‘But why more woe? more comfort let it be,Nothing is dead, but that which wished to die;Nothing is dead, but wretchedness and pain;Nothing is dead, but what incumbered, galled,Blocked up the pass and barred from real life!’”Page 94.
‘But why more woe? more comfort let it be,Nothing is dead, but that which wished to die;Nothing is dead, but wretchedness and pain;Nothing is dead, but what incumbered, galled,Blocked up the pass and barred from real life!’”Page 94.
‘But why more woe? more comfort let it be,Nothing is dead, but that which wished to die;Nothing is dead, but wretchedness and pain;Nothing is dead, but what incumbered, galled,Blocked up the pass and barred from real life!’”
‘But why more woe? more comfort let it be,
Nothing is dead, but that which wished to die;
Nothing is dead, but wretchedness and pain;
Nothing is dead, but what incumbered, galled,
Blocked up the pass and barred from real life!’”
Page 94.
Page 94.
Lady Brenton we have seen had been in the habit of making copious extracts from her favourite authors; no doubt for the future benefit of her children; in allusion to one of these taken from Wilberforce’s work on Practical Christianity, Sir Jahleel makes the following remark.
“However deeply you may be struck with the sentiments of the great and pious character, who has been himself so eminent an example of piety and virtue, who has so truly adorned that gospel which he professed, who has so strenuously endeavoured to shew his love to God, by his affection for his fellow creatures; however impressive you may, at a future period of your lives consider these arguments; they will to you, my darling children, appear with an additional force and value, thus treasured up for your attention, and guidance, by your beloved mother—by her, who first taught your infant lips to lisp the sacred name of God in prayer, and who enjoined you to place your trust, your hopes and your happiness in Him. How much do I owe to her, whom the Almighty, in His abundant mercy, was, pleased to bestow upon me.
“Well indeed do I remember that upon our first meeting after that long separation, of which I have already told you, and previous to our marriage; with what sweetness,what meekness, but with what dignified judgment, and true piety, did she instil similar sentiments into my mind; and shew me what erroneous views I had formed of the requisitions of Christianity. I was indeed a nominal Christian; my chief apprehension was of being righteous over much, and I felt as though a general compliance with the letter of the commandments was all that was required of me; and even in the neglect of many of these, I comforted myself with the reflection that the Lord would not be ‘extreme to mark what was done amiss.’ I was even in the constant habit of committing a breach of the third commandment without being sensible of it, and allowed myself to use the sacred name of God, in common and trivial conversation, without feeling the wickedness of such profanation. For this she instantly but gently reproved me. On the very first day of our meeting she entreated me to conquer the habit, with so much earnestness of affection, and described the nature of it in such just terms, that the effect was instantaneous, and I can hardly remember having been afterwards guilty of it, never certainly without strong reproaches of conscience; and for many years it has given me a feeling of pain when I have heard others guilty of it, similar to what my beloved Isabella experienced for me. Having been sent into the world at an early age, and not having had the advantage in any ship to which I belonged in early life, of ever hearing religion mentioned; it had certainly not been cultivated in my mind; and but for the pains taken by my beloved mother in my childhood, which the Almighty had been pleased to enable me toretain, amidst all the trials, temptations, and bad examples, to which I was so frequently exposed, and which I now deeply deplore, as having sometimes had dominion over me; but for these seeds thus preserved, I should indeed have been ‘without God in the world.’ But blessed be God, the inestimable treasure which he bestowed upon me in his mercy, soon opened my eyes, and taught me to see the difference between a nominal and a real Christian. All my future hopes, all my present consolation arises from this source. It was from her ardent piety that I was taught to distrust the bare forms of religion, as utterly inadequate to the fulfilment of its duties; and learnt that our best efforts are imperfect, and can only be accepted through the atonement of our blessed Lord and Saviour.”
In reference to some extracts from Buchanan’s Christian Researches Sir Jahleel says, “to those who have not the same reason to cherish the remembrance of the beloved object who made the above extracts, they will naturally appear inconsequent and uninteresting, but to us, my beloved children, to whom every recollection of her is dear, they will appear and prove far different; they will excite in us a lively interest in the work to which they refer, we shall read it with more attention, we shall feel as though her dear eyes were still perusing those pages, and the subjects of them will make a deeper impression upon us. I already feel the force of this association, and am convinced that it will be an additional stimulus to me to exert myself in the object I now have in view; that of procuring the extension of the Church of England over thiscolony, by every effort in my feeble power. Should I succeed to become, under Providence, the humble instrument towards forming even one establishment, and should I see it flourish, with what delight will you my darling children, at some distant period, when I also shall have left you, praise these memorials of your dear and affectionate parents; with what feeling will you contemplate our mutual love and respect for each other’s sentiments, which will so often and so forcibly appear to you, as you read over these remarks, and behold them in this instance producing upon my mind the same powerful effect, as though my beloved and inestimable companion were still present with me, assisting me in my efforts, by her piety and judgment. It is time that I should inform you, that for many months I have made it my practice before I open these invaluable extracts, to offer up the following humble prayer to the Almighty. ‘O! Almighty God, give me grace, I beseech Thee, most sincerely and affectionately to cherish the memory of my beloved wife, to imitate her piety and gratitude to Thee, to teach them to my beloved children, and may we at last all meet in Thy everlasting kingdom; through Jesus Christ, our Blessed Lord and Saviour. Amen.’”
In reference to an extract from the life of Sir William Jones, on the subject of the slave trade, he adds; “what a variety of feelings will the few lines thus rendered dear to us, my darling children, by the hand which treasured them up for us, excite in our minds. Every circumstance connected with this dreadful trade, every instance which has fallen under ourown experience, the gratitude and reverence due to the noble and undaunted mind, which could first contemplate the plan, and finally obtain the splendid feat of emancipation, strengthen the conviction. On what a proud eminence has the consistent and persevering piety of Wilberforce placed him! How far above the most successful hero that ever became the idol of a nation! Here indeed we see the precepts of our Blessed Saviour brought into practice. Here we see a fellow creature ‘so letting his light shine before men,’ that we are naturally inclined with one voice to ‘glorify our Father which is in heaven.’ We must, if we steadily contemplate the life and actions of this most exemplary of our countrymen, feel a desire to imitate him. His actions have given such irresistible strength and persuasion to his writings, that we must be influenced by them. He has indeed built his house upon a rock; the rain may descend and the floods come; the winds may blow and beat upon that house, but it will not fall. From this delightful contemplation we must, however reluctantly, turn our eyes to that great portion of the human race still in bondage, whom the energy of our beloved country has not yet been permitted to reach, blessed as it has been with the Divine Protection; their hour is not yet come, but it may be reserved for us as the humble instruments of the mercy of our Creator and Redeemer to soothe, and alleviate the sufferings of numbers now in misery; and we may hope that at some future period, perhaps not very distant, we may be the means under a kind Providence of liberating not only their bodies,but their minds from the cruel captivity under which they are now suffering. The serious reflections which this subject must necessarily excite in our minds, will also produce another blessed effect. They will incline us to be kind and charitable to our poor fellow creatures, who although in the enjoyment of comparative liberty, are from adverse circumstances of poverty, sickness, and affliction, placed in a state of almost the same dependence upon us, as though they were our own property. The mind of your angelic mother was peculiarly alive to feelings of this description. The kindness, the mildness, the sweetness of her disposition, was as conspicuous towards her servants as towards her children. The natural consequence was, that they loved as well as respected her; her house was not only well regulated, but the abode of happiness to all who dwelt in it.”
In reference to extracts from a sermon on the 19th Psalm, 1-3, author not known—“Let us endeavour to render these remarks valuable in directing our reflections, and in giving an habitual turn to our minds, by which the sublime scenery in the midst of which we dwell, may have an increasing influence in keeping alive our piety and gratitude to our Maker. If, as the excellent author of the above extracts observes, we contemplate the works of creation in both the points of view which he suggests, we shall have abundant employment for our thoughts, and they will insensibly rise from earth to heaven. Gratitude if really felt, will produce love and adoration, and as we daily endeavour to strive at that perfection of character,which although beyond our reach, is held out to our view, in order to stimulate and purify us; we shall meet with a most gracious and inestimable reward, by the peace and comfort it will procure for us in this life, and the bright prospect of never ending joy in the life to come.
“In tracing the various phœnomena of nature back to their first causes, we are not only delighted with the employment, and instructed by the intelligence that daily breaks in upon us from every direction; but when our finite reason arrives at the end of her career, and refuses to conduct us further, we find ourselves at once in the presence of the Deity, the author of all things, who has been graciously pleased to reveal to us a part of the mysteries of creation, reserving the remainder to the future period of our interminable existence.”
Extract from Lord Chatham’s letters to his nephew.—“Behaviour is of infinite advantage to a man, as he happens to have formed it, to a noble, graceful, engaging and proper manner, or to a vulgar, coarse, and ill-bred, an awkward and ungenteel one.”
Remarks by Sir Jahleel Brenton.—“I remember your mother taking great delight in the letters from which the foregoing is copied; and that she drew from them many of the ideas she had formed for the guidance and counsel of her own darling children, had it pleased the Almighty to have permitted them to enjoy for a longer period the blessing of such an instruction. Let us imagine to ourselves all she intended, and all she wished for you, and endeavour by atender and affectionate recollection of her statements to fulfil the object nearest to her heart. You, my sweet I——, will never forget the impressive manner in which your beloved mother inculcated the various instructions you received from her, or with what judgment she distinguished between those acquisitions which were to have an influence upon your comfort and prosperity through life, and such as were only likely to procure for you an ephemeral admiration. That you should gain entire possession of the former, was the object of her constant solicitude, of her unwearied endeavours, because she felt that real happiness even in this world, is not to be attained without piety and virtue; whereas experience had taught her, that the glare of shining accomplishments was often seen in characters devoid of both. With this impression upon your mind, it is probable that you may not be able to account for the importance attached to the carriage of your person by your inestimable mother; but I can in a few words explain the difficulty, which, under almost every similar circumstance, I feel the comfort of being able to do, from the perfect harmony of all our sentiments and opinions. Our Christian profession not only prescribes that we should individually perform our duty to our Maker, and our fellow creature, in such a manner as to fulfil the intention of our heavenly Father in creating us; but he has expressly ordered us to let our light so shine before men, that they may glorify our Father which is in heaven; and consequently that we may lead all who may be within the sphere of our influence to follow the example. You have already seenenough of human nature to be convinced that much depends upon the manner of conveying instruction, and that we are frequently influenced by the association of ideas, in themselves totally distinct. A person, for instance, may utter the soundest doctrine, with the most sublime eloquence, yet should there be at the same time a distortion of countenance, any disgusting or repulsive peculiarity of action, or any moroseness or severity in his manner, the effect which such a discourse might have produced, would be very much lessened, and to many would be entirely lost, from the medium through which it had reached them. Let us follow up the reflection, and suppose a person making profession of strict attention to his religious duties, and not only professing, but really, as far as is consistent with human weakness, acting up to them. Let us suppose that he should be constant and regular in his devotions both public and private; that the whole tenor of his conduct in the state of life in which he might be placed, should be upright, full of integrity, and unimpeachable; that he should be indefatigable in doing good, and that his charity should be unbounded; but also, that with all these mental qualifications he should be awkward in his gait, careless and slovenly in his person, coarse and ill-bred in his manners, mean and idiotical in his appearance, (for these blemishes and virtues are by no means incompatible,) what would be the effect produced upon those with whom he associated? Would the influence of his good qualities be sufficiently strong to cover his defects? Would those who were offended by his manner, and disgusted with his appearance, forgetthese feelings in the contemplation of the bright parts of his character, of which they could only judge perhaps from the report of others? Or would there not arise on the contrary a general indisposition towards him? Some might even go so far as to attribute his failings to religion itself, and ascribe to this sublime principle the greater part of his faults, as the offspring of self-righteousness and contempt of the world.
“Let us on the other hand draw the delightful picture of the sincere and faithful servant of God, adorning his faith by his practice, resolute and full of energy in the performance of his duties; but at the same time, mild and amiable and graceful in his manners; if called upon to preach the word of God, his eloquence might be rendered still more persuasive, by the sweetness and dignity of his expression and gestures. In the daily intercourse with society, he might, by gentle, unassuming, and graceful manners, continue to enforce his doctrine, which would be rendered more attractive by the conviction, that it was not hostile to the elegance and refined enjoyments of life. Here my children, you may see the propriety, and even the necessity of attending to that correctness of conduct and gracefulness of manner, which is called politeness.”
As the extracts terminate here, it appears but justice to the husband to insert the following from the pen and the heart of his wife.
Extract from Lady Brenton’s journal, Simon’s Town, April 19th, 1815.“This day thirteen years I became the wife of mybeloved Brenton; and most truly can I say, that never was woman blessed with a superior, or more exalted character in a husband than myself. When I say that I found him possessed of every virtue that can adorn or dignify human nature, I think I do not exaggerate, for I am not singular in my opinion: grateful indeed then do I feel to the all-wise disposer of events, that it pleased Him to vouchsafe me such a blessing, frail and erring mortal that I am. Our lives since our marriage have been chequered with a variety of scenes, but thanks be to Almighty God we have not met with any real misfortune; and the blessings we have received have preponderated so much, when weighed against the scale of disappointments, annoying circumstances, and pecuniary losses; that we can only have one feeling, when we view our situation in its true and proper light, and that is, most unbounded gratitude to the Father of all mercies.”
Extract from Lady Brenton’s journal, Simon’s Town, April 19th, 1815.
“This day thirteen years I became the wife of mybeloved Brenton; and most truly can I say, that never was woman blessed with a superior, or more exalted character in a husband than myself. When I say that I found him possessed of every virtue that can adorn or dignify human nature, I think I do not exaggerate, for I am not singular in my opinion: grateful indeed then do I feel to the all-wise disposer of events, that it pleased Him to vouchsafe me such a blessing, frail and erring mortal that I am. Our lives since our marriage have been chequered with a variety of scenes, but thanks be to Almighty God we have not met with any real misfortune; and the blessings we have received have preponderated so much, when weighed against the scale of disappointments, annoying circumstances, and pecuniary losses; that we can only have one feeling, when we view our situation in its true and proper light, and that is, most unbounded gratitude to the Father of all mercies.”