FRIENDS' INTELLIGENCER. The following day our friend James Thornton, who was preparing for a religious visit to Europe, came to see her, when she desired him to give her love to some particular friends in London, and inform them she was gone to rest. In the afternoon the doctor came who formerly attended her, she having not required his assistance, apprehending it unnecessary for some time, and partly laid aside all medicine. being a time of sore conflict and trial, having to | added: "I have nothing more to say, but 'Grave labor with much bodily pain, about noon she where is thy victory; death, thy sting!' My prayed fervently that she might be resigned, bed is a bed of pleasure, a river of pleasure." saying "What is all this to be compared with At another time she spoke thus to a sober perwhat my Redeemer suffered." In the evening son of a different persuasion: "I am resigned, I several friends being present, after a time of si- am only waiting for my final change; I would lence she broke forth thus: "Let the Lord arise not stay for any thing here." Some days after, in all our hearts, that our enemies may be scat- being very weak, and attended with a difficulty of breathing, she expressed herself thus: "I tered and the clouds dispersed." A few days after, a particular friend am ready and resigned when the Lord pleases to call." sitting beside her, she said, in a low voice: "I of the brook of Shiloh." About this time she have this day been drinking of the still waters requested an intimate friend to burn some needle-work, but the same friend requesting two of those pieces which were intended for the fire, for herself, she made this reply: "Do not deAfter a time in silence, she expressed herself sire it, my dear, they have been my idols, and I thus: "Doctor, the time is drawing near when am afraid thou wilt make them thine." The all pains and complaints shall cease; neverthe-next morning the same friend came to see her, less I acknowledge thy kindness." A few hours she queried : "hast thou utterly consumed those after, William Savery, a ministering friend, came pieces I gave thee yesterday?" Being answerinto the room, and taking her by the hand, she ed they were, she took some pieces from under "Take and consume these likewise," which was said: "The Lord liveth with me every day and her pillow, which she sent for home, and said: every hour." Some days after, having had a time of severe pain she expressed herself thus: fully complied with. Some days after, she sent "Though I walk through the valley of the for me into the room, and desired me to take shadow of death, I fear no evil, I feel his rod, down two pieces that were in frames. After At another time, they were taken down, and a pause made, I enbut his staff comforts me. being in much bodily pain, but in a sweet frame quired the reason; she answered with great firmof mind, she weightily uttered these words: ness: "They were idols." The next day she "I tell him I will endeavor to bear more for his desired me to go and bring an intimate friend; sake." Two days after, sitting by her and being when she came, I not being present, she exmuch affected, she pressed my hands within pressed herself thus: "I desire thee to call my hers, and said: "The God of love be my sup- husband to unite with thee to consume those port and thy support, for he is all love." The pieces of needle-work that are in frames." Some "I have no peace while I hear the next day some friends being present, she spoke hours after, she expressed herself in the followTake those thus: "I am weak, the Lord is strong, which ing manner: is my comfort: I see nothing in my way, noth-lowing of the oxen and the bleating of the ing but love to my friends and the outcasts." sheep, for there is yet a reserve. A few days after, feeling the renewing income things out of the drawers, and consume them of the Lord's presence, she said: "Blessed be all," (which was a considerable quantity of cuthe name of the Lord, for he hath refreshed my rious needle-work.) Her request was fully combody and soul. In the afternoon she took me plied with. She steadily bore her testimony by the hand and desired me to stay with her against this branch of education, particularly from meeting, saying her time was short, and spriging, and refused many advantageous offers crying out: glory to God in the highest, and on that account, in the way of her school; she peace and good will to men," adding, a little also desired me to procure a particular person to after: "Comfort ye my people, saith the Lord, take the necessary care of her remains, and likefor he hath comforted me. Open, ye everlasting wise some serious person to sit up with her corpse; she further requested a near friend to exdoors! and let the King of Glory come in." The morning At another time, holding me by the hand after amine her dress, saying: "Whatever is added, being urged to take a very efficacious medicine, let it be plain, and at the time of my departure, she spoke thus: "My Redeemer is a God of let the room be quiet and still." glory and might! and shall I defeat his purpo- before her close, after a season of great inward ses?" Several days after she sent for me to sit poverty and conflict, she said: "Now I feel the by her, and expressed herself thus: "I lay, spring of the Lord's love to arise in my heart, as it were, in my Saviour's arms, and I tell him to my great comfort." The morning following, The she beckoned to a friend whose spirit she often I will be nothing, and he shall be all." next day she desired that I would give some of felt near, and spoke thus: "Now I see the city; her apparel to the person who nursed her, and it hath twelve gates, and of a truth there is no need of the sun, for the Lord God is the light | impression of those excellent graces that shone of it." Then she inquired if it was almost four o'clock, and being answered that it was about eleven, said she thought it was later. "Am I to continue till four? for about four I shall be going to that city." During this interval, she was, as it were, wholly given up, frequently crying: "Come, Lord Jesus, come, Lord Jesus," with many more weighty expressions, which could not be distinctly heard, her voice being low and much impaired. About four in the afternoon of said day she changed, and appeared in fervent prayer; then asking an intimate friend to turn her, she said: "This would be the last," which accordingly proved so, for a few minutes after, she broke forth thus: "Come Lord, I am thy sheep; come Lord, I am thy sheep," and with the third sentence sweetly departed, having breathed her last without the least uneasy sensation, and I have no doubt, hath entered into that rest where sighing ceases, and sorrow hath an end. She was deep and inward in spirit, and bore her sickness and pain with great patience, manifesting a sweet disposition, and evinced throughout a mind much redeemed from the world, being preserved sensible to the last. She was interred in Friends' burying ground, in Philadelphia, attended by a number of Friends and others of different denominations. THE LIFE OF GOD IN THE SOUL OF MAN. "Infinite and eternal Majesty, author and fountain of being and blessedness, how little do we poor sinful creatures know of thee, or the way to serve and please thee! We talk of religion, and pretend unto it; but, alas! how few are there who know and consider what it means! How easily do we mistake the affections of our nature, and the issues of self-love, for those divine graces which alone can render us acceptable in thy sight! It may justly grieve me to consider that I should have wandered so long, and contented myself so often with vain shadows, and false images of piety and religion: yet I cannot but acknowledge and adore thy goodness, who hast been pleased in some measure to open mine eyes, and let me see what it is at which I ought to aim. I rejoice to consider what mighty improvements my nature is capable of, and what a divine temper of spirit doth shine in those whom thou art pleased to choose, and causest to approach unto thee. Blessed be thy infinite mercy, who sentest thine own son to dwell among men, and to instruct them by his example as well as by his laws, giving them a perfect pattern of what they ought to be. O that the holy life of the blessed Jesus may be always in my thoughts, and before mine eyes, till I receive a deep sense and so eminently in him; and let me never cease my endeavors, till that new and divine nature prevails in my soul, and Christ be formed within me." The excellency and advantage of Religion. And now, my dear friend, having discovered the nature of true religion, before I proceed any further, it will not, perhaps, be unfit to fix our meditations a little on the excellency and advan tages of it, that we may be excited to the more vigorous and diligent prosecution of those methods whereby we may attain so great a felicity. But alas! what words shall we find to express that inward satisfaction, those hidden pleasures, which can never be rightly understood, but by those holy souls who feel them! "a stranger intermeddleth not with their joy." (Prov. xiv. 10.) Holiness is the right temper, the vigorous and healthful constitution of the soul: its faculties had formerly been enfeebled and disordered, so that they could not exercise their natural functions: it had wearied itself with endless tossings and rollings, and was never able to find any rest: now that distemper being removed, it feels itself well, there is a due harmony in its faculties, and a sprightly vigor possesseth every part. The understanding can discern what is good, and the will can cleave unto it; the affections are not tied to the motions of sense, and the influence of external objects, but they are stirred by more divine impressions, are touched by a sense of invisible things. The Excellency of Divine Love. Let us descend, if you please, into a nearer and more particular view of religion, in those several branches of it which were named before; let us consider that love and affection wherewith holy souls are united to God, that we may see what excellency and felicity is involved in it. Love is that powerful and prevalent passion, by which all the faculties and inclinations of the soul are determined, and on which both its perfection and happiness depend. The worth and excellency of a soul is to be measured by the object of its love: he who loveth mean and sordid things, doth thereby become base and vile; but a noble and well-placed affection doth advance and improve the spirit into a conformity with the perfections which it loves. The images of these do frequently present themselves unto the mind, and by a secret force and energy insinuate into the very constitution of the soul, and mould and fashion it unto their own likeness. Hence we may see how easily lovers or friends do slide into the imitation of the persons whom they regard; how, even before they are aware, they begin to resemble them, not only in the more considerable instances of their deportment, but also in their voice and gesture, and that which we call FRIENDS' INTELLIGENCER. sions, which would debase the soul if directed to The Advantages of Divine Love. Again, as divine love doth advance and ele- their mien and air; and certainly we should as | eth its object a deity, ought to be bestowed on well transcribe the virtues and inward beauties him who really is so: those unlimited submisof the soul, if they were the object and motive of our love. But now, as all the creatures we converse with have their mixture and alloy, we are always in hazard to be sullied and corrupted by placing our affections on them. Passion doth easily blind our eyes, so that we first approve and then imitate the things that are blameable in them; the true way to improve and ennoble our souls, is by fixing our love on the divine perfections, that we may have them always before us, and derive an impression of them on ourselves; and "beholding with an open face, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, we may be changed into the same image from glory to glory." He who with a generous and holy ambition hath raised his eyes towards that uncreated beauty and goodness, and fixed his affection there, is quite of another spirit, of a more excellent and heroic temper, than the rest of the world, and cannot but infinitely disdain all mean and unworthy things; he will not entertain any low or base thoughts, which might disparage his high and noble pretensions. Love is the greatest and most excellent thing we are masters of, and therefore it is folly and baseness to bestow it unworthily; First, I say, love must needs be miserable, and it is indeed the only thing we can call our own; other things may be taken from us by violence, If any thing else full of trouble and disquietude, when there is but none can ravish our love. be counted ours, by giving our love, we give all, not worth and excellency enough in the object so far as we make over our hearts and wills, by to answer the vastness of its capacity; so eager which we possess our other enjoyments. It is and violent a passion cannot but fret and tornot possible to refuse him any thing to whom by ment the spirit, when it finds not wherewith to love we had given ourselves; nay, since it is the satisfy its cravings. And, indeed, so large and privilege of gifts to receive their value from the unbounded is its nature, that it must be extremely mind of the giver, and not be measured by the pinched and straightened; when confined to any event, but by the desire; he who loveth, may, creature; nothing below an infinite good can af in some sense, be said not only to bestow all that ford it room to stretch itself, and exert its vigor he hath, but all the things else which may make and activity. What is a skin-deep beauty, or the beloved person happy, since he doth heartily some small degrees of goodness, to match or satto embrace an infinite good? No wonder lovers wish them, and would readily give them, if they isfy a passion which was made for God; designed were in his power; in which sense it is that one makes bold to say, that "divine love doth in a do so hardly suffer any rival, and do not desire manner give God unto himself, by the compla- that others should approve their passion by imicency it takes in the happiness and perfection of tating it; they know the scantiness and narrowhis nature." But though this may seem too ness of the good which they love, that it cannot strained in expression, certainly love is the wor-suffice two, being in effect too little for one. thiest present we can offer unto God, and it is extremely debased when we bestow it another way. Hence love," which is strong as death," occathe coals whereof are coals of fire, which hath a sioneth "jealousy, which is wicked as the grave;" most violent flame. But divine love hath no mixture of this gall; When this affection is misplaced, it doth often vent itself in such expressions as point at its genuine and proper object and insinuate where it when once the soul is fixed on that supreme and ought to be placed. The flattering and blasphe-all-sufficient good, it finds so much perfection and mous terms of adoration, wherein men do some-goodness, as doth not only answer and satisfy its times express their passion, are the language of that affection which was made and designed for God as he who is accustomed to speak to some great person, doth perhaps unawares accost another with those titles he was wont to give to him. But certainly that passion which account affection, but master and overpower it too; it FRIENDS' INTELLIGENCER. cause it can do so little itself, it desires the assistance of the whole creation, that angels and men would concur with it in the admiration and love of those infinite perfections. The Certainty to be Beloved Again. Again, love is accompanied with trouble, when it misseth a suitable return of affection. Love is the most valuable thing we can bestow, and by giving it, we do in effect give all that we have: and therefore it must needs be afflicting, to find so great a gift despised; that the present which one hath made of his whole heart, cannot prevail to obtain any return. Perfect love is a kind of self-dereliction, a wandering out of ourselves; it is a kind of voluntary death, wherein the lover dies to himself, and all his own interests, not thinking of them, nor caring for them any more, and minding nothing but how he may please and gratify the party whom he loves. Thus he is quite undone, unless he meets with reciprocal affection; he neglects himself, and the other hath no regard to him; but if he be beloved, he is revived, as it were, and liveth in the soul and care of the person whom he loves; and now he begins to mind his own concernments not so much because they are his, as because the beloved is pleased to own an interest in them: he becomes dear unto himself, because he is so unto the other. But why should I enlarge on so known a matter? Nothing can be more clear, than that the happiness of love depends on the return it meets with and herein the divine lover hath unspeakably the advantage, having placed his affection on him whose nature is love; whose goodness is as infinite as his being; whose mercy prevented us when we were his enemies, therefore cannot choose but embrace us when we are become his friends. It is utterly impossible that God should deny his love to a soul wholly devoted to him, and which desires nothing so much as to serve and please him; he cannot disdain his own image, nor the heart in which it is engraved; love is all the tribute which we can pay him, and it is the sacrifice which he will not despise. The Presence of the Beloved Person. Another thing which disturbs the pleasure of love, and renders it a miserable and unquiet passion, is absence and separation from those we love. It is not without a sensible affliction that friends do part, though for some little time; it is sad to be deprived of that society which is so delightful; our life becomes tedious, being spent in an impatient expectation of the happy hour wherein we may meet again; but if death have made the separation, as some time or other it must, this occasions a grief scarce to be paralleled by all the misfortunes of human life, and wherein we pay dear enough for the comforts of our friendship. But, oh, how happy are those, who have placed their love on him who can never be absent from them! they need but The Divine Love makes us partake of an infinite he loveth be so; they who have made an exchange of hearts by love, get thereby an interest in one In fine, a lover is miserable if the another's happiness and misery; and this makes person whom The most fortunate person hath grief enough to love a troublesome passion when placed on earth." and suffer not only in our own person but in mar the tranquillity of his friend, and it is hard another's. But if God were the object of our to hold out, when we are attacked on all hands, love, we should share an infinite happiness, without any mixture or possibility of diminution: we should rejoice to behold the glory of God, praises wherewith men and angels do extol him. and receive comfort and pleasure from all the happy in himself, and that all his enemies canIt should delight us beyond all expression to consider that the beloved of our souls is infinitely is in the heavens, and doth whatsoever he pleasnot shake or unsettle his throne: That our God eth. love, whose will is transformed into the will of (To be continued.) LIFE'S DUTIES. gracious God, that all this toil for the supply of life. chinery; but, so far from arresting or impeding those of the heavenly sphere; at once "diligent | hast made me confident in thy sight; behold in business," and "fervent in spirit, serving the now I speak without restraint, because thy free Lord."-Caird. will has made me free. FRIENDS' INTELLIGENCER. PHILADELPHIA, EIGHTH MONTH 15, 1857. DIED,-At her residence, at Little Creek Landing, Delaware, of pneumonia, on the 18th of 3rd mo., 1857, ANN EMERSON, (widow of Pennel Emerson, dec'd.) in her 67th year. -9 At her residence in Camden, Delaware, of pueumomia, on the 24th of 4th month, 1857, MARY EMERSON, in her 58th year. At his residence on Yonge Street, Canada West, on 2nd day the 27th of the 7th month 1857, WILLIAM I. PHILLIPS, of remitting fever, in the 65th year of his age. He was a moral, upright man, a useful citizen, an affectionate husband, a tender father, and diligent in the attendance of religious meetings. His hospitable mansion was always open to the reception of travelling Friends, whom he often essentially assisted in their progress. "In the midst of life we are in death." For Friends' Intelligencer. THOMAS STORY. 1 was silent before the Lord, as a child not yet weaned; He put words in my mouth, and I sang forth his praises with an audible voice. I called unto my God from the great deep; He put on bowels of mercy, and had compassion on me, because his love was infinite, and his power without measure. He cailed for my life, and I offered it at his footstool, but he gave it me as a prey with unspeakable addition. He called for my will, and I resigned it at his call; but he returned me his own in token of his love. He called for the world, and I laid it at his feet, with the crowns thereof; I withheld them not at the beckoning of his hand. But mark the benefit of exchange! for he gave me instead of earth, a kingdom of eternal peace; and in lieu of the crowns of vanity, a crown of glory. My God called me from my father, and I went apace; he called me his son, and clothed me in his garments. He called me from the wife of my youth, and I ran in haste; he espoused me to his son, and I became his near relation. What moved thee to this, Oh! life of my soul! O! glory of thy saints! for I had become vile with the blackness of Egypt. Was it not thy infinite love and mercy, thine unalterable patience and wonderful condescension, that brought thee from thy throne below thy footstool, in the likeness of vanity, that thou mightest exalt me above the high Heavens in thy kingdom of eternal rest? Thou hast hast made me bold before thee; thoul So, now thy election is a free election, and thy call without dispute. *They gazed on me; they said I was mad, distracted, and become a fool; they lamented because my freedom came. their imaginations; but I inclined, mine ear to They whispered against me in the vanity of the whisperings of the spirit of truth. I said what am I, that I should receive such honor; but he removed the mountains out of my way, and by his secret workings pressed me forward. He gave me a reward, and behold I had done no work; wages, and I had not wrought in his vineyard. When the Lord quickened me, I called for obedience; he was pleased with my desire, and granted my request in the might of his power. My Lord called and I heard his voice, but knew him not, for the darkness of ignorance had caused unbelief. I answered, who art thou, Lord, and he informed me by the living. word of his love and mercy. He gave me living faith to lay hold on his voice; and saving knowledge to avoid the voice of the serpent. He gave me joy which no tongue can express, and peace which passeth understanding. My heart was melted with the height of comfort; my soul was immersed in the depths of love; my eyes overflowed with tears of greatest pleasure. The men of the earth looked as on a man forsaken of hope, given up to fear, and surrounded with shame. They said, Behold a man foolish in his imaginations, seeking after vanity, and given over to believe lies: but I regarded not; for I had the jewel in prospect, the promised land in view. I followed the voice of the Shepherd, who gave me food according to my strength, and found all things even as he said of old. He gave me power to open my mouth concerning things to come, and a name by which I shall be saved. I will call for perseverance in the ways of life; for the hidden manna day by day received. My comforter also taught me to pray in knowledge as in faith; I begged HIMSELF, and he gave me ALL. He gave me power to do wonders also; to keep his commandments through his holy spirit, and to walk in the paths of righteousness with joyful songs. I will call upon him in the days of temptation; and when I am in the shadow of death the Lord shall be my strength. He subsequently remembered this paragraph with instruction and encouragement, when he found it his duty to join the Society of Friends. |