Memoirs of Mrs. Rebecca Steward

In looking upon a life closed, from a Christian standpoint, we see the Divine and the human blended. We see human nature moulded by divinely cast circumstances; we see character developed and displayed through these occasional circumstances. The "hidden man of the heart" is brought out, and we are able to see the inner through the outer life. To this pleasant and profitable study, the reader of these pages is invited. He will be brought in contact with a life, humble and perhaps commonplace, but interesting at every step, because always earnest and real. He is invited to follow that life through a responsible, laborious and thorny pathway; and to see manifest, a character always glowing in brightness and stronger than any emergency. He may learn the secret of that brightness and strength if he will. It is not of man but of God. He may hear a faith express itself before great difficulties (as I have often times) in these words: "Who art thou O great mountain? before Zerubbabel, thou shalt become a plain." Zech. IV. 7. And, if his eyes are cleared to see the things of God, as were those of Elisha's servant, as he and his master stood in the midst of the Syrian hosts at Dothan, he will see, not the mountains round about full of horses and chariots of fire; but a heavenly light streaming down upon the toiler, and a crown of resplendent glory held in her full view;—an angelic hand guiding her as she slowly pursues her way, sometimes weeping but often singing, through the inspiration of the hope set before her