and truly bound to the good cause, as we have ever received it from the beginning; and may we be perfectly knit and united together in the same mind and in the same judgment; even though we be left as a little remnant, and as J. B. spectacles to the world. Το 1 heard of thy bereavement. I cannot doubt To J. B. STOKE NEWINGTON, 31st of Third month, 1837. How many and awful have been the warnings and the tender chastenings of the all-wise hand of Divine Providence of latter times; all (I sometimes think) concurring with, and bearing upon, and bespeaking somewhat in relation TUNBRIDGE WELLS, 16th of Ninth month, 1837. to the spiritual aspect of things in the church. May you be strengthened and animated from and in the world. "The wine of astonishment" indeed is given us to drink, in various time to time, and your drooping faith sustained ways; yet the meek and patient followers of and increased, to run with all patience and the Lamb, who know in whom they have be- quiet confidence, the wearisome journey that In due season our reaping lieved, and that he is able to keep their all, is yet before us. which they are engaged to commit to his keep- time and shouting time will come, for which ing, are not left desolate,-are not suffered to be we have sown in tears; laying down as it swallowed up of overmuch emotion of any were our all, (O! that it may be our very kind; they cannot be unduly "afraid with any all,-) surrendering everything that the amazement:"-nay, truly, "all these things,", Lord calls for at our hands,-casting into they well know, "must needs be, or come to the treasury even our mites, of our penury, pass;" and they are so far from saying with being content to see ourselves to be very one, "This evil cometh from the Lord, why poor, helpless, worthless, fit to be pitied, mere should I wait for the Lord any longer,"-that pensioners and dependents on the Lord's free they rather feel, "It is the Lord,-let him do mercy and renewed blessing. O! this is the what seemeth good to him;" and so in patience state that draws down the Divine regard, and, are engaged to possess their souls. May then as it were, commands the rich outpourings of the peaceable and peaceful fruits of righteous- those good and perfect gifts, which dignify and ness, be more and more brought forth in us, adorn poor fallen human nature;—which raise my dear friend, through and by means of up the brother and the sister of low degree, from all the losses, crosses, overturnings and humili- lying among the pots, among the things that ations; so that not only we may be rendered perish with the using, yea, from the dunghill more meet for, and more earnest after, that of pollution;-and from sitting like poor Job fruition of the end of our faith, which is end- among the ashes of despondency, to reach forth, to less, uninterrupted, and perfect,--but even mount up towards that inheritance incorruptible, here below may be the better qualified to fill undefiled, and which never fades away. It is up our measure of service, and glorify the prepared, it is reserved, it is laid up in store, good cause and blessed name of our holy Redeem- for those that are faithful unto death, who are There is indeed great occasion to believe, kept by the power of God through faith, and though the evidences and tokens are, now as are not moved away from the blessed hope of. ever, sufficiently obscure to try the faith of the gospel; continuing steadfast, immovable, God's dear children,-that His glorious cause not soon shaken in mind, nor shrinking from is. through all discouraging circumstances, still suffering, nor afraid of temptations or aboundgoing forward; and that His wonderful and all-ing tribulations;-but enduring to the end. righteous purposes are fulfilling in the earth. That this is substantially the case, should and must be matter of joy to us; and even make us at times, when we are given to see and appreciate it, excedingly "joyful in all our tribulation;" even though we should be pressed almost out of measure, beyond strength or hope, having fightings and fears without and within. This has been the portion of the faithful, more or less in all ages; and I believe it will be so, till the end come. er. I do much symBe assured, my dear — pathize with, and have often thought of thee in several respects, both before and since we I have been much comforted, while from home, in reading many precious letters of our primitive worthies of the first rank, who loved not their lives unto death, but gave up all, that they might keep a conscience void of offence, and be clear of the blood of all. I hope (if life be spared, and strength given,) to hand some, yea, many of these, for the perusal of such as can receive and profit by them. J. B. To answers to deep; for I am ready to think, thou hast from time to time to drink into that cup of suffering, which the livingly exercised every where up and down, in this day of treading under, of rebuke, and of scattering, have more or less to partake of. For, indeed, how can it be otherwise, when those who have been as leaders and waymarks to the flock, and have seemed to be pillars in the house of the Lord, are ready to stagger and to stumble, to be snared, and to be broken. But I must not here expatiate on my feelings, as to the state of things in regard to our still favored Society; but I will refer thee to my Preface to Pike's and Oxley's Journals, to other parts of J. Pike's Journal, but especially to his letters, and some of Deborah Bell's, which show that times of trouble have befallen our poor Society before now, in rather a similar way and degree. Ah! the same power can rescue his tribulated remnant, and restore the waste places; nor will He ever own proceedings which are not according to Truth and uprightness. with which we are encompassed, still to per- (To be continued.) The great secret of Christian usefulness is to be awake to opportunities, and intent on doing what we can, rather than bewailing that it is in our power to do so little; and, in this respect, he who faithfully improves the one talent bids fair to be entrusted with the five or ten. DR. SIMEON ABRAHAMS. Dr. Simeon Abrabams, who recently died in the city of New York, has left nearly the whole of his large estate to charitable purposes. The N. Y. Tribune says of him : "Though of the Jewish persuasion, he never was scetarian in his charities or his good will; and in his endeavors to confer a benefit, he never stopped to consider whether the recipient was Jew or Gentile. I am inclined to think that many have been, and are, endeavoring uprightly to retrieve their outgoings; seeing the palpable extremes and consequences of the track they have been on but others seem not sufficiently warned and instructed to return, in honesty and in earnest, to original principles and practice, but are "His acts of disinterested kindness were feignedly, and in part only, doing so; retaining numberless. Even in the distribution of his so much of the wisdom of the flesh, and so means in a business way, he always adhered to much of self in a refined form, as they think principles which were most likely to benefit will make the Truth more palatable to our own those with whom he dealt. No single individpeople and to others; thus shunning the shame ual in the City of New York ever held more of the cross, and the humiliating process there- small bonds and mortgages than he. While of. It will not do:-our all-conquering Cap-rich men generally deprecate the idea of investtain will discover and make bare all coverings, and find out all his enemies, and pursue and overtake them in all their retreats in the precincts of and backways to Babylon. To J. B. ing their means in small sums, Dr. Abrahams made it a principle if a poor man needed his means for the purpose of improving a lot in some out-of-the-way place, to advance it to him in sums of $500, or $1,000, in pref rence to loaning it in larger sums to those who would find less difficulty in obtaining them. In numberless instances, too, when such applications have been made, and the means not at hand, and the need urgent, has he deposited securities and borrowed at bank to accomodate his needy applicant. His kindness to them did not end here, for while he was ever ready to lend them, he was as willing to receive the payments in small amounts of $50 and upwards, as the ability of his beneficiaries enabled them to make them." 29th of Eleventh month, 1837.—I may truly and sincerely say, that we participated in a sense of the loss, which many (doubtless) even among the more distant connexions and friends of the deceased, feel they have sustained. Do I say loss, do I speak of deprivation, when those who have humbly endeavored to love and follow their dear Redeemer on earth, are taken from suffering and probation, as we trust, to their resting place in glory? Ah! we have them still, if the Apostle's language applies to us, if we are indeed come to Mount Zion, the After providing for his brother and sister, heavenly Jerusalem, the innumerable company, and directing his body to be disposed of for to the spirits of the just made perfect, to Jesus scientific purposes or for burial, according to our Mediator. May we then not sorrow as the wish of his family, he bequeathed to the those, who have no such substantial enjoyment" Hebrew Benevolent Society, $25,000; Jew's of things hoped for, and evidences of things Hospital, $25,000; Lying-in Asylum, Marion May we be quickened on our way, St., $3,000; American Female Guardian Soci and animated by the cloud of witnesses ety, $5,000; Orphan Asylum, Bloomingdale, not seen. ONE STITCH AND ANOTHER. $5,000; Eye and Ear Infirmary, $3,000; Fire- | wealth in the hands of a few individuals or famimen's Fund Association, $1,000: Deaf and lics is a deplorable evil, which is fortunately Dumb Institution, $3,000; Old Ladies' Home, being arrested, not only by various political and Twentieth St., $20,000; Blind Asylum, Ninth social influences peculiar to the United States, Av., $5,000; Juvenile Asylum for Reformation but by the humane and generous disposition of Delinquents, $2,000; New York Dispensary, that animates many of the rich men of Amer$1,000; Northern Dispensary, $1,000; East- ica." ero Dispensary, $1,000; Demilt Dispensary, $1,000; Western Dispensary, $1,000; North Eastern Dispensary, $1,000; North-Western Dispensary, $1.000; New York Ophthalmic Hospital, $2,000; Juvenile Asylum, $3,000; New York Society for the Relief of Widows and Orphans of Medical Men, $5,000; Nursery and Child's Hospital, $3,000; Colored Home, $5,000; Association for Benefit of Colored Or phans, $5,000. All the rest, residue, and remainder of his property to the New York Hos. pital; to which institution he also gives all the property of which his brother and sister have the use while living (house included) after their death." The Philadelphia "Press" thus comments upon the occasion :— A lady called into a house and found a little girl sitting by her mother knitting. "What are you kuitting, Bessie ?" asked the lady. A stocking for me," said Bessie. "A stocking" cried the lady, "how do you expect to knit a stocking?" O," said Bessie, "by just taking one stitch, and then another." And is not that just the way every good thing is accomplished, by quiet, patient doing day by day? One brick upon another And the highest house is made; And the deepest snow is laid. THE WRITINGS OF RICHARD COBDEN. The widow and family of the late Richard Cobden have made an appeal to this country, which there is every reason to believe will prove a singular success. They appeal not, of course, for money, for they have all and more than they or the late Richard Cobden ever sought. The family property must be worth nearly half a million of our currency. But the widow appeals to the United States for a full appreciation of her late distinguished husband's character, life and labors as a statesman, and for the good of mankind. She has done us the honor to publish, not any panegyric, nor even a life, but the works which he wrote, and which show what the man himself was. They have been published by the family, simultaneously in London and in this country, in two remarkably handsome volumes, by the Appletons, with a most judicious introductory chapter, introducing them to the American reader and student, by W. C. Bryant. "While our laws permit each individual entire freedom of choice in the disposal of his property, that very liberty redounds in many cases to the public benefit. The ambition to found a family prevails extensively and almost universally among the rich men of Europe. It there holds out the temptation of perpetuating, with the aid of a title and an entailed estate, fame and fortune. Here such aspirations are rudely checked. There are no hereditary titles to be purchased, and no laws of primogeniture to concentrate and preserve family wealth. There are so many instances of the children of toil and poverty acquiring honorable positions and vast possessions, while the families and heirs of wealthy men of a past generation are sinking into a melancholy decadence, that many rich men are naturally induced to devote a large share of their wealth to public purposes. The public spirit and keen sympathy with all that affects the general welfare, which are generated by our free institutions, also tend to arouse sympathies that in other countries remain dormant. Christian charity is probably becoming The fact is, that though Richard Cobden better developed here, where all religious iusti- was an Englishman by the accident of birth tutions, instead of being supported by the and position, he was, in all the great and warm State, are dependent solely upon voluntary sub- principles of his noble heart and eminent intelscriptions, than elsewhere. While wealth is, ligence, thoroughly American, and not afraid or in many instances, easily acquired, a sense of its ashamed to avow this beyond any man of his responsibilities in reference to the poor, the ig-day during a public career of more than thirty norant, the suffering, the helpless, and the op-years. He was the great advocate of American pressed, is becoming more and more general, and principles of statesmanship. In 1835 he made the conviction that abundant private means should a tour of the United States, and published the be used for beneficent public purposes is quietly results of it in a work that enlightened Europe spreading among the rich men and women of our as to the rising power and greatness of this land. The maintenance of the inviolability of the country. All his predictions have been more rights of property is an incentive to industry es-than verified. At the time of our deepest missential to civilization, but the concentration of fortunes, while all the Powers of Europe were threatening and plotting for our destruction, he | selves these volumns of his works will be found stood up in the House of Commons, fighting our a ready authority in regard to the principles. battles as if they had been his own. When that cannot be contested successfully in Engour cause seemed low his spirits were deeply land, and which will yet be friendly and fair affected, but his heart and voice never for one for us.-Ledger. moment wavered. In fact, he wore out his life to the last almost as much for America as for England. FRIENDS' INTELLIGENCER. PHILADELPHIA, FIFTH MONTH 4, 1867. We ask the attention of our readers to the advertisement in another column of the forthcoming History of the Religious Society of In doing all this there was an amount of mental and moral power displayed; a profound statesmanship, that will be the study of future. ages, for on it have turned the destiny of nations. A poor lad, whose family had declined in fortune, his own mental power gave him his first start in life. Travel and observation, Friends, by SAMUEL M. JANNEY. coupled with a wonderful power of generalization, were to him the secret of that profound knowledge which he displayed ever at the right time, and with sufficient energy to carry his point without leaving enmity in those he converted, rather than conquered, to his views. His life was a gigantic success in all he undertook. The anti-Corn Law League against the most powerful landed aristocracy in the world left no ill feeling against him; but his country raised a fund for him, personally, of three hundred thousand dollars, after having raised near a million and a half to carry through his great object; and his former opponents offered him a seat in the English Cabinet two or three times. DIED, at his residence at Germantown, Pa., at noon on the 18th of Fourth month, 1867, WM. STEVENSON NOBLE, in bis 35th year; a member of Green Street Monthly Meeting. He was the great harmonizer, not only of his own nation, but of Europe, because he never found fault until he could find and point out at the same time a practical remedy. He exposed the corrupt practices on three or four occasions, when the British Ministers regularly got up a war panic for party purposes, and really kept the peace between France and England, the present French Emperor and Great Britain, until his name became as much respected in Paris as in London. He visited successively France, Spain, Italy, Germany and Russia, and was received with marks of joy and enthusiasm as a sort of public benefactor wherever he went and was known. There was bardly a civilized nation on the globe that he did not benefit, and in such a way as to raise the honor and character of his own country, and unite the nations of the earth in closer social ties. In all that he did his principles were truly American, and there was no country for which he felt so high a degree of hope in the future, or to which he labored so assiduously to conform the institutions of his own country. His writings are worthy of the closest study. No doubt more of his speeches will be collected, but it was by what he did, wrote and thought, rather than by any mere power of oratory, that he effected so much greatness and renown for his age and honor for himself. In all future controversies between Great Britain and our on the morning of the 21st of Fourth month, 1867, at the residence of her father-in-law John Bancroft, Philadelphia, ANNA, wife of Joseph W. Bancroft, in her 30th year. residence, 246 N. Twentieth St., Philada., SAMUEL YARDLEY, in his 68th year. on the 23d of Fourth month, 1867, at his The Committee of Management of Friends' Library Association will meet in the Library room on Fourthday evening, Fifth month 8th, 1867, at 8 o'clock. JACOB M. ELLIS, Clerk. FRIENDS' PUBLICATION ASSOCIATION. tion......... Janney's Middle Ages......... ... 50 cts. 25 ... 25 “ 40" 30 " ...... Poems and Essays of E. M. Chandler............ 75 “ Friends interested are invited to contribute ac cording to their means to extend the usefulness of this newly-formed organization. Address JOSEPH M. TRUMAN, JR., Treasurer, 717 Willow St. publications, which will be issued for THE BOOK ASThe attention of Friends is called to the following sOCIATION OF FRIENDS during the early part of Fifth mouth. TALKS WITH THE CHILDREN, Part I., price 25 cts. TALKS WITH THE CHILDREN, Part II., price 50 cts. BIBLICAL HISTORY, FAMILIARIZED BY QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. Price $1.00. The books are designed for use in families and schools, as assistants to teachers and others, and they will, we trust, be found to supply a want long needed among us. Orders for single copies or by the dozen filled by the Publisher, T. ELLWOOD ZELL, JOHN PENINGTON. to respect. The sound judgment which characterized him in his private business was not lost in other things; and in political and public matters his advice was always safe. He was frequently called upon to assist members of Congress in framing such parts of the successive tariffs as were within his special business knowl edge, and his recommendations were never biassed by his own interests. The loss of such a man, capable in his business, proud of it, and making himself dear to his friends, is at all times a great one. Particularly in this the case now and here, when study and scholarship are taking their accustomed places, from which they had been seriously disturbed by five years of war. The trade of book selling in his hands was elevated to the dignity that it really acquires in the hands of competent men. Such men are rare everywhere. Here, unfortunately, they are growing rarer every day. In growing great rapidly we are not always growing wise, and the men who mean to study, and want a book shop and a bookseller to furnish them with the tools they need, will look long and vainly for such help as they always got from John Penington, of Philadelphia. It is beside our present purpose to speak of him except as a bookseller; but we should do wrong to forget that patriotic Philadelphia during the last five years, contained no man more sincere, and few men more forward, in every good work that civil war imposed upon lovers of the country.The Nation, March 28. Mr. John Penington, of Philadelphia, who died on the 18th inst., was the last, if not the ouly, American bookseller who represented the old traditional booksellers. A scholar of fine parts, thorough in his knowledge of bookselling, with judgment and skill, a biographer in its broadest and best sense, he was an honor to the craft, and he took pride in it. He was a man of fine taste, of large reading, and of exhaustless service to all who were curious in scholarship, or earnest in the study of letters. Descended from one of the old, respected, and wealthy Quaker families of Philadelphia, it was accident that made him a bookseller. His father's large fortune was suddenly lost. During his youth, Mr. John Penington had gathered a valuable collection of books, and had frequently contributed to the literary proceedings of the various learned societies of his uative town. Not caring for general mercantile pursuits, and suddenly thrown on his own resources, he quietly turned his library into his stock in trade, and with it opened one of the best bookstores of the country. Proud of his books, and contented with his shop and the fair profit which it brought him, he never allowed himself to be tempted from his chosen pursuit. His shop became the gathering place of scholars and men with a taste for letters, and one generation after another grew up almost under his eyes in the various branches of literature which he supplied. His business did not stop with supplying books to his customers; they were all his friends; they knew that to him they could turn for help in everything that related to books, and that his knowledge was only surpassed by his readiness to impart it; and his help was never refused to the earnest seeker after knowledge, no matter how small his requirements of Mr. Penington's services as a bookseller. Bookselling with him was not so much a trade as an art; books with him were valuable for their real, substantial merit; the book-buyer was precious in his eyes who knew what he wanted and why he wanted it. He never got rid of his old love of books for their own sake, and that love was too well founded in a knowledge of books ever to be lost in a poor ambition to become a great bookseller-a mere trader in so many thousand volumes of which he knew nothing and thought less. One of the matters of his trade in which he took pride was In reference to her school, she says: "I have the fact that his list of subscribers to the new one class in Short Division, one in Multipliedition of Brunet was the largest outside of cation, one in Subtraction, and three in Ad-. Paris, and thus he brought together the oldest dition. With a very few exceptions, most of biblographer of the Old World, and the young- these children could not make a figure when est student in the New. With Brunet and they first came to school. I have one class in with Bossange, as with all the other leading Definitions; have some very good readers and booksellers in Europe, his relations were inti- spellers, and think my first class is now premate, and ripened always into fast friendships,pared to take some other studies--either Grameach man finding in the other much to like and mar or Philosophy, or both." For Friends' Intelligencer. FRIENDS AMONGST THE FREEDMEN. NO. VII. Letters and Reports from our Teachers, from which the following extracts are made, show their continued faithfulness in the good work. CAROLINE THOMAS, at Leesburg, Va., in allusion to having found it impossible to procure board in any white family, cheerfully remarks: "Suffice it to say, I succeeded in getting a home amongst good, kind people, and the only fear is they will spoil me, for there is nothing they can do for me that is not done. They seem to understand by a kind of intuitive perception what I would like to have, which is all owing to their kind hearts; and the more I see of them, the more I wonder how any one could treat them unkindly." |