Morning fine, but the wind changed and it became cooler afterwards. I passed my morning in copying and arranging MS Papers which I am getting out of the way. The great multitude of them at present endangers their safety.

I also attended divine service and heard Mr. Stetson of Medford preach two very singular Sermons. Luke 12. 57. “Why, even of yourselves, judge ye not what is right.” And Romans 12. 2. “Be not conformed to this world; but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.” The subject was the same, the necessity of independent judgment together with the tendency of the principle of association in this country to suppress it. At the same time the expediency of drawing a proper line between the indulgence of conscientious opinion and an affectation of singularity. The discourses were full of strong sense and clear reasoning and appeared to me to have a marked reference to the opinions of my father and his political career. But perhaps this is a mere imagination of mine from the coincidence of my father’s letter and this discoursing.

Read a Sermon of Dr. Barrow from 1. Thess. 5. 16. “Rejoice evermore.” A cheerful view of religion. The injunction to find pleasure not in the pursuits of the senses but in the calm and enlivening meditation and action of a pious life. I think this is by far the best volume of Dr. Barrow’s Sermons.

In the evening, my Wife desired me to accompany her to her eldest brother Edward’s. We accordingly went, found them at home alone. Mrs. Brooks is an invalid and barely scraping along in life. He is always cheerful and pleasant. I like very much to be with him, although politically we do not much agree. After a pleasant supper we returned home.

Beautiful day. I was very much occupied this morning so as to make it entirely impossible for me to execute my promise to Mr. Ladd. My Accounts just at this time are always somewhat important and my arrears of Diary always grow with my occupations. I have succeeded in assorting all the correspondence of Washington and Jefferson with my grandfather and took them this morning to the binder’s to be done up. This is something.

I send away daily a few more numbers of my Appeal. But no one yet 241does me the favor to intimate there is any such thing in existence. Can this last? Have I written and published entirely in vain?

Walk, which I am now driven to make short, and home. Afternoon taken up in writing. I continue my practice of copying such papers of a valuable character as I have found in the course of my examination of these papers. This took my Afternoon. In the evening I remained at home and read to my Wife from Beckfords little sketch of a visit to a couple of Portuguese Monasteries.1