To Prof. Convers Francis.
Wayland, August 8, 1858.
I think you have done a vast amount of good in many ways.
Your conversation always tends to enlarge and liberalize the minds with which you come in contact; more than a dozen times I have heard people speak of the good your sympathizing words have done them in times of affliction; and for myself, I can say most truly before God that I consider such intellectual culture as I have mainly attributable to your influence; and most sincerely can I say, moreover, that up to this present hour I prize a chance for communion with your mind more than I do with any other person I know. ... In a literary point of view, I know that I have only a local reputation, “done in water-colors.” . . . I am not what I aspired to be in my days of young ambition; but I have become humble enough to be satisfied with the conviction that what I have written has always been written conscientiously ; that I have always spoken with sincerity, if not with power.
In every direction I see young giants rushing past me, at times pushing me somewhat rudely in their speed, but I am glad to see such strong laborers to plough the land and sow the seed for coming years.