'My dearest Fan,--Your letter has just reached me from Honiton, and I have read it with very great interest. I liked it better on a second perusal of it, which showed in itself that I wanted it, for it is quite true that I require to be reminded of the only true principle upon which one ought to work; and I allow quite willingly that I trace interested motives--e.g., love of self-approval or applause in actions where such feelings ought least of all to enter. I certainly did feel pleased with myself for speaking plainly to those people, and I often find myself indulging the notion that I am going to be a very hard-working clergyman, with a remedy for all the evils of the age, &c. If I was to hunt about for an excuse, I might perhaps find one, by saying that I am in that state of mind which attends always, I suppose, the anticipation of any great crisis in a person's life; sometimes hard work and hard thought, sometimes (though alas! very seldom) a real sense of the very awful responsibility of ministering in the Church, sometimes a less natural urging of the mind to contemplate and realise this responsibility. I was for some time reading Wilberforce's new book, and this involved an examination of the question in other writers; but lately I have laid all controversial works aside almost entirely, and have been reading Pearson, Bull, and the Apostolical Fathers, Clement and Ignatius. I shall probably read Justin Martyr's Apologies, and some treatises of Tertullian before next month is over. I have read some part already. There is such a very strong practical element in these very early writings that they ought to soothe and calm the mind; but I cannot honestly conceal the fact that the theological interest for the most part outweighs the practical teaching. 'My light reading is of a new and very amusing and interesting character--viz., books on school economy, management of school farms, allotments, the modern dairy, spade husbandry, agricultural chemistry. K, W, F, C, and G, and I have great talks; and as they all agree with me, I think them capital judges. 'I don't think at all that my present state of mind is quite natural. You quite repeat my own words when you say it is transitory. A calm undisturbed spirit of prayer and peace and contentment is a great gift of God, and to be waited for with patience. The motto of "The Christian Year" is very beautiful. I sent the roses on Tuesday. My best love to dear Father and Joan. 'Ever your loving Brother, 'J. C. P.' These words 'love of self-approval' perfectly analysed that snare of Coley's early life, against which he so endeavoured to guard--not self-conceit, but love of self-approval. So the Easter week drew on, and during it he writes to his cousin:-- 'Friday, Wallis Lodgings, Exeter: September, 1853.