Line after line my gushing eye o'erflow,
Led thro' a said variety of woe:
Now warm in read more

Line after line my gushing eye o'erflow,
Led thro' a said variety of woe:
Now warm in love, now with'ring in my bloom,
Lost in a convent's solitary gloom!

Now my days are swifter than a post: they flee away, they see no
good.

Now my days are swifter than a post: they flee away, they see no
good.

Letters, from absent friends, extinguish fear,
Unite division, and draw distance near;
Their magic force each silent read more

Letters, from absent friends, extinguish fear,
Unite division, and draw distance near;
Their magic force each silent wish conveys,
And wafts embodied though, a thousand ways:
Could souls to bodies write, death's pow'r were mean,
For minds could then meet minds with heav'n between.

Messenger of sympathy and love,
Servant of parted friends,
Consoler of the lonely,
Bond read more

Messenger of sympathy and love,
Servant of parted friends,
Consoler of the lonely,
Bond of the scattered family,
Enlarger of the common life.

Belshazzar had a letter,--
He never had but one;
Belshazzar's correspondence
Concluded and begun
read more

Belshazzar had a letter,--
He never had but one;
Belshazzar's correspondence
Concluded and begun
In that immortal copy
The conscience of us all
Can read without its glasses
On revelation's wall.

Ev'n so, with all submission, I
. . . .
Send you each year a homely letter,
read more

Ev'n so, with all submission, I
. . . .
Send you each year a homely letter,
Who may return me much a better.

(He) put that which was most material in the postscript.

(He) put that which was most material in the postscript.

Heav'n first taught letters for some wretch's aid,
Some banish'd lover, or some captive maid.

Heav'n first taught letters for some wretch's aid,
Some banish'd lover, or some captive maid.

Soon as thy letters trembling I unclose,
That well-known name awakens all my woes.

Soon as thy letters trembling I unclose,
That well-known name awakens all my woes.