MSS. OF JOHN RANDOLPH.1
1 We are indebted for the letters now published, to the same personal friend of Mr. Randolph, who furnished us those for the July number of the Messenger. We hope to be able to procure others for September.
LETTER IV.
GEORGE TOWN, Dec. 31,2 1811.
2 Five days after the Richmond Theatre was burnt.
My Dear Madam,—Under that most severe visitation of Divine Providence, which it is your fate to suffer, I well know how worse than useless—how almost cruel and insulting may appear any mention of comfort, or consolation on the part of a friend. I have none such to offer: yet I cannot resist the feeling which impels me, at this awful moment, to speak to you: to remind you that our Heavenly Father chasteneth whom he loveth; that his eye is upon us, who died for our sins; who, having partaken of our nature, looks with pity upon its errors and its sufferings, and offers to our acceptance a sure and eternal refuge from the calamities of this life and of the next. It is he who calls upon us to endure, not with stoical apathy, but with meek and Christian fortitude, the miseries inseparable from our mortal condition—to endure them, for his sake! Can we resist this appeal to our gratitude, made by him, who writhed upon the cross, that we might escape the eternal wrath of God? In him alone is our trust:—and when the troubled dream of life is past, let us humbly hope, that we shall awake to everlasting joy through his all atoning merits; that we shall be re-united (never more to part) to those who have preceded us in the voyage of eternity. They are released from those duties, which we are yet called upon to perform—upon the faithful discharge of which must depend our becoming acceptable in the sight of him who made us: our duty towards God; and our duty towards our neighbor;—our fellow sufferers in humanity. The wide-spread desolation that hath overwhelmed your house, hath yet left connexions the most sacred and most dear, who call for the exercise of all the charities of life. Fix your eye alone upon the survivors, and put your trust in God! It is my present sense of duty to Him, that alone hath emboldened me to hold this language to you. I almost shudder at my own rashness—may he whose grace “surpasseth all human understanding” support, comfort and bless you! All other hope is vain. It is from him, and him only, that we can receive strength in this life, or mercy in the life to come. Human learning and human devices avail nought. But where am I rambling? My dear madam, I would, but cannot express my sensations. I turn away my eyes from this world, and endeavor to fix them upon the next, as the only remedy against that stupefaction of grief, that at times overcomes me; and yet addressing myself to you, shall I dare to talk of my grief? May God, in his mercy, restore and comfort you! So prays, dear madam,
Your fervent friend,
JOHN RANDOLPH, of Roanoke.