William Wilberforce, London, to John Ryland, Jr., Bristol, 10 April 1821.

My dear Sir.

  Let me in the first place assure you with perfect truth, that I feel your application to me to be a mark of your Esteem & confidence which it gives me pleasure to have reason to believe that I possess.  I will add, the assurance that it would give me sincere pleasure to render you the service you desire.  But the honest truth is, that it has for many years been a rule with me, not to ask any favor of Government.  You know that I never attached myself to any particular party, conceiving from various considerations, that it became me, both as Member for Yorkshire, & as a personal friend of Mr Pitt’s, to maintain my Independence with peculiar strictness.  I laid down to myself & have since adhered to, this rigid rule; though often greatly at the expence of my personal feelings.   I fear you will find it peculiarly difficult to obtain any situation now, because the termination of the War has poured into the Civil Service, those who used to enter into the Naval or Military line.  The only department which might seem open to me through private friends is, that of ye East India Company’s service.  But a young Man of age could only be employed at Home, & the openings are so very few, that though I have made several efforts for these, thro’ different Friends, I never succeeded in any one instance.

I am sorry to send you so unacceptable a reply, but even this is better than keeping you in suspence, & when I was a young Man, I learned from painful Experience how necessary it was to avoid exciting Expectations which I was not sure I should be able to fulfil.

  I remain

  with esteem & regard

  My dear Sir

  Yours very sincerely

  W Wilberforce

To The Revd Dr Ryland.

Text: Wilberforce-Ryland Letters, shelfmark MS. G97a, Bristol Baptist College Library, fol. 14 (letter is not in Wilberforce’s hand; dated 10 April 1821 on the back page in Ryland’s hand).