Memoir of Mary L. Ware, Wife of Henry Ware, Jr.Hall, Edward B. (Edward Brooks)
Religion
Memoir of Mary L. Ware, Wife of Henry Ware, Jr.
Hall, Edward B. (Edward Brooks)
Unitarians -- United States -- Biography; Ware, Mary L. (Mary Lovell), 1798-1849
"While connected with the School, in 1834, I had a short but
violent attack of brain fever. I was in Divinity Hall, and very
kindly taken care of by my associates in the School, who did
for me every thing that young men know how to do in such a
case. After a few days, Mrs. Ware came to see me. The bare
sight of her countenance, and the sweet, gentle tones of her
voice, I shall never forget. They changed the whole aspect of
the room. As soon as it could be done, I was removed to her
house. And the delicacy of her touch, as in my helplessness she
washed my hands and face, with the air of motherly cheerfulness
and tenderness, was to my diseased nerves like the ministry of
one from a better world. During the months of confinement and
extreme debility which succeeded, the remembrance of her
kindness was a constant source of comfort, and I cannot now
recall it without deep and grateful emotion."
In connection with exertions for others, it is but just to refer again
to the laborious efforts, self-denial, and perpetual solicitude, to
which Mrs. Ware was driven, at home, in regard to pecuniary means. The
difficulty came at last to its height. They found it impossible to live
as they did, and yet impossible to retrench more than they always had.
We would not speak of this so freely, did we not feel--beside the light
it throws upon character and results--that it is due to the professors
and ministers of all denominations, whose energies are crippled, and
power of serving as well as enjoying sadly abridged, by the conflicting
facts of unreasonable demand and incompetent support. Those of us who do
not suffer, and are only grateful, have the better right to speak for
others; and we speak in the memory, and as by the authority, of those
two unsparing and noble workers, whose sentiments on the subject we well
know, and whose power of usefulness should never have been hampered, as
it often was, by the want of means which hundreds were both able and
willing to furnish. Yes, willing; for it is no want of _generosity_ that
we speak of; were we capable of that injustice, especially in the
community and the family under review, we should expect almost to hear
the reproof of the departed ones, whose gratitude was as intense as
their solicitude. Not for themselves did they feel, but for others; for
the School, for the ministry; for the students who were prevented from
entering the School, or forced to leave it, by poverty and the fear of
debt, some of whom were retained only by promises of aid, whose
fulfilment cost added labor and wearing anxiety. There is better
provision now, we know; ample provision for those willing to accept it.
Still are there wants and straits in the actual ministry which are not
duly considered. And this it is that is needed,--not generosity in the
few, but consideration in the many, and the coöperation of all. If the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account