to say that she and Bro are going to dine with Mrs. Robert Martin
to-morrow. I must tell you that Georgie and I went to hear Dr.
Chalmers preach, three Sundays ago. His sermon was on a text whose
extreme beauty would diffuse itself into any sermon preached upon
it--God is love. His eloquence was very great, and his views noble and
grasping. I expected much from his imagination, but not so much from
his knowledge. It was truer to Scripture than I was prepared for,
although there seemed to me some _want_ on the subject of the work
of the Holy Spirit on the heart, which work we cannot dwell upon too
emphatically. 'He worketh in us to will and to do,' and yet we are apt
to will and do without a transmission of the praise to Him. May God
bless you.

[Footnote 34: _Poetical Works_, ii. 83.]


_To Miss Commeline_
London: August 19, 1837.

My dear Miss Commeline,--I could not hear of your being in affliction
without very frequent thoughts of you and a desire to express some of
them in this way, and although so much time has passed I do hope that
you will believe in the sympathy with which I, or rather _we_, have
thought of you, and in the regard we shall not cease to feel for you
even if we meet no more in this world. It is blessed to know both
for ourselves and for each other that while there is a darkness that
_must_ come to all, there is a light which _may_; and may He who is
the light in the dark place be with you [now] and always, causing you
to feel rather the glory that is in Him than the shadow which is in
all beside--that so the sweetness of the consolation may pass the