A Memorial of Mrs. Margaret BreckinridgeBreckinridge, John
Philosophy
A Memorial of Mrs. Margaret Breckinridge
Breckinridge, John
Breckinridge, Margaret (Miller), Mrs., 1802-1838
It is true, the root of all sound morality is religion. And it is
equally true, that the deeper sense any one has of the constraining love
of Christ, and of the holiness, majesty, omniscience, and omnipresence
of God, the more faithful he will be in the discharge of all moral
duties, both in private and in public. Labour then, day by day, to gain
a deeper impression of the claims of your Creator and Redeemer upon you.
Meditate much on the Divine glory. Cultivate a devout spirit. Study to
walk with God in the exercise of faith, and love, and prayer. And
endeavour to keep constantly before your minds his all seeing eye, his
infinite holiness, his judgment seat, and those righteous retributions
which he has in store for all his creatures, whether they be good, or
whether they be evil? This is cultivating the heart in the most
essential and radical sense. This is going to "the root of the matter."
That morality, and that alone, which is grafted upon this sanctified
stock, will be regarded with approbation by the Searcher of hearts, and
stand the test of the great day.
But while you labour with your hearts, that they may be habitually laid
open, with all the softness and tenderness of spiritual sensibility, to
the claims of your Creator and Redeemer; study with no less diligence to
cherish a deep sense of all the duties which you owe to your beloved
relatives, to your friends, to your neighbours, and to all with whom you
have intercourse. To perceive the theory of these duties, is the
province of the understanding; to enter into them, as a practical
matter, and under a solemn sense of obligation, is an affair of the
heart; and the more deeply your hearts are schooled both in the
principles and practice of these duties, the more they may be said to
partake of that culture which I am now recommending.
When I imagine to myself what an influence your precious Mother might
have had in cultivating your moral feelings and habits, if it had
pleased God to spare her to you; when I think of the happy power which
her delicate, forming hand, might, by the divine blessing, have exerted
over the heart of each of you;--the heart--as Mrs. Hannah More expresses
it--that "seat of evil propensities--that little troublesome empire of
the passions;"--I could sit down and weep afresh that you are never to
enjoy that culture. But, happily, there is a source of infinitely better
culture. Try to lay to heart your weakness and your wants, and implore
without ceasing the enlightening, subduing, and sanctifying power of the
Holy Spirit, and you will find "his grace sufficient for you."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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