A curious story is told in connection with one of Catherine Beecher’s philosophical essays. In 1840 she wrote an article called “Free Agency,” which was published in the _Biblical Repository_. This is a theological term, meaning “free will,” and Catherine’s object was to answer the arguments on the subject of the human will that had been given out by Jonathan Edwards, one of the most profound scholars of New England. The story is that a New England preacher in talking with a professor of theology in Germany once mentioned this essay of Miss Beecher’s, calling it the ablest refutation of Edwards that had yet been written. “Do you mean to say that you have in your country a woman who can write the ablest refutation of Edwards on the will?” exclaimed the German professor. “Then may God forgive Christopher Columbus for discovering America!” This story had a good point in its day. But now that women have proved by their achievements in all branches of science and in literature and the arts that they needed only education and opportunity to attain distinction, it is only amusing that such a remark could ever have been made--even in Germany. When Harriet was nine years old--about the time when she was writing essays on the “Difference Between the Natural and Moral Sublime”--her sister Catherine was away at Boston studying music and drawing, and preparing herself in general to be a teacher. Because of her remarkable powers of mind, she made such progress that in a short time she was able to take a position as teacher in a young ladies’ school in New London, Connecticut. While in this place she met a young man of brilliant prospects and of great personal charm, a professor at Yale College. They became engaged and were most happy; but their joy was short-lived. Professor Fisher, commissioned to go to Europe to buy books for his department, set sail in the ship _Albion_, which encountered a severe storm and was dashed to pieces on the rocks of the Irish coast.