les, and led to prison; the streets are safe and
quiet: lord George was last night sent to the Tower. Mr. John Wilkes
was, this day, with a party of soldiers, in my neighbourhood, to seize
the publisher of a seditious paper. Every body walks, and eats, and
sleeps in security. But the history of the last week would fill you with
amazement: it is without any modern example.

Several chapels have been destroyed, and several inoffensive papists
have been plundered, but the high sport was to burn the gaols. This was
a good rabble trick. The debtors and the criminals were all set at
liberty; but, of the criminals, as has always happened, many are already
retaken, and two pirates have surrendered themselves, and it is expected
that they will be pardoned.

Government now acts again with its proper force; and we are all again
under the protection of the king and the law. I thought that it would be
agreeable to you and my master, to have my testimony to the publick
security; and that you would sleep more quietly, when I told you, that
you are safe. I am, dearest lady, your, &c.

XLVI.--To MRS. THRALE.

London, April 5, 1781.

DEAREST MADAM,--Of your injunctions, to pray for you, and write to you,
I hope to leave neither unobserved; and I hope to find you willing, in a
short time, to alleviate your trouble by some other exercise of the
mind. I am not without my part of the calamity. No death, since that of
my wife, has ever oppressed me like this. But let us remember, that we
are in the hands of him who knows when to give and when to take away;
who will look upon us, with mercy, through all our variations of
existence, and who invites us to call on him in the day of trouble. Call
upon him in this great revolution of life, and call with confidence. You
will then find comfort for the past, and support for the future. He that
has given you happiness in marriage, to a degree of which, without
personal knowledge, I should have thought the description fabulous, can
give you another mode of happiness as a mother, and, at last, the
happiness of losing all temporal cares, in the thoughts of an eternity
in heaven.

I do not exhort you to reason yourself into tranquillity. We must first
pray, and then labour; first implore the blessing of God, and use those
means which he puts into our hands. Cultivated ground has few weeds; a
mind, occupied by lawful business, has little room for useless regret.

We read the will to-day; but I wil