"Such active benevolence could hardly be detected in company with a niggardly temper. Wishes which cost nothing; pity which expires on the lips; be ye warmed and be ye clothed, from a cold heart and an unyielding gripe, never imprinted their disgraceful brand upon Isabella Graham. What she urged upon others she exemplified in herself. She kept a purse for God. Here, in obedience to his command, she deposited the first-fruits of all her increase; and they were sacred to his service, as in his providence he should call for them. No shuffling pretences, no pitiful evasions, when a fair demand was made upon the hallowed store; and no frigid affectation in determining the quality of the demand. A sense of duty was the prompter, candor the interpreter, and good sense the judge. Her disbursements were proportioned to the value of the object, and were ready at a moment's warning, to the very last farthing.* How pungent a reproof to those ladies of opulence and fashion who sacrifice so largely to their dissipation or their vanity, that they have nothing left for mouths without food, and limbs without raiment! How far does it throw back into the shade those men of prosperous enterprise and gilded state who, in the hope of some additional lucre, have thousands and ten thousands at their beck; but who, when asked for decent contributions to what they themselves acknowledge to be all-important, turn away with this hollow excuse, 'I cannot afford it.' Above all, how should her example redden the faces of many who profess to belong to Christ; to have received gratuitously from him what he procured for them at the expense of his own blood, 'an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away;' and yet, in the midst of abundance which he has lavished upon them, when the question is about relieving his suffering members, or promoting the glory of his kingdom, are sour, reluctant, mean. Are these the Christians? Can it be that they have committed their bodies, their souls, their eternal hope, to a Saviour whose thousand promises on this very point of honoring him with their substance, have less influence upon their hearts and their hands than the word of any honest man? Remember the deceased, and hang your heads--remember her, and tremble; remember her, and bring forth fruits meet for repentance. *The author knew her, when in moderate circumstances, to give, unsolicited, _fifty pounds at once_ out of that sacred purse to a single most worthy purpose.