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Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin. Previously published: Charles Ramos, The Letters of Robert Southey to John May: 1797–1838 (Austin, Texas, 1976), pp. 75-77.
These letters were edited with the assistance of Carol Bolton, Tim Fulford and Ian Packer
For permission to publish the text of MSS in their possession, the editor wishes to thank the Beinecke Rare Books and Manuscript Library, Yale University; Berg Collection of English and American Literature, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations; the Bodleian Library Oxford University; the British Library; Boston Public Library; the Syndics of Cambridge University Library; the Syndics of the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge; Haverford College, Connecticut; the Historical Society of Pennsylvania; the Hornby Library, Liverpool Libraries and Information Services; the Houghton Library, Harvard University; the John Rylands Library, Manchester; the Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas; Luton Museum (Bedfordshire County Council); Massachusetts Historical Society; McGill University Library; the National Library of Scotland; the Newberry Library, Chicago; the New York Public Library (Pforzheimer Collections); the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York; the Public Record Offices of Bedford, Suffolk (Bury St Edmunds) and Northumberland, the Master and Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge; the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne; the Trustees of the William Salt Library, Stafford, the Wisbech and Fenland Museum; the University of Virginia Library.
A research grant from the British Academy made much of the archival work possible, as did support from the English Department of Nottingham Trent University.
Any dashes occurring in line breaks have been removed.
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Southey’s spelling has not been regularized.
Writing in other hands appearing on these manuscripts has been indicated as such, the content recorded in brackets.
& has been used for the ampersand sign.
£ has been used for £, the pound sign
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Your with the bank-post bill of £40 for Danvers arrived safely
& the money has been paid. the first part of your letter gave me great pleasure. what relates to Harry is every way unpleasant, – what William Taylor palliates as only an imprudence I feel to be a very serious & a very
dangerous fault. Harry’s allowance is surely a sufficient one. my dress,
including every article, costs me upon the average not more than £15 a year, set down 5 more for the indulgence of a pardonable pride
of appearance – & Harry ought to be contented. he must after his
washing & other little necessary expences be paid have a clear ten pounds for his yearly pleasures. xx his journey to Paris did not break in upon his allowance. Wm Taylor
you know bore his expences there, conditioning that he should pay for his own journey, x & Harry said he had his unencumbered quarterly sum for that – but I gave him
ten guineas for the occasion. The mischief is that prodigality is in his nature & in the nature of all my brothers. he must write
to Lisbon now – the act of writing will give him some pain, & the very gentle reproof which he will receive from <in> my Uncles answer ought to give
more <him> more – for he knows how my
Uncle, who would else be an opulent xxx man, has been & is still kept needy by spendthrift
connections. I will write to Wm Taylor. I do not like that substitution of
honour for steady principle, which he is disposed to make. Harrys
prospects are as good as he could wish if he did not mar them by his own folly. let him keep out of debt & about four years hence,
he is almost secure of xxx xxxxx a good practise in Norwich & he will probably marry well –
ambition will make him prudent the in that instance. he will do well in the world – but I have no
expectation of his doing good in the world. he has great talents, but no genius. videri might be his motto. I
should chuse esse to be mine.
I shall perhaps see you in the course of the summer. it was my design to go to London for the purpose of getting
materials in the Museumwhere that so compels me to great exercise
as London. the complaint is diabetes with a disposition in the kidneys to manufacture lime calculus
matter, which I hope has been discovered in time to prevent the bladder from becoming a lime-kiln. soda is the peculiar medicine
needful – aided by the red sulphat of iron, which is certainly the most powerful general tonic that has yet been discovered. I know
<not> how I can take so much exercise with so little expence & so much little loss of time as
by passing a fortnight with Rickman in London, & on resting myself
for two hours at midday in the Museum.
I must have expressed myself <meaning> improperly in my last if you understood
that I considered the present period, upon the general average of good & evil, as worse than older times. On the contrary it
appears to me very far the best, as being the most enlightened. it is the best for the best men, virtues & talents which would have
been blasted formerly can grow up & flourish now. what I meant to express was that the condition of the greater part of society –
of the poor, is more uniformly miserable now than it ever has been in any former period, & that, in consequence xxxx of the inevitable effects of our commercial system. they were exposed to sudden calamities formerly
from which we are now tolerably secure – war we have not at home – nor pestilence, nor actual famine. but when neither of these ravages <visitations> happened to be let loose the peasantry & labourers of England in old
times enjoyed a degree of comfort & plenty which they now never can attain. their morals & their health were not poisoned by
the soul-&-body-murdering plan of herding together in large & unwholesome manufactories. the aggregate of human wisdom &
human virtue is greater now. but the aggregate of human misery is increased also. Upon my view of the moral government of the world,
these progressive steps have all been needful – a state of innocence is necessarily insecure. the Tree of
Knowledgewisdom.
In the gospel – in the express words of Christ I find the distinctions of rank & riches expressly forbidden to his
disciples.this rule xxx the xxxxxxx xxxxx xxx xxxxxxx xxxx. now the institutions of society directly counteract the
main precepts of Christ. he forbids rank & riches & worldly ambition – to renounce them is not merely difficult now – it is
actually impossible – but either the way of the world or the way of the gospel must be wrong.
––––
Is not the time past when they nominate the boys for Christ Hospital?
Your letter could not be answered by return of post because letters are not delivered here till after the post returns.
our respects to Mrs May