1065. Your injunction of cheerfulness, as an efficient means of securing a healthful equilibrium of the vital organism, I can fully appreciate, and shall endeavour to profit by your welcome brotherly and excellent advice, as far as circumstances will permit. It is true, my dear John, that a longer sojourn here harmonizes with my desire to effect some objects, the accomplishment of which would probably add to my happiness here, and my claim for congenial association. The object to which I allude is the amelioration of the condition of the poor and wretched of my fellow-creatures, making them through my agency the recipients of some active benevolence. 1066. I have imbibed the opinion that the only acceptable offering at the throne of the great God, is the actual performance of those duties which are incumbent on us as individuals and social beings; beginning with the establishment of our own personal physical and moral character, and those of our own household and immediate social circle of relatives and friends; and then, to the accomplishment of this, to cultivate the sentiment of benevolence in aiding to promote the individual welfare of mankind in the use of what talent and other means may have fallen to our lot. I am prone, in my relations with the great Omnipotent Ruler of the universe, to apply the time-honoured maxim, “Actions speak louder than words.” 1067. Your invitation, my dear brother, to increase my intercourse with my spirit friends, finds in my heart and mind a very ready compliance. You propose a daily appropriation of time to this object. If you will do me the favour to appoint the time most agreeable to them and most desirable for myself, it shall be, to the fullest extent of my power, sacredly devoted to a duty and pleasure that are nearest to my heart. 1068. I feel the assurance that the good earth-character and intelligence of my spirit family, and the extent of our mutual love and affinity, afford me a more than ordinary opportunity for receiving information of that bright world which has become a delightful prospective inheritance to me and to thousands of doubting, fearful, and despairing minds. 1069. Your inspiring cheerfulness, my dear John, has already verified your sensible prognostic of the great influence on disease of a cheerful mind. I have learnt to entertain a high opinion of the bright intelligence and clairvoyance of the more elevated denizens of the spirit world; and shall always, therefore, regard any advice that may be offered me for the better government of my body and soul as a welcome and precious offering from those I love. I will close for the present with the assurance of my unaltered affection. WILLIAM.