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A Memoir of the Reverend Sydney Smith
Letters 1810
Sydney Smith to Francis Jeffrey, [November] 1810
INTRODUCTION & INDEXES
DOCUMENT INFORMATION
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Author's Preface
Contents
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Index
Editor’s Preface
Letters 1801
Letters 1802
Letters 1803
Letters 1804
Letters 1805
Letters 1806
Letters 1807
Letters 1808
Letters 1809
Letters 1810
Letters 1811
Letters 1812
Letters 1813
Letters 1814
Letters 1815
Letters 1816
Letters 1817
Letters 1818
Letters 1819
Letters 1820
Letters 1821
Letters 1822
Letters 1823
Letters 1824
Letters 1825
Letters 1826
Letters 1827
Letters 1828
Letters 1829
Letters 1830
Letters 1831
Letters 1832
Letters 1833
Letters 1834
Letters 1835
Letters 1836
Letters 1837
Letters 1838
Letters 1839
Letters 1840
Letters 1841
Letters 1842
Letters 1843
Letters 1844
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Heslington, 1810.
My dear Jeffrey,

I have just had a letter from Horner, who is in-
80MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH.
clined to think Perceval will make a struggle against the Prince. I wish he may, and so thoroughly disgust the said Prince, that no future meanness will be accepted as an atonement. The best news that Horner sends is, that the Prince has behaved extremely well. It is nonsense however to look about in England for political information. The most delicate and sensitive turpitude is always to be met with in Scotland: there are twenty people in Edinburgh whose manners and conduct are more perfect exponents of the King’s health than the signatures of his physicians.

I am obliged to you for the kind things you say to me about myself. There is nobody, my dear Jeffrey, whose good opinion I am more desirous of retaining, or whose sagacity and probity I more respect. Living a good deal alone (as I now do) will, I believe, correct me of my faults; for a man can do without his own approbation in much society, but he must make great exertions to gain it when he lives alone. Without it, I am convinced, solitude is not to be endured.

I have read, since I saw you, Burke’s works, some books of Homer, Suetonius, a great deal of agricultural reading, Godwin’s ‘Enquirer,’ and a great deal of Adam Smith. As I have scarcely looked at a book for five years, I am rather hungry.

God bless you, dear Jeffrey! Ever your sincere friend,

S. S.