_Second: Be Patient._ This is one of the most difficult things to everyone, old or young. But it is also one of the greatest things. And this comes of Love too. Love is Patient: it bears; it suffers long; it is kind; it is beautiful; it makes us like angels. Patience is, indeed, angelic; it is the Gate that opens into the House of Happiness. Open it, my daughter, and enter in and take all your sisters in with you. _Third: Be Resolute._ Shake off all Sluggishness, and follow your Confidence as fast as your feelings, your thoughts, your eye, your hand, your foot, will carry you. Hate all excuses: almost always, these are lies. Be _quick_ in your obedience: delay is a laggard, who never gets up with himself, and loses the company of confidence always. Resolution is the ladder to Happiness. Resolve and be a wise and happy girl. _Fourth: Be Diligent._ Put your heart into all you do: and fix your thoughts on your doings. Halfness is almost as bad as nothing: be whole then in all you do and say. But I am saying a great deal and will stop now with the hope of meeting you on the 16th March, 1843 (the good God sparing us till then) a gentler, a meeker, more determined and obligent girl. Your friend and _Father_ Concordia 16 March _1842_ For _Anna Bronson Alcott._ Such a gift to an eleven-year-old girl on her birthday! One would expect not kindly counsel, but a toy, a picture book, something pretty for her body, not much for her mind. The spirituality and the wisdom of the poet-philosopher are shown in this letter with its "excuses, almost always lies," and "delay is a laggard." When Louisa was seven years old, her mother was ill, and the child was sent away from home for a time. To his little absent daughter the father sends this letter, printed so that she might read it for herself: For Louisa. 1839 My dear Little Girl. Father hopes you are well and happy. Mother will soon be well enough we hope for you to come home. You want to see us all I know. And we want to see you very much. Be a good girl and try to do as they tell you. You shall see us all in a few days. You were never away from home so long before. It has given you some new feelings. I have printed this note. I hope you can read it all yourself. Good Bye From Father. Saturday 11 o'clock in the School Room. 1839 On her seventh birthday he writes her one of the most wonderful letters of the many that have been preserved in the volumes of the Alcott manuscripts: [Illustration]