SHERWOOD FOREST,
November 23, 1859.
MY DEAR ROBERT: I
scarcely know what reply to give to your last letter. If I had the means to
make you independent pecuniarily of the world, the sun would not go down before
it would be done; but I am as hard put up, to use a vulgar phrase, as any one.
For two years past my crops have failed, and I have had, and still have, a whip
and spur concern to keep me on the track. Were it otherwise, I should
unhesitatingly say to you neither mission abroad nor paymastership at home, but
onward with your profession, which ultimately leads to emolument and position.
I am ambitious, and I acknowledge it, not for myself, except to leave behind me
a respected and honored name, but for my children. I would live again in them.
I would have them make a figure in the world, and thus hand down a name which
for two generations, to say nothing of a third, has won confidence and repute.
I think that your
devotion to the President ought long since to have received his endorsement. It
comes now at a late hour. Doubtless he has supposed that he could not do
otherwise. You have now to decide what you had best do. There is one word that
decides the matter—independence. Will the paymastership give you peace, quiet,
independence? Is it better than your present office and profession? If so, take
it. If not, reject it. Give up politics, by which no man profits other than a
knave; retrench, as far as retrenchment be practicable, and wait for political
preferment to reach you at its own gait. I estimate you unjustly if it do not
come at some day or other. It may find you as well in a paymastership as in a
mission abroad. Decide the whole question for yourself, and, whatever the
decision, I shall be satisfied.
For myself I care
for nothing, hope for nothing, seek for nothing. My confidence alone is in the Great
Being who has made us, and still preserves us a nation. Wise has obviously
gained in public esteem hereabouts. How things are to result time will
disclose.
SOURCE: Lyon
Gardiner Tyler, The Letters and Times of
the Tylers, Volume 2, p. 554-5
No comments:
Post a Comment