Women -- Biography; Women -- Social and moral questions
Her school career began before she was eight years old. She was,
however, shortly removed, because of ill health, and when about the age
of ten was sent to a different kind of school. As far as it was lawful
she always screened the faults of her companions, and was ever ready
and willing to plead for them when in disgrace; and so powerful was her
advocacy, that her preceptress was constrained to remove out of her way
when her judgment compelled her to persevere in her discipline.
At the age of twelve her delicate health again occasioned her removal
from school. Her illness lasted about two months, and during that time,
when confined upon a sofa, she committed to memory the whole Book of
Psalms. She was delighted with Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” and for many
successive mornings repeated three hundred lines. After her recovery
she spent several months by the seaside. About the age of sixteen she
was brought to the ordinance of confirmation, and publicly joined
herself to the Lord in a perpetual covenant never to be broken.
About the age of seventeen, Miss Graham fell, for a few months, from
the heavenly atmosphere of communion with God, into the dark and dismal
shades of infidelity. The metaphysical structure of her mind, combined
with a defective apprehension of her sad state by nature, induced a
spirit of self-dependence; which led to backsliding from God. In the
frivolities of the world she sought in vain for that priceless boon, a
quiet conscience. Wearied at length, she turned to religion for
comfort, but found that she had no religion; she had refused to give
glory to God, and now her feet were stumbling upon the dark mountains.
The Divinity of Christ had often been to her an occasion of perplexity.
Repeated examination had fully convinced her that it was a scriptural
doctrine; yet so repulsive was it to her proud heart, that she was led
from thence to doubt the truth of the Bible itself. After a few months’
conflict, she was brought, to the light and liberty of truth, and the
once abhorred doctrine became exceedingly precious. “From that time,”
to use her own words, “I have continued to sit at the feet of Jesus,
and to hear His word, taking Him for my teacher and guide, in things
temporal as well as spiritual.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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