declines for Surrey. Byng will probably be beat."

"Downing Street,
"Sunday, December 19, 1784.

"My dear Wilberforce,—I have been so diligently turning my thoughts on all sides since we parted, that tho' they have been turned to you as often as to any other quarter, I have never found the moment to put them into writing till now. I have not time to thank you sufficiently for the picturesque and poetical epistle I received from you dated, as I remember, from your boat, from the inside and the imperial of your postchaise, and two or three places more, and containing among a variety of accurate descriptions one in particular, viewed from all those different situations, of the sun setting in the middle of the day. I hope the whole of your tour has continued to be embellished by these happy incidents, and has kept you throughout in as mad and rhapsodical a mood as at that moment. I have some remorse in the immediate occasion of my writing to you just now; which, however, all things considered, I am bound to overcome. Be it known to you, then, that as much as I wish you to bask on, under an Italian sun, I am perhaps likely to be the instrument of snatching you from your present paradise, and hurrying you back to 'the rank vapours of this sin-worn mould.' A variety of circumstances concur to make it necessary to give notice immediately on the meeting of Parliament of the day on which I shall move the question of the Reform. We meet on the 25th of January, and I think about three weeks after, which will allow full time for a call of the House, will be as late as I can easily defer it. I would not for a thousand reasons have you absent, tho' I hate that you should come before your time, and if any particular circumstances made a week or ten days a matter of real importance to you, I think I could postpone it as long as that.

"Only let me hear from you positively before the meeting of Parliament. The chief thing necessary is that I should then be able to name some day, and the precise day is of less consequence. You will hardly believe me if I tell you that I entertain the strongest hope of coming very near, if not absolutely succeeding. I have seen the Oracle of Yorkshire, Wyvill, and made him completely happy with the prospect.

"All things are going, on the whole, exceeding well. You will have learnt that the Old Boy at last overcame his doubts, and has ventured single into the Cabinet, which is a great point happily settled. God bless you.

"Ever most faithfully yours.
"W. Pitt."

"1784.

"My dear Wilberforce,—I am sorry to find from your letter from Nottingham that the Knight of Yorkshire is in so much dudgeon. Tho', to say the truth the instances of neglect you mention are enough to provoke common patience. What is worse, I know no remedy for it. My letter, which missed you, contained no other information than that the place of Marshall of the Admiralty had been long since filled up. Some of the world is here at present, and will be multiplying every day till the meeting of Parliament. I expect Eliot in a very few days. I know nothing of Bankes very lately. Pray come to Wimbledon as soon as possible; I want to talk with you about your navy bills, which, tho' all your ideas now must go to landed property, you should not entirely forget, and about ten thousand other things. By the by, Lord Scarborough is risen from the dead, as you probably know. I have just received an account from Whitbread that St. Andrew loses his election by three; and would probably lose by more if he chooses a scrutiny or a petition. Adieu.

"Ever yrs.,
"W. Pitt.

"For the sake of this letter I am leaving a thousand others unanswered, and a thousand projects unread. You will probably think it was hardly worth while."

The brotherly intimacy between Pitt and Wilberforce is clearly shown in the next letter. Wilberforce had written to Pitt to tell him of the change in his religious opinions, and, in consequence, of his probable retirement from political life. He no doubt thought that Pitt would fail to sympathise with his altered views, but the man who was "so absorbed in politics that he had never given himself time for due reflection on religion"[5] wished to understand the religious difficulties of his friend, and with the greatest tenderness begs him to open his mind to "one who does not know how to separate your happiness from his own."

"Downing Street,
"December 2, 1785.

"My dear Wilberforce,—Bob Smith[6] mentioned to me on Wednesday the letters he had received from you, which prepared me for that I received from you yesterday. I am indeed too deeply interested in whatever concerns you not to be very sensibly affected by what has the appearance of a new æra in your life, and so important in its consequences for yourself and your friends. As to any public conduct which your opinions may ever lead you to, I will not disguise to you that few things could go nearer my heart than to find myself differing from you essentially on any great principle.

"I trust and believe that it is a circumstance which can hardly occur. But if it ever should, and even if I should experience as much pain in such an event, as I have found hitherto encouragement and pleasure in the reverse, believe me it is impossible that it should shake the sentiments of affection and friendship which I bear towards you, and which I must be forgetful and insensible indeed if I ever could part with. They are sentiments engraved in my heart, and will never be effaced or weakened. If I knew how to state all I feel, and could hope that you are open to consider it, I should say a great deal more on the subject of the resolution you seem to have formed. You will not suspect me of thinking lightly of any moral or religious motives which guide you. As little will you believe that I think your understanding or judgment easily misled. But forgive me if I cannot help expressing my fear that you are nevertheless deluding yourself into principles which have but too much tendency to counteract your own object, and to render your virtues and your talents useless both to yourself and mankind. I am not, however, without hopes that my anxiety paints this too strongly. For you confess that the character of religion is not a gloomy one, and that it is not that of an enthusiast. But why then this preparation of solitude, which can hardly avoid tincturing the mind either with melancholy or superstition? If a Christian may act in the several relations of life, must he seclude himself from them all to become so? Surely the principles as well as the practice of Christianity are simple, and lead not to meditation only but to action. I will not, however, enlarge upon these subjects now. What I would ask of you, as a mark both of your friendship and of the candour which belongs to your mind, is to open yourself fully and without reserve to one, who, believe me, does not know how to separate your happiness from his own. You do not explain either the degree or the duration of the retirement which you have prescribed to yourself; you do not tell me how