My Dear Darwin

My faith is an orthodoxy of its own, embracing a much wider revelation than the church admits of, & the reverence I feel for those “who still sway our spirits from their irons”,¹ rests with a fond complacency on you as one of Natures true interpreters. I also hold to the privilege of openly professing worship to all who have enlightened & quickened my spirit. I have not been in a church but once for the last 25 years, & I never yet comprehended the possibility of prayer beyond that emotional habit of the mind, when one contemplates the beauty of nature or the glories of genius. I place you in a nitch in my self-consecrated Temple, associated with a few of my Divinities. Your altar close to that of Linneus & Gilbert White,—& the Dear Hookers²—& not far from those imputed sinners Byron, Burns & Charles Lambe³—& those earlier Saints Milton, Shakespeare⁴ & that still earlier Bard whose spirit was more simply divine than the church tries to make it.—⁵ I make this confession to justify my last note to you, & you are too liberal to object to the worship of any man.⁶

But my especial object in writing is to beg you not to take the trouble of sending me any American Newspapers. If Dear Gray asks you to do so, silently appropriate them to the only use I make of them.⁷ I never look at them, nor do I read a syllable about this horrid war. I cannot see any desirable issue to it or to the fate of the poor blacks. I have had a nephew shot thro’ the abdomen,⁸ & my last remittance was at the rate of exchange 146$\frac{1}{2}$—⁹ These evils I consent to, for I have no power to redress them, but I cannot read details of hopeless bloodshed—

Many happy new years to you & Mrs Darwin & your family— | Yrs sincerely | F. Boott

Charles Darwin Esqre | &c &c