01.01. The Sketch

The Sketch OF the life that is outward,—the life that is lived before the eye of man,—there is little in this volume; almost nothing. The world’s "great things" are not here. Yet there are greater things than these,—the transactions between the soul and its Creator,—the intercourse between the Saviour and the saved one. Of the life that is inward,—the life that is lived under the eye of God,—with its struggles, and hopes, and joys, with its changeful movements, its lonely utterances, its quiet walks of shade or sunshine, there is much. In few such records will more of this be found; and it is this that gives to these pages all the interest which they possess,—an interest which will not seem poor or trivial, to those who know the difference between the seen and the unseen, and who have discovered, that the points at which the soul comes into contact with the God that made it, and with the eternity where its joys are treasured, are the points of truest interest and importance in its history. But though the dazzle of strange incident or soaring sentiment be awanting, the reader will find little of the flat or the commonplace. The life here recorded was no copy, no stale imitation. However much the biographer may fail in sketching its features, the life itself was not tame or artificial, as if the individual were merely saying over again what she had heard others say, and trying to feel in certain modes, because she had read that others felt so, and setting down in her diary or letters some excellent sentiments, neatly culled from the experiences of others. It was singularly fresh and real; all the colours of its varied complexion arising from the health underneath, and not laid on by a skilful hand from without. It was thoroughly natural, nay, original, even to simplicity, both in thought and language. Its movements were, not from the surface to the centre, but from the centre to the surface, produced by the indwelling Spirit, and regulated by His inworking hand. It did not shew itself in the form of second-hand pietism or imitated devotion; nor did it work itself into the stiff, irksome routine of externalism, either in language or in action. It came out, without effort or study, in the warm utterance of unborrowed feeling, in the eagerness, sometimes the fitfulness, of impulse, in vigorous yet quiet consistency of character, and in strenuous pressing forward to the mark for the prize of the high calling. It does not deceive you with plagiarised experiences. It is as true as it is transparent; true both in what it speaks and what it leaves unspoken, in what it does and in what it leaves undone; sometimes changeful in its moods, abrupt in its movements, and extreme in its ebbings and flowings, yet always true; with something in it of cloud, but more of sunshine, with much of conflict, but more of victory.

Take, for instance, such passages as the following, which, without unduly anticipating the narrative, will illustrate these statements. She writes to a dear friend—"I was a little happier at prayer this morning, but it was in confessing and weeping over my sins. I felt so vile, that I had nothing to say; I was self-condemned and ashamed; but the sweet name of Jesus I could plead, and I felt that His blood cleanseth from all sin. I think it is the fittest place for me,— in the dust: not even to look up. Oh! I am very unholy! You would not love me if you saw my heart. But God sees it all; and I wonder I am not more ashamed of my vileness. Oh to be holy as He is holy! Heaven would not be heaven if there was the shadow of a sin there. Don’t you long for heaven? It is not so much of being very happy here, even in God, that I think: I always want to be away, and at rest, from this vile body of sin." And again: "In your next I want you to tell me more about the Psalms, and how they tell about Jesus. I thought they were all David’s feelings; I think the one for this morning, the sixth, suited my state, for all my joy is fled. You said, in one of your letters, that you had then little delight in prayer. That is just my grief at present, and I have, what is worse, no desires after God. Oh! of all my different states of feeling, I shudder most at that, when I seem as if I had no need to seek God in prayer; I had far rather long, even to agony, to get a sense of God’s presence, than be as I am now, so lifeless: my soul seems completely driedup within me. Were you ever in that state when you cannot pray at all, because you do not know what to ask for? I like when I feel my need of God, for then He is precious."

"Dear J____, I wish I could speak to you about Jesus as you do to me, for I often think you will not care about my letters, for they are not fragrant with the oft-repeated name of Jesus; but what can I do? I cannot raise my dead soul, I can only write as I feel; but when we are together, we shall be ever speaking of Him, and He will join us as He did the two disciples going to Emmaus. Do you ever feel like Mary at the sepulchre, when she wept because they had taken away her Lord, and she did not know where they had laid him? Oh! such tears have a sweetness in them; but mine are dried up! I cannot even weep because Jesus is away. Perhaps he is with you. Oh! if he is there, I can feel happy yet. Don’t you long to bring others to Him, when you are happy in Him yourself? I sometimes wish that I could give ____ my faith, and then go and ask Him for more...Now may Jesus bless you, and speak peace to your heart!"

Then add to these such a paragraph as the following, and you have a specimen of the battle and the victory:—" Monday, August 10.—After a long season of darkness, God, my own God, has made his face to shine upon my happy soul again. I got near to Jesus in prayer this morning, and could do nothing but praise. Lord, I thank thee, Lord, I thank thee!

Why me, Lord, why me? Oh! how my whole soul longs and pants to live to his glory! O that I could only get rid of my vile self, I should be happy; but self, vile, hateful self, cleaves to all I do. Oh to be swallowed up in Jesus! O Lord, my own precious, altogether lovely Saviour, make me all thine own!" A life like this touched the world at but few points. Its affinities were with things unseen, and its connexions were with a world that is still "to come." Its communications were with One within the veil, and its ebbings or flowings were traceable to some far-distant orb, whose invisible influences, counteracting the forces of earth, regulated the tides of spiritual being. The religion here unfolded was no uncertainty, no mere earnestness, no well-filled-up piece of ritualism, no confused groping after the eternal birthright, but a "serving of God," a "walking with God," founded on the distinct consciousness of reconciliation through the blood of the everlasting covenant.

Such were the things which gave to the life here written such a tone of profound reality. They who saw it felt this; they who read it will feel it too. Power, genius, breadth of intellect—many things may be lacking, but reality is here. What reality there is in such a passage as this!— "This is Thursday, so I suppose you are all praising Jesus in the dear schoolroom, where, I doubt not, you have had many a happy hour of blest communion with Him whom your soul loveth. I wish I could join you at this moment in spirit, but, oh! I am so cold and dead! This afternoon, at five, I tried to pray for a blessing on you to-night at the meeting; tell me if you were happy, for I found it sweet to tell Jesus you were to be there to meet him. For two days I have been actually rejoicing in the love of Jesus! You will be astonished to hear me say so, after what I wrote in A.’s letter, but I do not understand it myself. I had been very miserable one day about ____, for I thought she was beginning not to love me, and afterwards I suppose I felt the love of Jesus sweeter; for I was so happy— so very happy; oh! how I longed to share my joy with you! I wonder what gave me such delight; it was not any clear views of my interest in Christ; on the contrary, I never stopped to inquire! I could not help rejoicing; and when Satan whispered that he would get me yet, I felt no alarm; indeed, the strangest thought came into my mind; I thought, well, if I am lost, I will sit in a corner, and think about Jesus! and I actually felt as if I could be happy even there, if I could think for ever about Jesus. My heart bounded up to him so. I thought I even loved Him! but that is impossible; such a cold heart could not love Him; but then He loves me. Nothing will ever persuade me that He does not; and He loves you too. Never believe Satan’s lies when he tells you He does not; believe that Jesus loves you, and you must rejoice. If the joy I have felt for two days were to last always, I don’t think I could stay on the earth!"

"Was it right to rejoice in this way without being sure that I was a child of God, and without being humbled for sin? But I could not think about myself, I was so enchanted with Jesus. We hear of people rejoicing in a sense of forgiveness, in the Spirit witnessing that they are children; in seeing their sins nailed to His cross; but my joy was simply this, that Jesus was love, that He was worthy to be loved; it was not that He loved me, but that he was love itself, that made my heart glad. I don’t understand my own feelings, now that I can think of them. I sometimes fear that I have a kind of enthusiastic joy that does not spring from faith; whatever it was, however, I wish I could have it oftener, for I felt as if then I could do anything for Jesus."

There is a certain class amongst us that speak much against "unrealities," and "shams," and "falsehoods." And they do not speak amiss or too strongly. But they know not where all this hollowness lies. They have yet to learn that the sad unreality of the age, is the want of the living God; that the world’s great falsehood is believing the lie of the Evil One, in preference to the truth of the everlasting gospel; that the grand "sham" is that of a religion without the indwelling Spirit, and without the fellowship of the Eternal Son. It is not (as one of them has said) that "the eternal pole-star has gone out," but that men will not have its light. Yet every other light is an "unreality." From a life like the one before us, some, perhaps, may learn the difference between the real and the unreal. An old minister of the Reformation—of whose poetry Scotland has no cause to be ashamed—dedicating his book of hymns to a noble lady in 1598, thus writes: "It is a rare thing to see a ladie, a tender youth, sad, solitare, and sanctified, oft sighing and weeping thro’ the conscience of sin." It may be that such a sight was rarer in the days of Alexander Hume than it is now. But, whether it be so or not, we cannot but think that the Memoir before us presents us with just such a character as these simple but solemn words of his describe. Not less in our day than in his, is the world laying, its snares for the young and buoyant. How many are its victims, how potent the fascination that binds them, and how few are delivered from the enchantment! This record of one who had escaped "as a bird from the snare of the fowler," may rouse some poor child of gaiety, to seek the unwinding of the spell, which is blinding her eye to the glory of the kingdom. It may make her feel that this world’s glitter is but a cheat, and that its mirth is madness; that the closet’s twilight stillness is dearer than the bright hall of midnight; that there is such a thing as the excellence of the unseen and the distant, disenchanting the beauty of the seen and the near, and such a thing as the love of Christ supplanting in the soul the fondest creature-love, and imparting gladness, truer and more abiding than all creature-joy.