Venn, John

Hannah More to Sarah (Sally) Horne Hole, 8 January 1816

I feel much pleasure at your report of dear . I hope it will please God to give her such a measure of his grace as to restrain her from the corruptions of a world which grows every year visibly more thoughtless, more dissipated, and more dangerous to a young, amiable, and inexperienced Mind. Rational Society, books well selected from History, Travels /Poetry/ and above all books of moral and religious instruction, together with those accomplishments which can be pursued and enjoyed, in the comforts of a home circle, form some of the truest and safest pleasures of life. I believe I recommended to you Mr. Venn’s Sermons^*. I know nothing superior to them – solid, sober minded, and elegantly written.

Hannah More to Marianne Thornton, December 4th 1819

Thanks for your very kind and interesting letter. We were all deeply affected with and all the circumstances which accompanied his introduction into his sacred Office.^* May he, in living and preaching be the exact representative of his excellent Father’s. Such fathers as his and have left a high Standard to which I trust it will be the study and the delight of the children of both families to act up. It is a great thing even where we cannot say we have altogether attained to be always pressing forward. I doubt not I shall admire Sermon^* as I do every thing that comes from his pen, his head, and his heart. I should be sorry if they had diluted it. I do not approve of that prudence which is apt to put ‘trop d’eau dans le vins de peres.’^* In my poor judgment it is not easy to be too strong on the delinquencies of the present times – When we adopt excessive moderation to the few we are guilty of cruelty to the many – I should prefer the Sermon glowing and animated as you heard it, to the more lowered cautious production, after it had passed thro the hands of the nibbling and lapping critics.