happy one. P. S. There are more lies contained in the piece of parchment on which my degree is written than I ever before saw in a like compass. It praises me for assiduous attention at recitations, etc., etc. (This letter seems to be all about M. W.) Good by, J. R. L. Sunday, [31 August, 1840.] I have received your letter and had also written an answer to it, which I just burnt. It was written when I was not in a fit state of mind to write. I had been feeling very strongly that “Custom lies about us with a weight Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life.” If I had written this an hour ago, it would have been black and melancholy enough, but I have smoked three cigars and ruminated and am calm--almost.... If I had seen her three years ago things might have been not thus. But yet I would not give up the bitter knowledge I gained last summer for much--very much. “Who never ate his bread in sorrow, Who never passed the lonesome hours, Weeping and watching for the morrow, He knows ye not, ye Heavenly powers.” I have been calmer and stronger ever since. Oh the glory of a calm, still soul! If we could keep our souls ever in a holy silence, we should be wise, we should hear the music of the spheres. But they will ever be talking to themselves. If we could but become so, we should then ever have at our beck those divine messengers which visit us also as well as Abraham.... Do “they say” that she is “transcendental”? Yes, she does indeed go beyond them. They cannot understand a being like her. But if they mean that she is unfit for the duties of life, they are entirely wrong. She has more “common sense” than any woman I have ever seen. Genius always has. Hear what Maria herself says in one of her glorious letters to me. “When I said that I loved you, I almost felt as if I had said ‘and I will espouse sorrow for thy sake,’ for I have lived long enough and observed life keenly enough to know that not the truest and most exalted love can bar the approach of much care and sorrow.” And all these she is ready and able to bear. Yes, she will love you, for she loves everything that I love.