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The clouds are thick about me, I cannot see the face of one Angel, nor hear the flitting of a wing, nor the echo of a harp, nor one whisper on the breeze. My heart is hard and I cannot weep. I am not good or I were more blessed and more happy, and more like the sweet spirits, who with folded pinions linger unseen above our pathway, ever beckoning us on in the good and right way.

Oh that I could dissolve my thoughts and mould them anew, free from all evil. Oh, that in the light of heaven I could whiten my immortal nature from all the stains which sin has made. Then my soul would put on her wings and go to breathe the expansive airs of heaven, and seize upon the revelations of her spiritual being, and learn her destiny in the future life, whither to our shortsightedness the way is unmarked, and to our weak faith and little courage her realities are solemn and fearful and when we would enter there and grow familiar with its white scenes, something earthly draws us back, and whispers, "not yet, no, not yet." Oh, my soul, when wilt thou be ready? when will thy work be done? when wilt thou rise and set thy house in order, and see to it that thy charities be all numbered, and thy goods be distributed to the poor, and hasten thy feet to the abodes of the distressed, set thy hand to smooth the pillow of the sick, arid place cooling waters to his fevered lips? Thy field of labor is in this life, and what thou wouldst do for God, thou must do for his creatures.

Institution for the Blind, June 12th, 1848.

FRIEND MUMFORD: -- I find here so little incident, so little that is sufficiently suggestive to awaken and call forth those lively emotions winch make the soul of epistolary writing, that I really approach it with diffidence.

Besides, you must not expect me to invest my pages with that coloring and vivacity that I would, were I mingling more with the world. Retirement is favorable to sentiment, but pent-up feelings die; and unexpressed and unshared thoughts do wither.

We are so constituted that suggestive society of some kind is needful, as well for our health and happiness as our mental culture. Thinking is perhaps a more healthful exercise for the mind than reading, for books are but the symbols of thought and feeling; and as the substance is preferred to the shadow, so the original is better than the copy. The sources of conversation and locality from which we can derive any positive improvement, cover only a little space in the learned world; to the active mind, hardly more than the boundary that girts the infant's cradle.

The future is unknown. We have not an eye like the Infinite, to pierce its dark veil, and read its mystic lore. To the past, then, we must go for knowledge, and books are its only chronicles, the only caskets in which its priceless pearls are set. To me the temples of knowledge are all barred, and its fountains are dried or turned to rocks, and I have no power to bring again their gushing waters. I may no more drink from the streams of Pieria, or sip the dews of Castalia.

Evermore mine is the brow of night, whose stars are set. Flowers are at my feet, and dews like diamonds are scattered, all around, but the light is gone, and I cannot see them. Grief has long had a place in my heart, and melancholy and sorrow have been familiar; but to-day something like the shadow of despair is nestling there. Oh God! save me, save me, oh God! There is a wildness in my thoughts, a dread, a torturing fear that is swallowing up my very life in wretchedness, more than words can speak. How real sorrow doth deceive the world! She weeps the long night away, and at morn puts on a sunny brow to meet those around her; and while they wonder at her cheerful joy, she answers well and wisely too; "ills are only severe blessings, and then received with a prepared heart, they do us the greater good." Besides, if we would please others, we must ourselves at least seem to be pleased; and it is well when, as Goldsmith says of the French, we grow to be what we seem. Common pity mixed with common scorn I do despise, my soul loathes the very word; but give me your friendship growing from esteem, and I will thank you and love you too; and such as my poor heart has will I give in return, and perhaps in our little commerce we may both grow richer.

You remember deaf Maggie. To-day I engaged to entertain her, but her senseless gibberings have wearied and sickened every feeling, till my spirit cries, "How long, Oh Lord! how long?" One can play the philanthropist to the low and ignorant, and share their little thoughts, and if possible try to lift them higher, and with ready delight minister to their wants; but to be ever companioned with them, to be herded one of them, is hard to bear.

My whole nature thirsts for a higher and more improving intercourse, and longs to feast again upon the beauties of kindling and inspiring thoughts. We are progressive beings, and our every act, every thought or emotion, should be a step in our progressive life. As the least blow upon this little earth, in its acting and reacting force is felt through the illimitable fields of space, and that eternally, so man's most simple word or feeling, in its effects will remain unmeasured, when matter's last atom shall have wandered back to that chaos, whence it came forth.