3331 - Edward Baker to Polly Dix, 31[?] December 1779

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Miss Dix
As it is now near 9 weeks since I saw or heard from you
I think is high time to inquire the reason. Thereoft as if I remember right you told me you was to be at your cousins last Monday when I expected you
would come to Newgate street: However had these been inconvenient I conclude
you might have wrote long before now, your last letter to me [?be coming] [illeg]
the 11 {^th} of October, a longer time than I could have expected from you
who have always held the first place among my friends in my Esteem.
Especially as you know a line from you is always valued as a favour to
me & if I have offended you in any shape it is but a candid to let me know
As we part in different Opinion, last time I Was at your home
I don't know but what you may think me a person not worthy of your {?friend}
-ship & therefore incline you to break it off to which I reply that my Opinions
where not so Slight & Ill-grounded as to be so easily [?alterd], and my thoughts on religious subjects may have been more than you perhaps may have imagined
Therefore I beg you would lay the [?resume] on its night place & instead of
slighting me for wrong opinions let it be for living so inconsistently in knowing my duty & not practicing it as cultivating those happy Portions of my [?self] when I have been seriously disposed but contrarily much time that might have been profitably spent I have [?misread] in [illeg] at home &
company abroad & suffering my mind to be carried away fixed
on things tho' innocent in themselves yet dangerous in their effects
I cannot vindicate myself but beg you would consider the force of
Temptation when you recollect my situation in Life, you [?know] youth in common is not inclined to devotion or Meditation without without being led there to either by some Affliction or [illeg] the good example of thein friends, now I think it
needless to tell you that my fathers family can be of little service
to

Details

Edward Baker to Polly Dix, 31[?] December 1779

Copy letter from a letter book. They have had a disagreement resulting from differing opinions on 'Religious subjects' and he asks if he has offended her. Includes reflections on his poor lifestyle and his friendship with and regard for her.

Baker Family Papers

CLC/423/MS16927

London Archives

1779

12

31

Dec.r ye. Last. 79

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How to Cite

To Cite this Letter

Edward Baker to Polly Dix, 31[?] December 1779, 31121779: London Archives, Baker Family Papers, CLC/423/MS16927

To Cite this Edition

Material Identities, Social Bodies: Embodiment in British Letters c.1680-1820. Compiled by: Karen Harvey, Helen Esfandiary, Sarah Fox, Emily Vine, University of Birmingham. Project funded by the Leverhulme Trust (2021-2025, Ref. RPG-2020-163), https://socialbodies.bham.ac.uk.

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