Jane Attwater Blatch, [Bratton], to an unknown recipient, undated.

   My dear & Hond friend permit me to congratulate you on that self knowledge conviction of & sorrow for sin wch you possess the most humble & eminent the most pious & exemplary of Christians are I believe led to the clearest views of sin in its proper colors the greater their discoverys are of ye purity of God his divine Law & the suffering of the Redeemer for sin the greater are their convictions of it & hatred to it  then as the light is more sweet to those who have been absolutely excluded fm its reviving rays – so is a sense of love pardon & mercy more exquisitely felt by those who have ye deepest sense of their need of it. –

   I trust you my Hond & much revered Friends will very soon have reason to rejoice in the goodness of God in causing you to triumph in a well grounded hope of your Interest in that redemption wch is invaluably precious & have those glorious promises recorded in ye sacred word applied with divine energy to your hearts that you may be inabled in the strength of our Lord to go on your way rejoicing  long may your valued Lifes be protracted & crownd with peace & prosperity be blest with ye solid satisfaction of seeing all your beloved Family with filial affection following your example tread in the path of true wisdom wch leads to permanent peace pleasure & glory that when the journey of Life is ended we may all meet in that blissful Home to join the perfect Family above in interrupted praise to the Triune God to all Eternity.

   Will you pardon me my much Hond Friend for this freedom I write not to inform one every way my Superior only to remind of those truths which the mists of dejection may now possibly seclude from the mental view & to express tho in a faint degree to what I feel the Interest & solicitude I have in ye true welfare of all my dear partners near relations

   With the tenderst filial duty & affection

                     Believe me my dear & Hond Madm to be your Sympathizing Fd

Text: Timothy Whelan, ed. Nonconformist Women Writers, 1720-1840, 8 vols. (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2011), vol. 8, p. 180 (fully annotated version); Reeves Collection, Box 19/2/e, Bodleian Library, Oxford; the recipient was one of Joseph Blatch's brothers or sisters, most of whom lived near Amesbury, Wiltshire.