A breviate of the life of Margaret, the daughter of Francis Charlton ... and…

This was written to her in her sickness, when, for better Air, she lay at Old Mr. Richard Folly's house, at Stourbridge.

This was written to her in her sickness, when, for better Air, she lay at Old Mr. Richard Foly's house, at Stourbridge.

§. 24. I have transcribed these, to show the mind and care of the good Gentlewoman, and what cause I and my Neighbours had of compassion to her in her Sorrows, when she was separated from an only Son, whose welfare she had prosecuted with so strong affection, and long labour and patience, and began to have much comfort in this Daughter whom she had formerly least valued, and thought she must so suddenly leave her. Let those that think these too little matters to be told the World, remember, that Nearness, Love and Sorrow, may be allowed to make things greater to me, than they seem to those that are not so concerned in them. And that Mr. Fox in his Book of Martyrs, publisheth a great number of as mean Letters as any of these, even some of women, and some written to the Martyrs, as well as those written by them. And while I say that, I will add, that though for Nineteen years I was so seldom from her, that she had few Letters of mine, ⟨p. 84⟩[…] ⟨p. 85⟩[…] ⟨p. 86⟩yet those which she had I find now among her reserved Papers: And that you may see what it was that I' thought she most desired, and what she her self most valued, I will here add one of them (not venturing to trouble such with more, as are affected little with any matters but their own, which is the case of most). I recite this rather than others, partly also as an act of repentance for those failings of her just expectations, by the neglect of such helps as I should have given her, which I had here mentioned. For though she oft said, that before she Married me she expected more sourness, and unsuitableness than she found; yet I am sure that she found less zeal, and holiness, and strictness in all words, and looks, and duties, and less help for her soul than she expected: And her temper was to aggravate a fault much more in her nearest and dearest friends than in any others, and to be far more troubled at them. But this use she made of my too cold and careless converse, and of all my impatience with her impatience, and of all my hasty words, that she that had long thought she had no grace, because she reached not higher than almost any reach on Earth, and because she had many Passions and Infirmities, perceived by me and many other esteemed Teachers, that we were all as bad as she;