I feel ashamd and distressd when I think how long I have left your most obliging and valuable Letter unanswerd. Indeed great part of the time I have been under the deep affliction of parting with our eldest and most deserving Daughter to the distance of Bengal. I do not mean to depretiate the rest; but She had more of that domestick kindness and attention which You know how to value and which an old Man wants and delights in. And tho’ Sir Wm Jones is a worthy and indeed a superior Man; yet so total a Seperation with only a base [bare?] distant possibility of meeting again is as deeply and as tenderly affecting, if I can judge truely of my own feelings as his [her?] Death itself would have been.

I have had a very agreable visit from your very respectable Nephew Mr. Williams. With a great tincture of Piety He seems to have preservd the old English Sense and Spirit, and Honesty, which the first Settlers exported in so large a quantity to America and have left an utter Scarcity of them here. You think too highly of us when You suppose that We have gaind Wisdom by all our misfortunes. We have discoverd many frauds and abuses; but corrected very few; and very little of the small savings We have made has been restord to the Publick. The old Rockingham Party, now headed by the D of Portland are a set of upright respectable Men but they have an aversion to every thing that they call a change in the Constitution; and yet without some change there can be no improvement. You know too as well as I, that these honest Men whom I lookd upon as the hopes of their Country are united with Ld North and his meritorious Band, on condition that the latter shall share only in the profits without interfering in the measures of Government. But I own I tremble for the Event of a Union with Men, who protest against all Improvement, who think that Corruption is the main Spring of Government and that We have already weakend it too much; and from whom it would be folly to expect either good Faith or Moderation. How different is all this from the liberal Spirit with which your thirteen States have formed their Constitutions availing themselves of the hights and Experience of all former Times and Countries with the courage to hazard any great Trial that inventive Philosophy may suggest. My Mind looks with impatience and wonder towards the new Scenes that so many wise Institutions seem to promise; for I think that the Virtues and Understandings of Men are not only cultivated, but almost created by the Government they live under.

But these thoughts and a thousand more I hope soon to have the pleasure of discussion in free conversation with my dear and venerable friend. May your Stay with us be long; and after all your Labours and Triumphs may You find many days to enjoy repose at Twyford amidst your adopted Daughter in a Family that in affection is your own. Your ever obligd and affectionate