--Yours sincerely,
'C. BRONTE.'
TO W. S. WILLIAMS
'HAWORTH, _October_ 6_th_, 1848.
'MY DEAR SIR,--I thank you for your last truly friendly letter, and
for the number of _Blackwood_ which accompanied it. Both arrived at
a time when a relapse of illness had depressed me much. Both did me
good, especially the letter. I have only one fault to find with your
expressions of friendship: they make me ashamed, because they seem to
imply that you think better of me than I merit. I believe you are
prone to think too highly of your fellow-creatures in general--to see
too exclusively the good points of those for whom you have a regard.
Disappointment must be the inevitable result of this habit. Believe
all men, and women too, to be dust and ashes--a spark of the divinity
now and then kindling in the dull heap--that is all. When I looked
on the noble face and forehead of my dead brother (nature had
favoured him with a fairer outside, as well as a finer constitution,
than his sisters) and asked myself what had made him go ever wrong,
tend ever downwards, when he had so many gifts to induce to, and aid
in, an upward course, I seemed to receive an oppressive revelation of
the feebleness of humanity--of the inadequacy of even genius to lead
to true greatness if unaided by religion and principle.
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