Robert Southey to Grosvenor Charles Bedford, 12-15 November 1793: 'I have been reading Courtney Melmoths Liberal Opinions to-day. I know not if you have ever read the book — but it contains the history of Benignus — some parts of which pleasd me much. a young man sets out in life with this principle. To be good is to be happy. of course he becomes miserable by practising or rather by attempting to practise theoretical principles of universal benevolence. Men of feeling (I hate to use the word but no other expresses the meaning) men of feeling are exposed to a thousand pangs which the fool escapes because his faculties are too gross to comprehend them.'