The extracts from Mrs. Graham's letters and devotional exercises, which constitute so large a part of the following pages, will furnish the best development of her principles; and may, with the blessing of God, prove useful to those who read them. In all her writings will be manifested the power of _faith_, the efficiency of _grace_, and in them, as in her own uniform confession, Jesus will be magnified and self will be humbled. Her life was chiefly distinguished by her continual dependence on God, and his unceasing faithfulness and mercy towards her. ISABELLA MARSHALL, afterwards Mrs. Graham, was born July 29, 1742, in the shire of Lanark, in Scotland. Her grandfather was one of the elders who quitted the established church with the Rev. Messrs. Ralph and Ebenezer Erskine. She was educated in the principles of the church of Scotland. Her father and mother were both pious; indeed, her mother, whose maiden name was Janet Hamilton, appears, from her letters yet extant, to have possessed a mind of the same character as her daughter afterwards exhibited. Isabella was trained to an active life, as well as favored with a superior education. Her grandfather, whose dying-bed she assiduously attended, bequeathed her a legacy of some hundred pounds. In the use to which she applied this money, the soundness of her judgment was thus early manifested. She requested it might be appropriated to the purpose of procuring a thorough _education_. When ten years of age, she was sent to a boarding-school taught by a lady of distinguished talents and piety. Often has Mrs. Graham repeated to her children the maxims of Mrs. Betty Morehead. With ardent and unwearied endeavors to attain mental endowments, and especially moral and religious knowledge, she attended the instructions of Mrs. Morehead for seven successive winters. How valuable is early instruction. With the blessing of God, it is probable that this instructress laid the foundation of the exertions and usefulness of her pupil in after-life. How wise and how gracious are the ways of the Lord. Knowing the path in which he was afterwards to lead Isabella Marshall, her God was pleased to provide her an education of a much higher kind than was usual in those days. Who would not trust that God, who alone can be _the guide of our youth_? Her father, John Marshall, farmed a paternal estate, called the Heads, near Hamilton. This estate he sold, and rented the estate of Elderslie, once the habitation of Sir William Wallace. There Isabella passed her childhood and her youth.