The Grimké Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimké: the First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights by Catherine H. Birney
page 79 of 312 (25%)
page 79 of 312 (25%)
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known,' and one of the very least where she was once among the
greatest." In one of her letters, written soon after her return home, she thus speaks of her Quaker dress:-- "I thought I should find it so trying to dress like a Quaker here; but it has been made so easy that if it is a cross I do not feel the weight of it.... It appears to me that at present I am to be little and unknown, and that the most that is required of me is that I bear a decided testimony against dress. I am literally as a wonder unto many, but though I am as a gazing-stock--perhaps a laughing-stock--in the midst of them, yet I scarcely feel it, so sensible am I of the presence and approbation of Him for whose sake I count it a high privilege to endure scorn and derision. I begin to feel that it is a solemn thing even to dress like a Quaker, as by so doing I profess a belief in the purest principles of the Bible, and warrant the expectation in others that my life will exhibit to all around those principles drawn out in living characters." There is a pride of conscience in all this, strongly contrasting with Sarah's want of self-confidence when travelling the same path. If Angelina suffered for her religion, no one suspected it, and for this very reason she was enabled to exert a stronger influence upon those about her than Sarah ever could have done. She herself saw the great points of difference between them, and frequently alluded to them. On one page of her diary she writes:-- "I have been reading dear sister's diary the last two days, and find she has suffered great conflict of mind, particularly about her call to |
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