The Cotman Letters 1835-1837

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the use of them, but this is usually only for a season and we enjoy the return of health with ten fold pleasure. In fact all sufferings are in the end blessings as every thing that comes from the most high must be, for as the poet has it Whatever is, is good therefore I think you will congratulate me on the affliction I have been suffering under which has not be much to be sure, but enough to cause some little uneasiness.

I too for a time during the duration of my illness wooed the Muses but found them so fickel that I gave them up as harlots unfit for men of worth to have any connection with, in fact I think them very injurious companions, look to the lives of our most eminent poets, they have never reaped (with the exception of one individual) the fruits of their labour but have sunk into the groove disgusted with the world, who now and ever must have something more substantial to feed on, I congratulate you on your attempts and am delighted with the manner you expressed yourself in the lines to me they are your sentiments and believe me they are mine also and if I thought you doubted it I would give you my writing again and again and again to confirm it, but this I know would be unnecessary as you well know my sentiments from top to toe. I shall not express myself in poetry as I think it highly injurious to the health and likewise, I might become so fond of writing poetry if I took it up again, that I dare not begin it for it is sure to lead to vexation for none properly esteems, even the finest poetry ever written and more poets have suffered from the world’s coldness than any other class of men, and , after all, what is poetry written for, Why for the world’s esteem and if, as I say, it never has and never will obtain it, what a worthless thing is it, look at Cooper how he lived in fact all of them were miserable and all will be, let their poetry and talents be