COTTAGE PIETY EXEMPLIFIED.
BY THE AUTHOR OF "UNION TO CHRIST," "LOVE TO GOD." ETCPHILADELPHIA: J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO.
1869.Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO., In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
INTRODUCTION.
MANY are the changes of the last fifty years,—some for the better, others for the worse. Of the latter, not the least are found in the humble tenements of the poor.
To them, in former days, much more than at present, the pastor turned for many of his most efficient helpers, the Church for many of her brightest ornaments.
The neat, white-washed cottage, partly hidden during the summer by creepers, and adorned with flowers in the windows and about the door, spoke of moral worth within, where the want of those things, in the like class, now betokens the lack of it, if there are not clear indications of degradation, vice, and crime.
The writer can call to mind many eminent cases of cottage piety; but that of Robert Dawson and Mary Lawrence, his wife, is the most vividly and fully before him.
Under these assumed names he takes two of God's page: vi-vii (Table of Contents) [View Page vi-vii (Table of Contents) ] humble poor, who are now with Him in heaven, to exemplify that type of cottage piety which formerly blessed this and other lands more than at present.
Those who do not recognize in the picture the ones who sat for it will see internal proof that the sketch is not one of fiction. It is rather one of the sternest reality, to the correctness of the most of which there are yet living witnesses; while those parts of it which lie back of the memory of any now on the stage of life, are well authenticated.
If more is said of Mary than of Robert, it is not because his piety adorned their cottage less while it shone there, but because he came later into the kingdom of Christ on earth, and passed thence much earlier to his reward in heaven.
Mary survived him for nearly forty years, and left behind her writings, from which we glean much that follows. Indeed, the most that is said relates to her during her widowed state. Should the reading of this unvarnished narrative induce any, in palace or cottage, to a more entire consecration to God, to his name be the glory.
CONTENTS.
- CHAPTER I. Mary's Parentage and Early Life. 9
- CHAPTER II. From the Marriage of Robert Dawson and Mary Lawrence to their Removal into the Country. 13
- CHAPTER III. Their Residence in Huntstown. 24
- CHAPTER IV. From their Removal to Westford to Mr. Dawson's Death. 29
- CHAPTER V. From the Death of Mr. Dawson to the Removal of his Widow from Westford. 41
- CHAPTER VI. From Mrs. Dawson's Removal to Ashton, to the End of her Journal. 65
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- CHAPTER VII. From the End of Mrs. Dawson's Journal to her Removal from Ashton. 154
- CHAPTER VIII. From Mrs. Dawson's Removal from Ashton to the Removal of the Old Meeting-House. 237
- CHAPTER IX. From Mrs. Dawson's Removal to her Daughter's, to her Death. 302
