you I feel on account of your good letter you cannot estimate--nearer
than when we slept in the same bed. Nearness of body is no evidence
of the distance between souls, for I imagine Christ loved His mother
very tenderly when He said, 'Woman, what have I to do with thee?'"

"I have felt, time and again, that either I would have to give up the
life that was struggling in me, or withdraw from business in the way
that we pursue it. This I had long felt, before the period came which
suddenly threw me involuntarily out of it. Here I am, living in the
present, without a why or a wherefore, trusting that something will
shape my course intelligibly. I am completely without object. And
when occasionally I emerge, if I may so speak, into actual life, I
feel that I have dissipated time. A sense of guilt accompanies that
of pleasure, and I return inwardly into a deeper, intenser life,
breaking those tender roots which held me fast for a short period to
the outward. In study only do I enter with wholeness; nothing else
appears to take hold of my life." . . . "I am staying here,
intentionally, for a short period. When the time arrives" (for
leaving) "heaven knows what I may do. I am now perfectly dumb before
it. Perhaps I may return and enter into business with more
perseverance and industry than before; perhaps I may stay here; it
may be that I shall be led elsewhere. But there is no utility in
speculating on the future. If we lived as we should, we would feel
that we lived in the presence of God, without past or future, having
a full consciousness of existence, living the 'eternal life.' . . .

"George, do not get too engrossed with outward business. Rather
neglect a part of it for that which is immortal in its life,
incomparable in its fulness. It is a deep, important truth: 'Seek
first the kingdom of God, and then all things will be added.' In