Philip Doddridge, Market Harborough, to Isaac Watts, [London], 22 November 1729.

        I hope you will pardon the Liberty I take of reminding you of a Letter I wrote to you a Fortnight ago to beg the Favour of your Advice in the present circumstance of my Affairs. I would by no Means urge to any Thing which would be an Inconvenience to you, but as it is high Time the Business should be determin’d & many Ill Consequences may follow on keeping it longer in Suspense I expect your Answer with some Impatience. I fear least in this sickly Season some Illness should have prevented your Writing. I heartily pray for the Continuance of that Life & Health which is so important to the Church & the World & am

                        with much greater Respect than I can express

                                    Revd Sir

                                                your most obliged

                                                                   & affectionate Servt

                                                                            P Doddridge

Harbro Nov. 22. 1729

P. S. Mr Jos. Saunders (Brother to Mr J. Saunders of Kettering is one of my Pupils) is a Man of so good a Genius & so excellent a Character that I conceive very delightful Hopes with Regard to him. His Circumstances are narrow & those of his excellent Brother are at present much perplex’d. His Coming to me has prevented his having an Exhibition from either of ye Funds which makes me the more solicitous to do him what Service I can by recommending him to the my Friends. If it lies in your Way Sir to give any Assistance towards his Education I should take it as a particular Favour & I hope you would have a great deal of Reason to be thoroughly satisfied, in having chosen a very worthy object of Regard.

Mr Some & Mrs Jennings are very much at your Service

Text: Simon Gratz Collection, British Authors, Case 10, Box 28, Folder 55, Historical Society of Pennsylvania. MS not previously published; comments upon the interactions of Doddridge and Watts in 1729 can be found in The Posthumous Works of Isaac Watts (1779), vol. 2, p.23; and in Thomas Milner, Life of Isaac Watts (1834), 468. Doddridge had written to Watts on 8 November 1729 and would accept the call to the Castle Hill congregation in Northampton in a letter to the church on 6 December 1729 (see Nuttall, Calendar, letters 331-33). Nuttall used the two references above for his citation of this letter in his Calendar; for some reason, this letter was not cited in his Philip Doddridge: Additional Letters (2001), suggesting it was not sent with the other letters from the Historical Society of Pennsylvania that do appear in Additional Letters.