The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2): Including Public Addresses, Her Own Letters and Many From Her Contemporaries During Fifty YearsHarper, Ida Husted
History
The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2): Including Public Addresses, Her Own Letters and Many From Her Contemporaries During Fifty Years
Harper, Ida Husted
Anthony, Susan B. (Susan Brownell), 1820-1906
Mrs. Blackwell writes her teasingly about what she calls her
obtuseness, going straight ahead with her work, never knowing when she
was snubbed or defeated, giving the undiluted doctrine to people
without ever perceiving their frantic efforts to escape, and ignoring
all the humorous features of the campaigns. Miss Anthony retorts: "You
might give some of the funny things at your own expense, but tell just
as many as you please at mine. You see I have always gone with such a
blind rush that I never had time to see the ridiculous, and blessed for
me and my work and my happiness that I did not." Another invariable
habit was never to notice complaints written to her. She always
answered the business points but entirely ignored complainings, charges
against other people and all extraneous matters.
She relates a significant incident which occurred during this summer
campaign when she and Antoinette Blackwell spent a Sunday at Gerrit
Smith's. He had established at Peterboro and was maintaining at his own
expense a Free church. Mrs. Blackwell, under the influence of Theodore
Parker, Chapin and other liberal thinkers, had become very broad in her
doctrines, and was greatly pleased at an opportunity to preach for Mr.
Smith, thinking to find perfect appreciation and sympathy. After church
Miss Anthony went to her room and found her weeping bitterly, but she
begged to be left to herself. When more composed she sent for her and
told how in the midst of her sermon, when she felt herself surpassing
anything she ever had done, she heard a gentle snore, and looking down
beheld Mr. Smith sound asleep! She was terribly disappointed and now
had made up her mind there was but one thing for the human soul, and
that was to live absolutely within itself. There is no friend, no
relative, who can enter into the depths of another individuality. A
husband and wife may be very happy together; in all the little
occurrences which really make up the sum of everyday life, they may be
perfectly congenial; but there will be times when each will feel the
other separated by an immeasurable distance. Henceforth she would enjoy
what solace there was in her religious faith for herself but would
expect no other soul to share it with her. "This was to me a wonderful
revelation," said Miss Anthony, "and I realized, as never before, that
in our most sacred hours we dwell indeed in a world of solitude."
[Autograph: Antoinette Brown Blackwell]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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