words spoken in charity will outweigh whole volumes written with disdainful sharpness of wit." I can only ask pardon of all whom I may offend, whilst endeavouring to uphold what I firmly believe to be God's law. I desire not by sharpness of tone to offend against His highest law, even the great law of love.
If we had no revelation of His will, I believe that we should commit an act fatal to the peace of society in abrogating a law that has regulated our homes since we became one people; but if there be any weight whatever in the constant acknowledgment from our first becoming Christians, not merely by our Church, but by our Parliament and our judges, that the unions in question are contrary to "God's law," surely every Christian legislator will pause before he advises the nation to incur a risk of judgments so fearful as those that overwhelmed the offending heathens of old; even if in doubt he will ponder, well and seriously and with prayer, the question, whether the supposed evil to be remedied be such as to demand a remedy so perilous.
Believe me.
Dear Mr. Dean,
Yours most faithfully,
W. P. WOOD.
February, 1861.
