MY DEAR FRIEND,—I have begun to look upon myself as an old man. I never did before. I have felt so [335] young, so much at least as I always have done, that I could n't fairly take in the idea. The giftie has n't been gi'ed me to see myself as others see me. Even yet, when they get up to offer me the great chair, I can't understand it. But at length I have so far come into their views as seriously to ask myself what it is fit for an old man to do, or to undertake. And I have come to the conclusion that the best thing for me is to be quiet, to keep, at least, to my quiet and customary method of living,-in other words, to be at home. My wife is decidedly of that opinion for herself, and, by parity of reasoning, for me; and I am inclined to think she is right.
This parity, however, does not apply to you. You are six months younger than I am, by calendar, and six years in activity; you go back and forth like Cicero to his country villas; pray stop at my door some day, and let me see you.
You see where all this points. I decide not to go to New York at present, notwithstanding all the attractions which you hold out to me. I don't feel like leaving home while this blustering March is roaring about the house. And from the mild winter we have had, I expect it to grow more like a lion at the end.
With love to J. and Miss F.,
Your timid old friend,
ORVILLE DEWEY.
To Rev. Henry W. Bellows, D.D.
Aug. 7, 1876.
DEAR FRIEND,—I can't be quite still, though I have nothing to say but how good you must be, to see so much good in others! That is what always strikes me [336] in your oraisons funebres, and equally, the fine discrimination you always show. And both appear in your loving notice of my volume.' Well, I take it to heart, and accept, though I cannot altogether understand it. Such words, from such a person as you, are a great thing to me. It is to me a great comfort to retire from the scene with such a testimony, instead of a bare civil dismissal, which is all I was looking for from anybody.
Mr. Dewey was urged to the publication of this last volume of sermons by several of his most valued friends; and its warm acceptance by the public justified their opinion, and gave him the peculiar gratification of feeling that in his old age and retirement his words could yet have power and receive approbation.