"I think you know Mr. Pearse of this place, an excellent and very agreeable man, and master of the Grammar School at this place, a large and flourishing one. He is a very musical man, an intimate and long attached friend of Dr. Crotch. I will consult him about your organ. I believe I told you that I scarcely ever remember finding my time so little equal to the claims on it as at this place, though were I asked 'What are you doing?' I should, alas! say 'Nothing'; and even, 'What have you to do?' still the same reply, 'Nothing'. I have one occupation of an interesting and in some degree of an embarrassing nature. Soon after our arrival, I learnt that the only other inmate of our house was a gentleman who had been confined to his sofa for many months from the effects of a rheumatic fever. He had no friends with him, only a family servant who attended on him. Naturally feeling for the poor man, he and ourselves being the only inmates, I sent a message to him to say that, if agreeable, I should be happy to wait on him for a few minutes. He returned an assenting and courteous reply. Accordingly I called, and found a very civil and well-behaved man. I found that he had been fond of game, and had expressed his regret that he could not purchase it (this was his servant's report). Accordingly I sent him some now and then. I soon afterwards was told that he was a Roman Catholic. He is by profession a lawyer at Pontypool. I have since had several conversations with him, and find him a decided Roman Catholic, but a man apparently of great candour and moderation. I was not surprised to find him strongly prejudiced against Blanco White.[68] 'Oh,' he cried, 'I assure you, sir, that book is full of the grossest falsehood.' But I was a good deal surprised to receive from him an assurance that he had been reading with great pleasure in a book of my writing; and I found, to my surprise, that quite unknown to me Kendal had lent him the book. I durst not have done it, but the event has taught me that we may sometimes be too timid or delicate. Can you suggest any mode of dealing with my fellow lodger? Hitherto I have gone on the plan of cultivating his favourable opinion by general kindness, sending him game, &c., and endeavouring to press on him the most important doctrines of true Christianity and of showing where the case is really so, that he may embrace those doctrines and still continue a good Roman Catholic. There is in the Christian Observer for September last a critique on Dr. Whately's sermons by the Bishop of Chichester. He is said, in the outset, to have stated in a pamphlet on the Bible Society controversy, that the only books in the Scriptures which were fit or useful for general circulation were Genesis, Exodus, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, I think Isaiah, but am not sure, the four Gospels, Acts, 1st Timothy, 1st Peter, 1st John and Jude; all the rest likely to do more harm than good."
"Bath, December 6, 1831.
"I am unaffectedly sorry for having been apparently so dilatory in complying with your request for hymns and tunes. I use the word apparently, because to any charge of suffering any opportunity of executing the commission to pass by unimproved, I may boldly plead not guilty. There never, surely, was such a place as this for the frittering away of time. Two visits before breakfast to the Pump Room, and two again from 2 to 3-1/4 o'clock in the afternoon, make such a chasm in the day, that little before dinner (about 4-3/4) is left for any rational occupation. Then not being able, for many reasons, to receive company at dinner, we often invite friends to breakfast, and as we cannot begin the meal till 10-1/2 at the soonest, we seldom have a clear room till after 12. Sometimes morning callers come in before the breakfasters are gone (as has been the case this morning, when my old friend Bankes has entered, taking Bath in his way from his son in North Wales into Dorsetshire). You owe this account of expenditure of my time to my feeling quite uncomfortable, from the idea of neglecting a commission you wished to consign to me for prompt execution. I will put down in any letter I may write to you any hymns and hymn tunes which I like ('Happy the heart where graces reign,' Lock tune), and you may add together the disjecta membra into one list. But I have not hymn-books here except G. Noel's. At Highwood I have a considerable number. Your poor mother is worried to pieces by company and business. I am fully persuaded, my dear Samuel, that you wish to lighten the pressure on me as much as possible, and on the other hand I doubt not you give me full credit for wishing to make you as comfortable as I can, and I really hope I shall be able to go on allowing my children what is necessary for their comfort."
"January 19, 1832.
"St. John says, you will remember, 'I have no greater joy than to know that my children walk in the truth.' This he could declare concerning his figurative children. And well, therefore, ought we to be able, at least, to desire to feel similar sensations on witnessing the graces of our true, real children. And I am in a situation to feel this with peculiar force. Indeed, I hope I can say with truth that the more frequent, more continued and closer opportunities of witnessing your conscientious and diligent discharge of your pastoral duties—opportunities which I probably should not have enjoyed in the same degree had I still a residence of my own—more than compensate all I suffer from the want of a proper home. Indeed, there are but two particulars that I at all feel, i.e., the absence of my books, and the not being able to practise hospitality; though that is rather a vulgar word for expressing my meaning, which is, the pleasure of receiving those we love under our own roof, joining with them morning and night in family prayers, shaking hands with them, and interchanging continual intercourse of mutual affection. Well, the time is short, even for those who are far less advanced than myself in the journey of life."
"Bath, June 14, 1832.
"I forget whether you know the Dean of Winchester[69] or not. We have many a discussion together, and I now and then stroke his plumage the wrong way to make him set up his bristles. He holds the great degeneracy of these times. I, on the contrary, declared to him that, though I acknowledged the more open prevalence of profaneness, and of all the vices which grow out of insubordination, yet that there had been also a marked and a great increase of religion within the last forty years. And as a proof I assigned the numerous editions of almost all the publications of family prayers, beginning with the Rector of St. Botolph's (Bishop of London's)."
"July 12, 1832.