Saturday May? 1747 Dear Brother,

According to my promise I have done my best to perswade father to Consent to your going, but he is so averse't to it that it is in vain to Say any more and his reasons I think, are good so that I had nothing to urge but your health. He says you may ride as much as you please at home or go out of town in a Suitable manner but not into a town among your friends with one so much beneath them.1

I pray that you wou'd dismiss the thoughts and when you hear all the reasons I doubt not but you will be Convince'd that it is best. Freeman Came home Last night and Asa2 has brought up Stirgis's horse. Aunt Eunice3 Came home yesterday & Longs to see you. I Expect to see you next week. Remain in great haste your Loving Sis,

ABIGAIL PAINE

RC ; addressed: "To Mr. Robert Treat Paine att Cambridge"; endorsed.

1.

RTP was in Boston on holiday from May 26 to June 2. He gives no hint in his diary of the proposed excursion.

2.

Asa Soper was in the Paine household from 1747 and was formally apprenticed to Thomas Paine by the Overseers of the Poor of Boston on Sept. 7, 1749, to learn the trade of shopkeeping. He was to be "set free" Oct. 22, 1755 (Publications of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts 43[1966]: 440).

3.

Eunice Willard (1695–1751), sister of RTP's grandmother, apparently lived alternately with the Paine family and with her brother, Province Secretary Josiah Willard, who lived nearby (Paine, Paine Ancestry, 18). RTP notes her death on July 25, 1751, in his diary.

Cambridge May the 5th AD 1747

Quo non Charior ullus.1 Frindship is that dilectable bond by which friends are united, than which nothing Can be more pleassnt. To this David of old Seam's to alude when he Saith how good and how pleasent is it to See brethrethen thus dwell together in unity, may it not with the Same justis be Said of Clasmates as he Said of breathren. To use your words thanks be to my jenial Stars that it was my happy lot to Contract Such an acquaintance with you that the Silver Cord of frindship hath rap'd wrapped our united Souls in Such a glorious Concord. O! had I had I all the tunefull art or did the noble fire wch. inspir'd the poets brasts of 13old inspird myne it would not be Sufficient to discribe the arduous love & noble value I have for you. When I think of representing my ansious Love & my ardent affection to you alas! my fainting muse folds up her wings unable to Sustain the task—wt. words Shall I Seak or what numbers Shall I Chuse to paint my arddent passion & my warm desires. Suffer me to break of with venting a few pasnate desires & weaping forth Sum broken accents—may heaven ever protect you whose prosperity is my hapyness & hose misfortune is my misiry may the extended wing of Gods watchfull Care preserve you in hose preservation mine Consists when gloomy night extends his Leaden Septure o're the world may the gardean angels preserve you in your Dorment howers which is the prayer of Yr.,

PHILOMATHIA2

RC ; addressed: "To Mr. Robt. Tret Pane of Harvard College in Cambridge these QDC"; endorsed: "Ezekiel Dodge recd. 1747."

1.

Thou whom no other dearer.

2.

Ezekiel Dodge (1723–1770), a classmate of RTP at Harvard, called “Father Dodge" by his classmates, later second minister of the First Congregational Church of Abington, Mass. ( Sibley's Harvard Graduates , 12:367–369).