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Good bye! I shall come soon, and we will talk and be happy.

Your true friend,

DOCTOR.

Before receiving this, she wrote me again, as follows:

MY VERY DEAR DR. HOWE:

What can I first say to God when I am wrong? Would he send me good thoughts and forgive me when I am very sad for doing wrong? Why does he not love wrong people if they love him? Would he be very happy to have me think of Him and Heaven very often? Do you remember that you said I must think of God and Heaven? I want you to please to answer me to please me. I have learned about great many things to please you very much. Mrs. Harrington has got a new little baby eight days last Saturday. God was very generous and kind to give babies to many people. Miss Rogers's mother has got baby two months ago. I want to see you very much. I send much love to you. Is God ever ashamed? I think of God very often to love Him. Why did you say that I must think of God? You must answer me all about it, if you do not I shall be sad. Shall we know what to ask God to do? When will he let us go to see Him in Heaven? How did God tell people that he lived in Heaven? How could he take care of folks in Heaven and why is he our Father? When can he let us go in Heaven? Why can not He let wrong people to go to live with Him and be happy? Why should he not like to have us ask him to send us good thoughts if we are not very sad for doing wrong?

I give the following extract from my own journal, as a specimen of the method of conversing with her on such subjects.

In talking with Laura to-day, on the subject of the Deity, I said, How do men make bread? "From wheat." How do they make wheat? "They cannot make wheat," said she. Then how do they get it? said I. "God makes it grow." Why? "For man to eat," said she. I then explained to her that some birds and animals eat grain, and asked -- Why does God give it to them? She said, "To make them happy." But does He love them? said I. "No," said she; "they have no souls."

I then told her there are some beautiful islands on the globe, where the sun shines clearly and warmly; where there are rich meadows, and sweet flowers, and tall trees, and shady groves; where the brooks run merrily down the hills, and where there is plenty of delicious fruit and nutritive plants; that these islands are never visited by man, yet nevertheless that thousands of birds are singing in the branches, and rejoicing over their little ones; that the young animals are frolicking on the soft grass, and the old ones looking on them with silent joy; that the fishes are swimming briskly about in the clear streams, and leaping out sportfully into the air, and that all this has been going on thousands of years. After thus trying to give her as vivid a picture as I could of the happy inhabitants of these peaceful isles, I asked her who made such beautiful places? She said -- "God." But for what did He make them? "To make the animals all happy," said she, -- and added, of her own accord, "God is very good to make them happy." She then meditated a little, and said -- "Can they thank Him?" Not in words, said I. I then went on to show her that He had no need of thanks in words; that He did not do these good things in order to be thanked, when she stopped me by asking "why He did not give them souls?" I tried to explain how much of reason and sense they really possess, and how grateful all of God's children should be for what they have, without asking why it was not more, when she said suddenly, "Why is God never unkind or wrong?" I tried as well as I could to explain the perfection of God's character, and its freedom from human frailties; but alas! how vain is the effort, when neither teacher nor pupil have any other standard than human littleness by which to measure God's greatness.

There is this constant difficulty with her, (and is it not one too much overlooked in the religions instruction of other children,) that being unable to form any idea of virtue and goodness in the abstract, she must seek it in the concrete; and her teachers and friends, frail and imperfect beings like herself, furnish the poor impersonations of the peerless attributes of God.

This difficulty might have been avoided, I think, by the plan which I had marked out for the orderly development of her intellectual faculties and moral sentiments, and which was simply to follow the natural order; but since that plan has been marred by the well-meant officiousness of others, there remains only to remedy, as far as we can, what we cannot cure entirely -- the bad effects of ill-timed direction of her thoughts to subjects too far above her comprehension.

After the conversation related above, I went on to illustrate, as well as I could, the difference between human and divine care of animals. I said, why does man take care of a cow, and get hay into his barn to feed her in winter? "Oh!" said she, "to get her milk!" Why does he take care of his horse, and keep him covered with a warm blanket, and feed him? "That is to ride him well," said she. Why do people keep cats, and feed them? "To catch mice!" Why do farmers take such good care of sheep? "To get wool." But when the cow and the sheep are old, and cannot work, what does man do? "He kills to get meat." Well! said I, why does God make the grass to grow in the meadow, and let the cow eat it -- does He want her milk? "No, no!" said she. Does He need the wool of the sheep? "No, no!" replied she, vehemently -- "He does not want any thing!" Presently she said, "How do men know whether cows are willing to give them their milk?" I said, They do not know, and do not care. She mused a while, as is her wont when talking on a new subject, and said -- "The little lambs and young animals play -- why do not sheep love to have their pleasure?" I explained how they had pleasure in giving milk to their young; how they loved to eat the tender grass, and lie in the shade. She seemed to have another difficulty, and said -- "Why do cats want to kill mice? they have no love!"