Part 2 (2/2)

After we returned from Texas, being the oldest child and the servants all gone, my mother sick, and the younger children going to school, I had the house work, cooking and most of the was.h.i.+ng to do. It was a new experience for me, and it was twice as hard as it ought to have been. I exposed my health; would slop up myself when I washed, and almost ruined my health, because I had not been properly educated. Herein was the curse of slavery. My father saw this, and I don't believe he had a regret when the slaves were free. Mother, it matters not what else you teach your daughters, if they have not an experience in doing the work themselves about a home, they are sadly deficient. It is not the soft, palefaced, painted, fas.h.i.+onable lady we want, for the world would be better without her; but the woman capable of knowing how, and willing to take a place in the home affairs of life. It is an ambition of mine to establish a Preparatory College in Topeka, Kansas, where girls may be taught, as women should be, that they in turn may teach others, how to wash, cook, scrub, dress and talk, to counteract the idea that woman is a toy, pretty doll, with no will power of her own, only a parrot, a parasite of a man. To be womanly, means strength of character, virtue and a power for good. Let your women be teachers of good things, says the Holy Spirit.

The last school I attended was at Liberty, Missouri, taught by Mr.

and Mrs. Love. Only went there a year, but it was of untold value to me.

I was so eager to get an education. On account of ill health and the war, I knew but little. I wanted a thorough education. I had read a good many books, and would write sketches; kept a diary part of the time.

I will here relate an incident that will give my readers a little insight into my impulses. At Liberty School we had a cla.s.s in Smellie's ”Natural Philosophy.” There was an argument among the girls. Some said animals had reasoning faculties. Others said not. Miss Jennie Johnson, our teacher, said: ”Have that for a question to debate on in your society.”

So it was ordered. I was given the affirmative. The Friday came.

I was taken by surprise and was in confusion, when I saw the room crowded. The two other societies of the Seminary, ”The Mary Lyons”

and ”Rising Star,” also all the teachers, were present. Our Society was the ”Eunomian”. I had made no preparations. When I was called I know I looked ridiculously blank. The president tried to keep her face straight. I got no farther than, ”Miss President”. All burst out in uncontrollable laughter. I went to my seat put my face in my arms and turned my back to the audience. I wept with tears of humiliation. I felt disgraced. I thought of what a shame this would be to my parents.

How ever after this I must be considered a ”Silly” by my schoolmates.

These things nerved me. I dried my tears, turned around in my seat, looked up, and the moral force it required to do this was almost equal to that which smashed a saloon. I arose and said: ”Miss President, I am ready to state my case.” I began in this style: ”I know animals have the power to reason for my brothers cured a dog from sucking eggs by having him take a hot one in his mouth, and it was the last egg we ever knew him to pick up. Why? Because he remembered the hot one and reasoned that he might get burned. Why is it that a horse will like one person more than another? Because he is capable of reasoning and knows who is the best to him.” I went on in this homely style and spoke with a vehemence which said: ”I will make my point,” which I did amidst the cheers of the school. I was eighteen at this time and you would say: ”You must have been rather green.” So I was in some things.

I believe I have always failed in everything I undertook to do the first time, but I learned only by experience, paid dearly for it, and valued it afterwards. My failures have been my best teachers. I see no one more awkward than I once was, but I had determined to conquer. My defects were the great incentives to perseverance, when I felt I was right.

I shall not in this book speak much of my love affairs, but they were, nevertheless, an important part of my life. I was a great lover. I used to think a person never could love but once in this life, but I often now say, I would not want a heart that could hold but one love. It was not the beauty of face or form that was the most attractive to me in young gentlemen, or ladies, but that of the mind. Seeing this the case with myself, I tried to acquire knowledge to make my company agreeable. I see young ladies, and gentlemen, who entertain each other with their silly jokes and gigglings that are disgusting. When I had company I always directed the conversation so that my friend would teach me something, or I would teach him. I would read the poets, and Scott's writings and history.

Read Josephus, mythology and the Bible together, and never read a course that taught me as much. I would go to the country dances and sometimes to b.a.l.l.s in the City. The church did not object to this: I would teach Sunday school at the same time. No one taught me that this was wrong. One thing was a tower of defense to me. I always, when possible, read the Bible and would pray. After retiring would get up and kneel, feeling that to pray in bed only, was disrespectful to G.o.d. If the angels in heaven would prostrate themselves before Him, I a poor sinner should.

And right here, I believe in ”advancing on your knees.” Abraham prostrated himself, so did David and Solomon, Elijah, Daniel, Paul, and even our sinless Advocate. Why did the Holy Ghost state the position so often?

For our example, of course. There are no s.p.a.ce writers in the Scriptures.

I often had doubts as to whether the Bible was the work of G.o.d or man.

I kept these doubts to myself, for I thought infidelity a disgrace. I wanted to believe the Bible the word of G.o.d. I early saw that to close the Bible was to shut out all knowledge of the purpose of life. Without its revelations one does not know why we are born, why we live, or where we go after death. We can see the purpose of all nature, but not of this life of ours, and G.o.d had, by revelation, to make this known.

The Bible was a mystery to me. It often seemed to be a contradiction.

I did not love to read it, but above all things, I did not want to be a hypocrite. I was determined to try to do my part. I would pray for the same thing over and over again, so as to be in earnest, and think of what I was asking. My mind was distracted by thoughts of the world. I said, if there is a G.o.d, he will not hear the prayer of those, so disrespectful as not to think of what they ask. I never seemed to get rid of this, unless at times, when I would have some sorrow of heart. ”By the sadness of the countenance, the heart is made better.”

I do not believe the Bible because I understand it; for there are few things of revelation that I do understand. Creation is a mystery, still we know everything had a beginning. I do not know why things grow out of the earth. Why they are green. Why gra.s.s makes wool on a sheep and hair on a cow, but I know these are facts. I cannot understand why or how the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses from sin, neither do I understand that greatest of all mysteries, the new birth, but nothing more positively a fact in my experience.

G.o.d is not perceived by the five senses. The things that are seen are temporal, but those that are unseen are eternal. What a sin of presumption to question G.o.d in any of His providences. What G.o.d says and does is wisdom, righteousness and power.

The book of Psalms condemned me. I said, I never felt like David.

I cannot rejoice. Still I felt that I ought to, but instead, a constant feeling of condemnation and conviction. This was torture to me. I would often have been willing to have died, if I thought it would have been an eternal sleep. My childhood and girlhood were not happy; had so many disappointments. I was called ”hard headed” by my parents. I never was free to have what I wished; something would come between me and what I wanted. No one understood me so well as my darling aunt Hope Hill, my mother's sister. She seemed to read me and would talk to me of persons and things, answering the very cry of my heart. My mother would often let me stay with her for months. She had five sons, but no daughters and she was very fond of me. This lesson she taught me: A party of ladies came out from Independence to spend the day with her. Mrs.

Woodson and a Mrs. Porter, wife of Dr. Porter, I remember the latter, one of the handsomest women I ever saw, beautiful feet, hands, hair, and a woman who knew it, and, it was a mater of the greatest pride with her, these charms. I was very much captivated by her splendid appearance and could not keep my eyes from her. Next day Mrs. John Staton, a country neighbor of my aunts, came in to make a visit, She was very plain, wore a calico dress, waist-ap.r.o.n, and she was knitting a sock.

After she left aunt said to me: ”Carry, you did not seem to like Mrs.

Staton's society as you did Mrs. Porter's; but one sentence of Mrs.

Staton's is worth all Mrs. Porter said. Mrs. Porter lives for this world, Mrs. Staton lives for G.o.d.” This Lesson I did not learn then, but have since. Oh! for the old-fas.h.i.+oned women.

MY EXPERIENCE WITH SPIRITUALISM.

Just at the close of the war when we were on a farm in Ca.s.s County, Missouri, a colony of spiritualists were near us, Mrs. Hawkins, the medium was about 60 years old, very peculiar, and finely educated.

My father had some farms he was selling for other people. He took Mrs. Hawkins and several of her company to look at a farm with a view of selling it. When she saw it from a hill some distance off she said: ”That is the place I saw in Connecticut.” She bought it for a town site.

In writing to Was.h.i.+ngton to give it a name, the word ”Peculiar” was selected, and so it has ever been called. Mrs. Hawkins took a great fancy to me. She would tell me of great things she had done, then say: ”Could Jesus Christ have done more?” I had never heard of Spiritualism that I knew of, up to this time. This colony brought mechanics, merchants and musicians with them. I was in great confusion about this matter, not knowing what to think, for she did some superhuman things. Up stairs we had a large safe full of old books. I was looking over them one day, came to a little book called ”Spiritualism Exposed”. I immediately went to the orchard, sat under a tree, as my custom was, when I wished to read, for there I could be quiet. I read the little book through, before I stopped.

This blessed lesson showed me to my entire satisfaction, that modern spiritualism is witchcraft. The writer took the instances in the Bible.

G.o.d told Moses: ”You must not suffer a witch to live;” see it at the court of Pharoah, and that they have ”superhuman power.” There are two kingdoms. One of darkness, and one of light. G.o.d rules in the latter; The Devil in the former. Both have powers above the power of man.

The magicians at Pharoah's court were wizards; and the woman of Endor was a witch. The Bible speaks of dealing with ”familiar spirits.” Mana.s.seh, Saul, and other Kings, were cursed for such. Gal. 5th has it as one of the ”mortal sins.” The Devil can do lying miracles to deceive. He will heal the body, or appear to do it, to d.a.m.n the soul. I find this in ”Christian Science.” This is the mark of the ”Beast” or carnal mind. Man is but a beast without the new birth, or spirit of G.o.d. Carnality always seeks to elevate itself. Grace is humble, and sees nothing good outside of G.o.d. The mark of the beast, is the number, or mark of a man; that is carnality or the Beast. Rev. 13:18.

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