I am always wondering if any body in the world is the better off for my
being in it. And so if I was of any comfort to you, I am very glad of
it. I do want, I confess, the privilege of offering you sometimes the
wine and oil of consolation, and if I do it in such a way as to cause
pain with my unskilful hand, why, you must forgive me.... Mr. ----
talked to me as if he imagined me a blue-stocking. Just because my
sister wears spectacles, folks take it for granted that I also am
literary.

_Aug. 25th._--You ask if I find it easy to engage in religious
meditation, referring in particular to that on our final rest. This is
another of my trials. I can not meditate upon anything, except indeed it
be something quite the opposite of what I wish to occupy my mind. You
know that some Christians are able in their solitary walks and rides
to hold, all the time, communion with God. I can very seldom do this.
Yesterday I was obliged to take a long walk alone, and it was made very
delightful in this way; so that I quite forgot that I was alone.... I am
beginning to feel, that I have enough to do without looking out for a
great, wide place in which to work, and to appreciate the simple lines:

"The trivial round, the common task,
Would furnish all we ought to ask;
Room to deny ourselves; a road
To bring us daily nearer God."

Those words "daily nearer God" have an inexpressible charm for me. I
long for such nearness to Him that all other objects shall fade into
comparative insignificance,--so that to have a thought, a wish, a
pleasure apart from Him shall be impossible.