SPRINGFIELD, MASS., Dec.
6, 1850.
DEAR SON JOHN, — Your kind letter is received. By same mail
I also have one from Mr. Perkins in answer to one of mine, in which I did in no
very indistinct way introduce some queries, not altogether unlike those your
letter contained. Indeed, your letter throughout is so much like what has often
passed through my own mind, that were I not a little sceptical yet, I should
conclude you had access to some of the knocking spirits.1 I shall
not write you very long, as I mean to write again before many days. Mr.
Perkins's letter, to which I just alluded, appears to be written in a very kind
spirit; and so long as he is right-side up, I shall by no means despond;
indeed, I think the fog clearing away from our matters a little. I certainly
wish to understand, and I mean to understand, “how the land lies” before taking
any important steps. You can assist me very much about being posted up: but you
will be able to get hold of the right end exactly by having everything done up
first-rate, and by becoming very familiar, and not by keeping distant. I most
earnestly hope that should I lose caste, my family will at least prove
themselves worthy of respect and confidence; and I am sure that my three sons
in Akron can do a great job for themselves and for the family if they behave
themselves wisely. Your letter so well expresses my own feelings, that were it
not for one expression I would mail it with one I have just finished, to
Mr. Perkins. Can you not all three effectually secure the name of good business
men this winter? That you are considered honest and rather intelligent I
have no doubt.
I do not believe the losses of our firm will in the end
prove so very severe, if Mr. Perkins can only be kept resolute and patient in
regard to matters. I have often made mistakes by being too hasty, and mean
hereafter to “ponder well the path of my feet.” I mean to pursue in all things
such a course as is in reality wise, and as will in the end give to myself and
family the least possible cause for regret. I believe Mr. Newton is properly authorized
to take testimony. If so, I wish you to ascertain the fact and write me; if
not, I want you to learn through Mr. Perkins who would be a suitable person for
that business, as I expect before many weeks to want your testimony, and I want
you to give me the name. I forgot to write to Mr. Perkins about it, and have
sealed up my letter to him. I mentioned about your testimony, but forgot what I
should have written.
Your affectionate
father,
JOHN BROWN.
__________
1 This was the period when the Fox family, at
Rochester, N. Y., were astonishing the world with their knockings and the
messages from another world which these were supposed to convey. John Brown,
Jr., was inclined to believe in the reality of this “rat-hole revelation” (as
Emerson described it to Henry Ward Beecher); but his father was sceptical. He
talked with his son at the American House, Springfield, in 1848, concerning
this matter, and told him that the Bible contains the whole revelation of God;
that since that canon was closed, “the book has been sealed.” In his later
years he was less confident of this; and in 1859, when he last talked with John
Brown, Jr., on the subject, he said he had received messages, as he believed,
from Dianthe Lusk, which had directed his conduct in cases of perplexity.
Milton Lusk has been a believer in “Spiritualism” for many years; indeed, he is
naturally heretical, and was excommunicated by the church in Hudson, in 1835.
SOURCE: Franklin B. Sanborn, The Life and Letters of
John Brown, p. 78-9
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