“My dear Lockhart,—Your truly acceptable news gave me as much pleasure as circumstances make me at present capable of receiving. I am happy to think Sophia and the baby are doing well; and for dear Johnnie, as I remember myself on my back, and shrouded in a new sheepskin, taken hot from the back of the animal to communicate some genial warmth to the wearer, I have strong hopes that his present confinement may not prevent his enjoying robust health at a future period of life, and his lively temper and disposition to collect information will make the necessary confinement less irksome than one would guess. I who recollect much of a sickly infancy and childhood can judge well of this.
“I have no good news to send you in return—none—and you must take your own time and manner
| 406 | LIFE OF J. G. LOCKHART. |
“I send enclosed the greater part of the dramatic article; you will readily excuse the lateness and the quality when you read what is gone before; but I think it is unmanly to sit down to fold one’s hands in helpless regret, when exertion may do good to yourself and others. My philosophy, if it can be called such, is that of the porch” (stoicism).
“If Charles chooses to fall back on the Church, of course I may be of use to him; but it is entre nous a sneaking line unless the adoption of it is dictated by a strong feeling of principle, and one which, with good prospects in that career, I renounced.1 I would not go to the altar for a bit of bread unless I could do so with a strong conviction that I could adopt, in the fullest extent, the doctrines which I was to teach.
“I will put off Chaffin (Cranbourne Chase) to another occasion, unless you want it much.2 I cannot write anything about the author unless I know it can hurt no one alive, and your well-intended offer would not mend the matter, because it is not that I care for the consequences of such a thing personally, but because I do not think it right. What I consider right to do I am not anxious to conceal from any one, and what is not right should not be done at all.”
