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Rejoice with me, my friend. Hartley
is arrived, and has been little incommoded by
his journey. He has brought with him your
letter. Will you pardon me for omitting to
answer it immediately, and as fully as it deserves?
As soon as the tumults of my joy
settles down into calm, unruffled felicity, I
will comment upon every sentence. At present,
I must devote myself to console this
good lad for his sufferings, incurred, as he
presumes to say, entirely on my account.

And so you have deferred the happiness
of your Sedley for a whole month. I wonder
he has any patience with you; but he that has

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endured, without much discontent, the delay
of six or eight years (is it not so long?) ought
to be ashamed of his impatience at a new delay
of a few weeks.

Dear Mary, shall I tell you a secret? If
you add one week of probation to the four
already decreed, it is, by no means, impossible,
that the same day may witness the happiness
of both of us. May that day, whenever
it shall come, prove the beginning of joy to
Mary, and to her who, in every state, will be
your affectionate