Stowey, Feb. 10, 1803.
My dear Wedgwood,
With regard to myself and my accompanying you, let me say thus much. My
health is not worse than it was in the North; indeed it is much better.
I have no fears. But if you fear that, my health being what you know it
to be, the inconveniences of my being with you will be greater than the
advantages; (I feel no reluctance in telling you so) [1] it is so
entirely an affair of spirits and feeling that the conclusion must be
made by you, not in your reason, but purely in your spirit and feeling.
Sorry indeed should I be to know that you had gone abroad with one, to
whom you were comparatively indifferent. Sorry if there should be no one
with you, who could with fellow-feeling and general like-mindedness,
yield you sympathy in your sunshiny moments. Dear Wedgwood, my heart
swells within me as it were. I have no other wish to accompany you than
what arises immediately from my personal attachment, and a deep sense in
my own heart, that let us be as dejected as we will, a week together
cannot pass in which a mind like yours would not feel the want of
affection, or be wholly torpid to its pleasurable influences. I cannot
bear to think of your going abroad with a mere travelling companion;
with one at all influenced by salary, or personal conveniences. You will
not suspect me of flattering you, but indeed dear Wedgwood, you are too
good and too valuable a man to deserve to receive attendance from a
hireling, even for a month together, in your present state.
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