We set out between six and seven in the morning of
Thursday, with sixteen heavy boxes and portfolios full of prints.
And now begins a new life, because another covering of earth is
shaken off. I am more famed in heaven for my works than I could well
conceive. In my brain are studies and chambers filled with books and
pictures of old, which I wrote and painted in ages of eternity
before my mortal life; and those works are the delight and study of
archangels. Why then should I be anxious about the riches or fame of
mortality? The Lord our Father will do for us and with us according to
His divine will, for our good.
You, O dear Flaxman! are a sublime archangel,--my friend and companion
from eternity. In the divine bosom is our dwelling-place. I look back
into the regions of reminiscence, and behold our ancient days before
this earth appeared in its vegetated mortality to my mortal vegetated
eyes. I see our houses of eternity which can never be separated,
though our mortal vehicles should stand at the remotest corners of
heaven from each other.
Farewell, my best friend! Remember me and my wife in love and
friendship to our dear Mrs. Flaxman, whom we ardently desire to
entertain beneath our thatched roof of rusted gold.
TO THOMAS BUTTS
_Trouble in the path_
Felpham, 10 _Jan._ 1802.
Dear Sir,
Your very kind and affectionate letter, and the many kind things you
have said in it, called upon me for an immediate answer. But it found
my wife and myself so ill, and my wife so very ill, that till now I
have not been able to do this duty.
Pages:
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264