…In the evening Joseph Fuller Jr smoked a pipe with me. Thoroughly melancholy all day. My loss, my loss, how great; but yet I am thoroughly sensible and doubt not but the unerring ways of Providence direct and govern all the affairs of man with infinite goodness and undoubtedly know what is better for us than we poor short-sighted creatures of a day can for ourselves. Therefore I humbly submit I hope with as much cheerfulness as possible to the divine will, and I am sure I desire nothing so much as to improve in virtue, knowing (were my wife alive, whose memory I hope will ever be dear to me) nothing could equal the satisfaction she would enjoy in the sight of it. I am truly certain by daily experience that frail and fallen man stands as it were surrounded with temptations, but still we have the promise of infinite goodness (if we are not wanting to ourselves) that we shall never be tempted above what we are able to bear. Therefore, may the pangs and agonies of that dear creature (my wife) be always fresh in my memory and act as an encitement to spur me on to prepare for that awful minute when death shall separate the soul from this mortal body. This I am sure should be the true use I ought to make of her death, and which through the assistance of divine grace I hope to do… [59 words omitted].