Mrs. P. did me the honor to call on me last night with the very painful news of the departure of your dear John. A variety of serious ideas flowed into my mind upon hearing of your affecting and serious loss. I knew how much you loved him, how dear he was to you both; I knew how very engaging he had become; I considered your feelings on the occasion, nor was I without my fears, lest you should reflect on yourselves in taking him so long a journey. I have also pictured to myself your absence from the little pious society of friends amongst us, your large and venerable house. Recent death of an aged parent, with none but strangers around you, and a variety of circumstances beside; these, yes, these things dwell on my mind, and have led me to trouble you with a line on the sad occasion. I hope an apology for intrusion is needless. I write not to _inform_ my beloved friends, but only to _remind_ them, that every event is absolutely decreed by a God of infinite wisdom; not a stroke of affliction, nor a shaft of death can possibly touch, but by Divine appointment. The _nature_, the _kind_, the _time_, the _age_, the _place_ were all arranged in the unerring purposes of God. It was decreed the dear dear boy should be taken to B. Hall, _there_ the Lord would send for him. He has sent for his own: the Lord had the greatest right to him, he was, indeed, lent to his affectionate parents, but he is demanded back again; he was the object of his heavenly father’s love, he was the property of Jesus, and he must be brought home to his house, by his holy angels. Death indeed is very terrible to our natures, it takes away the darlings of our hearts, and the desire of our eyes, but it has transmitted yours to the enjoyment of God in human nature: this is the accomplishment of God’s design in this providence, and with holy joy you will one day say, _He_ has done all things well. The dear boy, like Abraham in his conversion, has left his native country, and gone into the eternal inheritance, which God has prepared for him, and which he never saw or sought before. Like Jacob, he at the command of his God, has returned to his father’s house, and his own spiritual and angelic kindred: like the Israelites, though his journey was short, God opened a passage through the garden of death: his little journey is ended, he sets in peace, _it is well_. Farewell, my dear-little fellow, I shall kiss thy little lips or press thy little cheeks no more! no, no, the painful task is assigned to thy dear parents, to see thee taken from their arms, and from their house, to the solemn tomb, the silent, the dark, the cold, the dreary receptacle for suffering mortality. Happy voyager, how short thy passage on the sea of this tribulated world; how short thy stay, how swift thy flight; but what thy surprize to enter into another state of love, holiness, joy, and glory; every little power expanded, and the soul