Part 9 (2/2)
[4] In a letter written some time after, she says: ”I would have liked thee to join thy na out soit all elina was thus busily e those whose wrongs she had all her life felt so deeply, Sarah was reaching towards her, and in trying to be indulgent to her and just to her Society at the sa to her own false position and to soh the su appear in her diary: --
”The approach of our Yearly Meeting was al I felt as if I could be thankful even for sickness, for al it But my dear Saviour opened no door, and after a season of unusual conflict I was favored with resignation
”Oh! the cruel treatone from those in authority I could not have believed it had I not been called to endure it But the Lord per under divine direction, but to receive huh them the lessons of meekness, lowliness, faith, patience, and love, and I trust I may be thankful for the opportunity thus afforded to love my enemies and to pray for them, and perhaps it is to prepare me to feel for others, that I have been thus tried and afflicted”
That she was thus prepared was evidenced through all the varied experiences of her after-life, for certainly no enerously diffused its warmth and tenderness upon all who ca, she writes:--
”The suffering inshort of a settled conviction that obedience and eternal life are closely connected could enable me to open my lips there”
Teeks later, an alement does so prevail that it would be no surprise to me if Friends requested me to be silent Hitherto, I have been spared this trial, but if it comes, O Holy Father,sub all this distress, however, Sarahin the dry dust of the Quaker Church, and refusing to partake of the living water Angelina proffered to her, but for an incident which occurred about this tiht after the last sentence quoted,--an incident which proved to be the last straw added to the heavy burden she had borne so subiven in her oords, and I may add, it is the last entry in herto Orange Streetafter a season of conflict and prayer I believed the Lord required this sacrifice, but I ith a heart bowed down, praying to Jesus that I ht not speak my oords, that he would be pleased to ht uponhad been gathered so our Lord's thrice-repeated query to Peter, 'Lovest thou iven much, and who could appeal to the Searcher of hearts that he did indeed love Him Few of us had had the temptation to endure which overcah few of us ht us, yet there is, I apprehend, in many of us an evil heart of unbelief, which alienates us fro the query as Peter did I had proceeded so far when Jonathan Evans rose and said: 'I hope the Friend will now be satisfied' I immediately sat down and was favored to feel perfectly calainst h I am branded in the public eye with the disapprobation of a poor felloorm, and it was entirely a breach of discipline in him to publicly silence a ifts in her ownbeen requested to be silent, yet I feel no anger towards his that could pros of Christian love But it seens to bring me out of this place How much has his injunction rested on my mind of latter time 'When they persecute you in one city, flee ye into another' I pray unto Thee, O Lord Jesus, to direct the wanderer's footsteps and to plant o to Burlington to-morrow”
To those unacquainted with the Society of Friends fifty years ago, and its discipline at that period, so different from what it is now, this incident may seem of little consequence; but it was, on the contrary, extre elder of the Yearly Meetings, a e, whose authority was undisputed
He was sometimes alluded to as ”Pope Jonathan” He had disliked Sarah from the time of her connection with the Society, and had habitually treated her and her offerings with a silent indifference nificant, and which, of course, had its effect on many who pinned their prejudices as well as their faith to the coats of the elders It ing entirely to this secretly-exercised but well-understood opposition, that Sarah had for nine long years used herShe believed, against iven her to use in God's service, and that she had no right to withhold it; but she had been made so often to feel the condemnation under which she labored, that she was really not much surprised when the final blow careat, and her sensitiveness to any discourtesy very keen She ine, on the contrary, that her heart was filled with pity for hiely mixed with contempt; and it is certain that the Society was ht she had ever received in it caerated; all her dissatisfaction with its principles of action doubled; the grief she had always felt at its indifference to the doctrine of the atonelect to preach ”Jesus Christ and him crucified,” of which she had often complained, was intensified, and her first impulse was to quit the Society, as she deterreatly shocked when she learned of the treatment her sister had received, but the words, ”I will break your bonds and set you free,” carief and indignation were turned to joy She had long felt that, kind as Catherine Morris had always been, her strict orthodox principles, which she severely enforced in her household, circuht and action, and operated powerfully in preventing her froh the question had often revolved itself in her mind, and even been discussed between her and her sister, neither had been able to see how Sarah could ever leave Catherine, bound to her as she was by such strong ties of gratitude, and feeling herself so necessary to Catherine's comfort But now the as made clear, and certainly no true friend of Sarah could expect her to re that Sarah had not discovered raft a scion of the Charleston aristocracy upon the rugged stock of Quaker orthodoxy
She went to Burlington, to the house of a dear friend who knew of all her trials, and there she reelina had finished her ”Appeal,” and, only two days before she heard of the Evans incident, wrote to Sarah to infor 1st, 1836”
After a few affectionate inquiries, she says: ”I have just finished my 'Appeal to Southern Women' It has furnished work for teeks How much I wish I could have thee here, if it were only for three or four hours, that we ht I read it to Margaret, and she says it carries its own evidence with it; still, I should value thy judgment very much if I could have it, but a private opportunity offers to-o just as I sent my letter to WLG, with fervent prayers that the Lord would do just as he pleased with it I believe He directed and helpedto do but to send it to the Anti-Slavery Society, sube thou expressest in thy feelings with regard to the Anti-Slavery Society, and feel no desire at all to bla, as I do, that it was permitted in order to drive me closer to round upon which I was standing I am indeed thankful for it; how could I be otherwise, when it was so evident thou hadst ood at heart and really did for the best? And it did not hurt me at all It did not alienatethat would drive us back froood one ive up not only friends, but life itself, for the slave, if it is called for I feel as if I could go anywhere to save him, even down to the South if I athens, as retirement affords fuller opportunity for calm reflection, that the cause of e for, if need be With regard to the proposedabout it, and never did any poor creature feelthan I do to undertake it But what duty presses me into, I cannot press htened to think of how long I was standing idle in the reat ness so constantly preached up in our Society It is thedoctrine that ever was preached in the Church, and I believe has produced its legiti, e ought to have been a light in the Christian Church Farewell, dearest, perhaps we shall soon meet”
The Appeal was sent to New York, and this hat Mr Wright wrote to the author in acknowledging its receipt:--
”I have just finished reading your Appeal, and not with a dry eye I do not feel the slightest doubt that the committee will publish it Oh that it could be rained down into every parlor in our land I knoill carry the Christian women of the South if it can be read, and lorious Saviour who has helped you to write it”
When it was read soentlemen of the coe of the workings of the whole slave systehteous denunciation of it, and such a warm interest in the cause of emancipation, that they decided to publish it at once and scatter it through the country, especially through the South It es The Quarterly Anti-Slavery Magazine for October, 1836, thus mentions it:--
”This eloquent pamphlet is from the pen of a sister of the late Thomas S Grimke, of Charleston, SC We need hardly say more of it than that it is written with that peculiar felicity and unction which characterized the works of her las there are two classes--one especially adapted to then the old We cannot exclude Miss Gris pre-eminently to the former The converts that will be made by it, we have no doubt, will be not only nuht spoke of it as a patch of blue sky breaking through the storathered so black over the handful of anti-slavery workers
This praise was not exaggerated The pamphlet produced the elina predicted, she waswritten it Friends upbraided and denounced her, Catherine Morris even predicting that she would be disowned, and inti pretty plainly that she would not dissent froan to doubt her own judght not to have continued to live a useless life in Philadelphia, rather than to have so displeased her best friends
But her convictions of duty were too strong to allow her to re in this depressed, semi-repentant state In a letter to a friend she expresses herself as al at her oeakness; and of Catherine Morris she says: ”Her disapproval,else, shook my resolution Nevertheless, I told her, with ious duty to labor in this cause, and that I ainst the advice and wishes of my friends I think if I ever had a clear, calm view of the path of duty in all my life, I have had it since I came here, in reference to slavery But I assure thee that I expect nothing less than thatdisowned by Friends, but none of these things will ht very little in a Society which is frowning on all theits ard to uniting with others in these works of faith and labors of love I do not believe it would costmy duty to the slave”
But her condemnation reached beyond the Quaker Society--even to her native city, where her Appeal produced a sensation she had little expected Mr Weld's account of its reception there is thus given:--