1.    1 October 1793


[Mr Ring, Surgeon, Reading] [franked by a Thornton; added later, perhaps by Sohpia, 'very excellent']

My dear friends
 
I can truly style you so, though upon a short acquaintance, I have reason to believe that the Providence of the Lord was signally concerned in leading me to Reading, and particularly to lodge under your hospitable roof. [1] The time I was with you was a very pleasing part, of a very pleasing excursion. I wish to be thankful for it, both to the Lord and to you.
 
I address my letter to you both, because the Lord has made you one; not only in relation, but in affection, and in spirit. The remembrance of my past happiness in wedlock, was never more sensibly revived, than while I was with you. But I assure you, it did not excite in me either pain or envy; but on the contrary a very sincere pleasure. Oh! that I could see the like in every married pair! The object of my love is removed, my time is past; [2] but the bare recollection of what it once was, is worth much more than everything else which this poor world can afford. May the Lord maintain yea increase your mutual regard, but may he likewise so sanctify it, that you may, avoid my sin, and my sufferings. It ought to be a lasting source of humiliation to me, to remember, that my dearest earthly comfort, so often proved the occasion of discovering the vileness and ingratitude of my heart, in a more striking light, than perhaps I should have otherwise known. [3] There is a danger in an over-attachment. It has cost me many a pang. Yet when I think of the Apostle’s charge that husbands love their wives, as their own flesh, yea as Christ loved the Church, these strong expressions lead me to conclude, that the danger is not in loving too much, but in loving improperly. [4]
 
When a wife gives her husband her whole heart, she has still room for all her own friends and his. And should these friends be increased twentyfold still there is room for them all. But there is a peculiar kind of regard, which is due to her husband only. If she allows herself to transfer this regard to any other man, though it went no farther, she would be criminal. Thus while we love the Lord supremely, we may love our husbands, wives, children, or friends as much as we can, but all must be held in subordination and subserviency to what we owe to him; otherwise they will be idols, and we shall be idolaters. And the Lord, in one way or other will let us know that He is a jealous God, and will not bear a rival.
 
But above all I congratulate you, that the Lord has called you both out of the world, and given you the same views and desires, of better things than can be possessed here. This is a mercy which some of his people have not. It often happens, that of two in one bed the one is taken and the other left. [5] Had this been your case, had you differed in the most important concerns, the more tenderly you loved each other, the more unhappy you must have been. [6] But great is the privilege of walking together as helpmeets in the way to the Kingdom!
 
Please to give my love to your forty friends, and mine, whom I had the pleasure of meeting in the drawing-room. [7] When you first spoke of inviting some friends to meet me, I thought they would be only a few to dinner or tea, and was not in the least aware of the public step you were going to take. I was a little apprehensive for the consequences. But by what I saw and heard before and after, I am persuaded that it was not the effect of a transient warmth, but that you had deliberately counted the cost, and were willing to let it be known far and near, that you had made up your minds, and were determined by the grace of God, that whatever others do, you and your house, so far as your influence can prevail, will serve the Lord. [8] In this view, I greatly rejoiced in the opportunity, and it pleased me highly to see a room consecrated to him, which I suppose has formerly been filled in a very different manner.
 
We were favoured with a safe and comfortable journey. Our fellow travellers were sensible and civil. We reached home about one o’clock. Our servants testified both by words and looks, that they were glad to see us. It is a great comfort to be served by those who love us. And it is a comfort which money cannot purchase. The Lord only can give it. He it is who makes people of one mind in a house. A consistency of character, with a prudent condescension and kindness to those whom the Lord has placed in an inferior station, are means which seldom fail of some good effect; but when a whole family are united by spiritual ties, and act as under the eye of the same common Master; when the parlour and the kitchen are in unison, such domestic order, love and peace make a family happy indeed! [9]
 
I have ordered Mr Robinson’s books, [10] am promised them today or tomorrow, and hope they will be with you before the week closes. They will be accompanied by 2 or 3 single sermons, which I hope you will accept as a peppercorn acknowledgment of my love and thanks. As an author, I shall have Mr R’s books at the bookseller’s price, which will make them a little cheaper than if bought in a shop. [11] I shall likewise send a small parcel, which you will please to forward, with my best respects, to Mr Serle. [12]
 
I hope we had a good Sunday. I preached in the morning from 1 Thessalonians 2:17. [13] In the evening from Matthew 13:16,17. [14] The latter was designed to impress my dear people with a sense of the value of Gospel ordinances. I contrasted the present state of Southampton, with that of Reading. I did not mention the former place by name, but most people knew where I had been. [15]
 
This is another privilege, my dear friends, with which the Lord has favoured you. He could keep your souls alive, though you lived in the darkest spot. But the lines are fallen to you in a pleasant place, where you have every desirable help for promoting your spiritual progress. May his grace keep you humble and dependent. May you walk before him with a single eye! May you burn and shine, and go on from strength to strength! You have great advantages for usefulness to others, [16] and of being happy in each other, and in yourselves. Trials will sometimes occur, vanity will cleave (like the ivy to the oak), to all earthly enjoyments. But the Lord whom you serve is All-sufficient, and his promises are sure. I commend you to his blessing.
 
Miss Catlett [17] adds her love and thanks to mine. Please to present our love and best wishes to Mrs Skeete. [18] May all the blessings belonging to a believing widow be her portion! And may her dear little Mary [19] grow up to be a comfort and an ornament to her, and her family! Please to remember us likewise to Mr [left blank]; nor will I omit Charlotte and John. [20]
 
Believe me to be your very affectionate and obliged
John Newton
 
No. 6 Coleman Street Buildings
1 October 1793
 
I hope to hear from you soon. If one half, Mr Ring, should be too busy, perhaps the other half – Mrs Ring – will favour us with a letter.
 

Endnotes:
 
 [1] (See also the Introduction for details). On 8 August 1793 Newton set out from London with Betsy to stay first with Ambrose Serle (1742–1812) at his home in Heckfield, near Reading, where he met ‘Mr & Mrs Ring’ on Wednesday 14 August when they came to dinner at Serle’s. After holidaying as usual with the Walter Taylor (1732-1803) and family at Portswood Green, Southampton, and Charles Etty (c 1719-1797) at Priestlands, near Lymington, Newton returned to Heckfield on 18 September. On Friday 20th the Rings came to dinner. They must have prevailed on him to stay with them, for he arrived at their home in Market Place, Reading, at 6 the next evening. On Sunday 22nd he preached twice at St Giles, Reading, his second text being Philippians 1:21 For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. His diary for Tuesday 24th September records: ‘In the evening by Mr Ring’s desire, we had a meeting in his drawing room of about 40 people. I spoke from Romans 12:1,2. I thank thee, my Lord, for the hope that it was a good time. And, especially that thou hast enabled this young couple to give such a public testimony, that they are decidedly on the side of thy Gospel. How soon canst thou damp the glare of the world, and give those whose hearts thou drawest to thyself, much more and better than they ever conceived of, while living in gaity.’ He felt this new contact with the Rings providential, ‘and that the visit by thy blessing will prove seasonable and useful. Reward them with thy best blessings for their kindness to us.’
[2] Newton’s wife Mary (1728/9-1790), alias Polly, had died of cancer on 15 December 1790. They were married on 1 February 1749 Old Style, equivalent to 12 February 1750 New Style. This very week, on 3 October 1793, Newton’s Letters to a Wife were published.
[3] Written scarcely 3 years since the death of his wife, Newton was still grieving deeply for her. It was not until her birthday in 1795 that he could say, ‘the wound of this separation is so far healed, that I can cordially praise thee for inflicting it’. He sums it up in the 6th stanza of his Anniversary Hymn for her that December:
Content! – that word’s too faint to use
I should, I do rejoice;
Unable for myself to choose,
I glory in his choice.
[4] William Cowper (1731-1800) to Newton, 24 June 1791: ‘You speak of your late loss in a manner that affected me much; and when I read that part of your letter, I mourned with you, and for you. But surely, I said to myself, no man had ever less reason to charge his conduct to a wife with any thing blame-worthy… I am mistaken, too, or you can recollect a time when you had fears, and such as became a Christian, of loving too much; and it is likely that you have even prayed to be preserved from doing so. I suggest this to you as a plea against those self-accusations, which I am satisfied that you do not deserve, and as an effectual answer to them all… The truth is, that you both loved at least as much as you ought, and I dare say had not a friend in the world who did not frequently observe it. To love just enough, and not a bit too much, is not for creatures who can do nothing well. If we fail in duties less arduous, how should we succeed in this, the most arduous of all?’
[5] This is along the lines of Matthew 24:40,41 Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken, and the other left.
[6] Newton on an unequal marriage: ‘For a truly religious person to marry one who has no relish for spiritual things, is taking up a heavy burden which can never be laid aside… The more tenderly they love, the more sensibly they must grieve each other while together, and the more awful and overwhelming their separation will prove.’ The Christian’s Magazine, 1761.
[7] See Fn 2 and Introduction.
[8] Joshua 24:15… but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. Thomas Ring, as a medical doctor, was in a prominent public position. His boldly-affirmed conversion would have been widely noticed.
[9] That the Rings headed Newton’s advice is evidenced in their wills. Thomas, who died first, bequeathed ‘to my faithful and affectionate Servant William Craswell the sum of one hundred pounds sterling… to be free and clear of the legacy duty’. Sophia bequeathed ‘to my faithful servant William Craswell my pair of carriage horses and the harness and every article appertaining to my stable coach house and granary (my carriage only excepted) and also the sum of two hundred pounds for his great attention both to his late beloved master and to me his widow the same being at the particular request of my said late dear husband just before he departed this life and I further give to my gardener George Oliver the sum of one hundred pounds to my cook Sarah the sum of fifty pounds for their faithful services and to each of my other female servants ten pounds’. See also the remark [Sophia’s?] on his letter to her of 29 November 1802: ‘a lovely letter of forgiveness’.
[10] Two possibilities here: referring either to Thomas Robinson, Scripture Characters, 1793, 4v or to William Robinson, recorded as curate at St Giles in 1796 (but may well have been earlier) and mentioned in the letter of 16 September 1794 and later.
[11] The London Booksellers of Scripture Characters were J Matthews of 18 The Strand and C Dilly in the Poultry. Edward & Charles Dilly had been the publishers of Newton’s A review of ecclesiastical history in 1770.
[12] Ambrose Serle (1742-1812), qv, of Heckfield. Thomas Ring later became physician to the Duke of Wellington (1769-1852), who purchased the adjacent estate of Lord Rivers (1751 –1828), Stratford Saye, where Newton spent many of his hours walking through the woods.
[13] 1 Thessalonians 2:17 But we, brethren, being taken from you for a short time in presence, not in heart, endeavoured the more abundantly to see your face with great desire.
[14] Matthew 13:16,17 But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear. For verily I say unto you, That many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them.
[15] No Anglican churches in Southampton preached the Gospel at this time. Newton was refused a pulpit. Folk from all around met eagerly in Walter Taylor’s ‘laundry’ at his home Portswood Green to hear Newton preach on Sundays and during the week. Sometimes, he records in his diary, there were ‘more than a hundred’ present. Taylor had registered, in 1786, ‘a room over the coach house’ as a meeting place for Protestant Dissenters for worship.  Newton first began spending his summer holidays at Taylor’s in 1784. He had preached at St Michael’s in Southampton on 11 September 1791 [see Newton's f18], but it seems not after that and possibly not before either.
[16] Dr Ring was indeed ‘useful to others’. He founded (and substantially financed) the Reading Dispensary in Chain Street for free medical treatment for the poor. It gave health and hope to many thousands of people. Some thirty years later he proposed the foundation of the Royal Berkshire Hospital, again contributing a significant proportion of his time and money.
[17] Elizabeth (Betsy) Catlett, was born on 22 Jun 1769 in Chatham to Mary Newton’s brother George Catlett and his wife Sarah (nee Kite). Her mother died shortly after and her father died in 1774, whereupon the Newtons adopted her.
[18] Mary Skeete (née Ring), sister of Thomas Ring, the widow of Thomas Skeete (1757-1789) of Paternoster Row, London. They were married in Basingstoke on 22 May 1788. Thomas was born in Barbadoes. He studied in Edinburgh, graduated from Glasgow as doctor of medicine in 1785, was elected physician to Guy’s Hospital in 1788, and to the Asylum and the New Finsbury dispensary. He was the author of Experiments and Observations on the Red Quilled Peruvian Barks etc, London, 1786. He died from liver disease on 29 May 1789, aged 32. In his will of 2 April 1789 he entrusted all his real and personal estate to ‘my dear friends and relations William and Thomas Ring’, commissioning them to care for his wife and daughter. In a codicil written the day before he died, he added William Bishop and John Braithwaite Skeete to the Rings, requesting all four ‘to accept the guardianship and protection of my dear wife and child’.
[19] Mary Skeete, daughter of the above widow Mary Skeete and Thomas Skeete.
[20] ‘Charlotte and John’ – perhaps the Rings’ servants.

Acknowledgements:
Descendants of Sophia Ring
British Library
Lambeth Palace Library