"To Rev. R. Taylor,
"Sir,—My first duty to society is to seek the preservation of your life; your first is to preserve it as far as in your power.
If you die, we shall not fill the chasm for many years, if all the genius of England were to unite its efforts.
"I have just received your letter of this day's date. I heard at twelve o'clock that your friends were excluded for the day; at three o'clock by the medium of the vile old Osgood that there had been a fury between you and your gaoler. You say Walter the gaoler insults you. That is your fault. It is not in the power of man to insult me. The world could not do it if it were to try. Assault is one thing, but insult is another, and there can only be insult where there is a disposition to court it. Human nature is capable of a dignity that will not leave room for the word insult. Unfortunately you have the temperament that encourages villainy to be insolent. Let us try if reason cannot cure you of this disorder, which to you, at this moment, is as bad and dangerous a plague as the cholera morbus. To begin, let me remind you of the question of the Greek philosopher when asked why he did not resent the insolence of a vile fellow? He answered: 'Friend, if a jackass were to kick me, would you have me kick him back again?'
"By the statute law of gaol management the gaoler is required to go into every cell in which a prisoner is confined every day. Let him do so. If he must see you it is no reason why you should see him. I have been placed under much greater difficulties in Dorchester Gaol than those under which you are now placed. My gaoler would have given his fingers to have worked me into such a temper in which you were seen this morning. I never so gratified him; and pray do not you so gratify yours again. I know that reason is one thing and passion another; and that neither one nor the other can at all times be commanded. In the first place, let us have no more tricks. They greatly embarrass your friends and thwart our efforts and means of assisting you. It is now with you no time for poetry, for rhapsody, or for jest. You have and we have for you a serious game to play. At trick, our Christian enemy will beat us. I heard on Sunday that a Surrey magistrate had said: 'Taylor is playing some tricks with us about his pretended wife. We know all about it, and will out-trick him.'
"They will beat us at any game but that of open honesty. I have always seen this. You know my word. No secrets, no smuggling; nothing but that which will be fair and above board. My politics would have hung me twelve years ago if I had been a politician anywhere but through the Press and in the course of such lectures as I have delivered to public companies. No plots; no schemes; no tricks; no purposes but those which are openly avowed. I do not write in the spirit of reproach; but of salvation, of plan of warfare, of a determination to conquer the common enemy; and in this spirit, allow me to say that your friends, Mr. Hibbert, Mr. Prout, Mr. Ewen, and myself, are sorry for much that has been written, spoken, and done during your horrible fortnight past. There has been trick and impropriety in it, and it has not succeeded. It cannot succeed. Yours is a glorious situation if you will but fight your battle well. Having gained the necessaries—the physical necessaries of life—you should now make every shot tell among the enemy, and not allow another shot of theirs to reach you.
"I am more than a brother—I have an estate in your life. I shall lose and not gain an estate in your death. Not one word but a word of comfort should you hear from me did I not think some explanation necessary to the salvation of your life.
"If you were going out of the harbor in a ship to fight an enemy in another ship, would you not put your wife and children ashore if they were aboard? Let it be so now. Don't say to the enemy, 'Don't fire, because my wife and children are aboard,' but let them stay ashore, and you may safely say—'Damn you, fire away! I will rake you fore and aft, and give you broadsides between wind and water, and you shall not put a shot into me.' You may have it so if you will, and if you will not you will be beaten and die a thousand deaths. Your life is in your own hands, and not in the hands of your enemies. For the means and the disposition for annoyance, you cannot be worse situated than I was at Dorchester Gaol through four years and more of the time; yet I came out through it triumphantly, and I am of opinion that a similar game will never be tried or attempted on me again.
"First, then, I advise respectfully, regard fully and in the most friendly and brotherly spirit, that you send your wife and children ashore and say not one word more about them while the battle rages. Too much has been said, but my mouth has been sealed until I received your letter this evening. I will communicate the spirit of that letter by the first messenger that I can command to-morrow, and will, while I can, protect and comfort your family. But I will not, till I see a better reason for so doing, permit one more word about them. Too much has already been printed. Your friends—those whom I know to be your friends—are grieved, doubly grieved by that circumstance which doubly grieved you. It has been hitherto your fault to present your weak side to your enemy. You have in you the spirit of a divinity that is invincible. You have the spirit of humanity also that is weak and to be conquered—now which will you present to your enemies? They are not to be subdued by appeals to their sympathy or by any moral force. You must subdue them by making them afraid. They will beat you at any game that is wrong, they will be powerless if you avail yourself of your best and fairest means of warfare.
"If I could tell you of my motives, my feelings, my calculations, my every action in Dorchester Gaol, it would be a useful lesson for you. Blackguard, vile and wicked as was that gaoler, I made him fear me, simply by looking at him; yet I never expressed myself toward him that he could describe it as an insult or a threat, I conquered him by virtue. Leigh Hunt was once confined in your gaol and was much illused at first, but afterwards he obtained something approaching to decent treatment, and had his wife and children with him and free admission for his friends.