Letter (message)

“ This is my letter to the World
That never wrote to Me —
The simple News that Nature told —
With tender Majesty
Her Message is committed
To Hands I cannot see —
For love of Her — Sweet — countrymen —
Judge tenderly — of Me ”

“ So, if form letters are to escape the waste basket—if they are to win the prospect's attention and convince him—they must have all the ear-marks of a personally dictated communication. If a proposition is worth sending out it is worthy of a good dress and careful handling.
All the principles of making the individual letter a personal message hold good with the form letter, except that greater pains must be taken to make each letter look personal. Nothing should be put into the letter to a dozen or a thousand men that does not apply to each one individually. ”

“ A letter of condolence may be written to relatives, close friends, and to those whom we know well. When the recipient of the condolatory message is simply an acquaintance, it is in better taste to send a visiting card with "sincere sympathy." Flowers may or may not accompany the card. ”

“ The quality of the paper, the kind of printing or engraving, the mechanical make-up—all these things contribute to the IMPRESSION a letter makes upon the recipient even BEFORE THE MESSAGE IS READ. Many letters come to nothing because their dress is unattractive, cheap, slovenly; and so progressive business men are learning to select their stationery with care to insure for it both tone and dignity. ”

“ I had had no communication by letter or message with the outer world: school-rules, school-duties, school-habits and notions, and voices, and faces, and phrases, and costumes, and preferences, and antipathies—such was what I knew of existence. ”

“ Tell me O wicked old woman, the cause of all that hath befallen me from thee and from thy cunning and thine advocacy of him, so that thou hast made me write letter after letter and thou ceasest not to carry messages, going and coming between us twain, till thou hast brought about a correspondence and a connection. ”

“ The letter you write, whether you realize it or not, is always a mirror which reflects your appearance, taste and character. A "sloppy" letter with the writing all pouring into one corner of the page, badly worded, badly spelled, and with unmatched paper and envelope—even possibly a blot—proclaims the sort of person who would have unkempt hair, unclean linen and broken shoe laces; just as a neat, precise, evenly written note portrays a person of like characteristics. ”

“ As some have thought it strange that a private letter, of a particular business and friendship, should have got a place in the sacred canon, others have been industrious to find out the general uses which may be made of it. ”

“ A letter may, from a business point of view, make or mar the fortunes of its sender, while none the less surely, from a social standard, will our epistles approve or condemn our claim for consideration. Every position in life, and every occasion which may arise therein, demand more or less exercise of our epistolary powers, and while but few can hope for the grace, the wit, the repartee that sparkle in the missives of a de Staël, a Récamier, a Walpole, a Macaulay, every one can and should learn to write a clear, concise, intelligent, appropriate letter. ”

“ There are a hundred reasons why I value a letter from you more than that of any other friend in the world, even though it should be all that you seem to think, in ‘tameness.’ I like your so-called tame letters. ”

“ When a letter is written in reply to another, the date of the letter to which the reply is made should be given, and it is an excellent plan, and one that saves much time, to give in a letter the substance of the one to which it is a reply. ”

“ For when a woman writeth she spelleth her soul out on paper; but a man putteth all his tender meanings between the lines. Yea, a woman’s letter is a confession, but a man’s letter is a veiled allusion which concealeth his thoughts. ”

“ Writing winna do it—a letter canna look, and pray, and beg, and beseech, as the human voice can do to the human heart. A letter's like the music that the ladies have for their spinets—naething but black scores, compared to the same tune played or sung. ”

“ For the last fortnight I have been gulping down so many reckless words, burying so many reflections in my bosom, and accumulating such a store of things to tell, fit for your ear alone, that I should certainly have been suffocated but for the resource of letter-writing as a sorry substitute for our beloved talks. ”

“ Not there shall you find anything of [243] that conversation apart which constitutes the joy of writing as of reading letters. The letter which is intelligible to everybody is already impersonal and almost professional in tone, and you may print it with impunity; but a letter which is addressed to a friend will, in proportion to its intimacy, teem with allusions, oddities of phrase, and obscure references which make full sense only to the recipient, and you will print it at your peril. ”

“ Letters can be cold, stereotyped, following the same routine day by day, appearing more or less machine made, and the impression which the recipient has upon reading the letter is that the suggestion, complaint, petition or application made has been given scant consideration. ”

“ This, then, methinks, is what I feel.
No doubt a letter seems by no means indispensable, when one can see each other freely. What could it say that a word, a glance, or even silence would not say a hundred times better still? ”

“ ONE MAY acquire the art of letter-writing. Few possess it. A glance down the page of a fair example of our correspondence finds it studded with personal "I's" and filled with household groans.
The Letter We Look for The letter which is a joyous thing, bringing with it a subtle touch of the sender, and conveying the sense of a personal chat, is the one we seek at the postman's ring. Many clever, fluent talkers become incoherent at the touch of ink. They cannot put themselves on paper and the non-expressive, disappointing type of letter is the result. ”

“ Should you receive a letter from a friend, introducing to you any person known to and esteemed by the writer, the letter should be immediately acknowledged, and your willingness expressed to do all in your power to carry out his or her wishes. ”

“ The hand in them is scarcely perceptible, let alone the voice or the scowl. Ah, but when the post knocks and the letter comes always the miracle seems repeated—speech attempted. Venerable are letters, infinitely brave, forlorn, and lost. ”

“ To commence a letter to a comparative stranger, or to a person with whom the writer is but slightly acquainted, is the first difficulty to overcome. Shall it be a letter or a note, written in the first or in the third person? ”

“ I assure you I feel this, so do not misinterpret anything I say to you as being written in a flippant or critical spirit. One always feels the want of the voice and eyes to accompany a letter and give it the right tone. ”

“ To her the letter gave.
"Ha, there's a letter frae your love,
He says he sent you three;
He canna wait your love langer,
But for your sake he'll die.
"He bids you write a letter to him;
He says he's sent ye five;
He canna wait your love langer,
Tho' you're the fairest woman alive." ”

“ We all have these instincts at times: the contents of an unopened letter or parcel seem endowed with a voice; who has not guessed the fateful news in a telegram before he has broken open the envelope, even as Leavesley guessed the contents of the letter in his hand? ”

“ I tore open the envelope and read the one word which comprised the answer, standing alone, naked of punctuation, on the yellow sheet: ‘Come.’
“‘That means war to the knife,’ I thought, tossing the paper on my dressing-table. ‘No words wasted.’
“As I made preparations for the trip I caught myself glancing at the letter now and then. ‘Come!’ After all, it had a certain charm of its own, that word. Like all affirmative expressions, it possessed drawing power. The more I looked at it, the more alluring it appeared. Then I examined the signature. ”

“ Letter for letter is the law of all correspondence whatsoever, and, because I wrote last, I have indulged myself for some time in expectation of a sheet from you.—Not that I govern myself entirely by the punctilio of reciprocation, but having been pretty much occupied of late, I was not sorry to find myself at liberty to exercise my discretion, and furnished with a good excuse if I chose to be silent. ”

“ Letters stand halfway between the formlessness of conversation and the formality of essay or fiction. A letter to a friend has this advantage over a chat with him, that you can choose the impression you wish to make and make it without interference from the interlocutor’s telepathy, or interruption through his rejoinders. Conversation gives and takes, but a letter only gives, and gives exactly what it wishes, no more. In a letter one employs words, weaving them happily to one’s will, but it is a mistake to suppose that conversation is much concerned with words. ”

“ As though a letter, especially a letter to a lady, should not be as perfect in its kind as a lecture or sermon in its kind! as though one's duties toward an individual were less stringent than one's duties toward an audience! ”

“ THERE has nothing of late given me so much real trouble and uneasiness, as my having so long deferred writing to you, to make my acknowledgments for your most kind letter, and to assure you that I took every part of your obliging letter in the manner you would wish me to do: I must say, that amid my grief and concern, it gave me a secret pleasure to find that I was thought of by you ”

“ May I send my heartiest congratulations?
Sincerely yours,
Ruth Evans.
On an engagement
In writing to a girl or a man on the occasion of an engagement to be married there is no general rule if one knows the man or woman. One may write as one wishes.
If a stranger is to be received into the family, one writes a kindly letter. ”

“ I beg you to write to me with the utmost openness whatever you perceive to be the state of the case, and whether it is for good or evil, and also to send a letter, as you say, in my name to whomsoever you think it necessary. ”

“ For a man's expression, his gestures, and even the tones of his voice help to indicate the precise meaning of his words, while a letter, which is deprived of all these advantages, is exposed to the malignity of those who put upon it what interpretation they choose. ”

“ Read these and the like, and think your God is like a friend that sendeth a letter to a whole house and family, but speaketh in His letter to some by name, that are dearest to Him in the house. ”

“ If a picture, which is but a mute representation of an object, can give such pleasure, what cannot letters inspire? We may write to each other; so innocent a pleasure is not denied us. I shall read that you are my husband, and you shall see me sign myself your wife. In spite of all our misfortunes, you may be what you please in your letter. ”

“ It can do no kind of good for other people to meddle and talk. I would tear up this letter, but it is well that you at least should know what men are worth, and every word that I have written is true. So I send my letter just as it is, and only beg you to say nothing to Thea about it. ”

“ I Have but small comfort in this letter; the messenger comes too easily to me, and I am too sure that the letter shall be delivered. All adventures towards you should be of more difficulty and hazard. But perchance I need not lament this; it may be so many of my letters are lost already that it is time that one should come, like Jobs servant, to bring word that the rest were lost. ”

“ MY DEAR MRS. WORDSWORTH, I have repeatedly taken pen in hand to answer your kind letter. My sister should more properly have done it, but she having failed, I consider myself answerable for her debts. I am now trying to do it in the midst of commercial noises, and with a quill which seems more ready to glide into arithmetical figures and names of gourds, cassia, cardemoms, aloes, ginger, or tea, than into kindly responses and friendly recollections. The reason why I cannot write letters at home, is, that I am never alone. ”

“ Our letters, therefore, though their sentences are not so balanced nor their periods so rounded, are more real, more truthful, more spontaneous, and more delightful than the laborious productions of our ancestors, who had to weigh every phrase, and to think out their bon mots, epigrams, and smart things for weeks beforehand, so that the letter might appear full of impromptu wit. ”

“ No one, not even a Knight of the Order, should be dispensed from answering a letter from one greatly his inferior.... One should read letters more than once before answering them.... Letters of importance, carefully kept, serve more purposes than one thinks when one receives them.... ”

“ The most irritating letters to receive are those which, under a great show of courtesy, with many phrases and many kind inquiries about your health and that of your household, and even with some news adapted to your taste, contain some short sentence which betrays the fact that the whole letter was written with a manifestly selfish purpose. ”

“ The close of a less intimate letter, like taking leave of a visitor in your drawing-room, is necessarily more ceremonious. And the "ceremonious close" presents to most people the greatest difficulty in letter-writing. ”

“ Letter writing, a delightful branch of literature, attained its highest excellence in the eighteenth century. It is an art which gains most, if the paradox may be allowed, by being artless. The carefully studied epistle, written [Pg 199] with a view to publication, may have its value, but it cannot have the charm of a letter written in the familiar intercourse of friendship. It is the correspondence prompted by the heart which reaches the heart of the reader. ”