This library is built in the open.
If you spot an error, have a suggestion, or just want to say hello — we’d love to hear from you.

liking in his life, and he was afraid he never should. It was well for him I was not married, as I was the only one that could go to his house to assist him in distress; for, though they assisted him in money, they could not go to stay with him, as I did. But here I shall leave my Father. After this I went to Sidmouth to my Brother; and Peter West paid his addresses to me. He was a young man of remarkable good character, and one I thought remarkably handsome. Here my heart began to be entangled again in love, which I dreaded. One Sunday evening after we parted I walked my room, with a war in my heart: I was thinking with myself, where is my foolish heart wandering? and was earnest in prayer that the Lord would not permit the love of the creature In religious contexts of the time, this referred to an obsessive or idolatrous love for a human being that might distract one from the love of God. to draw my heart from my Creator, and that the Lord would not permit me to keep company with any man, that he had not ordained for my Husband. I prayed that that might be a sign to me that he might not be able to come to me for a month. I was answered, he should not come for a month if it was not the Will of the Lord I should have him. The next day my Brother said Peter’s courtship was too hot to hold long. I said if it lasted a month it would last for ever. My Brother laughed at my words; but finding Peter came no more, he said then Peter’s faith has failed him, and some laughed, and said Peter was worse than Paul, to break off in that abrupt manner. I said I did not blame him; for if he thought he could do better, I did not wish him to hurt himself to come to me. But two months after I met him by chance, and he then would have renewed his former acquaintance, and said he would never deceive me more. I told him he never should, for no man should deceive me twice; and if he thought himself better he should go to better; for I never wanted any man to hurt himself to come to me: for he was great, and I was grand, and he might raise his