XXVII Mother – Letters of Swami Vivekananda

To Mrs. G. W. Hale

GREENACRE INN
ELIOT, MAINE

8 August 1894

DEAR MOTHER

I have received the letter you sent over to me coming from India.

I am going to leave this place on Monday next for Plymouth [Massachusetts], where the Free Religious Association1 is holding its session. They will defray my expenses, of course.

I am all right, enjoying nice health, and the people here are very kind and nice to me. Up to date I had no occasion to cash any cheque as everything is going on smoothly. I have not heard anything from the Babies. Hope they are doing well. You also had nothing to write; however, I feel that you are doing well.

I would have gone over to another place, but Mr. Higginson’s2 invitation ought to be attended to. And Plymouth is the place where the fathers of your country first landed. I want, therefore, to see it.

I am all right. It is useless reiterating my love and gratitude to you and yours — you know it all. May the Lord shower His choicest blessings on you and yours.

This meeting is composed of the best professors of your country and other people, so I must attend it; and then they would pay me. I have not yet determined all my plans, only I am going to lecture in New York this coming fall; every arrangement is complete for that. They have printed advertisements at their own expense for that and made everything ready.

Give my best love to the Babies, to Father Pope, and believe me ever in gratitude and love,

Your Son,
VIVEKANANDA.

P.S. I am very much obliged to the sisters for asking me to tell them if I want anything. I have no want anyway — I have everything I require and more to spare.

“He never gives up His servants.”

My thanks and gratitude eternal to the sisters for their kindness in asking about my wants.

V.

1. ^The Free Religious Association, founded in 1867, was a liberal offshoot of the then conservative Unitarian Church. Among its members were some of the best thinkers of America.
2. ^Colonel Thomas Wentworth Storrow Higginson (1823 – 1911), President of the Free Religious Association, was a well-known writer and liberal reformer. He had made Swami Vivekananda’s acquaintance at the Chicago World’s Parliament of Religions.