Private Papers of William Wilberforce

"MY VERY DEAR BOY,--I congratulate you cordially on your success, and I rejoice to hear of your literary progress. But I should have been still more gratified, indeed beyond all...

Elizabeth would seem to have written to her father as to her solitariness of spirit in so confidential a strain that his sympathy had been thoroughly awakened. In his answer he...

"MY DEAR EMILY,--We had a delightful day yesterday for our ceremony, and after the indissoluble knot had been tied in due form, the parties drove off about 12 o'clock to spend a...

Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 44912-h.htm or 44912-h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/44...

"MY DEAR PITT,--My head and heart have been long full of some thoughts which I wished to state to you when a little less under extreme pressure than when Parliament is sitting....

"It has often been a matter of grief to me that both Henry and Robert have a sad habit of appearing, if not of being, inattentive at church. The former I have known turn half or...

Lord Holland,[38] described as "truly fascinating, having something of his uncle's good humour," by Wilberforce, writes of Abolition to him in 1815, and thinks "the cause had be...

"Any applications from your Society shall most certainly be attended to. Justice Addington's grievance in particular, which I was before acquainted with by a memorial, will be i...

"I could do nothing (without the Lord Lieutenant's warrant) but despatch the business of the Court of Chancery; and yet I am not to be trusted with the Great Seal _for a few day...

In 1803 the tardiness of our military preparations had been accentuated in a debate on the second reading of the Army Reserve Bill. Windham, of whom Wilberforce says that "he ha...

It was at Paris, in October, that Mr. Pitt first became acquainted with Mr. Rose, who was introduced to him by Lord Thurlow, whose fellow-traveller he was on the Continent; and...

"Whether regarded in relation to your bodily strength, your spiritual interests, or to prudence in affairs, I should be disposed to advise you to decline, with a due sense of ki...

Is it not a melancholy consideration that this very country, the constitution and laws of which have been the objects of the highest possible admiration of the wisest men, shoul...

"Why mention duplicity to me? You know there is not a human being further from it; and I know you don't in your heart believe one word upon the subject. If you do, you have not...

"I will remind you of an idea which I threw out on the day preceding your departure--that I feared I had scarcely enough endeavoured to impress on my children the idea that they...

In the concluding year of Wilberforce's life, though he complains of "becoming more and more stupid and inefficient," the feelings and thoughts which animated his life appear in...