information of the result. . . .
Your affectionate
father,
John Brown.
SOURCE: Franklin B. Sanborn, The Life and Letters of
John Brown, p. 432-3
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