Part 6
The ladies of our Missionary Society wish me to tell you how much all were interested in Julius's letters, and how deeply they feel with you, and at my request send you a book of consolation, "Light on the Cloud," as an expression of our real interest in your son. It seemed to me that nothing could be so appropriate as the literature he so learned to love. "He being dead yet speaketh" (Heb. xi. 4); and such we deem would be his words to those who were so dear to him. The President of our society marked one piece,--"He giveth his beloved sleep," and I have marked passages through the book, particularly under the head "Death a Blessing," and the last poem in the book. If words can cheer you, it is our hope that this little gift may serve the purpose. At least may it be a testimonial to you of our deep interest in your dear boy.... Our ladies are to hold the first meeting this season a week from to-morrow, when the obituary notice of Julius R. Woodruff's death will be read, and listened to with interest. He was my first correspondent, and his letter from Colorado was particularly enjoyable. It grieves me to think it was the last.... Hoping to hear farther from you, dear friend, through your daughter or Miss----, and to have the pleasure of becoming personally acquainted with you at some future day, with a God's blessing on you one and all, far and near,
Yours in common sorrow, S. ELLIS.
The correspondence was continued with Mr. Woodruff's sister as follows:--
NOVEMBER 11, 1881.
... Yes, you may call me your "friend," for I truly feel that I have lost a dear and true friend in your brother, and consequently feel interested in all of his family, and do not wonder that your mother and the whole family are heart-broken to be called to give him up. Am sincerely glad that you felt free to express all your feelings to me, for now I can sympathize more deeply with you. You are just the age I was when my first sorrow came upon me,--the death of my dear mother. As you say, I felt that I must keep up, to cheer my father, who has ever been a domestic man, and the loss of my mother was very hard for him to bear, and the five little children to be cared for, I the oldest daughter at home, and had been my mother's "right-hand man" in the care of the children. But all our sorrows and trials are good for us to bear, and we need the crosses as well as the joys of life to fit us for the life here and for that which is to come.
It was hard to be reconciled to the death of one so young and so good and true as Julius; but we must not be selfish, but think what is our loss is the gain of those taken, many times. He may, through his spiritual influence, still care for and lead you all nearer to God. These "dark hours of life" bring us to know ourselves better; they call out our sympathy for our fellow-men; and, what is more than all, they bring us nearer to God, and thus they are not a mere cross of agony; therefore let us not murmur at our affliction, but still believe that God is good, and will so make our trials serve us that they may become _good_ to us.... We must trust God, who doeth all things for the best, and pray for strength and light to be given us. Our prayers may not always be answered as we ask, but they are answered in another way.
"Pray, though the gift you ask for May never comfort your fears, May never repay your pleading; Yet pray, and with hopeful tears. An answer--not that you sought for, But diviner--will come one day: Your eyes are too dim to see it; Yet strive, and wait, and pray.[5]
"How shalt thou bear the cross which now So dread a weight appears? Keep quietly to God, and think Upon the Eternal Years.
"Bear gently, suffer like a child, Nor be ashamed of tears; Kiss the sweet cross, and in thy heart Sing of the Eternal Years."[6]
[Footnote 5: A. A. Procter.]
[Footnote 6: Faber.]
The whole of Whittier's "Angels of Grief" and a poem by Ellerton are copied in addition.
The correspondence was continued, occasionally, during Miss Ellis's life. Aug. 11, 1882, she wrote:--
"Young women, Miss----, have great influence over young men, and I hope you struggle to improve all those whom you know. Have you ever come across Frances Power Cobbe's 'Duties of Women'? It is a remarkably sensible book, and I feel as if every young girl ought to read it. I think you would do your young friends a service by owning it and passing it around among them. You can get it in paper for twenty-five cents. It is not a doctrinal work at all. She delivered the lectures in London, to women. Neither is it a Woman's Rights book altogether, but what any girl or young man, come to that, ought to do and practise. Are you going to resume school after vacation again, or what do you intend to turn your attention to?
"I have not been very strong since I was sick last August, therefore have not done much this year. I go into the city every two weeks on Saturday A.M., to be at the church to loan books to any one who desires them. Was there last Saturday, and two strange ladies came in who proved very pleasant; one a young girl. She came after 'Helps to Devout Living,' for a sister who has gone out to Nebraska for her health, and is miles away from any church and has no companionable people about her. This young sister also selected for herself 'Day unto Day,' as a book of daily study in an upward path. It is such pleasant work to have it within my power to loan and to recommend so many good books to those who have not read them. They always enjoy them. Julius would have been so happy in it out at Leadville."
Mr. Woodruff's sister wrote, Feb. 15, 1886:
"Some one very kindly sent us the obituary of our dear friend Miss Ellis. We were surprised and deeply grieved to hear of her death, as we did not know that her health was poor even. She said so little about herself, that we never thought of her as otherwise than well and strong.... I enjoyed Miss Ellis's letters so much, and we appreciated her kindness in writing to us after my dear brother's death. He thought so much of Miss Ellis, and I know if he had lived you would not have been disappointed in him. I cannot thank you sufficiently for the little book you sent mother after J----'s death. Truly it was a 'Light on the Cloud,' and it comforted mother more than I can tell you. It is so full of comforting words.
"Though Miss Ellis is gone from us, she has left behind the influence of a life so pure, so noble, and so grand, that we will all be the better for having known her. As my brother once wrote in a friend's album, 'God wisely wills that we may not know the number of our years, and in view of the uncertainty which enshrouds each to-morrow, let us so live that be our lives long or short, the little home-world that surrounds us will be the better for our having lived in it.' Can we not say that these two did not live in vain? My brother had a great influence over young people and also over some who were much older than he, and had he been spared, I feel sure that he would have done a grand work for the cause of Christianity. But their life work is ended only too soon; and why they should be taken when they were doing so much good, and others who are a burden to themselves and others are left, I suppose we shall know sometime; and until that time we must believe that 'He doeth all things well.'"
Miss Ellis's letters frequently express her joy in a young man who had become a Unitarian minister through her efforts. He was a Methodist minister in Ohio, but had grown unable longer to accept the creed of his church. Unhappy, unsettled, and adrift, not knowing where to turn for help, by the merest "chance" he picked up on a railroad car a Cincinnati paper, and his eye fell on the Women's Auxiliary Conference advertisement. He wrote Miss Ellis a postal card, saying:--
"I have seen your notice in the 'Commercial,' offering Unitarian papers and tracts free to persons who may desire to read them. I must confess to more ignorance in regard to Unitarian doctrines than is seemly in a minister of the gospel, and will be thankful indeed if you will kindly favor me with such papers and tracts as may enlighten me ever so little."
Later he wrote:--
"You have helped me not a little in my search for truth. Before I first wrote you for tracts, etc., I knew absolutely nothing of Unitarianism beyond the term, and the fact that Unitarians did not believe Christ to have been God."
Miss Ellis corresponded with him from that time on, loaning many books, etc. It was never her wish or aim to unsettle persons of a fixed faith. She sought rather to reach and help those who, by reading and thinking, had become dissatisfied with the only forms of religious faith known to them, and were consequently drifting into scepticism. Mr. ----'s own letters best tell the story. After Miss Ellis's death, he wrote Feb. 3,1886:
"I had long been wondering why I did not hear from her, but supposed that she found her time so engrossed with her chosen work that she must defer writing until some more convenient season. She had, it is true, hinted at her failing health, but I never dreamed it was so bad. My first intimation of the real state of affairs was the notice of her death. I need not say that I was startled, that I regret our common loss; these are but feeble expressions.
"Through all my life here at Cambridge I have been anticipating the day when, returning West, I should meet her, and in some degree thank her for the help and comfort she brought me in life. This has become such a fixed idea with me, that it is hard to believe, as I write this, that it can never be in this world. It seems very strange that the one friend who did me such a supreme kindness in life I shall never meet.
"She was the very messenger of God to me, and is inseparably associated with the most trying period of my life. The only conceptions of religion I had ever had were proving unreal and worthless, and no one offered anything as a substitute. As I look back, the peril of my situation seems much greater than it did at the time. I fear I should have become insincere, or, what is perhaps almost as bad, should have fallen into a sort of despairing scepticism. Heaven in mercy saved me from it; but I shall not forget that even Heaven might not have found a way to do this, had there been no Miss Ellis. It was but a little thing, a trifle, a brief notice in a daily paper, that in some way caught a careless reader's eye. But my whole life is changed in consequence.
"And so, while you miss her in her place and in your work, in your church and social life, I, too, here in New England miss her. I feel as if something is gone out of my life and I have really one less reason for returning West when my school work is done. But I have if possible an additional incentive to a good life. I trust I shall hear that your work is still going on successfully. I assure you I shall never lose interest in your Mission, and shall never cease to regard it as in some sense a home into which I was adopted. I sincerely hope I shall never do it any discredit."
In a letter to Mrs. Hunert, Miss Ellis's successor, he says:--
"Accept, please, my hearty congratulations, and my best wishes for your very abundant success. It is a great work indeed, one that cannot be easily over-estimated, and in which it seems to me you can accomplish a minister's work even, and a very successful minister's work at that. I wonder how large your congregation is now; that is, how many persons are in communication with you and your Mission.
"Of Miss Ellis I shall always think as one of my greatest earthly benefactors, and it will be a life-long regret that I never met her.... I wish you would say to Mrs. Smith that I have by me here in New England only the letters received from Miss Ellis since coming to Harvard, and these I fear contain nothing she would like to make use of. The really helpful letters, those that were of most vital interest to me, were written while I was a Methodist preacher in Ohio, and these are back there still, packed up among odds and ends, and practically might almost as well be in the moon.... Again accept my best wishes for your success in the new calling,--a divine one in the truest sense of the word. I assure you I shall always be glad to hear of the growth and success of your Mission, all the more, perhaps, because I hold to it a sort of filial relation. You know that in the Methodist Church each young convert or young minister speaks of the minister under whose preaching he was converted, as a spiritual father. So I think of myself now as the spiritual child of your Women's Missionary Society in Cincinnati. Would that Heaven might help me to be worthy of the home, and justify in some sense their loving-kindness and help in time of need."
A gentleman in Kentucky, long a correspondent of Miss Ellis, who had taken papers, bought many books, etc., through her, and who has recently died, wrote of her, Jan. 22, 1886:--
"Many souls will miss the modest, unassuming, faithful secretary, but her silent labors will be followed by a rich reward. Her memorial is in the hearts and minds of those who were led through her efforts to freedom, fellowship, and character, in religion."
This correspondent was a farmer's wife in Ohio, who, after Miss Ellis's death, wrote:--
"I have had much trouble in the last two years, and would have given up to utter despair many times, if it had not been for her kind letters and sermons. I made a confidential friend of her; so, knowing my situation, she knew what sermons would serve most to strengthen me, and sometimes she would come across sermons in papers that she would cut out and send me. I have them yet, and intend to paste them in a scrapbook. I thought of calling upon her father to see if he had a picture that he would allow me to have a copy from, so I am very glad her portrait will be in the book.... I learned to _love_ Miss Ellis, and shall _never_ forget her."
There was a little family of step-children living on a remote Ohio farm, in whom Miss Ellis took a warm personal interest, advising as to their religious training, sending them children's papers and books. "Miss Ellis" came to be regarded as a dear friend by these children who never saw her. March 16, 1885, she wrote to the mother:--
"Your letter was received a week since, but I have been sick three weeks with a very severe cough and cold. Have been up and about, but could not accomplish much of anything, and especially writing, and still had much of it to do.... Wanted to advise you about the Sunday-school lessons. Order the lessons of 'Home Life' from Chicago at present, and then next, if you can, 'Corner-Stones of Character;' but do not get the 'Old Testament Chart,' for I have some very good lessons on the Old Testament that you will like and can have immediately.... Am so sorry you have so much sadness to contend against. However, you must feel that all your sacrifices are known by the good Father in heaven; so to him turn in your hour of need. There is a hymn Mr. Thayer often selects for our opening on Sunday. We sang it last Sunday,--'Daily Consecration,' by Caroline Mason.
'Oh God! I thank thee for each sight Of beauty that thy hand doth give; For sunny skies, and air, and light,-- Oh God, I thank thee that I live!
'That life I consecrate to thee; And ever, as the day is born, On wings of joy my soul would flee To thank thee for another morn:
'Another day in which to cast Some silent deed of love abroad, Which, greatening as it journeys past, May do some earnest work for God.
'Another day to do, to dare; To use anew my growing strength; To arm my soul with faith and prayer, And so win life and thee, at length.'
"Let your first thoughts be turned to God in the morning, and in the day's struggles believe that you are in his presence; and even if your earthly life is not such as you may wish, you may rest assured that your tears are counted above.... My own life is much brighter than it was. My brother ---- has an only child, three and a half years old, who is very cunning, and much company for us all. On Friday I passed my semi-centennial birthday, which a number of my friends kindly remembered.... I was not strong enough to enjoy the occasion fully; but still on the whole it was a bright day to me, and on Sunday I was glad Mr. Thayer selected the beautiful hymn, 'Daily Consecration.' I am too weak to write longer.... May God bless and strengthen you for your daily toils."
On the envelopes of all these letters was written, "From my friend Miss Ellis." To the oldest child, who was difficult to influence, Miss Ellis addressed this letter:--
MY DEAR M----: I wonder if you ever had any one write a letter to you, and whether you can read a letter yourself. If not, your mamma will read it to you. She has told me that you are having a little Sunday-school of your own at home, and I feel quite interested in it, and am going to have two of the lessons sent to your mamma from Chicago, hoping you three children will feel interested in them. One is a very simple thing to learn,--"Rules to make Home Pleasant;" and I hope you will all try to learn them, and try to keep them in your daily life.... If children do not learn to keep such rules, they never can have happy homes, for they will grow up into ill-natured, lazy men and women. The other lesson is called "Corner-Stones of Character," because it gives us true ideas of what all children should learn in order to grow up into good, truthful men and women.... Now I know you are studying together Brown's "Life of Jesus," and these lessons I am to send you will help you to understand better what Jesus did to make himself, with God's help, become so good a man. I know, too, that you, M----, have a copy of "Daily Praise and Prayer," which is a very good book. It is pleasant to me as I read in mine to think that Mrs. ---- and M---- are reading their lesson to-day, and I wonder if they are thinking how beautiful it is, and that "Miss Ellis" and many others are reading and asking God for the same goodness to-day. It is so pleasant,--do you not think so?--to feel that our good Father in heaven and all good, kind people are thinking of us each day. It helps _us_ to be good, to know that others are trying in the same way,--do you not think so? You are the oldest of the three children, and I want to hear from you, that by studying our Sunday-school lessons, and reading in sensible books, and playing with well-behaved children, you are all becoming wiser and better, and helping mamma and each other. I will also send you some verses all the children in our Sunday-school learned one winter.... There are many things I could talk to you about, but I must leave the rest till another day. It will be sufficient for you to know that some one on earth feels interested in your life at home, with a kind mother to lead you so well.... I will say good-by now, and hope you will learn to write to me. With love to all of you, very kindly your friend.
Miss Ellis corresponded frequently with a young man in Canada (living in a city where, so far as known, he is the only Unitarian), beginning in 1882, and loaning him many books. He, too, was in a state of religious doubt and despair, when chance threw the little advertisement in his way. He intends to enter the Unitarian ministry, as is shown by the following extracts from the correspondence. Miss Ellis wrote him Oct. 21, 1882:--
Monday afternoon I mailed "Religion in Evolution" to you, and I have imagined you eagerly poring over the book this week in high ecstasies.... To me James F. Clarke's views and Dr. Furness's seem more just and reliable. But Dr. Clarke says, "What commends itself best to our reason, must be the truth;" therefore Mr. Savage may benefit you more. If he rouses you to a deep faith and makes you truly Christian, that is the point to be gained. Should like to have you compare James F. Clarke with Mr. Savage, on the Humanity of Jesus and the Miracles and the Resurrection, particularly. "Bible for Learners," Vol. III., takes the same view, about, of the Miracles and Resurrection,--"myths and legends," "not an external fact of history, but simply a form of belief assumed by the faith of his friends and earliest disciples." James F. Clarke, in "Truths and Errors of Orthodoxy," in the chapter Miracles, says, "The resurrection may have been an example of a universal law." Dr. Furness says: "Till men know all the laws of God it is rather presumptuous in them to set the resurrection aside as an impossibility." These are not his exact words; but the purport I have quoted from memory. To return to Dr. Clarke.... [Then follows a long extract from Clarke, which is omitted here.] Dr. Clarke's view is the most likely and rational to me; but all the more radical men take the view of the German critics, and look upon it rather as "myths and legends" arising from a simple faith of the disciples. The only way is to read for yourself and compare, forming an opinion of your own, while remembering that Christianity does not rest on a certain belief, but on the life. "What doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but to do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with thy God," are the words of the prophet Micah. James F. Clarke believes firmly in the simple, pure humanity of Jesus, best shown in "Steps of Belief," under the "Historical Christ." I have "Steps of Belief," "Truths and Errors of Orthodoxy," also "Bible for Learners" and "Talks about Jesus" (M. J. Savage), to loan you. You have only to say which you wish first.... I am tired, and must rise early to be in the city in time for Sunday-school, so I will tear off the paper here, or I shall go on writing all night. Have more good sermons to send you. Wish you could go to Boston, join the Young Men's Christian Union (Unitarian), and be helped into what God means you and all to be, by putting our faculties to the highest use we are capable of. Hoping to hear further from you,
Truly your friend, SARAH ELLIS.
_Sunday Evening._ Our sermon to-day was on the "Effects of Modern Scientific Thought upon the Essentials of Religion." If it is published, will send you a copy of it.... I think the hymn will meet your views, therefore copy it. Do you know it?
The hymn referred to is the one, "God Ever Near," by T. H. Gill, beginning:--