en into this private place
of his affections posterity should follow him with a complete approval;
and he was willing, in order that this might be so, to exhibit the
defects of his lost friend, and tell the world what weariness he had
sustained through her unhappy disposition. There is something here that
reminds one of Rousseau.

I do not think he ever saw Mrs. Locke after he left Geneva; but his
correspondence with her continued for three years. It may have continued
longer, of course, but I think the last letters we possess read like the
last that would be written. Perhaps Mrs. Locke was then re-married, for
there is much obscurity over her subsequent history. For as long as
their intimacy was kept up, at least, the human element remains in the
Reformer's life. Here is one passage, for example, the most likable
utterance of Knox's that I can quote:--Mrs. Locke has been upbraiding
him as a bad correspondent. "My remembrance of you," he answers, "is not
so dead, but I trust it shall be fresh enough, albeit it be renewed by
no outward token for one year. _Of nature, I am churlish; yet one thing
I ashame not to affirm, that familiarity once thoroughly contracted was
never yet broken on my default. The cause may be that I have rather need
of all, than that any have need of me._ However it (_that_) be, it
cannot be, as I say, the corporal absence of one year or two that can
quench in my heart that familiar acquaintance in Christ Jesus, which
half a year did engender, and almost two years did nourish and confirm.
And therefore, whether I write or no, be assuredly persuaded that I have
you in such memory as becometh the faithful to have of the
faithful."[111] This is the truest touch of personal humility that I can
remember to have seen in all the five volumes of the Reformer's
collected works: It is no small honour to Mrs. Locke that his affection
for her should have brought home to him this unwonted feeling of
dependence upon others. Everything else in the course of the
correspondence testifies to a good, sound, downright sort of friendship
between the two, less ecstatic than it was at first, perhaps, but
serviceable and very equal. He gives her ample details as to the
progress of the work of reformation; sends her the sheets of the
"Confession of Faith," "in quairs," as he calls it; asks her to assist
him with her prayers, to collect money for the good cause in Scotland,
and to send him books for himself--books by Calvin