It is because I cannot be disappointed on account of
this belief. To stand and wait after doing all that is legitimate is
my instinct, my best wisdom, my inspiration; and I always hear the
still, small voice at last. If man would not babble so much, we could
much oftener hear God. The lesson of my life has been patience. It
has only made me feel the more humble that God has been so beyond
count benignant to me. I have been cushioned and pillowed with tender
love from the cradle. Such a mother seldom falls to the lot of
mortals. She was the angel of my life. Her looks and tones and her
acts of high-bred womanhood were the light and music and model of my
childhood. Then God joined my destiny with him who was to be all
relations in one. Pain passed away when my husband came. Poverty was
lighter than a thistle-down with such a power of felicity to uphold
it. With 'lowering clouds' I have never been long darkened, because
the sun above has been so penetrating that their tissue has directly
become silvered and goldened. Our own closed eyelids are too often the
only clouds between us and the ever-shining sun. I hold all as if it
were not mine, but God's, and ready to resign it."
It seemed to me a terrible thing that one so peculiarly strong,
sentient, luminous, as my father should grow feebler and fainter, and
finally ghostly still and white. Yet when his step was tottering and
his frame that of a wraith, he was as dignified as in the days of
greater pride, holding himself, in military self-command, even more
erect than before.
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