502 FRIENDS’

REVIEW.

 

same nature, which I believe she had not before
mentioned to any one, though it had happened
four years previous : so careful was she not to
be too free in speaking of Divine things; but I
have now thought there may bea use in re-
cording these accounts.”

‘In the year 1749, going to bed before my
husband, and having my mind upon my Creator
and my duty to him; considering how many
people I knew whom I believed to be good men
and women, and how unlike them I was, and
earnestly wishing that I could be as good as they
were ; | heard a most sweet and melodious voice
distinctly say: ‘ Child, so thou may, ”

A few years after thedate of the impressions,
which Sibyl Cooper thus narrates with trans-
parent candor, and leaves without comment,
John Woolman partook one night* in Burling-
ton, N. J., of the hospitality of his friend John
Smith, brother to Samuel Smith the historian, in
the house subsequently occupied by Peter Worral,
whose wife was mother to George and William
Dillwyo and Ann Cox, (“to name them is to
praise,”) and more recently by those dear old Is-
raelites, Nathanieland Elizabeth Coleman. Hav-
ing retired at his usual time, he says : “‘ 1 awoke in
the night, and my meditations as Llay were onthe
goodness and mercy of the Lord ; ina sense where-
of my heart was contrite. After this, I went to
sleep again ; and sleeping a short time, I awoke.
It was yet dark, and no appearance of day or
moonshine ; and as I opened mine eyes, I saw
a light in my chamber at the apparent distance
of five feet, about nine inches diameter, of a
clear easy brightness, and near its centre the
most radiant. As TI lay still, without any sur-
prise, looking upon it, words were spoken tomy
inward ear, which filled my whole inward man ;
they were not the effect of thought, nor any
conclusion in relation to the appearance, but as
the language of the Holy One spoken in my
mind: the words were, ‘certain evidenceof Divine
truth ;’ and were again repeated, exactly in the
same manner; whereupon the light disap-

eared.”

John Woolman’s conscientiousness in the use
of words, oral or written, is proverbial. It is
this which has made his style, though he was
an unlearned man, a model, and which induced
Charles Lamb to say: “Get the writings of
John Woolman by heart, and learn to love the
Early Quakers.” His narrative in this case, so
Scripture-like in its unostentatious simplicity
may be taken as unquestioned truth. The ex-
periences of 8. ©. recorded above, are certainly
kindred in their character, and whilst this ex-
cellent woman regarded them as almost too sacred
to communicate, and yet could not with an easy

_ mind entirely withhold them, it can hardly be
inappropriate to extend the knowledge of them
through the medium of a Journal, which, in

 

   
  
 
    
      
 

various parts of our country, is read
bers of her descendants. ere

Her husband, in recording the account, mak
only this comment: ‘Some may doubt he
being awake at these times, which I sha
undertake to determine,—but of this I a
sensible,—that she thought herself so, an
there was no room for adoubt in her own
We resume the Diary. ”

“In the Seventh month, 1756, I y
pointed one of the overseers of our meeting at
Woodbury. I had been nominated, and much
pressed to accept the appointment some time
before, but the weight of the service, and the
sense of my own unfitness, occasioned me to
withstand the request of my friends. I was
condemned and much distressed in mind for re-
fusing a service in the church of which my
friends thought me capable, and this was so
heavy at times that I often wished Friends
would move it again, that so I might submit to
what I clearly saw I ought before to have done;
which at length was the case, and I was ap-
pointed. But oh, the weight of the service, and
a sense of my own weakness and unfitness for so
important a trust, had a humbling effect on my
mind ; in which state | saw the great necessity
of applying for and receiving Divine aid and as-
sistance in all our religious labors. And when
clothed with this power and authority the least
stripling need not be dismayed. However moun-
tainous the service may appear, that Power
which divided the sea to make a way for his peo-
ple to pass over, and which enabled the little
shepherd to slay Goliath of Gath, never failed
those who move in His power, and whose trust
is in Him alone, and not in their own under-
standing. And I may with deep ‘fulness
remark that I have seldom attempted to treat
with an offender, without first laboring to feel
this seasoning virtue to cover my mind ; which
gives weight to the labor, and keeps down the
opposing spirit in those who are treated with ;
so that I think I have not had a sour or reflect-
ing expression used to me on these occasions,
from the time of my appointment as overseer to
the time of writing this. And indeed, in those
early times, when I have been going to speak to
offenders, a sense of my own shortness and fail-
ing, and of Divine mercy in forgiving and pass-
ing them by, hath often, even on the way, ex-
ceedingly affected and tendered my mind, in
the reflection that I, who had so much to be for-
given, should have to tell others of their of-
fences :—and this tended much to preserve from
a harsh and censorious spirit, which is very apt
to get up when we are speaking to offenders,—~
as we see jt did, even in meek Moses. ‘Ye
rebels,’ said he, ‘must I bring water out of
this rock ?’—and instead of speaking to the
rock he smote it. Oy

“How displeasing this was to the Almighty,

 

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* 2d mo, 13th, 1757.

appears, in so much that for this offence he was