you retain an inherent respect for the religion of your forefathers.

"I have often reflected on your trials, and the fortitude with which
you have sustained them, with astonishment. Yours has been no common
lot. But you seem to have forgotten the right use of adversity.
Afflictions from Heaven 'are angels sent on embassies of love.' We
must improve, and not abuse them, to obtain the blessing. They are
commissioned to stem the tide of impetuous passion; to check
inordinate ambition; to show us the insignificance of earthly
greatness; to wean our affections from transitory things, and elevate
them to those realities which are ever blooming at the right hand of
God. When affliction is thus sanctified, 'the heart at once it humbles
and exalts.'

"Was it philosophy that supported you in your trials? There is an hour
approaching when philosophy will fail, and all human science will
desert you. What then will be your substitute? Tell me, Colonel Burr,
or rather answer it to your own heart, when the pale messenger
appears, how will you meet him--'undamped by doubts, undarkened by
despair?'

"The enclosed is calculated to excite mingled sensations both of a
melancholy and pleasing nature. The hand that penned it is now among
'the just made perfect.' Your mother had given you up by faith. Have
you ever ratified the vows she made in your behalf? When she bade you
a long farewell, she commended you to the protection of Him who had
promised to be a father to the fatherless." The great Augustine, in
his early years, was an infidel in his principles, and a libertine in
his conduct, which his pious mother deplored with bitter weeping. But
she was told by her friends that 'the child of so many prayers, and