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diff --git a/9597.txt b/9597.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d0c44c6 --- /dev/null +++ b/9597.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3478 @@ +Project Gutenberg EBook, The Inner Life, Part 3, From Vol. VII. +The Works of Whittier: The Conflict With Slavery, Politics and Reform +#42 in our series by John Greenleaf Whittier + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**EBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These EBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers***** + + + +Title: The Inner Life, Part 3, From Vol. VII, + The Works of Whittier: The Conflict With Slavery, Politics + and Reform, The Inner Life and Criticism + + +Author: John Greenleaf Whittier + +Release Date: December 2005 [EBook #9597] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on October 25, 2003] + + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + + + + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE INNER LIFE *** + + + + +This eBook was produced by David Widger + + + + + + THE INNER LIFE + + BY + + JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER + + + +CONTENTS: + + THE AGENCY OF EVIL + HAMLET AMONG THE GRAVES + SWEDENBORG + THE BETTER LAND + DORA GREENWELL + THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS + JOHN WOOLMAN'S JOURNAL + THE OLD WAY + HAVERFORD COLLEGE + + + + + +THE INNER LIFE + +THE AGENCY OF EVIL. + +From the Supernaturalism of New England, in the Democratic Review for +1843. + +IN this life of ours, so full of mystery, so hung about with wonders, so +written over with dark riddles, where even the lights held by prophets +and inspired ones only serve to disclose the solemn portals of a future +state of being, leaving all beyond in shadow, perhaps the darkest and +most difficult problem which presents itself is that of the origin of +evil,--the source whence flow the black and bitter waters of sin and +suffering and discord,--the wrong which all men see in others and feel +in themselves,--the unmistakable facts of human depravity and misery. A +superficial philosophy may attempt to refer all these dark phenomena of +man's existence to his own passions, circumstances, and will; but the +thoughtful observer cannot rest satisfied with secondary causes. The +grossest materialism, at times, reveals something of that latent dread +of an invisible and spiritual influence which is inseparable from our +nature. Like Eliphaz the Temanite, it is conscious of a spirit passing +before its face, the form whereof is not discerned. + +It is indeed true that our modern divines and theologians, as if to atone +for the too easy credulity of their order formerly, have unceremoniously +consigned the old beliefs of Satanic agency, demoniacal possession, and +witchcraft, to Milton's receptacle of exploded follies and detected +impostures, + + "Over the backside of the world far off, + Into a limbo broad and large, and called + The paradise of fools,"-- + +that indeed, out of their peculiar province, and apart from the routine +of their vocation, they have become the most thorough sceptics and +unbelievers among us. Yet it must be owned that, if they have not the +marvellous themselves, they are the cause of it in others. In certain +states of mind, the very sight of a clergyman in his sombre professional +garb is sufficient to awaken all the wonderful within us. Imagination +goes wandering back to the subtle priesthood of mysterious Egypt. We +think of Jannes and Jambres; of the Persian magi; dim oak groves, with +Druid altars, and priests, and victims, rise before us. For what is the +priest even of our New England but a living testimony to the truth of the +supernatural and the reality of the unseen,--a man of mystery, walking in +the shadow of the ideal world,--by profession an expounder of spiritual +wonders? Laugh he may at the old tales of astrology and witchcraft and +demoniacal possession; but does he not believe and bear testimony to his +faith in the reality of that dark essence which Scripture more than hints +at, which has modified more or less all the religious systems and +speculations of the heathen world,--the Ahriman of the Parsee, the Typhon +of the Egyptian, the Pluto of the Roman mythology, the Devil of Jew, +Christian, and Mussulman, the Machinito of the Indian,--evil in the +universe of goodness, darkness in the light of divine intelligence,--in +itself the great and crowning mystery from which by no unnatural process +of imagination may be deduced everything which our forefathers believed +of the spiritual world and supernatural agency? That fearful being with +his tributaries and agents,--"the Devil and his angels,"--how awfully he +rises before us in the brief outline limning of the sacred writers! How +he glooms, "in shape and gesture proudly eminent," on the immortal canvas +of Milton and Dante! What a note of horror does his name throw into the +sweet Sabbath psalmody of our churches. What strange, dark fancies are +connected with the very language of common-law indictments, when grand +juries find under oath that the offence complained of has been committed +"at the instigation of the Devil"! + +How hardly effaced are the impressions of childhood! Even at this day, +at the mention of the evil angel, an image rises before me like that with +which I used especially to horrify myself in an old copy of Pilgrim's +Progress. Horned, hoofed, scaly, and fire-breathing, his caudal +extremity twisted tight with rage, I remember him, illustrating the +tremendous encounter of Christian in the valley where "Apollyon straddled +over the whole breadth of the way." There was another print of the enemy +which made no slight impression upon me. It was the frontispiece of an +old, smoked, snuff-stained pamphlet, the property of an elderly lady, +(who had a fine collection of similar wonders, wherewith she was kind +enough to edify her young visitors,) containing a solemn account of the +fate of a wicked dancing-party in New Jersey, whose irreverent +declaration, that they would have a fiddler if they had to send to the +lower regions after him, called up the fiend himself, who forthwith +commenced playing, while the company danced to the music incessantly, +without the power to suspend their exercise, until their feet and legs +were worn off to the knees! The rude wood-cut represented the demon +fiddler and his agonized companions literally stumping it up and down in +"cotillons, jigs, strathspeys, and reels." He would have answered very +well to the description of the infernal piper in Tam O'Shanter. + +To this popular notion of the impersonation of the principle of evil we +are doubtless indebted for the whole dark legacy of witchcraft and +possession. Failing in our efforts to solve the problem of the origin of +evil, we fall back upon the idea of a malignant being,--the antagonism of +good. Of this mysterious and dreadful personification we find ourselves +constrained to speak with a degree of that awe and reverence which are +always associated with undefined power and the ability to harm. "The +Devil," says an old writer, "is a dignity, though his glory be somewhat +faded and wan, and is to be spoken of accordingly." + +The evil principle of Zoroaster was from eternity self-created and +existent, and some of the early Christian sects held the same opinion. +The gospel, however, affords no countenance to this notion of a divided +sovereignty of the universe. The Divine Teacher, it is true, in +discoursing of evil, made use of the language prevalent in His time, and +which was adapted to the gross conceptions of His Jewish bearers; but He +nowhere presents the embodiment of sin as an antagonism to the absolute +power and perfect goodness of God, of whom, and through whom, and to whom +are all things. Pure himself, He can create nothing impure. Evil, +therefore, has no eternity in the past. The fact of its present actual +existence is indeed strongly stated; and it is not given us to understand +the secret of that divine alchemy whereby pain, and sin, and discord +become the means to beneficent ends worthy of the revealed attributes of +the Infinite Parent. Unsolved by human reason or philosophy, the dark +mystery remains to baffle the generations of men; and only to the eye of +humble and childlike faith can it ever be reconciled to the purity, +justice, and mercy of Him who is "light, and in whom is no darkness at +all." + +"Do you not believe in the Devil?" some one once asked the Non-conformist +Robinson. "I believe in God," was the reply; "don't you?" + +Henry of Nettesheim says "that it is unanimously maintained that devils +do wander up and down in the earth; but what they are, or how they are, +ecclesiasticals have not clearly expounded." Origen, in his Platonic +speculations on this subject, supposed them to be spirits who, by +repentance, might be restored, that in the end all knees might be bowed +to the Father of spirits, and He become all in all. Justin Martyr was of +the opinion that many of them still hoped for their salvation; and the +Cabalists held that this hope of theirs was well founded. One is +irresistibly reminded here of the closing verse of the _Address to the +Deil_, by Burns:-- + + "But fare ye weel, Auld Nickie ben! + Gin ye wad take a thought and mend, + Ye aiblins might--I dinna ken-- + Still has a stake + I'm was to think upon yon den + Fen for your sake." + +The old schoolmen and fathers seem to agree that the Devil and his +ministers have bodies in some sort material, subject to passions and +liable to injury and pain. Origen has a curious notion that any evil +spirit who, in a contest with a human being, is defeated, loses from +thenceforth all his power of mischief, and may be compared to a wasp who +has lost his sting. + +"The Devil," said Samson Occum, the famous Indian preacher, in a +discourse on temperance, "is a gentleman, and never drinks." +Nevertheless it is a remarkable fact, and worthy of the serious +consideration of all who "tarry long at the wine," that, in that state of +the drunkard's malady known as delirium tremens, the adversary, in some +shape or other, is generally visible to the sufferers, or at least, as +Winslow says of the Powahs, "he appeareth more familiarly to them than to +others." I recollect a statement made to me by a gentleman who has had +bitter experience of the evils of intemperance, and who is at this time +devoting his fine talents to the cause of philanthropy and mercy, as the +editor of one of our best temperance journals, which left a most vivid +impression on my mind. He had just returned from a sea-voyage; and, for +the sake of enjoying a debauch, unmolested by his friends, took up his +abode in a rum-selling tavern in a somewhat lonely location on the +seaboard. Here he drank for many days without stint, keeping himself the +whole time in a state of semi-intoxication. One night he stood leaning +against a tree, looking listlessly and vacantly out upon the ocean; the +waves breaking on the beach, and the white sails of passing vessels +vaguely impressing him like the pictures of a dream. He was startled by +a voice whispering hoarsely in his ear, _"You have murdered a man; the +officers of justice are after you; you must fly for your life!"_ Every +syllable was pronounced slowly and separately; and there was something in +the hoarse, gasping sound of the whisper which was indescribably +dreadful. He looked around him, and seeing nothing but the clear +moonlight on the grass, became partially sensible that he was the victim +of illusion, and a sudden fear of insanity thrilled him with a momentary +horror. Rallying himself, he returned to the tavern, drank another glass +of brandy, and retired to his chamber. He had scarcely lain his head on +the pillow when he heard that hoarse, low, but terribly distinct whisper, +repeating the same words. He describes his sensations at this time as +inconceivably fearful. Reason was struggling with insanity; but amidst +the confusion and mad disorder one terrible thought evolved itself. Had +he not, in a moment of mad frenzy of which his memory made no record, +actually murdered some one? And was not this a warning from Heaven? +Leaving his bed and opening his door, he heard the words again repeated, +with the addition, in a tone of intense earnestness, "Follow me!" He +walked forward in the direction of the sound, through a long entry, to +the head of the staircase, where he paused for a moment, when again he +heard the whisper, half-way down the stairs, "Follow me!" + +Trembling with terror, he passed down two flights of stairs, and found +himself treading on the cold brick floor of a large room in the basement, +or cellar, where he had never been before. The voice still beckoned him +onward; and, groping after it, his hand touched an upright post, against +which he leaned for a moment. He heard it again, apparently only two or +three yards in front of him "You have murdered a man; the officers are +close behind you; follow me!" Putting one foot forward while his hand +still grasped the post, it fell upon empty air, and he with difficulty +recovered himself. Stooping down and feeling with his hands, he found +himself on the very edge of a large uncovered cistern, or tank, filled +nearly to the top with water. The sudden shock of this discovery broke +the horrible enchantment. The whisperer was silent. He believed, at the +time, that he had been the subject, and well-nigh the victim, of a +diabolical delusion; and he states that, even now, with the recollection +of that strange whisper is always associated a thought of the universal +tempter. + +Our worthy ancestors were, in their own view of the matter, the advance +guard and forlorn hope of Christendom in its contest with the bad angel. +The New World, into which they had so valiantly pushed the outposts of +the Church militant, was to them, not God's world, but the Devil's. They +stood there on their little patch of sanctified territory like the +gamekeeper of Der Freischutz in the charmed circle; within were prayer +and fasting, unmelodious psalmody and solemn hewing of hereties, "before +the Lord in Gilgal;" without were "dogs and sorcerers, red children of +perdition, Powah wizards," and "the foul fiend." In their grand old +wilderness, broken by fair, broad rivers and dotted with loveliest lakes, +hanging with festoons of leaf, and vine, and flower, the steep sides of +mountains whose naked tops rose over the surrounding verdure like altars +of a giant world,--with its early summer greenness and the many-colored +wonder of its autumn, all glowing as if the rainbows of a summer shower +had fallen upon it, under the clear, rich light of a sun to which the +misty day of their cold island was as moonlight,--they saw no beauty, +they recognized no holy revelation. It was to them terrible as the +forest which Dante traversed on his way to the world of pain. Every +advance step they made was upon the enemy's territory. And one has only +to read the writings of the two Mathers to perceive that that enemy was +to them no metaphysical abstraction, no scholastic definition, no figment +of a poetical fancy, but a living, active reality, alternating between +the sublimest possibilities of evil and the lowest details of mean +mischief; now a "tricksy spirit," disturbing the good-wife's platters or +soiling her newwashed linen, and anon riding the storm-cloud and pointing +its thunder-bolts; for, as the elder Mather pertinently inquires, "how +else is it that our meeting-houses are burned by the lightning?" What +was it, for instance, but his subtlety which, speaking through the lips +of Madame Hutchinson, confuted the "judges of Israel" and put to their +wits' end the godly ministers of the Puritan Zion? Was not his evil +finger manifested in the contumacious heresy of Roger Williams? Who else +gave the Jesuit missionaries--locusts from the pit as they were--such a +hold on the affections of those very savages who would not have scrupled +to hang the scalp of pious Father Wilson himself from their girdles? To +the vigilant eye of Puritanism was he not alike discernible in the light +wantonness of the May-pole revellers, beating time with the cloven foot +to the vain music of obscene dances, and in the silent, hat-canopied +gatherings of the Quakers, "the most melancholy of the sects," as Dr. +Moore calls them? Perilous and glorious was it, under these +circumstances, for such men as Mather and Stoughton to gird up their +stout loins and do battle with the unmeasured, all-surrounding terror. +Let no man lightly estimate their spiritual knight-errantry. The heroes +of old romance, who went about smiting dragons, lopping giants' heads, +and otherwise pleasantly diverting themselves, scarcely deserve mention +in comparison with our New England champions, who, trusting not to carnal +sword and lance, in a contest with principalities and powers, "spirits +that live throughout, Vital in every part, not as frail man,"-- +encountered their enemies with weapons forged by the stern spiritual +armorer of Geneva. The life of Cotton Mather is as full of romance as +the legends of Ariosto or the tales of Beltenebros and Florisando in +Amadis de Gaul. All about him was enchanted ground; devils glared on him +in his "closet wrestlings;" portents blazed in the heavens above him; +while he, commissioned and set apart as the watcher, and warder, and +spiritual champion of "the chosen people," stood ever ready for battle, +with open eye and quick ear for the detection of the subtle approaches of +the enemy. No wonder is it that the spirits of evil combined against +him; that they beset him as they did of old St. Anthony; that they shut +up the bowels of the General Court against his long-cherished hope of the +presidency of Old Harvard; that they even had the audacity to lay hands +on his anti-diabolical manuscripts, or that "ye divil that was in ye girl +flewe at and tore" his grand sermon against witches. How edifying is his +account of the young bewitched maiden whom he kept in his house for the +purpose of making experiments which should satisfy all "obstinate +Sadducees"! How satisfactory to orthodoxy and confounding to heresy is +the nice discrimination of "ye divil in ye girl," who was choked in +attempting to read the Catechism, yet found no trouble with a pestilent +Quaker pamphlet; who was quiet and good-humored when the worthy Doctor +was idle, but went into paroxysms of rage when he sat down to indite his +diatribes against witches and familiar spirits! + + [The Quakers appear to have, at a comparatively early period, + emancipated themselves in a great degree from the grosser + superstitions of their times. William Penn, indeed, had a law in + his colony against witchcraft; but the first trial of a person + suspected of this offence seems to have opened his eyes to its + absurdity. George Fox, judging from one or two passages in his + journal, appears to have held the common opinions of the day on the + subject; yet when confined in Doomsdale dungeon, on being told that + the place was haunted and that the spirits of those who had died + there still walked at night in his room, he replied, "that if all + the spirits and devils in hell were there, he was over them in the + power of God, and feared no such thing." + + The enemies of the Quakers, in order to account for the power and + influence of their first preachers, accused them of magic and + sorcery. "The Priest of Wakefield," says George Fox (one trusts he + does not allude to our old friend the Vicar), "raised many wicked + slanders upon me, as that I carried bottles with me and made people + drink, and that made them follow me; that I rode upon a great black + horse, and was seen in one county upon my black horse in one hour, + and in the same hour in another county fourscore miles off." In his + account of the mob which beset him at Walney Island, he says: "When + I came to myself I saw James Lancaster's wife throwing stones at my + face, and her husband lying over me to keep off the blows and + stones; for the people had persuaded her that I had bewitched her + husband." + + Cotton Mather attributes the plague of witchcraft in New England in + about an equal degree to the Quakers and Indians. The first of the + sect who visited Boston, Ann Austin and Mary Fisher,--the latter a + young girl,--were seized upon by Deputy-Governor Bellingham, in the + absence of Governor Endicott, and shamefully stripped naked for the + purpose of ascertaining whether they were witches with the Devil's + mark on them. In 1662 Elizabeth Horton and Joan Broksop, two + venerable preachers of the sect, were arrested in Boston, charged by + Governor Endicott with being witches, and carried two days' journey + into the woods, and left to the tender mercies of Indians and + wolves.] + +All this is pleasant enough now; we can laugh at the Doctor and his +demons; but little matter of laughter was it to the victims on Salem +Hill; to the prisoners in the jails; to poor Giles Corey, tortured with +planks upon his breast, which forced the tongue from his mouth and his +life from his old, palsied body; to bereaved and quaking families; to a +whole community, priest-ridden and spectresmitten, gasping in the sick +dream of a spiritual nightmare and given over to believe a lie. We may +laugh, for the grotesque is blended with the horrible; but we must also +pity and shudder. The clear-sighted men who confronted that delusion in +its own age, disenchanting, with strong good sense and sharp ridicule, +their spell-bound generation,--the German Wierus, the Italian D'Apone, +the English Scot, and the New England Calef,--deserve high honors as the +benefactors of their race. It is true they were branded through life as +infidels and "damnable Sadducees;" but the truth which they uttered +lived after them, and wrought out its appointed work, for it had a Divine +commission and Godspeed. + + "The oracles are dumb; + No voice nor hideous hum +Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving; + Apollo from his shrine + Can now no more divine, +With hollow shriek the steep of Delphns leaving." + +Dimmer and dimmer, as the generations pass away, this tremendous terror, +this all-pervading espionage of evil, this active incarnation of +motiveless malignity, presents itself to the imagination. The once +imposing and solemn rite of exorcism has become obsolete in the Church. +Men are no longer, in any quarter of the world, racked or pressed under +planks to extort a confession of diabolical alliance. The heretic now +laughs to scorn the solemn farce of the Church which, in the name of the +All-Merciful, formally delivers him over to Satan. And for the sake of +abused and long-cheated humanity let us rejoice that it is so, when we +consider how for long, weary centuries the millions of professed +Christendom stooped, awestricken, under the yoke of spiritual and +temporal despotism, grinding on from generation to generation in a +despair which had passed complaining, because superstition, in alliance +with tyranny, had filled their upward pathway to freedom with shapes of +terror,--the spectres of God's wrath to the uttermost, the fiend, and +that torment the smoke of which rises forever. Through fear of a Satan +of the future,--a sort of ban-dog of priestcraft, held in its leash and +ready to be let loose upon the disputers of its authority,--our toiling +brothers of past ages have permitted their human taskmasters to convert +God's beautiful world, so adorned and fitted for the peace and happiness +of all, into a great prison-house of suffering, filled with the actual +terrors which the imagination of the old poets gave to the realm of +Rhadamanthus. And hence, while I would not weaken in the slightest +degree the influence of that doctrine of future retribution,--the +accountability of the spirit for the deeds done in the body,--the truth +of which reason, revelation, and conscience unite in attesting as the +necessary result of the preservation in another state of existence of the +soul's individuality and identity, I must, nevertheless, rejoice that the +many are no longer willing to permit the few, for their especial benefit, +to convert our common Father's heritage into a present hell, where, in +return for undeserved suffering and toil uncompensated, they can have +gracious and comfortable assurance of release from a future one. Better +is the fear of the Lord than the fear of the Devil; holier and more +acceptable the obedience of love and reverence than the submission of +slavish terror. The heart which has felt the "beauty of holiness," which +has been in some measure attuned to the divine harmony which now, as of +old in the angel-hymn of the Advent, breathes of "glory to God, peace on +earth, and good-will to men," in the serene atmosphere of that "perfect +love which casteth out fear," smiles at the terrors which throng the sick +dreams of the sensual, which draw aside the nightcurtains of guilt, and +startle with whispers of revenge the oppressor of the poor. + +There is a beautiful moral in one of Fouque's miniature romances,--_Die +Kohlerfamilie_. The fierce spectre, which rose giant-like, in its +bloodred mantle, before the selfish and mercenary merchant, ever +increasing in size and, terror with the growth of evil and impure thought +in the mind of the latter, subdued by prayer, and penitence, and patient +watchfulness over the heart's purity, became a loving and gentle +visitation of soft light and meekest melody; "a beautiful radiance, at +times hovering and flowing on before the traveller, illuminating the +bushes and foliage of the mountain-forest; a lustre strange and lovely, +such as the soul may conceive, but no words express. He felt its power +in the depths of his being,--felt it like the mystic breathing of the +Spirit of God." + +The excellent Baxter and other pious men of his day deprecated in all +sincerity and earnestness the growing disbelief in witchcraft and +diabolical agency, fearing that mankind, losing faith in a visible Satan +and in the supernatural powers of certain paralytic old women, would +diverge into universal skepticism. It is one of the saddest of sights to +see these good men standing sentry at the horn gate of dreams; attempting +against the most discouraging odds to defend their poor fallacies from +profane and irreverent investigation; painfully pleading doubtful +Scripture and still more doubtful tradition in behalf of detected and +convicted superstitions tossed on the sharp horns of ridicule, stretched +on the rack of philosophy, or perishing under the exhausted receiver of +science. A clearer knowledge of the aspirations, capacities, and +necessities of the human soul, and of the revelations which the infinite +Spirit makes to it, not only through the senses by the phenomena of +outward nature, but by that inward and direct communion which, under +different names, has been recognized by the devout and thoughtful of +every religious sect and school of philosophy, would have saved them much +anxious labor and a good deal of reproach withal in their hopeless +championship of error. The witches of Baxter and "the black man" of +Mather have vanished; belief in them is no longer possible on the part of +sane men. But this mysterious universe, through which, half veiled in +its own shadow, our dim little planet is wheeling, with its star worlds +and thought-wearying spaces, remains. Nature's mighty miracle is still +over and around us; and hence awe, wonder, and reverence remain to be the +inheritance of humanity; still are there beautiful repentances and holy +deathbeds; and still over the soul's darkness and confusion rises, +starlike, the great idea of duty. By higher and better influences than +the poor spectres of superstition, man must henceforth be taught to +reverence the Invisible, and, in the consciousness of his own weakness, +and sin, and sorrow, to lean with childlike trust on the wisdom and mercy +of an overruling Providence,--walking by faith through the shadow and +mystery, and cheered by the remembrance that, whatever may be his +apparent allotment,-- + + "God's greatness flows around our incompleteness; + Round our restlessness His rest." + +It is a sad spectacle to find the glad tidings of the Christian faith and +its "reasonable service" of devotion transformed by fanaticism and +credulity into superstitious terror and wild extravagance; but, if +possible, there is one still sadder. It is that of men in our own time +regarding with satisfaction such evidences of human weakness, and +professing to find in them new proofs of their miserable theory of a +godless universe, and new occasion for sneering at sincere devotion as +cant, and humble reverence as fanaticism. Alas! in comparison with +such, the religious enthusiast, who in the midst of his delusion still +feels that he is indeed a living soul and an heir of immortality, to whom +God speaks from the immensities of His universe, is a sane man. Better +is it, in a life like ours, to be even a howling dervis or a dancing +Shaker, confronting imaginary demons with Thalaba's talisman of faith, +than to lose the consciousness of our own spiritual nature, and look upon +ourselves as mere brute masses of animal organization,--barnacles on a +dead universe; looking into the dull grave with no hope beyond it; earth +gazing into earth, and saying to corruption, "Thou art my father," and to +the worm, "Thou art my sister." + + + + + + HAMLET AMONG THE GRAVES. + + [1844.] + +AN amiable enthusiast, immortal in his beautiful little romance of Paul +and Virginia, has given us in his Miscellanies a chapter on the Pleasures +of Tombs,--a title singular enough, yet not inappropriate; for the meek- +spirited and sentimental author has given, in his own flowing and +eloquent language, its vindication. "There is," says he, "a voluptuous +melancholy arising from the contemplation of tombs; the result, like +every other attractive sensation, of the harmony of two opposite +principles,--from the sentiment of our fleeting life and that of our +immortality, which unite in view of the last habitation of mankind. A +tomb is a monument erected on the confines of two worlds. It first +presents to us the end of the vain disquietudes of life and the image of +everlasting repose; it afterwards awakens in us the confused sentiment of +a blessed immortality, the probabilities of which grow stronger and +stronger in proportion as the person whose memory is recalled was a +virtuous character. + +"It is from this intellectual instinct, therefore, in favor of virtue, +that the tombs of great men inspire us with a veneration so affecting. +From the same sentiment, too, it is that those which contain objects that +have been lovely excite so much pleasing regret; for the attractions of +love arise entirely out of the appearances of virtue. Hence it is that +we are moved at the sight of the small hillock which covers the ashes of +an infant, from the recollection of its innocence; hence it is that we +are melted into tenderness on contemplating the tomb in which is laid to +repose a young female, the delight and the hope of her family by reason +of her virtues. In order to give interest to such monuments, there is no +need of bronzes, marbles, and gildings. The more simple they are, the +more energy they communicate to the sentiment of melancholy. They +produce a more powerful effect when poor rather than rich, antique rather +than modern, with details of misfortune rather than titles of honor, with +the attributes of virtue rather than with those of power. It is in the +country principally that their impression makes itself felt in a very +lively manner. A simple, unoruamented grave there causes more tears to +flow than the gaudy splendor of a cathedral interment. There it is that +grief assumes sublimity; it ascends with the aged yews in the churchyard; +it extends with the surrounding hills and plains; it allies itself with +all the effects of Nature,--with the dawning of the morning, with the +murmuring of wind, with the setting of the sun, and with the darkness of +the night." + +Not long since I took occasion to visit the cemetery near this city. It +is a beautiful location for a "city of the dead,"--a tract of some forty +or fifty acres on the eastern bank of the Concord, gently undulating, and +covered with a heavy growth of forest-trees, among which the white oak is +conspicuous. The ground beneath has been cleared of undergrowth, and is +marked here and there with monuments and railings enclosing "family +lots." It is a quiet, peaceful spot; the city, with its crowded mills, +its busy streets and teeming life, is hidden from view; not even a +solitary farm-house attracts the eye. All is still and solemn, as befits +the place where man and nature lie down together; where leaves of the +great lifetree, shaken down by death, mingle and moulder with the frosted +foliage of the autumnal forest. + +Yet the contrast of busy life is not wanting. The Lowell and Boston +Railroad crosses the river within view of the cemetery; and, standing +there in the silence and shadow, one can see the long trains rushing +along their iron pathway, thronged with living, breathing humanity,--the +young, the beautiful, the gay,--busy, wealth-seeking manhood of middle +years, the child at its mother's knee, the old man with whitened hairs, +hurrying on, on,--car after car,--like the generations of man sweeping +over the track of time to their last 'still resting-place. + +It is not the aged and the sad of heart who make this a place of favorite +resort. The young, the buoyant, the light-hearted, come and linger among +these flower-sown graves, watching the sunshine falling in broken light +upon these cold, white marbles, and listening to the song of birds in +these leafy recesses. Beautiful and sweet to the young heart is the +gentle shadow of melancholy which here falls upon it, soothing, yet sad, +--a sentiment midway between joy and sorrow. How true is it, that, in the +language of Wordsworth,-- + + "In youth we love the darkling lawn, + Brushed by the owlet's wing; + Then evening is preferred to dawn, + And autumn to the spring. + Sad fancies do we then affect, + In luxury of disrespect + To our own prodigal excess + Of too familiar happiness." + +The Chinese, from the remotest antiquity, have adorned and decorated +their grave-grounds with shrubs and sweet flowers, as places of popular +resort. The Turks have their graveyards planted with trees, through +which the sun looks in upon the turban stones of the faithful, and +beneath which the relatives of the dead sit in cheerful converse through +the long days of summer, in all the luxurious quiet and happy +indifference of the indolent East. Most of the visitors whom I met at +the Lowell cemetery wore cheerful faces; some sauntered laughingly along, +apparently unaffected by the associations of the place; too full, +perhaps, of life, and energy, and high hope to apply to themselves the +stern and solemn lesson which is taught even by these flower-garlanded +mounds. But, for myself, I confess that I am always awed by the presence +of the dead. I cannot jest above the gravestone. My spirit is silenced +and rebuked before the tremendous mystery of which the grave reminds me, +and involuntarily pays: + + "The deep reverence taught of old, + The homage of man's heart to death." + +Even Nature's cheerful air, and sun, and birdvoices only serve to remind +me that there are those beneath who have looked on the same green leaves +and sunshine, felt the same soft breeze upon their cheeks, and listened +to the same wild music of the woods for the last time. Then, too, comes +the saddening reflection, to which so many have given expression, that +these trees will put forth their leaves, the slant sunshine still fall +upon green meadows and banks of flowers, and the song of the birds and +the ripple of waters still be heard after our eyes and ears have closed +forever. It is hard for us to realize this. We are so accustomed to +look upon these things as a part of our life environment that it seems +strange that they should survive us. Tennyson, in his exquisite +metaphysical poem of the Two Voices, has given utterance to this +sentiment:-- + + "Alas! though I should die, I know + That all about the thorn will blow + In tufts of rosy-tinted snow. + + "Not less the bee will range her cells, + The furzy prickle fire the dells, + The foxglove cluster dappled bells." + +"The pleasures of the tombs!" Undoubtedly, in the language of the +Idumean, seer, there are many who "rejoice exceedingly and are glad when +they can find the grave;" who long for it "as the servant earnestly +desireth the shadow." Rest, rest to the sick heart and the weary brain, +to the long afflicted and the hopeless,--rest on the calm bosom of our +common mother. Welcome to the tired ear, stunned and confused with +life's jarring discords, the everlasting silence; grateful to the weary +eyes which "have seen evil, and not good," the everlasting shadow. + +Yet over all hangs the curtain of a deep mystery,--a curtain lifted only +on one side by the hands of those who are passing under its solemn +shadow. No voice speaks to us from beyond it, telling of the unknown +state; no hand from within puts aside the dark drapery to reveal the +mysteries towards which we are all moving. "Man giveth up the ghost; and +where is he?" + +Thanks to our Heavenly Father, He has not left us altogether without an +answer to this momentous question. Over the blackness of darkness a +light is shining. The valley of the shadow of death is no longer "a land +of darkness and where the light is as darkness." The presence of a +serene and holy life pervades it. Above its pale tombs and crowded +burial-places, above the wail of despairing humanity, the voice of Him +who awakened life and beauty beneath the grave-clothes of the tomb at +Bethany is heard proclaiming, "I am the Resurrection and the Life." We +know not, it is true, the conditions of our future life; we know not what +it is to pass fromm this state of being to another; but before us in that +dark passage has gone the Man of Nazareth, and the light of His footsteps +lingers in the path. Where He, our Brother in His humanity, our Redeemer +in His divine nature, has gone, let us not fear to follow. He who +ordereth all aright will uphold with His own great arm the frail spirit +when its incarnation is ended; and it may be, that, in language which I +have elsewhere used, + + --when Time's veil shall fall asunder, + The soul may know + No fearful change nor sudden wonder, + Nor sink the weight of mystery under, + But with the upward rise and with the vastness grow. + + And all we shrink from now may seem + No new revealing; + Familiar as our childhood's stream, + Or pleasant memory of a dream, + The loved and cherished past upon the new life stealing. + + Serene and mild the untried light + May have its dawning; + As meet in summer's northern night + The evening gray and dawning white, + The sunset hues of Time blend with the soul's new morning. + + + + + SWEDENBORG + + [1844.] + +THERE are times when, looking only on the surface of things, one is +almost ready to regard Lowell as a sort of sacred city of Mammon,--the +Benares of gain: its huge mills, temples; its crowded dwellings, lodging- +places of disciples and "proselytes within the gate;" its warehouses, +stalls for the sale of relics. A very mean idol-worship, too, unrelieved +by awe and reverence,--a selfish, earthward-looking devotion to the +"least-erected spirit that fell from paradise." I grow weary of seeing +man and mechanism reduced to a common level, moved by the same impulse, +answering to the same bell-call. A nightmare of materialism broods over +all. I long at times to hear a voice crying through the streets like +that of one of the old prophets proclaiming the great first truth,--that +the Lord alone is God. + +Yet is there not another side to the picture? High over sounding +workshops spires glisten in the sun,--silent fingers pointing heavenward. +The workshops themselves are instinct with other and subtler processes +than cotton-spinning or carpet-weaving. Each human being who watches +beside jack or power loom feels more or less intensely that it is a +solemn thing to live. Here are sin and sorrow, yearnings for lost peace, +outgushing gratitude of forgiven spirits, hopes and fears, which stretch +beyond the horizon of time into eternity. Death is here. The graveyard +utters its warning. Over all bends the eternal heaven in its silence and +mystery. Nature, even here, is mightier than Art, and God is above all. +Underneath the din of labor and the sounds of traffic, a voice, felt +rather than beard, reaches the heart, prompting the same fearful +questions which stirred the soul of the world's oldest poet,--"If a man +die, shall he live again?" "Man giveth up the ghost, and where is he?" +Out of the depths of burdened and weary hearts comes up the agonizing +inquiry, "What shall I do to be saved?" "Who shall deliver me from the +body of this death?" + +As a matter of course, in a city like this, composed of all classes of +our many-sided population, a great variety of religious sects have their +representatives in Lowell. The young city is dotted over with "steeple +houses," most of them of the Yankee order of architecture. The +Episcopalians have a house of worship on Merrimac Street,--a pile of dark +stone, with low Gothic doors and arched windows. A plat of grass lies +between it and the dusty street; and near it stands the dwelling-house +intended for the minister, built of the same material as the church and +surrounded by trees and shrubbery. The attention of the stranger is also +attracted by another consecrated building on the hill slope of +Belvidere,--one of Irving's a "shingle palaces," painted in imitation of +stone,--a great wooden sham, "whelked and horned" with pine spires and +turrets, a sort of whittled representation of the many-beaded beast of +the Apocalypse. + +In addition to the established sects which have reared their visible +altars in the City of Spindles, there are many who have not yet marked +the boundaries or set up the pillars and stretched out the curtains of +their sectarian tabernacles; who, in halls and "upper chambers" and in +the solitude of their own homes, keep alive the spirit of devotion, and, +wrapping closely around them the mantles of their order, maintain the +integrity of its peculiarities in the midst of an unbelieving generation. + +Not long since, in company with a friend who is a regular attendant, I +visited the little meeting of the disciples of Emanuel Swedenborg. +Passing over Chapel Hill and leaving the city behind us, we reached the +stream which winds through the beautiful woodlands at the Powder Mills +and mingles its waters with the Concord. The hall in which the followers +of the Gothland seer meet is small and plain, with unpainted seats, like +those of "the people called Quakers," and looks out upon the still woods +and that "willowy stream which turns a mill." An organ of small size, +yet, as it seemed to me, vastly out of proportion with the room, filled +the place usually occupied by the pulpit, which was here only a plain +desk, placed modestly by the side of it. The congregation have no +regular preacher, but the exercises of reading the Scriptures, prayers, +and selections from the Book of Worship were conducted by one of the lay +members. A manuscript sermon, by a clergyman of the order in Boston, was +read, and apparently listened to with much interest. It was well written +and deeply imbued with the doctrines of the church. I was impressed by +the gravity and serious earnestness of the little audience. There were +here no circumstances calculated to excite enthusiasm, nothing of the +pomp of religious rites and ceremonies; only a settled conviction of the +truth of the doctrines of their faith could have thus brought them +together. I could scarcely make the fact a reality, as I sat among them, +that here, in the midst of our bare and hard utilities, in the very +centre and heart of our mechanical civilization, were devoted and +undoubting believers in the mysterious and wonderful revelations of the +Swedish prophet,--revelations which look through all external and outward +manifestations to inward realities; which regard all objects in the world +of sense only as the types and symbols of the world of spirit; literally +unmasking the universe and laying bare the profoundest mysteries of life. + +The character and writings of Emanuel Swedenborg constitute one of the +puzzles and marvels of metaphysics and psychology. A man remarkable for +his practical activities, an ardent scholar of the exact sciences, versed +in all the arcana of physics, a skilful and inventive mechanician, he has +evolved from the hard and gross materialism of his studies a system of +transcendent spiritualism. From his aggregation of cold and apparently +lifeless practical facts beautiful and wonderful abstractions start forth +like blossoms on the rod of the Levite. A politician and a courtier, a +man of the world, a mathematician engaged in the soberest details of the +science, he has given to the world, in the simplest and most natural +language, a series of speculations upon the great mystery of being: +detailed, matter-of-fact narratives of revelations from the spiritual +world, which at once appall us by their boldness, and excite our wonder +at their extraordinary method, logical accuracy, and perfect consistency. +These remarkable speculations--the workings of a mind in which a powerful +imagination allied itself with superior reasoning faculties, the +marvellous current of whose thought ran only in the diked and guarded +channels of mathematical demonstration--he uniformly speaks of as +"facts." His perceptions of abstractions were so intense that they seem +to have reached that point where thought became sensible to sight as well +as feeling. What he thought, that he saw. + +He relates his visions of the spiritual world as he would the incidents +of a walk round his own city of Stockholm. One can almost see him in his +"brown coat and velvet breeches," lifting his "cocked hat" to an angel, +or keeping an unsavory spirit at arm's length with that "gold-headed +cane" which his London host describes as his inseparable companion in +walking. His graphic descriptions have always an air of naturalness and +probability; yet there is a minuteness of detail at times almost +bordering on the ludicrous. In his Memorable Relations he manifests +nothing of the imagination of Milton, overlooking the closed gates of +paradise, or following the "pained fiend" in his flight through chaos; +nothing of Dante's terrible imagery appalls us; we are led on from heaven +to heaven very much as Defoe leads us after his shipwrecked Crusoe. We +can scarcely credit the fact that we are not traversing our lower planet; +and the angels seem vastly like our common acquaintances. We seem to +recognize the "John Smiths," and "Mr. Browns," and "the old familiar +faces" of our mundane habitation. The evil principle in Swedenborg's +picture is, not the colossal and massive horror of the Inferno, nor that +stern wrestler with fate who darkens the canvas of Paradise Lost, but an +aggregation of poor, confused spirits, seeking rest and finding none save +in the unsavory atmosphere of the "falses." These small fry of devils +remind us only of certain unfortunate fellows whom we have known, who +seem incapable of living in good and wholesome society, and who are +manifestly given over to believe a lie. Thus it is that the very +"heavens" and "hells" of the Swedish mystic seem to be "of the earth, +earthy." He brings the spiritual world into close analogy with the +material one. + +In this hurried paper I have neither space nor leisure to attempt an +analysis of the great doctrines which underlie the "revelations" of +Swedenborg. His remarkably suggestive books are becoming familiar to the +reading and reflecting portion of the community. They are not unworthy +of study; but, in the language of another, I would say, "Emulate +Swedenborg in his exemplary life, his learning, his virtues, his +independent thought, his desire for wisdom, his love of the good and +true; aim to be his equal, his superior, in these things; but call no man +your master." + + + + + + THE BETTER LAND. + + [1844.] + +"THE shapings of our heavens are the modifications of our constitution," +said Charles Lamb, in his reply to Southey's attack upon him in the +Quarterly Review. + +He who is infinite in love as well as wisdom has revealed to us the fact +of a future life, and the fearfully important relation in which the +present stands to it. The actual nature and conditions of that life He +has hidden from us,--no chart of the ocean of eternity is given us,--no +celestial guidebook or geography defines, localizes, and prepares us for +the wonders of the spiritual world. Hence imagination has a wide field +for its speculations, which, so long as they do not positively contradict +the revelation of the Scriptures, cannot be disproved. + +We naturally enough transfer to our idea of heaven whatever we love and +reverence on earth. Thither the Catholic carries in his fancy the +imposing rites and time-honored solemnities of his worship. There the +Methodist sees his love-feasts and camp-meetings in the groves and by the +still waters and green pastures of the blessed abodes. The Quaker, in +the stillness of his self-communing, remembers that there was "silence in +heaven." + +The Churchman, listening to the solemn chant of weal music or the deep +tones of the organ, thinks of the song of the elders and the golden harps +of the New Jerusalem. + +The heaven of the northern nations of Europe was a gross and sensual +reflection of the earthly life of a barbarous and brutal people. + +The Indians of North America had a vague notion of a sunset land, a +beautiful paradise far in the west, mountains and forests filled with +deer and buffalo, lakes and streams swarming with fishes,--the happy +hunting-ground of souls. In a late letter from a devoted missionary +among the Western Indians (Paul Blohm, a converted Jew) we have noticed a +beautiful illustration of this belief. Near the Omaha mission-house, on +a high luff, was a solitary Indian grave. "One evening," +says the missionary, "having come home with some cattle which I had been +seeking, I heard some one wailing; and, looking in the direction from +whence I proceeded, I found it to be from the grave near our house. In a +moment after a mourner rose up from a kneeling or lying posture, and, +turning to the setting sun, stretched forth his arms in prayer and +supplication with an intensity and earnestness as though he would detain +the splendid luminary from running his course. With his body leaning +forward and his arms stretched towards the sun, he presented a most +striking figure of sorrow and petition. It was solemnly awful. He +seemed to me to be one of the ancients come forth to teach me how to +pray." + +A venerable and worthy New England clergyman, on his death-bed, just +before the close of his life, declared that he was only conscious of an +awfully solemn and intense curiosity to know the great secret of death +and eternity. + +The excellent Dr. Nelson, of Missouri, was one who, while on earth, +seemed to live another and higher life in the contemplation of infinite +purity and happiness. A friend once related an incident concerning him +which made a deep impression upon my mind. They had been travelling +through a summer's forenoon in the prairie, and had lain down to rest +beneath a solitary tree. The Doctor lay for a long time, silently +looking upwards through the openings of the boughs into the still +heavens, when he repeated the following lines, in a low tone, as if +communing with himself in view of the wonders he described:-- + + "O the joys that are there mortal eye bath not seen! + O the songs they sing there, with hosannas between! + O the thrice-blessed song of the Lamb and of Moses! + O brightness on brightness! the pearl gate uncloses! + O white wings of angels! O fields white with roses! + O white tents of peace, where the rapt soul reposes + O the waters so still, and the pastures so green!" + +The brief hints afforded us by the sacred writings concerning the better +land are inspiring and beautiful. Eye hath not seen, nor the ear heard, +neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive of the good in +store for the righteous. Heaven is described as a quiet habitation,--a +rest remaining for the people of God. Tears shall be wiped away from all +eyes; there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither +shall there be any more pain. To how many death-beds have these words +spoken peace! How many failing hearts have gathered strength from them +to pass through the dark valley of shadows! + +Yet we should not forget that "the kingdom of heaven is within;" that it +is the state and affections of the soul, the answer of a good conscience, +the sense of harmony with God, a condition of time as well as of +eternity. What is really momentous and all-important with us is the +present, by which the future is shaped and colored. A mere change of +locality cannot alter the actual and intrinsic qualities of the soul. +Guilt and remorse would make the golden streets of Paradise intolerable +as the burning marl of the infernal abodes; while purity and innocence +would transform hell itself into heaven. + + + + + +DORA GREEN WELL. + +First published as an introduction to an American edition of that +author's _The Patience of Hope_. + +THERE are men who, irrespective of the names by which they are called in +the Babel confusion of sects, are endeared to the common heart of +Christendom. Our doors open of their own accord to receive them. For in +them we feel that in some faint degree, and with many limitations, the +Divine is again manifested: something of the Infinite Love shines out of +them; their very garments have healing and fragrance borrowed from the +bloom of Paradise. So of books. There are volumes which perhaps contain +many things, in the matter of doctrine and illustration, to which our +reason does not assent, but which nevertheless seem permeated with a +certain sweetness and savor of life. They have the Divine seal and +imprimatur; they are fragrant with heart's-ease and asphodel; tonic with +the leaves which are for the healing of the nations. The meditations of +the devout monk of Kempen are the common heritage of Catholic and +Protestant; our hearts burn within us as we walk with Augustine under +Numidian fig-trees in the gardens of Verecundus; Feuelon from his +bishop's palace and John Woolman from his tailor's shop speak to us in +the same language. The unknown author of that book which Luther loved +next to his Bible, the Theologia Germanica, is just as truly at home in +this present age, and in the ultra Protestantism of New England, as in +the heart of Catholic Europe, and in the fourteenth century. For such +books know no limitations of time or place; they have the perpetual +freshness and fitness of truth; they speak out of profound experience +heart answers to heart as we read them; the spirit that is in man, and +the inspiration that giveth understanding, bear witness to them. The +bent and stress of their testimony are the same, whether written in this +or a past century, by Catholic or Quaker: self-renunciation,-- +reconcilement to the Divine will through simple faith in the Divine +goodness, and the love of it which must needs follow its recognition, the +life of Christ made our own by self-denial and sacrifice, and the +fellowship of His suffering for the good of others, the indwelling +Spirit, leading into all truth, the Divine Word nigh us, even in our +hearts. They have little to do with creeds, or schemes of doctrine, or +the partial and inadequate plans of salvation invented by human +speculation and ascribed to Him who, it is sufficient to know, is able to +save unto the uttermost all who trust in Him. They insist upon simple +faith and holiness of life, rather than rituals or modes of worship; they +leave the merely formal, ceremonial, and temporal part of religion to +take care of itself, and earnestly seek for the substantial, the +necessary, and the permanent. + +With these legacies of devout souls, it seems to me, the little volume +herewith presented is not wholly unworthy of a place. It assumes the +life and power of the gospel as a matter of actual experience; it bears +unmistakable evidence of a realization, on the part of its author, of the +truth, that Christianity is not simply historical and traditional, but +present and permanent, with its roots in the infinite past and its +branches in the infinite future, the eternal spring and growth of Divine +love; not the dying echo of words uttered centuries ago, never to be +repeated, but God's good tidings spoken afresh in every soul,--the +perennial fountain and unstinted outflow of wisdom and goodness, forever +old and forever new. It is a lofty plea for patience, trust, hope, and +holy confidence, under the shadow, as well as in the light, of Christian +experience, whether the cloud seems to rest on the tabernacle, or moves +guidingly forward. It is perhaps too exclusively addressed to those who +minister in the inner sanctuary, to be entirely intelligible to the +vaster number who wait in the outer courts; it overlooks, perhaps, too +much the solidarity and oneness of humanity;' but all who read it will +feel its earnestness, and confess to the singular beauty of its style, +the strong, steady march of its argument, and the wide and varied +learning which illustrates it. + + ["The good are not so good as I once thought, nor the bad so evil, + and in all there is more for grace to make advantage of, and more to + testify for God and holiness, than I once believed."--Baxter.] + +To use the language of one of its reviewers in the Scottish press:-- + +"Beauty there is in the book; exquisite glimpses into the loveliness of +nature here and there shine out from its lines,--a charm wanting which +meditative writing always seems to have a defect; beautiful gleams, too, +there are of the choicest things of art, and frequent allusions by the +way to legend or picture of the religious past; so that, while you read, +you wander by a clear brook of thought, coining far from the beautiful +hills, and winding away from beneath the sunshine of gladness and beauty +into the dense, mysterious forest of human existence, that loves to sing, +amid the shadow of human darkness and anguish, its music of heavenborn +consolation; bringing, too, its pure waters of cleansing and healing, yet +evermore making its praise of holy affection and gladness; while it is +still haunted by the spirits of prophet, saint, and poet, repeating +snatches of their strains, and is led on, as by a spirit from above, to +join the great river of God's truth. . . . + +"This is a book for Christian men, for the quiet hour of holy solitude, +when the heart longs and waits for access to the presence of the Master. +The weary heart that thirsts amidst its conflicts and its toils for +refreshing water will drink eagerly of these sweet and refreshing words. +To thoughtful men and women, especially such as have learnt any of the +patience of hope in the experiences of sorrow and trial, we commend this +little volume most heartily and earnestly." + + +_The Patience of Hope_ fell into my hands soon after its publication in +Edinburgh, some two years ago. I was at once impressed by its +extraordinary richness of language and imagery,--its deep and solemn tone +of meditation in rare combination with an eminently practical tendency,-- +philosophy warm and glowing with love. It will, perhaps, be less the +fault of the writer than of her readers, if they are not always able to +eliminate from her highly poetical and imaginative language the subtle +metaphysical verity or phase of religious experience which she seeks to +express, or that they are compelled to pass over, without appropriation, +many things which are nevertheless profoundly suggestive as vague +possibilities of the highest life. All may not be able to find in some +of her Scriptural citations the exact weight and significance so apparent +to her own mind. She startles us, at times, by her novel applications of +familiar texts, by meanings reflected upon them from her own spiritual +intuitions, making the barren Baca of the letter a well. If the +rendering be questionable, the beauty and quaint felicity of illustration +and comparison are unmistakable; and we call to mind Augustine's saying, +that two or more widely varying interpretations of Scripture may be alike +true in themselves considered. "When one saith, Moses meant as I do,' +and another saith, 'Nay, but as I do,' I ask, more reverently, 'Why not +rather as both, if both be true?" + +Some minds, for instance, will hesitate to assent to the use of certain +Scriptural passages as evidence that He who is the Light of men, the Way +and the Truth, in the mystery of His economy, designedly "delays, +withdraws, and even hides Himself from those who love and follow Him." +They will prefer to impute spiritual dearth and darkness to human +weakness, to the selfishness which seeks a sign for itself, to evil +imaginations indulged, to the taint and burden of some secret sin, or to +some disease and exaggeration of the conscience, growing out of bodily +infirmity, rather than to any purpose on the part of our Heavenly Father +to perplex and mislead His children. The sun does not shine the less +because one side of our planet is in darkness. To borrow the words of +Augustine "Thou, Lord, forsakest nothing thou hast made. Thou alone art +near to those even who remove far from thee. Let them turn and seek +thee, for not as they have forsaken their Creator hast thou forsaken thy +creation." It is only by holding fast the thought of Infinite Goodness, +and interpreting doubtful Scripture and inward spiritual experience by +the light of that central idea, that we can altogether escape the +dreadful conclusion of Pascal, that revelation has been given us in +dubious cipher, contradictory and mystical, in order that some, through +miraculous aid, may understand it to their salvation, and others be +mystified by it to their eternal loss. + +I might mention other points of probable divergence between reader and +writer, and indicate more particularly my own doubtful parse and +hesitancy over some of these pages. But it is impossible for me to make +one to whom I am so deeply indebted an offender for a word or a +Scriptural rendering. On the grave and awful themes which she discusses, +I have little to say in the way of controversy. I would listen, rather +than criticise. The utterances of pious souls, in all ages, are to me +often like fountains in a thirsty land, strengthening and refreshing, yet +not without an after-taste of human frailty and inadequateness, a slight +bitterness of disappointment and unsatisfied quest. Who has not felt at +times that the letter killeth, that prophecies fail, and tongues cease to +edify, and been ready to say, with the author of the Imitation of Christ: +"Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth. Let not Moses nor the prophets +speak to me, but speak thou rather, who art the Inspirer and Enlightener +of all. I am weary with reading and hearing many things; let all +teachers hold their peace; let all creatures keep silence: speak thou +alone to me." + +The writer of The Patience of Hope had, previous to its publication, +announced herself to a fit, if small, audience of earnest and thoughtful +Christians, in a little volume entitled, A Present Heaven. She has +recently published a collection of poems, of which so competent a judge +as Dr. Brown, the author of _Horae Subsecivae_ and _Rab and his Friends_, +thus speaks, in the _North British Review_:-- + +"Such of our readers--a fast increasing number--as have read and enjoyed +_The Patience of Hope_, listening to the gifted nature which, through +such deep and subtile thought, and through affection and godliness still +deeper and more quick, has charmed and soothed them, will not be +surprised to learn that she is not only poetical, but, what is more, a +poet, and one as true as George Herbert and Henry Vaughan, or our own +Cowper; for, with all our admiration of the searching, fearless +speculation, the wonderful power of speaking clearly upon dark and all +but unspeakable subjects, the rich outcome of 'thoughts that wander +through eternity,' which increases every time we take up that wonderful +little book, we confess we were surprised at the kind and the amount of +true poetic _vis_ in these poems, from the same fine and strong hand. +There is a personality and immediateness, a sort of sacredness and +privacy, as if they were overheard rather than read, which gives to these +remarkable productions a charm and a flavor all their own. With no +effort, no consciousness of any end but that of uttering the inmost +thoughts and desires of the heart, they flow out as clear, as living, as +gladdening as the wayside well, coming from out the darkness of the +central depths, filtered into purity by time and travel. The waters are +copious, sometimes to overflowing; but they are always limpid and +unforced, singing their own quiet tune, not saddening, though sometimes +sad, and their darkness not that of obscurity, but of depth, like that of +the deep sea. + +"This is not a book to criticise or speak about, and we give no extracts +from the longer, and in this case, we think, the better poems. In +reading this Cardiphonia set to music, we have been often reminded, not +only of Herbert and Vaughan, but of Keble,--a likeness of the spirit, not +of the letter; for if there is any one poet who has given a bent to her +mind, it is Wordsworth,--the greatest of all our century's poets, both in +himself and in his power of making poets." + +In the belief that whoever peruses the following pages will be +sufficiently interested in their author to be induced to turn back and +read over again, with renewed pleasure, extracts from her metrical +writings, I copy from the volume so warmly commended a few brief pieces +and extracts from the longer poems. + +Here are three sonnets, each a sermon in itself:-- + + + ASCENDING. + +They who from mountain-peaks have gazed upon +The wide, illimitable heavens have said, +That, still receding as they climbed, outspread, +The blue vault deepens over them, and, one +By one drawn further back, each starry sun +Shoots down a feebler splendor overhead +So, Saviour, as our mounting spirits, led +Along Faith's living way to Thee, have won +A nearer access, up the difficult track +Still pressing, on that rarer atmosphere, +When low beneath us flits the cloudy rack, +We see Thee drawn within a widening sphere +Of glory, from us further, further back,-- +Yet is it then because we are more near. + + + LIFE TAPESTRY. + +Top long have I, methought, with tearful eye +Pored o'er this tangled work of mine, and mused +Above each stitch awry and thread confused; +Now will I think on what in years gone by +I heard of them that weave rare tapestry +At royal looms, and hew they constant use +To work on the rough side, and still peruse +The pictured pattern set above them high; +So will I set my copy high above, +And gaze and gaze till on my spirit grows +Its gracious impress; till some line of love, +Transferred upon my canvas, faintly glows; +Nor look too much on warp or woof, provide +He whom I work for sees their fairer side! + + + HOPE. + +When I do think on thee, sweet Hope, and how +Thou followest on our steps, a coaxing child +Oft chidden hence, yet quickly reconciled, +Still turning on us a glad, beaming brow, +And red, ripe lips for kisses: even now +Thou mindest me of him, the Ruler mild, +Who led God's chosen people through the wild, +And bore with wayward murmurers, meek as thou +That bringest waters from the Rock, with bread +Of angels strewing Earth for us! like him +Thy force abates not, nor thine eye grows dim; +But still with milk and honey-droppings fed, +Thou leadest to the Promised Country fair, +Though thou, like Moses, may'st not enter there + + +There is something very weird and striking in the following lines:-- + + + GONE. + +Alone, at midnight as he knelt, his spirit was aware +Of Somewhat falling in between the silence and the prayer; + +A bell's dull clangor that hath sped so far, it faints and dies +So soon as it hath reached the ear whereto its errand lies; + +And as he rose up from his knees, his spirit was aware +Of Somewhat, forceful and unseen, that sought to hold him there; + +As of a Form that stood behind, and on his shoulders prest +Both hands to stay his rising up, and Somewhat in his breast, + +In accents clearer far than words, spake, "Pray yet longer, pray, +For one that ever prayed for thee this night hath passed away; + +"A soul, that climbing hour by hour the silver-shining stair +That leads to God's great treasure-house, grew covetous; and there + +"Was stored no blessing and no boon, for thee she did not claim, +(So lowly, yet importunate!) and ever with thy name + +"She link'd--that none in earth or heaven might hinder it or stay-- +One Other Name, so strong, that thine hath never missed its way. + +"This very night within my arms this gracious soul I bore Within the +Gate, where many a prayer of hers had gone before; + +"And where she resteth, evermore one constant song they raise Of 'Holy, +holy,' so that now I know not if she prays; + +"But for the voice of praise in Heaven, a voice of Prayer hath gone +From Earth; thy name upriseth now no more; pray on, pray on!" + + +The following may serve as a specimen of the writer's lighter, half- +playful strain of moralizing:-- + + + SEEKING. + +"And where, and among what pleasant places, +Have ye been, that ye come again +With your laps so full of flowers, and your faces +Like buds blown fresh after rain?" + +"We have been," said the children, speaking +In their gladness, as the birds chime, +All together,--"we have been seeking +For the Fairies of olden time; +For we thought, they are only hidden,-- +They would never surely go +From this green earth all unbidden, +And the children that love them so. +Though they come not around us leaping, +As they did when they and the world +Were young, we shall find them sleeping +Within some broad leaf curled; +For the lily its white doors closes +But only over the bee, +And we looked through the summer roses, +Leaf by leaf, so carefully. + +But we thought, rolled up we shall find them +Among mosses old and dry; +From gossamer threads that bind them, +They will start like the butterfly, +All winged: so we went forth seeking, +Yet still they have kept unseen; +Though we think our feet have been keeping +The track where they have been, +For we saw where their dance went flying +O'er the pastures,--snowy white." + +Their seats and their tables lying, +O'erthrown in their sudden flight. +And they, too, have had their losses, +For we found the goblets white +And red in the old spiked mosses, +That they drank from over-night; +And in the pale horn of the woodbine +Was some wine left, clear and bright; +"But we found," said the children, speaking +More quickly, "so many things, +That we soon forgot we were seeking,-- +Forgot all the Fairy rings, +Forgot all the stories olden +That we hear round the fire at night, +Of their gifts and their favors golden,-- +The sunshine was so bright; +And the flowers,--we found so many +That it almost made us grieve +To think there were some, sweet as any, +That we were forced to leave; +As we left, by the brook-side lying, +The balls of drifted foam, +And brought (after all our trying) +These Guelder-roses home." + +"Then, oh!" I heard one speaking +Beside me soft and low, +"I have been, like the blessed children, seeking, +Still seeking, to and fro; +Yet not, like them, for the Fairies,-- +They might pass unmourned away +For me, that had looked on angels,-- +On angels that would not stay; +No! not though in haste before them +I spread all my heart's best cheer, +And made love my banner o'er them, +If it might but keep them here; +They stayed but a while to rest them; +Long, long before its close, +From my feast, though I mourned and prest them +The radiant guests arose; +And their flitting wings struck sadness +And silence; never more +Hath my soul won back the gladness, +That was its own before. +No; I mourned not for the Fairies +When I had seen hopes decay, +That were sweet unto my spirit +So long; I said, 'If they, +That through shade and sunny weather +Have twined about my heart, +Should fade, we must go together, +For we can never part!' +But my care was not availing; +I found their sweetness gone; +I saw their bright tints paling;-- +They died; yet I lived on. + +"Yet seeking, ever seeking, +Like the children, I have won +A guerdon all undreamt of + +When first my quest begun, +And my thoughts come back like wanderers, +Out-wearied, to my breast; +What they sought for long they found not, +Yet was the Unsought best. +For I sought not out for crosses, +I did not seek for pain; +Yet I find the heart's sore losses +Were the spirit's surest gain." + + +In _A Meditation_, the writer ventures, not without awe and reverence, +upon that dim, unsounded ocean of mystery, the life beyond:-- + + "But is there prayer +Within your quiet homes, and is there care +For those ye leave behind? I would address +My spirit to this theme in humbleness +No tongue nor pen hath uttered or made known +This mystery, and thus I do but guess +At clearer types through lowlier patterns shown; +Yet when did Love on earth forsake its own? +Ye may not quit your sweetness; in the Vine +More firmly rooted than of old, your wine +Hath freer flow! ye have not changed, but grown +To fuller stature; though the shock was keen +That severed you from us, how oft below +Hath sorest parting smitten but to show +True hearts their hidden wealth that quickly grow +The closer for that anguish,--friend to friend +Revealed more clear,--and what is Death to rend +The ties of life and love, when He must fade +In light of very Life, when He must bend +To love, that, loving, loveth to the end? + + "I do not deem ye look +Upon us now, for be it that your eyes +Are sealed or clear, a burden on them lies +Too deep and blissful for their gaze to brook +Our troubled strife; enough that once ye dwelt +Where now we dwell, enough that once ye felt +As now we feel, to bid you recognize +Our claim of kindred cherished though unseen; +And Love that is to you for eye and ear +Hath ways unknown to us to bring you near,-- +To keep you near for all that comes between; +As pious souls that move in sleep to prayer, +As distant friends, that see not, and yet share +(I speak of what I know) each other's care, +So may your spirits blend with ours! +Above Ye know not haply of our state, yet +Love Acquaints you with our need, and through a way +More sure than that of knowledge--so ye pray! + + "And even thus we meet, +And even thus we commune! spirits freed +And spirits fettered mingle, nor have need +To seek a common atmosphere, the air +Is meet for either in this olden, sweet, +Primeval breathing of Man's spirit,--Prayer!" + + +I give, in conclusion, a portion of one of her most characteristic poems, +_The Reconciler_:-- + + "Our dreams are reconciled, +Since Thou didst come to turn them all to Truth; +The World, the Heart, are dreamers in their youth +Of visions beautiful, and strange and wild; +And Thou, our Life's Interpreter, dost still +At once make clear these visions and fulfil; + +Each dim sweet Orphic rhyme, +Each mythic tale sublime +Of strength to save, of sweetness to subdue, +Each morning dream the few, +Wisdom's first lovers told, if read in Thee comes true. + + . . . . . . . . . . . . . + + "Thou, O Friend +From heaven, that madest this our heart Thine own, +Dost pierce the broken language of its moan-- +Thou dost not scorn our needs, but satisfy! +Each yearning deep and wide, +Each claim, is justified; +Our young illusions fail not, though they die +Within the brightness of Thy Rising, kissed +To happy death, like early clouds that lie +About the gates of Dawn,--a golden mist +Paling to blissful white, through rose and amethyst. + + "The World that puts Thee by, +That opens not to greet Thee with Thy train, +That sendeth after Thee the sullen cry, +'We will not have Thee over us to reign,' +Itself Both testify through searchings vain +Of Thee and of its need, and for the good +It will not, of some base similitude +Takes up a taunting witness, till its mood, +Grown fierce o'er failing hopes, doth rend and tear +Its own illusions grown too thin and bare +To wrap it longer; for within the gate +Where all must pass, a veiled and hooded Fate, +A dark Chimera, coiled and tangled lies, +And he who answers not its questions dies,-- +Still changing form and speech, but with the same +Vexed riddles, Gordian-twisted, bringing shame +Upon the nations that with eager cry +Hail each new solver of the mystery; +Yet he, of these the best, +Bold guesser, hath but prest +Most nigh to Thee, our noisy plaudits wrong; +True Champion, that hast wrought +Our help of old, and brought +Meat from this eater, sweetness from this strong. + + "O Bearer of the key +That shuts and opens with a sound so sweet +Its turning in the wards is melody, +All things we move among are incomplete +And vain until we fashion them in Thee! +We labor in the fire, +Thick smoke is round about us; through the din +Of words that darken counsel clamors dire +Ring from thought's beaten anvil, where within +Two Giants toil, that even from their birth +With travail-pangs have torn their mother Earth, +And wearied out her children with their keen +Upbraidings of the other, till between +Thou tamest, saying, 'Wherefore do ye wrong +Each other?--ye are Brethren.' Then these twain +Will own their kindred, and in Thee retain +Their claims in peace, because Thy land is wide +As it is goodly! here they pasture free, +This lion and this leopard, side by side, +A little child doth lead them with a song; +Now, Ephraim's envy ceaseth, and no more +Doth Judah anger Ephraim chiding sore, +For one did ask a Brother, one a King, +So dost Thou gather them in one, and bring-- +Thou, King forevermore, forever Priest, +Thou, Brother of our own from bonds released +A Law of Liberty, +A Service making free, +A Commonweal where each has all in Thee. + + "And not alone these wide, +Deep-planted yearnings, seeking with a cry +Their meat from God, in Thee are satisfied; +But all our instincts waking suddenly +Within the soul, like infants from their sleep +That stretch their arms into the dark and weep, +Thy voice can still. The stricken heart bereft +Of all its brood of singing hopes, and left +'Mid leafless boughs, a cold, forsaken nest +With snow-flakes in it, folded in Thy breast +Doth lose its deadly chill; and grief that creeps +Unto Thy side for shelter, finding there +The wound's deep cleft, forgets its moan, and weeps +Calm, quiet tears, and on Thy forehead Care +Hath looked until its thorns, no longer bare, +Put forth pale roses. Pain on Thee doth press +Its quivering cheek, and all the weariness, +The want that keep their silence, till from Thee +They hear the gracious summons, none beside +Hath spoken to the world-worn, 'Come to me,' +Tell forth their heavy secrets. + + "Thou dost hide +These in Thy bosom, and not these alone, +But all our heart's fond treasure that had grown +A burden else: O Saviour, tears were weighed +To Thee in plenteous measure! none hath shown +That Thou didst smile! yet hast Thou surely made +All joy of ours Thine own. + + "Thou madest us for Thine; +We seek amiss, we wander to and fro; +Yet are we ever on the track Divine; +The soul confesseth Thee, but sense is slow +To lean on aught but that which it may see; +So hath it crowded up these Courts below +With dark and broken images of Thee; +Lead Thou us forth upon Thy Mount, and show +Thy goodly patterns, whence these things of old +By Thee were fashioned; One though manifold. +Glass Thou Thy perfect likeness in the soul, +Show us Thy countenance, and we are whole!" + + +No one, I am quite certain, will regret that I have made these liberal +quotations. Apart from their literary merit, they have a special +interest for the readers of The Patience of Hope, as more fully +illustrating the writer's personal experience and aspirations. + +It has been suggested by a friend that it is barely possible that an +objection may be urged against the following treatise, as against all +books of a like character, that its tendency is to isolate the individual +from his race, and to nourish an exclusive and purely selfish personal +solicitude; that its piety is self-absorbent, and that it does not take +sufficiently into account active duties and charities, and the love of +the neighbor so strikingly illustrated by the Divine Master in His life +and teachings. This objection, if valid, would be a fatal one. For, of +a truth, there can be no meaner type of human selfishness than that +afforded by him who, unmindful of the world of sin and suffering about +him, occupies himself in the pitiful business of saving his own soul, in +the very spirit of the miser, watching over his private hoard while his +neighbors starve for lack of bread. But surely the benevolent unrest, +the far-reaching sympathies and keen sensitiveness to the suffering of +others, which so nobly distinguish our present age, can have nothing to +fear from a plea for personal holiness, patience, hope, and resignation +to the Divine will. "The more piety, the more compassion," says Isaac +Taylor; and this is true, if we understand by piety, not self-concentred +asceticism, but the pure religion and undefiled which visits the widow +and the fatherless, and yet keeps itself unspotted from the world,--which +deals justly, loves mercy, and yet walks humbly before God. Self- +scrutiny in the light of truth can do no harm to any one, least of all to +the reformer and philanthropist. The spiritual warrior, like the young +candidate for knighthood, may be none the worse for his preparatory +ordeal of watching all night by his armor. + +Tauler in mediaeval times and Woolman in the last century are among the +most earnest teachers of the inward life and spiritual nature of +Christianity, yet both were distinguished for practical benevolence. +They did not separate the two great commandments. Tauler strove with +equal intensity of zeal to promote the temporal and the spiritual welfare +of men. In the dark and evil time in which he lived, amidst the untold +horrors of the "Black Plague," he illustrated by deeds of charity and +mercy his doctrine of disinterested benevolence. Woolman's whole life +was a nobler Imitation of Christ than that fervid rhapsody of monastic +piety which bears the name. + +How faithful, yet, withal, how full of kindness, were his rebukes of +those who refused labor its just reward, and ground the faces of the +poor? How deep and entire was his sympathy with overtasked and ill-paid +laborers; with wet and illprovided sailors; with poor wretches +blaspheming in the mines, because oppression had made them mad; with the +dyers plying their unhealthful trade to minister to luxury and pride; +with the tenant wearing out his life in the service of a hard landlord; +and with the slave sighing over his unrequited toil! What a significance +there was in his vision of the "dull, gloomy mass" which appeared before +him, darkening half the heavens, and which he was told was "human beings +in as great misery as they could be and live; and he was mixed with them, +and henceforth he might not consider himself a distinct and separate +being"! His saintliness was wholly unconscious; he seems never to have +thought himself any nearer to the tender heart of God than the most +miserable sinner to whom his compassion extended. As he did not +live, so neither did he die to himself. His prayer upon his death-bed +was for others rather than himself; its beautiful humility and simple +trust were marred by no sensual imagery of crowns and harps and golden +streets, and personal beatific exaltations; but tender and touching +concern for suffering humanity, relieved only by the thought of the +paternity of God, and of His love and omnipotence, alone found utterance +in ever-memorable words. + +In view of the troubled state of the country and the intense +preoccupation of the public mind, I have had some hesitation in offering +this volume to its publishers. But, on further reflection, it has seemed +to me that it might supply a want felt by many among us; that, in the +chaos of civil strife and the shadow of mourning which rests over the +land, the contemplation of "things unseen which are eternal" might not be +unwelcome; that, when the foundations of human confidence are shaken, and +the trust in man proves vain, there might be glad listeners to a voice +calling from the outward and the temporal to the inward and the +spiritual; from the troubles and perplexities of time, to the eternal +quietness which God giveth. I cannot but believe that, in the heat and +glare through which we are passing, this book will not invite in vain to +the calm, sweet shadows of holy meditation, grateful as the green wings +of the bird to Thalaba in the desert; and thus afford something of +consolation to the bereaved, and of strength to the weary. For surely +never was the Patience of Hope more needed; never was the inner sanctuary +of prayer more desirable; never was a steadfast faith in the Divine +goodness more indispensable, nor lessons of self-sacrifice and +renunciation, and that cheerful acceptance of known duty which shifts not +its proper responsibility upon others, nor asks for "peace in its day" at +the expense of purity and justice, more timely than now, when the solemn +words of ancient prophecy are as applicable to our own country as to that +of the degenerate Jew,--"Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy +backsliding reprove thee; know, therefore, it is an evil thing, and +bitter, that thou bast forsaken the Lord, and that my fear is not in +thee,"--when "His way is in the deep, in clouds, and in thick darkness," +and the hand heavy upon us which shall "turn and overturn until he whose +right it is shall reign,"--until, not without rending agony, the evil +plant which our Heavenly Father hath not planted, whose roots have wound +themselves about altar and hearth-stone, and whose branches, like the +tree Al-Accoub in Moslem fable, bear the accursed fruit of oppression, +rebellion, and all imaginable crime, shall be torn up and destroyed +forever. + +AMESBURY, 1st 6th mo., 1862. + + + + + + THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. + +The following letters were addressed to the Editor of the Friends' Review +in Philadelphia, in reference to certain changes of principle and +practice in the Society then beginning to be observable, but which have +since more than justified the writer's fears and solicitude. + + +I. + + AMESBURY, 2d mo., 1870. + +TO THE EDITOR OF THE REVIEW. + +ESTEEMED FRIEND,--If I have been hitherto a silent, I have not been an +indifferent, spectator of the movements now going on in our religious +Society. Perhaps from lack of faith, I have been quite too solicitous +concerning them, and too much afraid that in grasping after new things we +may let go of old things too precious to be lost. Hence I have been +pleased to see from time to time in thy paper very timely and fitting +articles upon a _Hired Ministry_ and _Silent Worship_. + +The present age is one of sensation and excitement, of extreme measures +and opinions, of impatience of all slow results. The world about us +moves with accelerated impulse, and we move with it: the rest we have +enjoyed, whether true or false, is broken; the title-deeds of our +opinions, the reason of our practices, are demanded. Our very right to +exist as a distinct society is questioned. Our old literature--the +precious journals and biographies of early and later Friends--is +comparatively neglected for sensational and dogmatic publications. We +bear complaints of a want of educated ministers; the utility of silent +meetings is denied, and praying and preaching regarded as matters of will +and option. There is a growing desire for experimenting upon the dogmas +and expedients and practices of other sects. I speak only of admitted +facts, and not for the purpose of censure or complaint. No one has less +right than myself to indulge in heresy-hunting or impatience of minor +differences of opinion. If my dear friends can bear with me, I shall not +find it a hard task to bear with them. + +But for myself I prefer the old ways. With the broadest possible +tolerance for all honest seekers after truth! I love the Society of +Friends. My life has been nearly spent in laboring with those of other +sects in behalf of the suffering and enslaved; and I have never felt like +quarrelling with Orthodox or Unitarians, who were willing to pull with +me, side by side, at the rope of Reform. A very large proportion of my +dearest personal friends are outside of our communion; and I have learned +with John Woolman to find "no narrowness respecting sects and opinions." +But after a kindly and candid survey of them all, I turn to my own +Society, thankful to the Divine Providence which placed me where I am; +and with an unshaken faith in the one distinctive doctrine of Quakerism-- +the Light within--the immanence of the Divine Spirit in Christianity. I +cheerfully recognize and bear testimony to the good works and lives of +those who widely differ in faith and practice; but I have seen no truer +types of Christianity, no better men and women, than I have known and +still know among those who not blindly, but intelligently, hold the +doctrines and maintain the testimonies of our early Friends. I am not +blind to the shortcomings of Friends. I know how much we have lost by +narrowness and coldness and inactivity, the overestimate of external +observances, the neglect of our own proper work while acting as +conscience-keepers for others. We have not, as a society, been active +enough in those simple duties which we owe to our suffering fellow- +creatures, in that abundant labor of love and self-denial which is never +out of place. Perhaps our divisions and dissensions might have been +spared us if we had been less "at ease in Zion." It is in the decline of +practical righteousness that men are most likely to contend with each +other for dogma and ritual, for shadow and letter, instead of substance +and spirit. Hence I rejoice in every sign of increased activity in doing +good among us, in the precious opportunities afforded of working with the +Divine Providence for the Freedmen and Indians; since the more we do, in +the true spirit of the gospel, for others, the more we shall really do +for ourselves. There is no danger of lack of work for those who, with an +eye single to the guidance of Truth, look for a place in God's vineyard; +the great work which the founders of our Society began is not yet done; +the mission of Friends is not accomplished, and will not be until this +world of ours, now full of sin and suffering, shall take up, in jubilant +thanksgiving, the song of the Advent: "Glory to God in the highest! +Peace on earth and good-will to men!" + +It is charged that our Society lacks freedom and adaptation to the age in +which we live, that there is a repression of individuality and manliness +among us. I am not prepared to deny it in certain respects. But, if we +look at the matter closely, we shall see that the cause is not in the +central truth of Quakerism, but in a failure to rightly comprehend it; in +an attempt to fetter with forms and hedge about with dogmas that great +law of Christian liberty, which I believe affords ample scope for the +highest spiritual aspirations and the broadest philanthropy. If we did +but realize it, we are "set in a large place." + +"We may do all we will save wickedness." + +"Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." + +Quakerism, in the light of its great original truth, is "exceeding +broad." As interpreted by Penn and Barclay it is the most liberal and +catholic of faiths. If we are not free, generous, tolerant, if we are +not up to or above the level of the age in good works, in culture and +love of beauty, order and fitness, if we are not the ready recipients of +the truths of science and philosophy,--in a word, if we are not full- +grown men and Christians, the fault is not in Quakerism, but in +ourselves. We shall gain nothing by aping the customs and trying to +adjust ourselves to the creeds of other sects. By so doing we make at +the best a very awkward combination, and just as far as it is successful, +it is at the expense of much that is vital in our old faith. If, for +instance, I could bring myself to believe a hired ministry and a written +creed essential to my moral and spiritual well-being, I think I should +prefer to sit down at once under such teachers as Bushnell and Beecher, +the like of whom in Biblical knowledge, ecclesiastical learning, and +intellectual power, we are not likely to manufacture by half a century of +theological manipulation in a Quaker "school of the prophets." If I must +go into the market and buy my preaching, I should naturally seek the best +article on sale, without regard to the label attached to it. + +I am not insensible of the need of spiritual renovation in our Society. +I feel and confess my own deficiencies as an individual member. And I +bear a willing testimony to the zeal and devotion of some dear friends, +who, lamenting the low condition and worldliness too apparent among us, +seek to awaken a stronger religious life by the partial adoption of the +practices, forms, and creeds of more demonstrative sects. The great +apparent activity of these sects seems to them to contrast very strongly +with our quietness and reticence; and they do not always pause to inquire +whether the result of this activity is a truer type of practical +Christianity than is found in our select gatherings. I think I +understand these brethren; to some extent I have sympathized with them. +But it seems clear to me, that a remedy for the alleged evil lies not in +going back to the "beggarly elements" from which our worthy ancestors +called the people of their generation; not in will-worship; not in +setting the letter above the spirit; not in substituting type and symbol, +and oriental figure and hyperbole for the simple truths they were +intended to represent; not in schools of theology; not in much speaking +and noise and vehemence, nor in vain attempts to make the "plain +language" of Quakerism utter the Shibboleth of man-made creeds: but in +heeding more closely the Inward Guide and Teacher; in faith in Christ not +merely in His historical manifestation of the Divine Love to humanity, +but in His living presence in the hearts open to receive Him; in love for +Him manifested in denial of self, in charity and love to our neighbor; +and in a deeper realization of the truth of the apostle's declaration: +"Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit +the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself +unspotted from the world." + +In conclusion, let me say that I have given this expression of my +opinions with some degree of hesitation, being very sensible that I have +neither the right nor the qualification to speak for a society whose +doctrines and testimonies commend themselves to my heart and head, whose +history is rich with the precious legacy of holy lives, and of whose +usefulness as a moral and spiritual Force in the world I am fully +assured. + + +II. + +Having received several letters from dear friends in various sections +suggested by a recent communication in thy paper, and not having time or +health to answer them in detail, will thou permit me in this way to +acknowledge them, and to say to the writers that I am deeply sensible of +the Christian love and personal good-will to myself, which, whether in +commendation or dissent, they manifest? I think I may say in truth that +my letter was written in no sectarian or party spirit, but simply to +express a solicitude, which, whether groundless or not, was nevertheless +real. I am, from principle, disinclined to doctrinal disputations and +so-called religious controversies, which only tend to separate and +disunite. We have had too many divisions already. I intended no censure +of dear brethren whose zeal and devotion command my sympathy, +notwithstanding I may not be able to see with them in all respects. The +domain of individual conscience is to me very sacred; and it seems the +part of Christian charity to make a large allowance for varying +experiences; mental characteristics, and temperaments, as well as for +that youthful enthusiasm which, if sometimes misdirected, has often been +instrumental in infusing a fresher life into the body of religious +profession. It is too much to expect that we can maintain an entire +uniformity in the expression of truths in which we substantially agree; +and we should be careful that a rightful concern for "the form of sound +words" does not become what William Penn calls "verbal orthodoxy." We +must consider that the same accepted truth looks somewhat differently +from different points of vision. Knowing our own weaknesses and +limitations, we must bear in mind that human creeds, speculations, +expositions, and interpretations of the Divine plan are but the faint and +feeble glimpses of finite creatures into the infinite mysteries of God. + + "They are but broken lights of Thee, + And Thou, O Lord, art more than they." + +Differing, as we do, more or less as to means and methods, if we indeed +have the "mind of Christ," we shall rejoice in whatever of good is really +accomplished, although by somewhat different instrumentalities than those +which we feel ourselves free to make use of, remembering that our Lord +rebuked the narrowness and partisanship of His disciples by assuring them +that they that were not against Him were for Him. + +It would, nevertheless, give me great satisfaction to know, as thy kindly +expressed editorial comments seem to intimate, that I have somewhat +overestimated the tendencies of things in our Society. I have no pride +of opinion which would prevent me from confessing with thankfulness my +error of judgment. In any event, it can, I think, do no harm to repeat +my deep conviction that we may all labor, in the ability given us, for +our own moral and spiritual well-being, and that of our fellow-creatures, +without laying aside the principles and practice of our religious +Society. I believe so much of liberty is our right as well as our +privilege, and that we need not really overstep our bounds for the +performance of any duty which may be required of us. When truly called +to contemplate broader fields of labor, we shall find the walls about us, +like the horizon seen from higher levels, expanding indeed, but nowhere +broken. + +I believe that the world needs the Society of Friends as a testimony and +a standard. I know that this is the opinion of some of the best and most +thoughtful members of other Christian sects. I know that any serious +departure from the original foundation of our Society would give pain to +many who, outside of our communion, deeply realize the importance of our +testimonies. They fail to read clearly the signs of the times who do not +see that the hour is coming when, under the searching eye of philosophy +and the terrible analysis of science, the letter and the outward evidence +will not altogether avail us; when the surest dependence must be upon the +Light of Christ within, disclosing the law and the prophets in our own +souls, and confirming the truth of outward Scripture by inward +experience; when smooth stones from the brook of present revelation +shall' prove mightier than the weapons of Saul; when the doctrine of the +Holy Spirit, as proclaimed by George Fox and lived by John Woolman, shall +be recognized as the only efficient solvent of doubts raised by an age of +restless inquiry. In this belief my letter was written. I am sorry it +did not fall to the lot of a more fitting hand; and can only hope that no +consideration of lack of qualification on the part of its writer may +lessen the value of whatever testimony to truth shall be found in it. + +AMESBURY, 3d mo., 1870. + + +P. S. I may mention that I have been somewhat encouraged by a perusal of +the Proceedings of the late First-day School Conference in Philadelphia, +where, with some things which I am compelled to pause over, and regret, I +find much with which I cordially unite, and which seems to indicate a +providential opening for good. I confess to a lively and tender sympathy +with my younger brethren and sisters who, in the name of Him who "went +about doing good," go forth into the highways and byways to gather up the +lost, feed the hungry, instruct the ignorant, and point the sinsick and +suffering to the hopes and consolations of Christian faith, even if, at +times, their zeal goes beyond "reasonable service," and although the +importance of a particular instrumentality may be exaggerated, and love +lose sight of its needful companion humility, and he that putteth on his +armor boast like him who layeth it off. Any movement, however irregular, +which indicates life, is better than the quiet of death. In the +overruling providence of God, the troubling may prepare the way for +healing. Some of us may have erred on one hand and some on the other, +and this shaking of the balance may adjust it. + + + + + +JOHN WOOLMAN'S JOURNAL. + +Originally published as an introduction to a reissue of the work. + +To those who judge by the outward appearance, nothing is more difficult +of explanation than the strength of moral influence often exerted by +obscure and uneventful lives. Some great reform which lifts the world to +a higher level, some mighty change for which the ages have waited in +anxious expectancy, takes place before our eyes, and, in seeking to trace +it back to its origin, we are often surprised to find the initial link in +the chain of causes to be some comparatively obscure individual, the +divine commission and significance of whose life were scarcely understood +by his contemporaries, and perhaps not even by himself. The little one +has become a thousand; the handful of corn shakes like Lebanon. "The +kingdom of God cometh not by observation;" and the only solution of the +mystery is in the reflection that through the humble instrumentality +Divine power was manifested, and that the Everlasting Arm was beneath the +human one. + +The abolition of human slavery now in process of consummation throughout +the world furnishes one of the most striking illustrations of this truth. +A far-reaching moral, social, and political revolution, undoing the evil +work of centuries, unquestionably owes much of its original impulse to +the life and labors of a poor, unlearned workingman of New Jersey, whose +very existence was scarcely known beyond the narrow circle of his +religious society. + +It is only within a comparatively recent period that the journal and +ethical essays of this remarkable man have attracted the attention to +which they are manifestly entitled. In one of my last interviews with +William Ellery Channing, he expressed his very great surprise that they +were so little known. He had himself just read the book for the first +time, and I shall never forget how his countenance lighted up as he +pronounced it beyond comparison the sweetest and purest autobiography in +the language. He wished to see it placed within the reach of all classes +of readers; it was not a light to be hidden under the bushel of a sect. +Charles Lamb, probably from his friends, the Clarksons, or from Bernard +Barton, became acquainted with it, and on more than one occasion, in his +letters and Essays of Elia, refers to it with warm commendation. Edward +Irving pronounced it a godsend. Some idea of the lively interest which +the fine literary circle gathered around the hearth of Lamb felt in the +beautiful simplicity of Woolman's pages may be had from the Diary of +Henry Crabb Robinson, one of their number, himself a man of wide and +varied culture, the intimate friend of Goethe, Wordsworth, and Coleridge. +In his notes for First Month, 1824, he says, after a reference to a +sermon of his friend Irving, which he feared would deter rather than +promote belief: + +"How different this from John Woolman's Journal I have been reading at +the same time! A perfect gem! His is a _schone Seele_, a beautiful +soul. An illiterate tailor, he writes in a style of the most exquisite +purity and grace. His moral qualities are transferred to his writings. +Had he not been so very humble, he would have written a still better +book; for, fearing to indulge in vanity, he conceals the events in which +he was a great actor. His religion was love. His whole existence and +all his passions were love. If one could venture to impute to his creed, +and not to his personal character, the delightful frame of mind he +exhibited, one could not hesitate to be a convert. His Christianity is +most inviting, it is fascinating! One of the leading British reviews a +few years ago, referring to this Journal, pronounced its author the man +who, in all the centuries since the advent of Christ, lived nearest to +the Divine pattern. The author of The Patience of Hope, whose authority +in devotional literature is unquestioned, says of him: 'John Woolman's +gift was love, a charity of which it does not enter into the natural +heart of man to conceive, and of which the more ordinary experiences, +even of renewed nature, give but a faint shadow. Every now and then, in +the world's history, we meet with such men, the kings and priests of +Humanity, on whose heads this precious ointment has been so poured forth +that it has run down to the skirts of their clothing, and extended over +the whole of the visible creation; men who have entered, like Francis of +Assisi, into the secret of that deep amity with God and with His +creatures which makes man to be in league with the stones of the field, +and the beasts of the field to be at peace with him. In this pure, +universal charity there is nothing fitful or intermittent, nothing that +comes and goes in showers and gleams and sunbursts. Its springs are deep +and constant, its rising is like that of a mighty river, its very +overflow calm and steady, leaving life and fertility behind it.'" + +After all, anything like personal eulogy seems out of place in speaking +of one who in the humblest self-abasement sought no place in the world's +estimation, content to be only a passive instrument in the hands of his +Master; and who, as has been remarked, through modesty concealed the +events in which he was an actor. A desire to supply in some sort this +deficiency in his Journal is my especial excuse for this introductory +paper. + +It is instructive to study the history of the moral progress of +individuals or communities; to mark the gradual development of truth; to +watch the slow germination of its seed sown in simple obedience to the +command of the Great Husbandman, while yet its green promise, as well as +its golden fruition, was hidden from the eyes of the sower; to go back to +the well-springs and fountain-heads, tracing the small streamlet from its +hidden source, and noting the tributaries which swell its waters, as it +moves onward, until it becomes a broad river, fertilizing and gladdening +our present humanity. To this end it is my purpose, as briefly as +possible, to narrate the circumstances attending the relinquishment of +slave-holding by the Society of Friends, and to hint at the effect of +that act of justice and humanity upon the abolition of slavery throughout +the world. + +At an early period after the organization of the Society, members of it +emigrated to the Maryland, Carolina, Virginia, and New England colonies. +The act of banishment enforced against dissenters under Charles II. +consigned others of the sect to the West Indies, where their frugality, +temperance, and thrift transmuted their intended punishment into a +blessing. Andrew Marvell, the inflexible republican statesman, in some +of the sweetest and tenderest lines in the English tongue, has happily +described their condition:-- + +What shall we do but sing His praise +Who led us through the watery maze, +Unto an isle so long unknown, +And yet far kinder than our own? +He lands us on a grassy stage, +Safe from the storms and prelates' rage; +He gives us this eternal spring, +Which here enamels everything, +And sends the fowls to us in care, +On daily visits through the air. +He hangs in shades the orange bright, +Like golden lamps, in a green night, +And doth in the pomegranate close +Jewels more rich than Ormus shows. + + . . . . . . . . . + +And in these rocks for us did frame +A temple where to sound His name. +Oh! let our voice His praise exalt, +Till it arrive at heaven's vault, +Which then, perhaps rebounding, may +Echo beyond the Mexic bay.' + +"So sang they in the English boat, +A holy and a cheerful note; +And all the way, to guide their chime, +With falling oars they kept the time." + +Unhappily, they very early became owners of slaves, in imitation of the +colonists around them. No positive condemnation of the evil system had +then been heard in the British islands. Neither English prelates nor +expounders at dissenting conventicles had aught to say against it. Few +colonists doubted its entire compatibility with Christian profession and +conduct. Saint and sinner, ascetic and worldling, united in its +practice. Even the extreme Dutch saints of Bohemia Manor community, the +pietists of John de Labadie, sitting at meat with hats on, and pausing +ever and anon with suspended mouthfuls to bear a brother's or sister's +exhortation, and sandwiching prayers between the courses, were waited +upon by negro slaves. Everywhere men were contending with each other +upon matters of faith, while, so far as their slaves were concerned, +denying the ethics of Christianity itself. + +Such was the state of things when, in 1671, George Fox visited Barbadoes. +He was one of those men to whom it is given to discern through the mists +of custom and prejudice something of the lineaments of absolute truth, +and who, like the Hebrew lawgiver, bear with them, from a higher and +purer atmosphere, the shining evidence of communion with the Divine +Wisdom. He saw slavery in its mildest form among his friends, but his +intuitive sense of right condemned it. He solemnly admonished those who +held slaves to bear in mind that they were brethren, and to train them up +in the fear of God. "I desired, also," he says, "that they would cause +their overseers to deal gently and mildly with their negroes, and not use +cruelty towards them as the manner of some hath been and is; and that, +after certain years of servitude, they should make them free." + +In 1675, the companion of George Fox, William Edmundson, revisited +Barbadoes, and once more bore testimony against the unjust treatment of +slaves. He was accused of endeavoring to excite an insurrection among +the blacks, and was brought before the Governor on the charge. It was +probably during this journey that he addressed a remonstrance to friends +in Maryland and Virginia on the subject of holding slaves. It is one of +the first emphatic and decided testimonies on record against negro +slavery as incompatible with Christianity, if we except the Papal bulls +of Urban and Leo the Tenth. + +Thirteen years after, in 1688, a meeting of German Quakers, who had +emigrated from Kriesbeim, and settled at Germantown, Pennsylvania, +addressed a memorial against "the buying and keeping of negroes" to the +Yearly Meeting for the Pennsylvania and New Jersey colonies. That +meeting took the subject into consideration, but declined giving judgment +in the case. In 1696, the Yearly Meeting advised against "bringing in +any more negroes." In 1714, in its Epistle to London Friends, it +expresses a wish that Friends would be "less concerned in buying or +selling slaves." The Chester Quarterly Meeting, which had taken a higher +and clearer view of the matter, continued to press the Yearly Meeting to +adopt some decided measure against any traffic in human beings. + +The Society gave these memorials a cold reception. The love of gain and +power was too strong, on the part of the wealthy and influential planters +and merchants who had become slaveholders, to allow the scruples of the +Chester meeting to take the shape of discipline. The utmost that could +be obtained of the Yearly Meeting was an expression of opinion adverse to +the importation of negroes, and a desire that "Friends generally do, as +much as may be, avoid buying such negroes as shall hereafter be brought +in, rather than offend any Friends who are against it; yet this is only +caution, and not censure." + +In the mean time the New England Yearly Meeting was agitated by the same +question. Slaves were imported into Boston and Newport, and Friends +became purchasers, and in some instances were deeply implicated in the +foreign traffic. In 1716, the monthly meetings of Dartmouth and +Nantucket suggested that it was "not agreeable to truth to purchase +slaves and keep them during their term of life." Nothing was done in the +Yearly Meeting, however, until 1727, when the practice of importing +negroes was censured. That the practice was continued notwithstanding, +for many years afterwards, is certain. In 1758, a rule was adopted +prohibiting Friends within the limits of New England Yearly Meeting from +engaging in or countenancing the foreign slave-trade. + +In the year 1742 an event, simple and inconsiderable in itself, was made +the instrumentality of exerting a mighty influence upon slavery in the +Society of Friends. A small storekeeper at Mount Holly, in New Jersey, a +member of the Society, sold a negro woman, and requested the young man in +his employ to make a bill of sale of her. + + [Mount Holly is a village lying in the western part of the long, + narrow township of Northampton, on Rancocas Creek, a tributary of + the Delaware. In John Woolman's day it was almost entirely a + settlement of Friends. A very few of the old houses with their + quaint stoops or porches are left. That occupied by John Woolman + was a small, plain, two-story structure, with two windows in each + story in front, a four-barred fence inclosing the grounds, with the + trees he planted and loved to cultivate. The house was not painted, + but whitewashed. The name of the place is derived from the highest + hill in the county, rising two hundred feet above the sea, and + commanding a view of a rich and level country, of cleared farms and + woodlands. Here, no doubt, John Woolman often walked under the + shadow of its holly-trees, communing with nature and musing on the + great themes of life and duty. + + When the excellent Joseph Sturge was in this country, some thirty + years ago, on his errand of humanity, he visited Mount Holly, and + the house of Woolman, then standing. He describes it as a very + "humble abode." But one person was then living in the town who had + ever seen its venerated owner. This aged man stated that he was at + Woolman's little farm in the season of harvest when it was customary + among farmers to kill a calf or sheep for the laborers. John + Woolman, unwilling that the animal should be slowly bled to death, + as the custom had been, and to spare it unnecessary suffering, had a + smooth block of wood prepared to receive the neck of the creature, + when a single blow terminated its existence. Nothing was more + remarkable in the character of Woolman than his concern for the + well-being and cornfort of the brute creation. "What is religion?" + asks the old Hindoo writer of the Vishnu Sarman. "Tenderness toward + all creatures." Or, as Woolman expresses it, "Where the love of God + is verily perfected, a tenderness towards all creatures made subject + to our will is experienced, and a care felt that we do not lessen + that sweetness of life in the animal creation which the Creator + intends for them under our government."] + +On taking up his pen, the young clerk felt a sudden and strong scruple in +his mind. The thought of writing an instrument of slavery for one of his +fellow-creatures oppressed him. God's voice against the desecration of +His image spoke in the soul. He yielded to the will of his employer, +but, while writing the instrument, he was constrained to declare, both to +the buyer and the seller, that he believed slave-keeping inconsistent +with the Christian religion. This young man was John Woolman. The +circumstance above named was the starting-point of a life-long testimony +against slavery. In the year 1746 he visited Maryland, Virginia, and +North Carolina. He was afflicted by the prevalence of slavery. It +appeared to him, in his own words, "as a dark gloominess overhanging the +land." On his return, he wrote an essay on the subject, which was +published in 1754. Three years after, he made a second visit to the +Southern meetings of Friends. Travelling as a minister of the gospel, he +was compelled to sit down at the tables of slaveholding planters, who +were accustomed to entertain their friends free of cost, and who could +not comprehend the scruples of their guest against receiving as a gift +food and lodging which he regarded as the gain of oppression. He was a +poor man, but he loved truth more than money. He therefore either placed +the pay for his entertainment in the hands of some member of the family, +for the benefit of the slaves, or gave it directly to them, as he had +opportunity. Wherever he went, he found his fellow-professors entangled +in the mischief of slavery. Elders and ministers, as well as the younger +and less high in profession, had their house servants and field hands. +He found grave drab-coated apologists for the slave-trade, who quoted the +same Scriptures, in support of oppression and avarice, which have since +been cited by Presbyterian doctors of divinity, Methodist bishops; and +Baptist preachers for the same purpose. He found the meetings generally +in a low and evil state. The gold of original Quakerism had become dim, +and the fine gold changed. The spirit of the world prevailed among them, +and had wrought an inward desolation. Instead of meekness, gentleness, +and heavenly wisdom, he found "a spirit of fierceness and love of +dominion." + + [The tradition is that he travelled mostly on foot during his + journeys among slaveholders. Brissot, in his New Travels in + America, published in 1788, says: "John Woolman, one of the most + distinguished of men in the cause of humanity, travelled much as a + minister of his sect, but always on foot, and without money, in + imitation of the Apostles, and in order to be in a situation to be + more useful to poor people and the blacks. He hated slavery so much + that he could not taste food provided by the labor of slaves." That + this writer was on one point misinformed is manifest from the + following passage from the Journal: "When I expected soon to leave a + friend's house where I had entertainment, if I believed that I + should not keep clear from the gain of oppression without leaving + money, I spoke to one of the heads of the family privately, and + desired them to accept of pieces of silver, and give them to such of + their negroes as they believed would make the best use of them; and + at other times I gave them to the negroes myself, as the way looked + clearest to me. Before I came out, I had provided a large number of + small pieces for this purpose, and thus offering them to some who + appeared to be wealthy people was a trial both to me and them. But + the fear of the Lord so covered me at times that my way was made + easier than I expected; and few, if any, manifested any resentment + at the offer, and most of them, after some conversation, accepted of + them."] + +In love, but at the same time with great faithfulness, he endeavored to +convince the masters of their error, and to awaken a degree of sympathy +for the enslaved. + +At this period, or perhaps somewhat earlier, a remarkable personage took +up his residence in Pennsylvania. He was by birthright a member of the +Society of Friends, but having been disowned in England for some +extravagances of conduct and language, he spent several years in the West +Indies, where he became deeply interested in the condition of the slaves. +His violent denunciations of the practice of slaveholding excited the +anger of the planters, and he was compelled to leave the island. He came +to Philadelphia, but, contrary to his expectations, he found the same +evil existing there. He shook off the dust of the city, and took up his +abode in the country, a few miles distant. His dwelling was a natural +cave, with some slight addition of his own making. His drink was the +spring-water flowing by his door; his food, vegetables alone. He +persistently refused to wear any garment or eat any food purchased at the +expense of animal life, or which was in any degree the product of slave +labor. Issuing from his cave, on his mission of preaching "deliverance +to the captive," he was in the habit of visiting the various meetings for +worship and bearing his testimony against slaveholders, greatly to their +disgust and indignation. On one occasion he entered the Market Street +Meeting, and a leading Friend requested some one to take him out. A +burly blacksmith volunteered to do it, leading him to the gate and +thrusting him out with such force that he fell into the gutter of the +street. There he lay until the meeting closed, telling the bystanders +that he did not feel free to rise himself. "Let those who cast me here +raise me up. It is their business, not mine." + +His personal appearance was in remarkable keeping with his eccentric +life. A figure only four and a half feet high, hunchbacked, with +projecting chest, legs small and uneven, arms longer than his legs; a +huge head, showing only beneath the enormous white hat large, solemn eyes +and a prominent nose; the rest of his face covered with a snowy +semicircle of beard falling low on his breast,--a figure to recall the +old legends of troll, brownie, and kobold. Such was the irrepressible +prophet who troubled the Israel of slave-holding Quakerism, clinging like +a rough chestnut-bur to the skirts of its respectability, and settling +like a pertinacious gad-fly on the sore places of its conscience. + +On one occasion, while the annual meeting was in session at Burlington, +N. J., in the midst of the solemn silence of the great assembly, the +unwelcome figure of Benjamin Lay, wrapped in his long white overcoat, +was seen passing up the aisle. Stopping midway, he exclaimed, "You +slaveholders! Why don't you throw off your Quaker coats as I do mine, +and show yourselves as you are?" Casting off as he spoke his outer +garment, he disclosed to the astonished assembly a military coat +underneath and a sword dangling at his heels. Holding in one hand a +large book, he drew his sword with the other. "In the sight of God," he +cried, "you are as guilty as if you stabbed your slaves to the heart, as +I do this book!" suiting the action to the word, and piercing a small +bladder filled with the juice of poke-weed (playtolacca decandra), which +he had concealed between the covers, and sprinkling as with fresh blood +those who sat near him. John Woolman makes no mention of this +circumstance in his Journal, although he was probably present, and it +must have made a deep impression on his sensitive spirit. The violence +and harshness of Lay's testimony, however, had nothing in common with +the tender and sorrowful remonstrances and appeals of the former, except +the sympathy which they both felt for the slave himself. + + [Lay was well acquainted with Dr. Franklin, whosometimes visited him. + Among other schemes of reform he entertained the idea of converting + all mankind to Christianity. This was to be done by three + witnesses,--himself, Michael Lovell, and Abel Noble, assisted by Dr. + Franklin. But on their first meeting at the Doctor's house, the + three "chosen vessels" got into a violent controversy on points of + doctrine, and separated in ill-humor. The philosopher, who had been + an amused listener, advised the three sages to give up the project + of converting the world until they had learned to tolerate each + other.] + +Still later, a descendant of the persecuted French Protestants, Anthony +Benezet, a man of uncommon tenderness of feeling, began to write and +speak against slavery. How far, if at all, he was moved thereto by the +example of Woolman is not known, but it is certain that the latter found +in him a steady friend and coadjutor in his efforts to awaken the +slumbering moral sense of his religious brethren. The Marquis de +Chastellux, author of _De la Felicite Publique_, describes him as a +small, eager-faced man, full of zeal and activity, constantly engaged in +works of benevolence, which were by no means confined to the blacks. +Like Woolman and Lay, he advocated abstinence from intoxicating spirits. +The poor French neutrals who were brought to Philadelphia from Nova +Scotia, and landed penniless and despairing among strangers in tongue and +religion, found in him a warm and untiring friend, through whose aid and +sympathy their condition was rendered more comfortable than that of their +fellow-exiles in other colonies. + +The annual assemblage of the Yearly Meeting in 1758 at Philadelphia must +ever be regarded as one of the most important religious convocations in +the history of the Christian church. The labors of Woolman and his few +but earnest associates had not been in vain. A deep and tender interest +had been awakened; and this meeting was looked forward to with varied +feelings of solicitude by all parties. All felt that the time had come +for some definite action; conservative and reformer stood face to face in +the Valley of Decision. John Woolman, of course, was present,--a man +humble and poor in outward appearance, his simple dress of undyed +homespun cloth contrasting strongly with the plain but rich apparel of +the representatives of the commerce of the city and of the large slave- +stocked plantations of the country. Bowed down by the weight of his +concern for the poor slaves and for the well-being and purity of the +Society, he sat silent during the whole meeting, while other matters were +under discussion. "My mind," he says, "was frequently clothed with +inward prayer; and I could say with David that 'tears were my meat and +drink, day and night.' The case of slave-keeping lay heavy upon me; nor +did I find any engagement, to speak directly to any other matter before +the meeting." When the important subject came up for consideration, many +faithful Friends spoke with weight and earnestness. No one openly +justified slavery as a system, although some expressed a concern lest the +meeting should go into measures calculated to cause uneasiness to many +members of the Society. It was also urged that Friends should wait +patiently until the Lord in His own time should open a way for the +deliverance of the slave. This was replied to by John Woolman. "My +mind," he said, "is led to consider the purity of the Divine Being, and +the justice of His judgments; and herein my soul is covered with +awfulness. I cannot forbear to hint of some cases where people have not +been treated with the purity of justice, and the event has been most +lamentable. Many slaves on this continent are oppressed, and their cries +have entered into the ears of the Most High. Such are the purity and +certainty of His judgments that He cannot be partial in our favor. In +infinite love and goodness He hath opened our understandings from one +time to another, concerning our duty towards this people; and it is not a +time for delay. Should we now be sensible of what He requires of us, and +through a respect to the private interest of some persons, or through a +regard to some friendships which do not stand upon an immutable +foundation, neglect to do our duty in firmness and constancy, still +waiting for some extraordinary means to bring about their deliverance, +God may by terrible things in righteousness answer us in this matter." + +This solemn and weighty appeal was responded to by many in the assembly, +in a spirit of sympathy and unity. Some of the slave-holding members +expressed their willingness that a strict rule of discipline should be +adopted against dealing in slaves for the future. To this it was +answered that the root of the evil would never be reached effectually +until a searching inquiry was made into the circumstances and motives of +such as held slaves. At length the truth in a great measure triumphed +over all opposition; and, without any public dissent, the meeting agreed +that the injunction of our Lord and Saviour to do to others as we would +that others should do to us should induce Friends who held slaves "to set +them at liberty, making a Christian provision for them," and four +Friends--John Woolman, John Scarborough, Daniel Stanton, and John Sykes-- +were approved of as suitable persons to visit and treat with such as kept +slaves, within the limits of the meeting. + +This painful and difficult duty was faithfully performed. In that +meekness and humility of spirit which has nothing in common with the +"fear of man, which bringeth a snare," the self-denying followers of +their Divine Lord and Master "went about doing good." In the city of +Philadelphia, and among the wealthy planters of the country, they found +occasion often to exercise a great degree of patience, and to keep a +watchful guard over their feelings. In his Journal for this important +period of his life John Woolman says but little of his own services. How +arduous and delicate they were may be readily understood. The number of +slaves held by members of the Society was very large. Isaac Jackson, in +his report of his labors among slave-holders in a single Quarterly +Meeting, states that he visited the owners of more than eleven hundred +slaves. From the same report may be gleaned some hints of the +difficulties which presented themselves. One elderly man says he has +well brought up his eleven slaves, and "now they must work to maintain +him." Another owns it is all wrong, but "cannot release his slaves; his +tender wife under great concern of mind" on account of his refusal. A +third has fifty slaves; knows it to be wrong, but can't see his way clear +out of it. "Perhaps," the report says, "interest dims his vision." A +fourth is full of "excuses and reasonings." "Old Jos. Richison has +forty, and is determined to keep them." Another man has fifty, and +"means to keep them." Robert Ward "wants to release his slaves, but his +wife and daughters hold back." Another "owns it is wrong, but says he +will not part with his negroes,--no, not while he lives." The far +greater number, however, confess the wrong of slavery, and agree to take +measures for freeing their slaves. + + [An incident occurred during this visit of Isaac Jackson which + impressed him deeply. On the last evening, just as he was about to + turn homeward, he was told that a member of the Society whom he had + not seen owned a very old slave who was happy and well cared for. + It was a case which it was thought might well be left to take care + of itself. Isaac Jackson, sitting in silence, did not feel his mind + quite satisfied; and as the evening wore away, feeling more and more + exercised, he expressed his uneasiness, when a young son of his host + eagerly offered to go with him and show him the road to the place. + The proposal was gladly accepted. On introducing the object of + their visit, the Friend expressed much surprise that any uneasiness + should be felt in the case, but at length consented to sign the form + of emancipation, saying, at the same time, it would make no + difference in their relations, as the old man was perfectly happy. + At Isaac Jackson's request the slave was called in and seated before + them. His form was nearly double, his thin hands were propped on + his knees, his white head was thrust forward, and his keen, + restless, inquiring eyes gleamed alternately on the stranger and on + his master. At length he was informed of what had been done; that + he was no longer a slave, and that his master acknowledged his past + services entitled him to a maintenance so long as he lived. The old + man listened in almost breathless wonder, his head slowly sinking on + his breast. After a short pause, he clasped his hands; then + spreading them high over his hoary head, slowly and reverently + exclaimed, "Oh, goody Gody, oh!"--bringing his hands again down on + his knees. Then raising them as before, he twice repeated the + solemn exclamation, and with streaming eyes and a voice almost too + much choked for utterance, he continued, "I thought I should die a + slave, and now I shall die a free man!" + + It is a striking evidence of the divine compensations which are + sometimes graciously vouchsafed to those who have been faithful to + duty, that on his death-bed this affecting scene was vividly revived + in the mind of Isaac Jackson. At that supreme moment, when all + other pictures of time were fading out, that old face, full of + solemn joy and devout thanksgiving, rose before him, and comforted + him as with the blessing of God.] + +An extract or two from the Journal at this period will serve to show both +the nature of the service in which he was engaged and the frame of mind +in which he accomplished it:-- + +"In the beginning of the 12th month I joined in company with my friends, +John Sykes and Daniel Stanton, in visiting such as had slaves. Some, +whose hearts were rightly exercised about them, appeared to be glad of +our visit, but in some places our way was more difficult. I often saw +the necessity of keeping down to that root from whence our concern +proceeded, and have cause in reverent thankfulness humbly to bow down +before the Lord who was near to me, and preserved my mind in calmness +under some sharp conflicts, and begat a spirit of sympathy and tenderness +in me towards some who were grievously entangled by the spirit of this +world." + +"1st month, 1759.--Having found my mind drawn to visit some of the more +active members of society at Philadelphia who had slaves, I met my friend +John Churchman there by agreement, and we continued about a week in the +city. We visited some that were sick, and some widows and their +families; and the other part of the time was mostly employed in visiting +such as had slaves. It was a time of deep exercise; but looking often to +the Lord for assistance, He in unspeakable kindness favored us with the +influence of that spirit which crucifies to the greatness and splendor of +this world, and enabled us to go through some heavy labors, in which we +found peace." + +These labors were attended with the blessing of the God of the poor and +oppressed. Dealing in slaves was almost entirely abandoned, and many who +held slaves set them at liberty. But many members still continuing the +practice, a more emphatic testimony against it was issued by the Yearly +Meeting in 1774; and two years after the subordinate meetings were +directed to deny the right of membership to such as persisted in holding +their fellow-men as property. + +A concern was now felt for the temporal and religious welfare of the +emancipated slaves, and in 1779 the Yearly Meeting came to the conclusion +that some reparation was due from the masters to their former slaves for +services rendered while in the condition of slavery. The following is an +extract from an epistle on this subject: + +"We are united in judgment that the state of the oppressed people who +have been held by any of us, or our predecessors, in captivity and +slavery, calls for a deep inquiry and close examination how far we are +clear of withholding from them what under such an exercise may open to +view as their just right; and therefore we earnestly and affectionately +entreat our brethren in religious profession to bring this matter home, +and that all who have let the oppressed go free may attend to the further +openings of duty. + +"A tender Christian sympathy appears to be awakened in the minds of many +who are not in religious profession with us, who have seriously +considered the oppressions and disadvantages under which those people +have long labored; and whether a pious care extended to their offspring +is not justly due from us to them is a consideration worthy our serious +and deep attention." + +Committees to aid and advise the colored people were accordingly +appointed in the various Monthly Meetings. Many former owners of slaves +faithfully paid the latter for their services, submitting to the award +and judgment of arbitrators as to what justice required at their hands. +So deeply had the sense of the wrong of slavery sunk into the hearts of +Friends! + +John Woolman, in his Journal for 1769, states, that having some years +before, as one of the executors of a will, disposed of the services of a +negro boy belonging to the estate until he should reach the age of thirty +years, he became uneasy in respect to the transaction, and, although he +had himself derived no pecuniary benefit from it, and had simply acted as +the agent of the heirs of the estate to which the boy belonged, he +executed a bond, binding himself to pay the master of the young man for +four years and a half of his unexpired term of service. + +The appalling magnitude of the evil against which he felt himself +especially called to contend was painfully manifest to John Woolman. At +the outset, all about him, in every department of life and human +activity, in the state and the church, he saw evidences of its strength, +and of the depth and extent to which its roots had wound their way among +the foundations of society. Yet he seems never to have doubted for a +moment the power of simple truth to eradicate it, nor to have hesitated +as to his own duty in regard to it. There was no groping like Samson in +the gloom; no feeling in blind wrath and impatience for the pillars of +the temple of Dagon. "The candle of the Lord shone about him," and his +path lay clear and unmistakable before him. He believed in the goodness +of God that leadeth to repentance; and that love could reach the witness +for itself in the hearts of all men, through all entanglements of custom +and every barrier of pride and selfishness. No one could have a more +humble estimate of himself; but as he went forth on his errand of mercy +he felt the Infinite Power behind him, and the consciousness that he had +known a preparation from that Power "to stand as a trumpet through which +the Lord speaks." The event justified his confidence; wherever he went +hard hearts were softened, avarice and love of power and pride of opinion +gave way before his testimony of love. + +The New England Yearly Meeting then, as now, was held in Newport, on +Rhode Island. In the year 1760 John Woolman, in the course of a +religious visit to New England, attended that meeting. He saw the +horrible traffic in human beings,--the slave-ships lying at the wharves +of the town, the sellers and buyers of men and women and children +thronging the market-place. The same abhorrent scenes which a few years +after stirred the spirit of the excellent Hopkins to denounce the slave- +trade and slavery as hateful in the sight of God to his congregation at +Newport were enacted in the full view and hearing of the annual +convocation of Friends, many of whom were themselves partakers in the +shame and wickedness. "Understanding," he says, "that a large number of +slaves had been imported from Africa into the town, and were then on sale +by a member of our Society, my appetite failed; I grew outwardly weak, +and had a feeling of the condition of Habakkuk: 'When I heard, my belly +trembled, my lips quivered; I trembled in myself, that I might rest in +the day of trouble.' I had many cogitations, and was sorely distressed." +He prepared a memorial to the Legislature, then in session, for the +signatures of Friends, urging that body to take measures to put an end to +the importation of slaves. His labors in the Yearly Meeting appear to +have been owned and blessed by the Divine Head of the church. The London +Epistle for 1758, condemning the unrighteous traffic in men, was read, +and the substance of it embodied in the discipline of the meeting; and +the following query was adopted, to be answered by the subordinate +meetings:-- + +"Are Friends clear of importing negroes, or buying them when imported; +and do they use those well, where they are possessed by inheritance or +otherwise, endeavoring to train them up in principles of religion?" + +At the close of the Yearly Meeting, John Woolman requested those members +of the Society who held slaves to meet with him in the chamber of the +house for worship, where he expressed his concern for the well-being of +the slaves, and his sense of the iniquity of the practice of dealing in +or holding them as property. His tender exhortations were not lost upon +his auditors; his remarks were kindly received, and the gentle and loving +spirit in which they were offered reached many hearts. + +In 1769, at the suggestion of the Rhode Island Quarterly Meeting, the +Yearly Meeting expressed its sense of the wrongfulness of holding slaves, +and appointed a large committee to visit those members who were +implicated in the practice. The next year this committee reported that +they had completed their service, "and that their visits mostly seemed to +be kindly accepted. Some Friends manifested a disposition to set such at +liberty as were suitable; some others, not having so clear a sight of +such an unreasonable servitude as could be desired, were unwilling to +comply with the advice given them at present, yet seemed willing to take +it into consideration; a few others manifested a disposition to keep them +in continued bondage." + +It was stated in the Epistle to London Yearly Meeting of the year 1772, +that a few Friends had freed their slaves from bondage, but that others +"have been so reluctant thereto that they have been disowned for not +complying with the advice of this meeting." + +In 1773 the following minute was made: "It is our sense and judgment that +truth not only requires the young of capacity and ability, but likewise +the aged and impotent, and also all in a state of infancy and nonage, +among Friends, to be discharged and set free from a state of slavery, +that we do no more claim property in the human race, as we do in the +brutes that perish." + +In 1782 no slaves were known to be held in the New England Yearly +Meeting. The next year it was recommended to the subordinate meetings to +appoint committees to effect a proper and just settlement between the +manumitted slaves and their former masters, for their past services. In +1784 it was concluded by the Yearly Meeting that any former slave-holder +who refused to comply with the award of these committees should, after +due care and labor with him, be disowned from the Society. This was +effectual; settlements without disownment were made to the satisfaction +of all parties, and every case was disposed of previous to the year 1787. + +In the New York Yearly Meeting, slave-trading was prohibited about the +middle of the last century. In 1771, in consequence of an Epistle from +the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, a committee was appointed to visit those +who held slaves, and to advise with them in relation to emancipation. In +1776 it was made a disciplinary offence to buy, sell, or hold slaves upon +any condition. In 1784 but one slave was to be found in the limits of +the meeting. In the same year, by answers from the several subordinate +meetings, it was ascertained that an equitable settlement for past +services had been effected between the emancipated negroes and their +masters in all save three cases. + +In the Virginia Yearly Meeting slavery had its strongest hold. Its +members, living in the midst of slave-holding communities, were +necessarily exposed to influences adverse to emancipation. I have +already alluded to the epistle addressed to them by William Edmondson, +and to the labors of John Woolman while travelling among them. In 1757 +the Virginia Yearly Meeting condemned the foreign slave-trade. In 1764 +it enjoined upon its members the duty of kindness towards their servants, +of educating them, and carefully providing for their food and clothing. +Four years after, its members were strictly prohibited from purchasing +any more slaves. In 1773 it earnestly recommended the immediate +manumission of all slaves held in bondage, after the females had reached +eighteen and the males twenty-one years of age. At the same time it was +advised that committees should be appointed for the purpose of +instructing the emancipated persons in the principles of morality and +religion, and for advising and aiding them in their temporal concerns. + +I quote a single paragraph from the advice sent down to the subordinate +meetings, as a beautiful manifestation of the fruits of true repentance:-- + +"It is the solid sense of this meeting, that we of the present generation +are under strong obligations to express our love and concern for the +offspring of those people who by their labors have greatly contributed +towards the cultivation of these colonies under the afflictive +disadvantage of enduring a hard bondage, and the benefit of whose toil +many among us are enjoying." + +In 1784, the different Quarterly Meetings having reported that many still +held slaves, notwithstanding the advice and entreaties of their friends, +the Yearly Meeting directed that where endeavors to convince those +offenders of their error proved ineffectual, the Monthly Meetings should +proceed to disown them. We have no means of ascertaining the precise +number of those actually disowned for slave-holding in the Virginia +Yearly Meeting, but it is well known to have been very small. In almost +all cases the care and assiduous labors of those who had the welfare of +the Society and of humanity at heart were successful in inducing +offenders to manumit their slaves, and confess their error in resisting +the wishes of their friends and bringing reproach upon the cause of +truth. + +So ended slavery in the Society of Friends. For three quarters of a +century the advice put forth in the meetings of the Society at stated +intervals, that Friends should be "careful to maintain their testimony +against slavery," has been adhered to so far as owning, or even hiring, a +slave is concerned. Apart from its first-fruits of emancipation, there +is a perennial value in the example exhibited of the power of truth, +urged patiently and in earnest love, to overcome the difficulties in the +way of the eradication of an evil system, strengthened by long habit, +entangled with all the complex relations of society, and closely allied +with the love of power, the pride of family, and the lust of gain. + +The influence of the life and labors of John Woolman has by no means been +confined to the religious society of which he was a member. It may be +traced wherever a step in the direction of emancipation has been taken in +this country or in Europe. During the war of the Revolution many of the +noblemen and officers connected with the French army became, as their +journals abundantly testify, deeply interested in the Society of Friends, +and took back to France with them something of its growing anti-slavery +sentiment. Especially was this the case with Jean Pierre Brissot, the +thinker and statesman of the Girondists, whose intimacy with Warner +Mifflin, a friend and disciple of Woolman, so profoundly affected his +whole after life. He became the leader of the "Friends of the Blacks," +and carried with him to the scaffold a profound hatred, of slavery. To +his efforts may be traced the proclamation of emancipation in Hayti by +the commissioners of the French convention, and indirectly the subsequent +uprising of the blacks and their successful establishment of a free +government. The same influence reached Thomas Clarkson and stimulated +his early efforts for the abolition of the slave-trade; and in after life +the volume of the New Jersey Quaker was the cherished companion of +himself and his amiable helpmate. It was in a degree, at least, the +influence of Stephen Grellet and William Allen, men deeply imbued with +the spirit of Woolman, and upon whom it might almost be said his mantle +had fallen, that drew the attention of Alexander I. of Russia to the +importance of taking measures for the abolition of serfdom, an object the +accomplishment of which the wars during his reign prevented, but which, +left as a legacy of duty, has been peaceably effected by his namesake, +Alexander II. In the history of emancipation in our own country +evidences of the same original impulse of humanity are not wanting. In +1790 memorials against slavery from the Society of Friends were laid +before the first Congress of the United States. Not content with +clearing their own skirts of the evil, the Friends of that day took an +active part in the formation of the abolition societies of New England, +New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia. Jacob Lindley, Elisha +Tyson, Warner Mifflin, James Pemberton, and other leading Friends were +known throughout the country as unflinching champions of freedom. One of +the earliest of the class known as modern abolitionists was Benjamin +Lundy, a pupil in the school of Woolman, through whom William Lloyd +Garrison became interested in the great work to which his life has been +so faithfully and nobly devoted. Looking back to the humble workshop at +Mount Holly from the stand-point of the Proclamation of President +Lincoln, how has the seed sown in weakness been raised up in power! + +The larger portion of Woolman's writings is devoted to the subjects of +slavery, uncompensated labor, and the excessive toil and suffering of the +many to support the luxury of the few. The argument running through them +is searching, and in its conclusions uncompromising, but a tender love +for the wrong-doer as well as the sufferer underlies all. They aim to +convince the judgment and reach the heart without awakening prejudice and +passion. To the slave-holders of his time they must have seemed like the +voice of conscience speaking to them in the cool of the day. One feels, +in reading them, the tenderness and humility of a nature redeemed from +all pride of opinion and self-righteousness, sinking itself out of sight, +and intent only upon rendering smaller the sum of human sorrow and sin by +drawing men nearer to God, and to each other. The style is that of a man +unlettered, but with natural refinement and delicate sense of fitness, +the purity of whose heart enters into his language. There is no attempt +at fine writing, not a word or phrase for effect; it is the simple +unadorned diction of one to whom the temptations of the pen seem to have +been wholly unknown. He wrote, as he believed, from an inward spiritual +prompting; and with all his unaffected humility he evidently felt that +his work was done in the clear radiance of + + "The light which never was on land or sea." + +It was not for him to outrun his Guide, or, as Sir Thomas Browne +expresses it, to "order the finger of the Almighty to His will and +pleasure, but to sit still under the soft showers of Providence." Very +wise are these essays, but their wisdom is not altogether that of this +world. They lead one away from all the jealousies, strifes, and +competitions of luxury, fashion, and gain, out of the close air of +parties and sects, into a region of calmness,-- + + "The haunt + Of every gentle wind whose breath can teach + The wild to love tranquillity,"-- + +a quiet habitation where all things are ordered in what he calls "the +pure reason;" a rest from all self-seeking, and where no man's interest +or activity conflicts with that of another. Beauty they certainly have, +but it is not that which the rules of art recognize; a certain +indefinable purity pervades them, making one sensible, as he reads, of a +sweetness as of violets. "The secret of Woolman's purity of style," said +Dr. Channing, "is that his eye was single, and that conscience dictated +his words." + +Of course we are not to look to the writings of such a man for tricks of +rhetoric, the free play of imagination, or the unscrupulousness of +epigram and antithesis. He wrote as he lived, conscious of "the great +Task-master's eye." With the wise heathen Marcus Aurelius Antoninus he +had learned to "wipe out imaginations, to check desire, and let the +spirit that is the gift of God to every man, as his guardian and guide, +bear rule." + +I have thought it inexpedient to swell the bulk of this volume with the +entire writings appended to the old edition of the Journal, inasmuch as +they mainly refer to a system which happily on this continent is no +longer a question at issue. I content myself with throwing together a +few passages from them which touch subjects of present interest. + +"Selfish men may possess the earth: it is the meek alone who inherit it +from the Heavenly Father free from all defilements and perplexities of +unrighteousness." + +"Whoever rightly advocates the cause of some thereby promotes the good of +the whole." + +"If one suffer by the unfaithfulness of another, the mind, the most noble +part of him that occasions the discord, is thereby alienated from its +true happiness." + +"There is harmony in the several parts of the Divine work in the hearts +of men. He who leads them to cease from those gainful employments which +are carried on in the wisdom which is from beneath delivers also from the +desire of worldly greatness, and reconciles to a life so plain that a +little suffices." + +"After days and nights of drought, when the sky hath grown dark, and +clouds like lakes of water have hung over our heads, I have at times +beheld with awfulness the vehement lightning accompanying the blessings +of the rain, a messenger from Him to remind us of our duty in a right use +of His benefits." + +"The marks of famine in a land appear as humbling admonitions from God, +instructing us by gentle chastisements, that we may remember that the +outward supply of life is a gift from our Heavenly Father, and that we +should not venture to use or apply that gift in a way contrary to pure +reason." + +"Oppression in the extreme appears terrible; but oppression in more +refined appearances remains to be oppression. To labor for a perfect +redemption from the spirit of it is the great business of the whole +family of Jesus Christ in this world." + +"In the obedience of faith we die to self-love, and, our life being `hid +with Christ in God,' our hearts are enlarged towards mankind universally; +but many in striving to get treasures have departed from this true light +of life and stumbled on the dark mountains. That purity of life which +proceeds from faithfulness in following the pure spirit of truth, that +state in which our minds are devoted to serve God and all our wants are +bounded by His wisdom, has often been opened to me as a place of +retirement for the children of the light, in which we may be separated +from that which disordereth and confuseth the affairs of society, and may +have a testimony for our innocence in the hearts of those who behold us." + +"There is a principle which is pure, placed in the human mind, which in +different places and ages bath had different names; it is, however, pure, +and proceeds from God. It is deep and inward, confined to no forms of +religion nor excluded from any, when the heart stands in perfect +sincerity. In whomsoever this takes root and grows, they become +brethren." + +"The necessity of an inward stillness hath appeared clear to my mind. In +true silence strength is renewed, and the mind is weaned from all things, +save as they may be enjoyed in the Divine will; and a lowliness in +outward living, opposite to worldly honor, becomes truly acceptable to +us. In the desire after outward gain the mind is prevented from a +perfect attention to the voice of Christ; yet being weaned from all +things, except as they may be enjoyed in the Divine will, the pure light +shines into the soul. Where the fruits of the spirit which is of this +world are brought forth by many who profess to be led by the Spirit of +truth, and cloudiness is felt to be gathering over the visible church, +the sincere in heart, who abide in true stillness, and are exercised +therein before the Lord for His name's sake, have knowledge of Christ in +the fellowship of His sufferings; and inward thankfulness is felt at +times, that through Divine love our own wisdom is cast out, and that +forward, active part in us is subjected, which would rise and do +something without the pure leadings of the spirit of Christ. + +"While aught remains in us contrary to a perfect resignation of our +wills, it is like a seal to the book wherein is written 'that good and +acceptable and perfect will of God' concerning us. But when our minds +entirely yield to Christ, that silence is known which followeth the +opening of the last of the seals. In this silence we learn to abide in +the Divine will, and there feel that we have no cause to promote except +that alone in which the light of life directs us." + +Occasionally, in Considerations on the Keeping of? Negroes, the intense +interest of his subject gives his language something of passionate +elevation, as in the following extract:-- + +"When trade is carried on productive of much misery, and they who suffer +by it are many thousand miles off, the danger is the greater of not +laying their sufferings to heart. In procuring slaves on the coast of +Africa, many children are stolen privately; wars are encouraged among the +negroes, but all is at a great distance. Many groans arise from dying +men which we hear not. Many cries are uttered by widows and fatherless +children which reach not our ears. Many cheeks are wet with tears, and +faces sad with unutterable grief, which we see not. Cruel tyranny is +encouraged. The hands of robbers are strengthened. + +"Were we, for the term of one year only, to be eye-witnesses of what +passeth in getting these slaves; were the blood that is there shed to be +sprinkled on our garments; were the poor captives, bound with thongs, and +heavily laden with elephants' teeth, to pass before our eyes on their way +to the sea; were their bitter lamentations, day after day, to ring in our +ears, and their mournful cries in the night to hinder us from sleeping,-- +were we to behold and hear these things, what pious heart would not be +deeply affected with sorrow!" + +"It is good for those who live in fulness to cultivate tenderness of +heart, and to improve every opportunity of being acquainted with the +hardships and fatigues of those who labor for their living, and thus to +think seriously with themselves: Am I influenced by true charity in +fixing all my demands? Have I no desire to support myself in expensive +customs, because my acquaintances live in such customs? + +"If a wealthy man, on serious reflection, finds a witness in his own +conscience that he indulges himself in some expensive habits, which might +be omitted, consistently with the true design of living, and which, were +he to change places with those who occupy his estate, he would desire to +be discontinued by them,--whoever is thus awakened will necessarily find +the injunction binding, 'Do ye even so to them.' Divine Love imposeth no +rigorous or unreasonable commands, but graciously points out the spirit +of brotherhood and the way to happiness, in attaining which it is +necessary that we relinquish all that is selfish. + +"Our gracious Creator cares and provides for all His creatures; His +tender mercies are over all His works, and so far as true love influences +our minds, so far we become interested in His workmanship, and feel a +desire to make use of every opportunity to lessen the distresses of the +afflicted, and to increase the happiness of the creation. Here we have a +prospect of one common interest from which our own is inseparable, so +that to turn all we possess into the channel of universal love becomes +the business of our lives." + +His liberality and freedom from "all narrowness as to sects and opinions" +are manifest in the following passages:-- + +"Men who sincerely apply their minds to true virtue, and find an inward +support from above, by which all vicious inclinations are made subject; +who love God sincerely, and prefer the real good of mankind universally +to their own private interest,--though these, through the strength of +education and tradition, may remain under some great speculative errors, +it would be uncharitable to say that therefore God rejects them. The +knowledge and goodness of Him who creates, supports, and gives +understanding to all men are superior to the various states and +circumstances of His creatures, which to us appear the most difficult. +Idolatry indeed is wickedness; but it is the thing, not the name, which +is so. Real idolatry is to pay that adoration to a creature which is +known to be due only to the true God. + +"He who professeth to believe in one Almighty Creator, and in His Son +Jesus Christ, and is yet more intent on the honors, profits, and +friendships of the world than he is, in singleness of heart, to stand +faithful to the Christian religion, is in the channel of idolatry; while +the Gentile, who, notwithstanding some mistaken opinions, is established +in the true principle of virtue, and humbly adores an Almighty Power, may +be of the number that fear God and work righteousness." + +Nowhere has what is called the "Labor Question," which is now agitating +the world, been discussed more wisely and with a broader humanity than in +these essays. His sympathies were with the poor man, yet the rich too +are his brethren, and he warns them in love and pity of the consequences +of luxury and oppression:-- + +"Every degree of luxury, every demand for money inconsistent with the +Divine order, hath connection with unnecessary labors." + +"To treasure up wealth for another generation, by means of the immoderate +labor of those who in some measure depend upon us, is doing evil at +present, without knowing that wealth thus gathered may not be applied to +evil purposes when we are gone. To labor hard, or cause others to do so, +that we may live conformably to customs which our Redeemer +discountenanced by His example, and which are contrary to Divine order, +is to manure a soil for propagating an evil seed in the earth." + +"When house is joined to house, and field laid to field, until there is +no place, and the poor are thereby straitened, though this is done by +bargain and purchase, yet so far as it stands distinguished from +universal love, so far that woe predicted by the prophet will accompany +their proceedings. As He who first founded the earth was then the true +proprietor of it, so He still remains, and though He hath given it to the +children of men, so that multitudes of people have had their sustenance +from it while they continued here, yet He bath never alienated it, but +His right is as good as at first; nor can any apply the increase of their +possessions contrary to universal love, nor dispose of lands in a way +which they know tends to exalt some by oppressing others, without being +justly chargeable with usurpation." + +It will not lessen the value of the foregoing extracts in the minds of +the true-disciples of our Divine Lord, that they are manifestly not +written to subserve the interests of a narrow sectarianism. They might +have been penned by Fenelon in his time, or Robertson in ours, dealing as +they do with Christian practice,--the life of Christ manifesting itself +in purity and goodness,--rather than with the dogmas of theology. The +underlying thought of all is simple obedience to the Divine word in the +soul. "Not every one that saith unto me Lord, Lord, shall enter into the +kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of my Father in heaven." +In the preface to an English edition, published some years ago, it is +intimated that objections had been raised to the Journal on the ground +that it had so little to say of doctrines and so much of duties. One may +easily understand that this objection might have been forcibly felt by +the slave-holding religious professors of Woolman's day, and that it may +still be entertained by a class of persons who, like the Cabalists, +attach a certain mystical significance to words, names, and titles, and +who in consequence question the piety which hesitates to flatter the +Divine ear by "vain repetitions" and formal enumeration of sacred +attributes, dignities, and offices. Every instinct of his tenderly +sensitive nature shrank from the wordy irreverence of noisy profession. +His very silence is significant: the husks of emptiness rustle in every +wind; the full corn in the ear holds up its golden fruit noiselessly to +the Lord of the harvest. John Woolman's faith, like the Apostle's, is +manifested by his labors, standing not in words but in the demonstration +of the spirit,--a faith that works by love to the purifying of the heart. +The entire outcome of this faith was love manifested in reverent waiting +upon God, and in that untiring benevolence, that quiet but deep +enthusiasm of humanity, which made his daily service to his fellow- +creatures a hymn of praise to the common Father. + +However the intellect may criticise such a life, whatever defects it may +present to the trained eyes of theological adepts, the heart has no +questions to ask, but at once owns and reveres it. Shall we regret that +he who had so entered into fellowship of suffering with the Divine One, +walking with Him under the cross, and dying daily to self, gave to the +faith and hope that were in him this testimony of a life, rather than any +form of words, however sound? A true life is at once interpreter and +proof of the gospel, and does more to establish its truth in the hearts +of men than all the "Evidences" and "Bodies of Divinity" which have +perplexed the world with more doubts than they solved. Shall we venture +to account it a defect in his Christian character, that, under an abiding +sense of the goodness and long-suffering of God, he wrought his work in +gentleness and compassion, with the delicate tenderness which comes of a +deep sympathy with the trials and weaknesses of our nature, never +allowing himself to indulge in heat or violence, persuading rather than +threatening? Did he overestimate that immeasurable Love, the +manifestation of which in his own heart so reached the hearts of others, +revealing everywhere unsuspected fountains of feeling and secret longings +after purity, as the rod of the diviner detects sweet, cool water-springs +under the parched surfaces of a thirsty land? And, looking at the +purity, wisdom, and sweetness of his life, who shall say that his faith +in the teaching of the Holy Spirit--the interior guide and light--was a +mistaken one? Surely it was no illusion by which his feet were so guided +that all who saw him felt that, like Enoch, he walked with God. "Without +the actual inspiration of the Spirit of Grace, the inward teacher and +soul of our souls," says Fenelon, "we could neither do, will, nor believe +good. We must silence every creature, we must silence ourselves also, to +hear in a profound stillness of the soul this inexpressible voice of +Christ. The outward word of the gospel itself without this living +efficacious word within would be but an empty sound." "Thou Lord," says +Augustine in his Meditations, "communicatest thyself to all: thou +teachest the heart without words; thou speakest to it without articulate +sounds." + + "However, I am sure that there is a common spirit that plays within + us, and that is the Spirit of God. Whoever feels not the warm gale + and gentle ventilation of this Spirit, I dare not say he lives; for + truly without this to me there is no heat under the tropic, nor any + light though I dwelt in the body of the sun."--Sir Thomas Browne's + Religio Medici. + +Never was this divine principle more fully tested than by John Wool man; +and the result is seen in a life of such rare excellence that the world +is still better and richer for its sake, and the fragrance of it comes +down to us through a century, still sweet and precious. + +It will be noted throughout the Journal and essays that in his lifelong +testimony against wrong he never lost sight of the oneness of humanity, +its common responsibility, its fellowship of suffering and communion of +sin. Few have ever had so profound a conviction of the truth of the +Apostle's declaration that no man liveth and no man dieth to himself. +Sin was not to him an isolated fact, the responsibility of which began +and ended with the individual transgressor; he saw it as a part of a vast +network and entanglement, and traced the lines of influence converging +upon it in the underworld of causation. Hence the wrong and discord +which pained him called out pity, rather than indignation. The first +inquiry which they awakened was addressed to his own conscience. How far +am I in thought, word, custom, responsible for this? Have none of my +fellow-creatures an equitable right to any part which is called mine? +Have the gifts and possessions received by me from others been conveyed +in a way free from all unrighteousness? "Through abiding in the law of +Christ," he says, "we feel a tenderness towards our fellow-creatures, and +a concern so to walk that our conduct may not be the means of +strengthening them in error." He constantly recurs to the importance of +a right example in those who profess to be led by the spirit of Christ, +and who attempt to labor in His name for the benefit of their fellow-men. +If such neglect or refuse themselves to act rightly, they can but +"entangle the minds of others and draw a veil over the face of +righteousness." His eyes were anointed to see the common point of +departure from the Divine harmony, and that all the varied growths of +evil had their underlying root in human selfishness. He saw that every +sin of the individual was shared in greater or less degree by all whose +lives were opposed to the Divine order, and that pride, luxury, and +avarice in one class gave motive and temptation to the grosser forms of +evil in another. How gentle, and yet how searching, are his rebukes of +self-complacent respectability, holding it responsible, in spite of all +its decent seemings, for much of the depravity which it condemned with +Pharisaical harshness! In his Considerations on the True Harmony of +Mankind be dwells with great earnestness upon the importance of +possessing "the mind of Christ," which removes from the heart the desire +of superiority and worldly honors, incites attention to the Divine +Counsellor, and awakens an ardent engagement to promote the happiness of +all. "This state," he says, "in which every motion from the selfish +spirit yieldeth to pure love, I may acknowledge with gratitude to the +Father of Mercies, is often opened before me as a pearl to seek after." + +At times when I have felt true love open my heart towards my fellow- +creatures, and have been engaged in weighty conversation in the cause of +righteousness, the instructions I have received under these exercises in +regard to the true use of the outward gifts of God have made deep and +lasting impressions on my mind. I have beheld how the desire to provide +wealth and to uphold a delicate life has greviously entangled many, and +has been like a snare to their offspring; and though some have been +affected with a sense of their difficulties, and have appeared desirous +at times to be helped out of them, yet for want of abiding under the +humbling power of truth they have continued in these entanglements; +expensive living in parents and children hath called for a large supply, +and in answering this call the 'faces of the poor' have been ground away, +and made thin through hard dealing. + +"There is balm; there is a physician! and oh what longings do I feel that +we may embrace the means appointed for our healing; may know that removed +which now ministers cause for the cries of many to ascend to Heaven +against their oppressors; and that thus we may see the true harmony +restored!--a restoration of that which was lost at Babel, and which will +be, as the prophet expresses it, 'the returning of a pure language!'" + +It is easy to conceive how unwelcome this clear spiritual insight must +have been to the superficial professors of his time busy in tithing mint, +anise, and cummin. There must have been something awful in the presence +of one endowed with the gift of looking through all the forms, shows, and +pretensions of society, and detecting with certainty the germs of evil +hidden beneath them; a man gentle and full of compassion, clothed in "the +irresistible might of meekness," and yet so wise in spiritual +discernment, + + "Bearing a touchstone in his hand + And testing all things in the land + By his unerring spell. + + "Quick births of transmutation smote + The fair to foul, the foul to fair; + Purple nor ermine did he spare, + Nor scorn the dusty coat." + +In bringing to a close this paper, the preparation of which has been to +me a labor of love, I am not unmindful of the wide difference between the +appreciation of a pure and true life and the living of it, and am willing +to own that in delineating a character of such moral and spiritual +symmetry I have felt something like rebuke from my own words. I have +been awed and solemnized by the presence of a serene and beautiful spirit +redeemed of the Lord from all selfishness, and I have been made thankful +for the ability to recognize and the disposition to love him. I leave +the book with its readers. They may possibly make large deductions from +my estimate of the author; they may not see the importance of all his +self-denying testimonies; they may question some of his scruples, and +smile over passages of childlike simplicity; but I believe they will all +agree in thanking me for introducing them to the Journal of John Woolman. + +AMESBURY, 20th 1st mo.,1871. + + + + + + HAVERFORD COLLEGE. + + Letter to President Thomas Chase, LL. D. + + AMESBURY, MASS., 9th mo., 1884. + +THE Semi-Centennial of Haverford College is an event that no member of +the Society of Friends can regard without deep interest. It would give +me great pleasure to be with you on the 27th inst., but the years rest +heavily upon me, and I have scarcely health or strength for such a +journey. + +It was my privilege to visit Haverford in 1838, in "the day of small +beginnings." The promise of usefulness which it then gave has been more +than fulfilled. It has grown to be a great and well-established +institution, and its influence in thorough education and moral training +has been widely felt. If the high educational standard presented in the +scholastic treatise of Barclay and the moral philosophy of Dymond has +been lowered or disowned by many who, still retaining the name of +Quakerism, have lost faith in the vital principle wherein precious +testimonials of practical righteousness have their root, and have gone +back to a dead literalness, and to those materialistic ceremonials for +leaving which our old confessors suffered bonds and death, Haverford, at +least, has been in a good degree faithful to the trust committed to it. + +Under circumstances of more than ordinary difficulty, it has endeavored +to maintain the Great Testimony. The spirit of its culture has not been +a narrow one, nor could it be, if true to the broad and catholic +principles of the eminent worthies who founded the State of +Pennsylvania, Penn, Lloyd, Pastorius, Logan, and Story; men who were +masters of the scientific knowledge and culture of their age, hospitable +to all truth, and open to all light, and who in some instances +anticipated the result of modern research and critical inquiry. + +It was Thomas Story, a minister of the Society of Friends, and member of +Penn's Council of State, who, while on a religious visit to England, +wrote to James Logan that he had read on the stratified rocks of +Scarborough, as from the finger of God, proofs of the immeasurable age +of our planet, and that the "days" of the letter of Scripture could +only mean vast spaces of time. + +May Haverford emulate the example of these brave but reverent men, who, +in investigating nature, never lost sight of the Divine Ideal, and who, +to use the words of Fenelon, "Silenced themselves to hear in the +stillness of their souls the inexpressible voice of Christ." Holding +fast the mighty truth of the Divine Immanence, the Inward Light and +Word, a Quaker college can have no occasion to renew the disastrous +quarrel of religion with science. Against the sublime faith which shall +yet dominate the world, skepticism has no power. No possible +investigation of natural facts; no searching criticism of letter and +tradition can disturb it, for it has its witness in all human hearts. + +That Haverford may fully realize and improve its great opportunities as +an approved seat of learning and the exponent of a Christian philosophy +which can never be superseded, which needs no change to fit it for +universal acceptance, and which, overpassing the narrow limits of sect, +is giving new life and hope to Christendom, and finding its witnesses in +the Hindu revivals of the Brahmo Somaj and the fervent utterances of +Chunda Sen and Mozoomdar, is the earnest desire of thy friend. + + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE INNER LIFE *** +By John Greenleaf Whittier + +** This file should be named 9597.txt or 9597.zip *** + +This eBook was produced by David Widger + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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