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Browsing named entities in Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall). You can also browse the collection for Northampton (Massachusetts, United States) or search for Northampton (Massachusetts, United States) in all documents.
Your search returned 15 results in 15 document sections:
Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall), To E. Carpenter
To E. Carpenter. Northampton [Mass.], September 6, 1838.
When I remember what a remarkable testimony the early Friends bore (a testimony which seems to me more and more miraculous, the more I compare it with the spirit of the age in which they lived), I could almost find it in my heart to weep at the too palpable proofs that little now remains of that which was full of life.
This letter refers to the opposition to active anti-slavery effort manifested by the New York yearly meeting of Friends of what is called the Hicksite division.
On the Orthodox side there was the same disposition to discountenance decided abolition labors, although both societies professed to maintain a testimony against slavery. I was saying this, last winter, to George Ripley, a Unitarian minister of Boston.
He replied beautifully, Mourn not over their lifelessness.
Truly the dead form alone remains ; but the spirit that emanated from it is not dead, the word which they spake has gone out silently into
Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall), To Mrs. Ellis Gray Loring
To Mrs. Ellis Gray Loring. Northampton [Mass.], June 9, 1838.
A month elapsed after I came here before I stepped into the woods which were all around me blooming with wild flowers.
I did not go to Mr. Dwight's ordination, nor have I yet been to meeting.
He has been to see me, however, and though I left my work in the midst, and sat down with a dirty gown and hands somewhat grimmed, we were high up in the blue in fifteen minutes. I promised to take a flight with him from the wash-tub or dish-kettle any time when he would come along with his balloon. ...
C. is coming down next week, and I think I shall send a line to some of you by her. Her religious furor is great, just at this time, but of her theological knowledge you can judge when I tell you that when I spoke of old John Calvin, she asked me if he was the same as John the Baptist. ...
I don't suppose any present was quite so satisfactory as the pretty green watering pot. Father said I was out with it in the rain as wel
Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall), To Rev. Convers Francis
To Rev. Convers Francis. Northampton, July 12, 1838.
Your kind letter in reply to mine was most welcome.
The humility with which you say that you may have been permitted now and then to suggest things not useless to my genius, sounds oddly enough.
Such expressions from a mind so immeasurably superior to mine, in its attainments, would seem to be feigned and excessive, did I not know that you speak sincerely.
If I possessed your knowledge, it seems to me as if I could move the whole world.
I am often amused and surprised to think how many things I have attempted to do with my scanty stock of learning.
I know not how it is, but my natural temperament is such that when I wish to do anything
I seem to have an instinctive faith that I can do it; whether it be cutting and making a garment, or writing a Greek novel.
The sort of unconsciousness of danger arising from this is in itself strength.
Whence came it?
I did not acquire it. But the whence?
how? whither?
of our inwar
Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall), To Francis G. Shaw
To Francis G. Shaw. Northampton, August 17, 1838.
With regard to intercourse with slave-holders, far from shunning it myself, I seek it diligently.
Many and many an hour's argument, maintained with candor and courtesy, have I had with them ; and they have generally appeared to like me, though my principles naturally seemed to them stern and uncompromising.
I am not so intolerant as to suppose that slave-holders have not many virtues, and many very estimable qualities; but at the same time, let me caution you against believing all their fair professions on the subject of slavery.
Men who are true and honorable on all other subjects will twist, and turn, and deceive, and say what they must absolutely know to be false on this subject.
I account for the inconsistency and tergiversation of such men partly upon the supposition that conscience perpetually whispers to them that the system is wrong, but is not sufficiently revered to overcome the temptation of apparent interest.
S
Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall), To Miss Henrietta Sargent
To Miss Henrietta Sargent. Northampton, 1838.
Why do you not write?
Are you ill?
Are you sorry with me, as the little French girl used to say; or what is the matter?
I really hunger and thirst to hear from you. . .
My husband and I are busy in that most odious of all tasks, that of getting signatures to petitions.
We are resolved that the business shall be done in this town more thoroughly than it has been heretofore.
But, Oh Lord, sir!
I have never been so discouraged about abolition as since we came into this iron-bound Valley of the Connecticut.
I have ceased to believe that public opinion will ever be sincerely reformed on the question till long after emancipation has taker place.
I mean that for generations to come there will be a very large minority hostile to the claims of colored people; and the majority will be largely composed of individuals who are found on that side from any and every motive rather than hearty sympathy with the down-trodden race.
Public
Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall), To Rev. Convers Francis
To Rev. Convers Francis. Northampton, December 22, 1838.
If I were to choose my home, I certainly would not place it in the Valley of the Connecticut.
It is true, the river is broad and clear, the hills majestic, and the whole aspect of outward nature most lovely.
But oh!
the narrowness, the bigotry of man!
To think of hearing a whole family vie with each other, in telling of vessels that were wrecked, or shattered, or delayed on their passage, because they sailed on Sunday!
To think of people's troubling their heads with the question whether the thief could have been instantaneously converted on the cross, so that the Saviour could promise him an entrance to Paradise!
In an age of such stirring inquiry, and of such extended benevolence — in a world which requires all the efforts of the good and wise merely to make it receptive of holy influences, what a pity it is that so much intellect should be wasted upon such theological jargon!
No wonder that the intelligent infidel
Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall), To Francis G. Shaw
To Francis G. Shaw. Northampton, 1840.
I too should like to see the poetry of motion in Fanny Elssler.
But the only thing (except seeing dear friends) that has attracted me to Boston, was the exhibition of statuary.
In particular I have an earnest desire to see the Infant guided to heaven by angels.
I am ashamed to say how deeply I am charmed with sculpture; ashamed, because it seems like affectation in one who has had such very limited opportunity to become acquainted with the arts.
I have a little plaster figure of a caryatid, which acts upon my spirit like a magician's spell.
Sarah (she reproves me when I call her Mrs. S.) did not seem to think much of it; but to me it has an expression of the highest kind.
Repose after conflict — not the repose of innocence, but the repose of wisdom.
Many a time this hard summer I have laid down dish-cloth or broom and gone to refresh my spirit by gazing on it a few minutes.
It speaks to me. It says glorious things.
In summer I plac
Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall), To a Child. (search)
To a Child. Northampton, August 16, 1840.
Dearest Nony,--Now I will write to you. I have no kitten to purr aloud ; and my great black cat is not sufficiently well-behaved to deserve a written description.
But my swallows still keep about the house.
Almost every evening one or two of them come in at dark in search of flies; and they go circling round my head, so that I sometimes feel their wings fan my face.
Once in a great while they come in now to look at the old nest, and squat down in it for a minute or two; just as children love to go back to the old homestead, to see the place where they were born.
But the pleasantest sight of all was when the little ones were learning to fly. Such a twittering and bustling And when the baby birds, in spite of the mother's unwearied efforts, still continued too timid to drop down from the edge of the nest, she brought in eight or ten of her neighbor swallows to instruct and encourage them.
She did this three times in succession.
The wo
Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall), To Francis G. Shaw
To Francis G. Shaw. Northampton, 1840.
I did hope mightily to see you, and I wanted to have you hear John Dwight preach.
John's is a mild, transparent, amber light, found In einem andern Sonnen lichte, In einer glucklichen Natur.
Shame on me for quoting German so pompously, when these are almost the only lines I know.
You have seen the illustrations of John Bunyan, the literary part prepared by Bernard Barton?
Oh, it is a lovely book!
The memory of it haunts me like a sweet dream.
You looked at it in church one day; and I pointed to you the picture of the river of life, where the light was so supernaturally transparent, and soft, and warm; like the sun shining through crystal walls upon golden floors.
Well, that picture is like some of John Dwight's sermons.
Blessings on him!
He has ministered to my soul in seasons of great need.
I think that was all he was sent here for, and that the parish are paying for a missionary to me. Who are the rest of the world, that Go
Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child (ed. John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall), To Miss Augusta King
To Miss Augusta King. Northampton, October 21, 1840.
My heart has written you several epistles in reply, but the hand could not be spared.
Oh for some spiritual daguerreotype, by which thoughts might spontaneously write themselves!
How should you like that?
Would you dare venture upon it for the sake of the convenience?
Oh, but you should have seen Lonetown woods in the rich beauty of autumnal foliage!
Color taking its fond and bright farewell of form,--Like the imagination giving a deeper, richer, warmer glow to old familiar truths, before the winter of rationalism comes, and places trunk and branches in naked outline against the clear cold sky.
I have had a charming letter from Mr. W., a real German effusion, filling matter brimful of life; so that statues beseech, and are sad that we do not understand their language ; and flowers dance in troops to wind-music; and the brook goes tumbling to the river, roaring as he falls, and the river smiles that he comes to her un