[Paris—Sunday, 20 November 1859]
Sunday 20th Read Robertson at home in the morning about noon the fog cleared and we started for a long stroll on the Boulevards. Letters from home greeted us as we descended into the Conciergerie. We were most thankful for them; such comforting comfortable letters they were too!
In the evening we went to tea at Mrs Greene’s. I never saw kinder people than these. Their hearts were filled with sympathetic sadness for poor Mrs R. Mrs Greene said her only fear was Mr G. would offer to cross the Atlantic with her in his anxiety to see her safely cared for. Mrs Tappan was seated by the fire as we entered. She seemed like an unresting spirit full of gifts but distracted in her desire to find the truth and the right way forgetting the simple narrow difficult path which lies at the feet of all. She had been reading Buckle & liked it immensely; said, she had at last found here something she could give her children, a simple form of expressing truth. I told her I could only think it rank in fidelity; whereat Mr Greene took up my side of the argument and the matter was ably and briskly discussed. She maintained with Buckle that morality consisted of certain fixed rules which were always the same and did not advance nations but Mr Greene alleged that abstract morality did advance with the growth of nations.
