George Washington, His Letters with PROVIDENCE all on one pageFrom George Washington To BURWELL BASSETT, from Mount Vernon, April 25, 1773. Dear Sir: The interruption of the post for several weeks, prevented our receiving the melancholy account of your loss until within these few days. [NOTE: Their daughter had died] That we sympathize in the misfortune, and lament the decree which has deprived you of so dutiful a child, and the world of so promising a young lady, stands in no need, I hope, of argument to prove; but the ways of Providence being inscrutable, and the justice of it not to be scanned by the shallow eye of humanity, nor to be counteracted by the utmost efforts of human power or wisdom, resignation, and as far as the strength of our reason and religion can carry us, a cheerful acquiescence to the Divine Will, is what we are to aim; and I am persuaded that your own good sense will arm you with fortitude to withstand the stroke, great as it is, and enable you to console Mrs. Bassett, whose loss and feelings are much to be pitied. By letters from Doct'r Cooper, President of the College in New York, my departure for that place is now fixed to about the 8th of May, which puts it out of my power to attend the meeting in Williamsburg this Court. I have therefore by Mr. Henderson inclosed several letters to and drafts upon different people for money, to Col. Fielding Lewis, who wrote me that he should be in Williamsburg; but if sickness, or any other unforeseen accident should prevent his attendance, I should take it very kind of you to ask for and open my letter to him and comply with the contents in respect to the receiving and paying of money. Mrs. Washington, in her letter to Mrs. Bassett, informs her of Jack Custis's engagement with Nelly Calvert, second daughter of Benedict Calvert, Esq., of Maryland. I shall say nothing further therefore on the subject than that I could have wished he had postponed entering into that engagement till his studies were finished. Not that I have any objection to the match, as she is a girl of exceeding good character; but because I fear, as he has discovered much fickleness already, that he may either change, and therefore injure the young lady; or that it may precipitate him into a marriage before, I am certain, he has ever bestowed a serious thought of the consequences; by which means his education is interrupted and he perhaps wishing to be at liberty again before he is fairly embarked on those important duties. My sincere good wishes attend Mrs. Bassett and ye family. [Note: The text is from Ford. ] ====
  
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