AN INTERVAL
‘O dignitosa coscienza e netto
Come t’e picciol fallo amaro morso.’
DANTE, _Purgatorio_, iii.
The early part of the year 1858 is the one period in the life of Dorothea
Beale when she could have been called really free. It was a time when
it became her part to choose what she would do; to wait for what was
suitable, to decide between conflicting claims. She came home depressed,
defeated, disappointed; but she had discovered her own weakness and real
strength; she had increased her knowledge of human nature through some
experience of a boarding-school and its Committee. She had learned for
one thing, that it would be best for herself and for the world that she
should be head of a school, and she submitted to wait for one. But in the
meantime other calls and needs besides that of education were heard and
considered.
The fact of apparent failure in her recent position at Casterton might
have been taken as an indication that her energies should perhaps be
directed to a fresh field of action. She was not under the necessity
of earning her bread; she loved her home and had a circle of friends
and interests about her. Various kinds of good work for others appealed
to her, and her ability and gifts made it clear that she might have
succeeded in other walks of life than the one in which her steps were
finally directed.
Though Dorothea had inherited, in a strong degree, her father’s antipathy
to a _mariage de convenance_, though she was far from regarding marriage
as the necessary completion of a woman’s life, she had not—at this time
at least—made any definite refusal of it. This is a subject to which
it will not be necessary to return in Miss Beale’s life, devoted as it
became to one great cause. But here, before her vocation had distinctly
declared itself, it is right to say that in the course of events she was
not only not without opportunities of marriage, she also gave it her
full consideration. Flippant scholars might echo the words of Punch,
‘How different from us, Miss Beale and Miss Buss!’ But in the sense in
which the words were intended, this was not true in either case. Suffice
it to say, that Dorothea Beale knew what it was to be admired, loved,
even for a short time engaged to be married. She knew also, among other
experiences, what it was to sacrifice a girlish romance because it was
right to put away vain regret; to forget the things that are behind, and
in this matter as in others, to use any sense of personal loss in such a
way that it strengthened her character.
To pass from this subject, which, as it happens, does not appear to
have had any place in the short period which elapsed between Casterton
and Cheltenham, it is interesting to note what kinds of work Miss Beale
considered with a view to taking them up.
Philanthropic occupations in the ordinary sense of the term she had had
but few. Her duties as a tutor at Queen’s College were first undertaken
when she was still eighteen, and up to then her time had been filled
with interests arising from her own education and that of her brothers.
Yet, while at Queen’s, busy as she was, she had made time to aid one
less fortunate than herself. In 1853 her friend Miss Alston consulted
her how best to help a clever boy brought up in a charity school. Miss
Beale volunteered to teach him Euclid and algebra, and for four months
gave him a lesson a week in each of these subjects. In that time he went
through the first four books of Euclid and part of the sixth. Miss Beale
enjoyed these lessons, for her pupil was keen and intelligent and took a
delight in working out things for himself. Doubtless he too responded to
the teaching of one whose method was ever to lead a pupil on to perceive
a truth before accepting it. When, after a time, he came under the
instruction of the headmaster of a public school, the latter remarked to
Miss Alston _à propos_ of Miss Beale’s teaching: ‘What a well-balanced
head your friend must have!’
She had never, however, been engaged in the Sunday School teaching
and visiting of the poor, such as was not infrequently undertaken
by thoughtful girls of her day. Her strong intellectual bent, her
well-defined sense of purpose possibly kept her from even good
occupations which might have seemed desultory. But one kind of work for
others seems actually to have been considered. This was in connection
with Mrs. Lancaster whom for some years Miss Beale had helped by
collecting money for the Church Penitentiary Association, and for a
Diocesan Home at Highgate. Mrs. Lancaster became in 1861 the founder
of St. Peter’s Sisterhood. She died in 1874. ‘She was,’ says one who
knew her, ‘a very remarkable woman, of great charm and cleverness, and
wholly devoted to the service of God.’ Her letters to Miss Beale at this
time show that she was at once drawn to her young helper, so active in
inspiring others to share in the good work, so punctual in her payments.
It was work in which Miss Beale was interested all her life, to which she
gave largely, and which she ever promoted as far as her much filled time
and thought permitted. Mrs. Lancaster greeted her first sign of interest
with a warm welcome to the new worker. ‘Indeed, it was a great joy to me
to see another drawn in by the Good Shepherd to help in seeking His lost
sheep. May He bless and strengthen your will and power for the work.’
Dorothea appears to have been an assistant secretary, and to have
collected money from her sisters and friends for this object. It is
unnecessary, perhaps, to say that this money was always paid on the same
date of each year.
After a time, when it seemed likely that Miss Beale would not remain at
Casterton, Mrs. Lancaster obviously hoped to find in her one who would
give up her life and talents to this cause. ‘I wish,’ she wrote, ‘for
the sake of poor Penitents that you were more free, for I fancy you are
a _real, steady, orderly doer_, and that is worth much in such a cause.
Still, you do what you can, and may well be grateful to help in any way.
Thank your sister too very much; it is very delightful to get young
interest.’
Then, when an occasion arrived on which it was absolutely necessary to
find a worker for the Highgate Home, she wrote: ‘_Are you sure_ that
you don’t know of a really good young lady not _over_ accomplished, and
she need know neither Greek nor Hindostanee, who would come and _live_
at the Home, with a salary of £30 only, and _poor people’s_ diet?’ This
was followed by a still more practical suggestion: ‘Is there any chance
(I don’t like the word) of your liking to take the Headship of a large
Penitentiary to be worked by Sisters, but the whole under strict, honest,
English principles—more like Kaiserwerth than anything we have now?’
Dorothea’s answer seems to have emboldened Mrs. Lancaster to make a
definite suggestion to her to come herself, either as a Sister or a lay
worker, and the following note from Mrs. Lancaster, written during the
summer holidays of the Casterton year, shows that the idea was to some
extent entertained. It is interesting also in the history of the work and
institution established by that lady.
‘As your mind does not altogether say “No” to my proposal at
once, I write a line to beg you not to _decide against_ the
thought of what I wrote to you about, without weighing very
seriously these considerations:
‘What is the highest work?
‘What constitutes a call to God’s service?
‘Is it lawful to give up a higher for a lower work?
‘If, when you have considered it well, you feel at all drawn
towards it, then will you write either to me or to the Rev.
John Oliver of St. Mary’s House of Mercy, Highgate, appointing
with him to see you (for the appointment is in his hands),
and he will not make it unless he is fully convinced that the
lady would work it on strictly English principles, and that
her _heart_ was given to God first. He is very earnest and
very honest, and all there seems most hopeful if regarded as a
beginning and a foundation, for at present there are only two
Sisters and one other lady at work. The house and grounds are
delightful, the Penitents in a good healthy state, and if but
a _wise_ lady is given to the work I should be very hopeful of
seeing _there_, _such_ a Sisterhood as we have talked about
but have not been privileged to see growing up in English
soil. Pray do consult your sister, or your parents, but please
confidentially, as I think we ought to do these _preliminaries_
as quietly as possible. I have mentioned your name _quite_ in
confidence to Mr. Oliver, and I _do_ hope you will see him and
talk it out to _the bottom_ with him before you decide. I know
you will do what is better than all, ask for guidance that
cannot fail.
‘I do not think your parents would object, after allowing
you to go to Casterton and Queen’s College, because in point
of position, this is _now_ felt to be _all_ that a lady need
care about. I am so _very_ anxious about Highgate because it
seems so _hopeful_ as regards soundness of principle _now_, but
I will say no more excepting to beg you to remember that the
appointment does not _rest_ with me even if you felt you could
and would take it.—Ever yours affectionately and sincerely,
ROSA: LANCASTER.’
It is probable that Mrs. Lancaster’s friendship and the glimpse of
Sisterhood life which she obtained by means of it deepened the sense
of vocation with which Miss Beale was prepared to take up the new work
for which she was waiting in 1858. It may also have had its influence
on outside matters such as dress, which we know, when engaged on her
work of teaching, was in early days especially very plain and simple.
Mrs. Lancaster was obviously a friend whom she revered, one to whom she
could speak of religious matters, and with whose devoted work among poor
women she fully sympathised; but the conventual side of it never really
appealed to her.
Through Miss Twining, who began her work in 1850, Miss Beale became much
interested in the reform of workhouses, and the idea even passed through
her mind of seeking a position as matron in order to help to promote a
better state of affairs. We can only wonder what would have been wrought
had that great personality and unwearied diligence, that refusal to
accept anything but the best, been brought to bear on the Poor Law, on
Vestries, or Boards of Guardians.
The education of girls of her own class was of far deeper interest to her
than any other work for women. She was trained for it, was conscious of
her own power and knowledge of what a school should be, and she decided
to wait till she could find a headship and carry out her own ideas. It
was not quite easy to find the post she wanted. As she put it herself,
‘They might say, “She could not get on at Queen’s, she could not get
on at Casterton”’; and it is obvious from her diary, that though she
was actually told as early as January 1858 of the possible vacancy at
Cheltenham, she tried for more than one school before she was elected
there in June.
While she waited, she worked. There was plenty of home interest, a
pleasant circle of friends about her: she took her share in the life of
others, and yet led her own and accomplished a large amount in those few
months. During a part of this time she gave weekly lessons in mathematics
and Latin at Miss Elwall’s school at Barnes, a school which afterwards
became well known under Miss Eliza Beale, already in 1858 an assistant
teacher there. But the great occupation of these months was _The
Student’s Textbook of English and General History_.
In point of time this important work was the third book produced by Miss
Beale, and a word on its first predecessor will not be out of place here.
The little volume on the Deaconesses’ Institution at Kaiserwerth was the
outcome of a visit there during one of two summers passed in Germany for
the sake of studying schools and foreign methods of education. Miss Beale
stayed for a few days with the founder, Pastor Fliedner, and his wife,
and studied each department of work. She was specially pleased with the
Hospital and Sunday-school, of which she wrote with much appreciation:
‘I never was present at a lesson which seemed to give so much pleasure
to children and listeners, as well as to the teacher, who certainly
understood the art of drawing out children by means of questions.’
Germany, its schools and similar institutions, its literature and
language, even its handwriting, had a great attraction for Miss Beale.
She had a few German lessons at the Paris school and afterwards worked at
it alone, finally perfecting herself in the language by two long visits
to the country, when she stayed principally at Brunswick and Dresden. On
one occasion she resided for some time in a German family. In after years
she would talk of this time to the girls at Cheltenham, telling them how
she would make a point of conversing with the person she understood least
easily at any gathering, inquiring the meaning of any word she did not
know, to make use of it herself at the first opportunity. ‘And of course
I did not mind being laughed at a little,’ she would add with a smile.
Hence the praise that German ladies teaching at Cheltenham would accord
her knowledge of the language, saying that she never made a mistake
either in speaking or writing. She frequently made use of the German
character in writing her diary.
The book on Kaiserwerth, written as it was for a special cause, has
naturally long since had its day, though on its appearance it was
accepted widely enough to justify the thought of a second edition. Mrs.
Lancaster was greatly interested by it, and showed it to the Bishop of
London,[22] who had just signed the Rule of the newly-founded Sisterhood.
Both Bishop Jackson and Dean Trench declined, in friendly letters,
dedications to themselves of a second edition, and none appears to have
been issued; possibly on account of difficulties suggested by Mrs.
Lancaster, who wished the scope of the book enlarged to embrace work
of a similar nature in England. In the event of this being done, she
begged Miss Beale to add a notice of the infant Community of St. Peter’s,
then in Broughton Square. To-day the book can scarcely be called extant,
but there is certainly one copy in England and one in Kaiserwerth. It
is interesting because it shows, like other writing of this time, the
continuity of Miss Beale’s ideas and thoughts. Her sowing had been
betimes and abundant, and she could already gather as she needed. She did
not give till she had the wherewithal, and though in her long years she
frequently sowed afresh—was ever disciple as well as teacher—she was an
early husbandman, a wise householder, able continuously and opportunely
to bring out things new and old. The simile of Jairus’s daughter,
occurring for the first time in the passage quoted below, was one she
often quoted in connection with that awakening of women’s energies it had
been her lot to share; and one she finally enshrined for her children in
the window placed in the College to the memory of Miss Buckoll in 1890.
And like much of her later work, the little book shows also how much her
religion went hand in hand with all her work for others. There was no
thought of the emancipation of women, no word of rights; she spoke only
of duties, of scope to do good; but even these were quite secondary to
the desire, the will to make the effort, the ear to hear the bidding
voice. Here is a passage to illustrate this:
‘It has occurred to me that a more detailed description than
that given six years ago by Miss Nightingale of an institution
in which she was herself trained, and which has since that
time many new features, might assist those who are considering
the best way of turning to account the wasted energy of our
country-women, of those whose highest happiness it would be to
be like Mary, Joanna, and Susannah, to follow Christ.... There
are many who, when they pray to God “to comfort and succour
all them who ... are in trouble, sorrow, need, sickness, or any
other adversity,” cannot be satisfied without giving a small
portion of their money, who tremble at the thought of being
numbered with the women who are at ease, with the careless
daughters. O that Christ would take us by the hand. He has but
to speak the word: “Daughter, I say unto thee, Arise”; and
we shall arise and minister to Him: then will the scorners
acknowledge we were only sleeping, and our souls will magnify
the Lord.’[23]
Two other short extracts must be permitted:
‘I could not but contrast the aimless existence of many of my
own country-women, the dreary regions of the fashionable world,
with the wide field under cultivation by this band of Sisters,
who, by God’s blessing, penetrate year by year farther into
the wilderness, and rescue so many of their fellow-creatures
from evils more to be dreaded than famine, pestilence, and the
sword.’[24]
Finally, the following passage tells how the strengthening thought of the
Communion of Saints, of which she spoke to Miss Gore on the last Sunday
of her life, was already beginning to be hers:
‘The happiness of a Deaconess does not arise from external
circumstances; it is a peace which the world cannot give. She
must be prepared to live away from the world, without any
society but that of a few sick persons and children, without
beautiful services; to believe, in the midst of unbelief and
sin, in the Holy Catholic Church and the Communion of Saints.
She must always be watching for her Lord’s coming, for in the
midst of the pestilence and near the field of battle is her
post.’[25]
A second visit to Kaiserwerth, ten years later, gave Miss Beale great
pleasure. She was delighted with the work being done and the extension of
the small beginnings she had seen in 1856. In 1905, at Oeynhausen, she
met accidentally a Deaconess of Kaiserwerth, was much attracted by her,
and invited her to come and see her and talk to her of the institution,
and after her return to England exchanged letters with her.
The _Textbook of History_ entailed a great deal of labour and study,
which must have been a boon to its writer at a time of depression and
uncertainty. Though the scheme of it was no doubt in her mind before she
left Casterton, and the book was probably begun in the summer holidays of
1857, it was not till after Christmas that she was free to devote herself
to it. Then she threw into the work every hour she could justly secure,
striving at the same time not to neglect family claims. The conditions
under which it was done were little short of heroic. In order to secure
freedom from interruption both for herself and her books of reference,
she chose for her study a large empty room, where she worked in the midst
of open volumes spread round her on the floor. It was winter, but she
was glad to avail herself of the difficulty of keeping up a daily fire
at the top of the old City house, in order to give less attraction to
any other members of the household to sit with her and take up time in
conversation. The empty grate by which she wrote lends significance to
an entry in the diary of March 1858: ‘Self-indulgence because of cold.’
The self-denial and concentration of the writer bore early fruit, for
this book, a digest of world-wide histories, was published in August
1858, just after its author had come to Cheltenham. The production of
this textbook is an instance of the way in which Miss Beale would see
and seize an opportunity. There was a real need for such a work. In her
introduction she alludes to objections which could be raised to similar
books then in use, and which were stated in articles which appeared in
the _Times_ of January 1857.
Miss Beale’s reference is doubtless to two letters headed ‘The
Corruption of Popular School Books.’ The first of these, by the noted Dr.
Cumming, appeared on January 17, and dealt with certain changes which had
been made, in a Romish direction, in a widely used textbook of English
history by Henry Ince. A new edition had lately appeared, professing
itself to be much extended and improved, in wide circulation, and
sanctioned by her Majesty’s Committee of the Council of Education. This
edition, pleaded the writer of the _Times_ letter, contained statements
which made it ‘unsuitable for use in Protestant schools.’ Those quoted,
_e.g._ that ‘Queen Elizabeth was a mistress in the art of dissembling,’
do not seem very reprehensible, but enough savour of Papistry had been
introduced into the book to cause the Committee above-mentioned and the
Society of Arts to strike the book off their lists. Dorothea Beale was
quick to see and seize the opportunity thus afforded for a new textbook.
The very large scope of the work, embracing as it does the whole
history of the world since the beginning of the Christian era, with the
history of England given in rather fuller detail than the rest, makes
it imperative that its hundred and seventy closely printed pages should
be rather dry. The _Textbook_ is intended for the teacher rather than
the pupil; highly useful in its arrangement of facts, and names, and
suggestions of ideas, but not in itself a complete lesson-book. Its
clearness and fulness are not more characteristic of the writer than the
dramatic instinct which led her to give such names, titles, and short
quotations as tend at once to fix a fact in the memory, and to conjure up
visions of the conditions under which such and such events took place.
Miss Beale had a remarkable quickness in seizing on the important matter
and stating it in a few telling words. It is interesting to take at
haphazard her history of any century, and mark what a wealth of interest
rather than of information is brought together in a few short pages to
stimulate the reader’s thirst for knowledge. But it is sufficient to
point out the titles chosen for the centuries, as showing what seemed to
her of greatest importance to the progress of mankind.[26]
The book is completed with an account of the English Constitution and
some genealogical tables. It reached a seventh edition, but Miss Beale
was disinclined to bring it up to quite modern times, doubtless because
she felt there are now other books to cover the ground as well or better
than her own. Consequently the nineteenth century is left uncompleted.
The book, however, played a useful part at a time when the teaching of
history was very imperfect, and was well received by those who knew its
author. ‘The plan of the book,’ wrote Mr. Plumptre, ‘seems to me very
good, and I cannot doubt that you have carried into the details the same
painstaking accuracy with which we used to be familiar in your work with
us.’
Mr. Mackenzie, at the writer’s request, made an elaborate criticism, from
which it is enough to quote his ‘_chief_ complaint’: ‘Your unfairness to
your own sex, and your willingness to believe and repeat the calumnies
uttered against them by male writers, a fault to which the old monks were
especially prone; but they were not quite silent, as you are, upon the
virtues of the royal and noble Anglo-Saxon ladies, who did so much, even
in the darkest ages, towards educating and refining the barbarous people
by whom they were surrounded.’
Mr. Beale mentioned it more than once in his letters to the daughter in
whose talent he had such pride: ‘The success of your little book is
very encouraging. E. says they call it “Beale’s Ince.” ... I dined at
the Adams’ last week, a doctor’s party. Dr. Daldy was loud in praise of
the _Textbook_.’ And again, ‘Underneath D. Beale in my own copy I have
written “sed summa sequar festigia rerum.”’ And to the end it was a
source of satisfaction to the writer herself. ‘You could not have done so
well without my _Textbook_, could you?’ she said to an old pupil whose
Histories for Schools have been widely accepted.
The third work of this period was a little book entitled
_Self-Examination_. This was chiefly designed for schools, and was edited
by Mr. Denton, the vicar of St. Bartholomew’s, Moor Lane. This book,
too, written when books of devotion were far less common than they are
now, and in order to supply a real need of schoolgirls, has been long
superseded by others, but in many cases the works for which it has been
put on one side are less thoughtful and penetrating. The questions and
meditations are arranged round the subjects of ‘My Duty towards God, and
my Duty towards my Neighbour,’ and with the comment of verses from the
Bible are presented in that tabular form which Miss Beale loved.[27]
The actual questions for self-examination are throughout slight and
few in proportion to what is suggested by the Scripture texts and the
meditations; the reason doubtless being to make the reader think for
herself.
This little work brings us face to face with that religion which all her
life long was the motive power of Dorothea’s life. Deep religious feeling
was no phase nor change of thought which came to her with years or
experience. It was not wrought for her in the furnace of sorrow, though
many times there renewed and purified. It was so much the dominating
force of her mind and life, that, by which every day as every year she
was controlled and inspired, that it may be reverently regarded as a
special gift to one called to a great service. ‘I cannot,’ she wrote,
‘look back upon the time when God was not a present Friend. I would throw
myself on my knees in trouble, and He gave of His compassion. How (as a
child) I used to follow the service and wish it were possible to think of
what God was;—to think of Him as mere Light was the nearest approach.’
And as an old woman—despite the love of friends, and her well-deserved
honours, often alone and sick and weary—she wrote, ‘The Lord is my
Light.’ But the religion of Dorothea Beale was far indeed from being a
mere succession of beautiful and comforting thoughts. It meant authority.
It involved all the difficulties of daily obedience, it meant the fatigue
of watching, the pains of battle, sometimes the humiliation of defeat.
Intense as was her feeling on religious subjects, it was never permitted
to go off in steam, as she would term it, but became at once a practical
matter for everyday life. Sorrow and regret for sin and mistakes passed
into fresh effort against them; the perception of a beautiful thought or
idea became a new motive for definite acts of charity and diligence. With
regard to such a religious life as hers, the mind dwelling habitually in
a region which is beyond controversy, it seems like a descent to a lower
plane to speak of religious _opinions_. Yet no approximately true history
of her can be related without reference to these. Even if there were no
record of it as there is, it is obvious that one at once so large-minded
and clear-headed, whose life displayed so much organisation and
arrangement, must have definitely faced the great problems of eternity,
must have listened to every appeal of Christianity, and with her own
eyes have looked up each avenue of thought which promised an approach
to Truth. And this she undoubtedly did. But in the knowledge of Divine
things, as in that which she would scarcely permit to be called secular,
her faithfulness and simple obedience to early teaching directed her mind
to certain religious duties and opinions from which she never parted: ‘If
any man will do His will he shall know of the doctrine,’ is a text she
was fond of quoting to her Scripture classes. She lived to realise it.
Very early and continuously she ruled her life by the commandments of the
Lord, and when storms arose, when winds and floods of doubt threatened
ruin, when she was herself ready to cry, ‘All is gone,’ the foundations
of the house of faith were yet secure, and thereon love rebuilt.
And so it may be truly said that the framework of her personal religion
was in age what it had been in youth. She had her own distinctly outlined
path to which she had been guided early by such friends as her father
and Mr. Mackenzie. This has been sometimes lost sight of, possibly owing
to her deep sympathy and interest in matters of doubt and difficulty.
When any of her children turned to her in distress of this nature, she
felt, more than at any other time, the yearning of a mother’s heart, and
was fearful of saying any word or even of showing any opinion of her own
which might alarm or seal up confidence. Hence people of widely different
views wished to claim her as of their own way of thinking when often
she was not. She did not think it of paramount importance when speaking
to the unorthodox, or even to the agnostic, to state her own beliefs
precisely. She did not seek to proselytise but to help, to remove, as
far as power was given her, all hindrances to the light, to persuade
those who were in darkness still to obey. But she knew that she could not
make any _see_; she recognised faith as the gift of God.
Miles Beale was a Churchman of the type known best by its nickname ‘High
and Dry.’ His daughters were still quite young when they found this
was a school to which not all the world belonged, and they began to
appreciate religious differences. They heard, between St. Helen’s and St.
Bartholomew’s, preachers of varying shades of thought. Mr. Mackenzie was
succeeded at St. Helen’s by an incumbent of evangelical views. Some of
Mr. Denton’s curates at St. Bartholomew’s went over to Rome; one became
Father Ignatius.
Dorothea was only sixteen when her father wrote to her on the subject of
the Hampden-Gorham dispute, as of a matter she well understood and found
interesting. And this recalls the fact that religious controversy of
that day raged specially round the question of Baptismal Regeneration.
A letter written to the Council of the Ladies’ College after her
appointment[28] shows how clearly and concisely, and without reference
to books, Miss Beale could state her opinions. It deals with her views
of the Sacraments, marking her religious position at the time and
indeed to the end;—it was for her Prayer-book that she asked in the one
clear moment of the last unconsciousness. This letter contains a bare,
unemotional statement of belief, to which may well be added this: that
while she held firmly the doctrine of ‘Two only, as generally necessary
to salvation,’ the life of grace through the Sacraments was the power
by which she lived. She recognised herself as fortunate in her special
heritage of Christian thought, writing of it thus:—
‘It was a time of great religious revival: the bald services
of my childhood were beginning to develop into the musical
services of our own time.... The beautiful music of to-day
is not more dear to me than those plain services with often
grotesque accompaniments where I learned to see Heaven opened.
Miss Sewell’s writings, especially _The Experience of Life_,
helped me in early youth to work out the problems of my daily
life. Religion quickened the intellectual life, for Sacramental
teaching was to the leaders of that movement no narrow
dogmatism, but the discovery of the river of the water of
life flowing through the whole desert of human existence, and
making it rejoice and blossom as the rose, revealing a unity in
creation, a continuity in history, a glory in art, a purpose in
life, making life infinitely worth living.’[29]
When quite young she began the practice of Sunday Communion, and many a
week day found her at the 6 A.M. celebration at St. Bartholomew’s Church.
From first to last her scanty diary records this service among the
leading facts of ordinary life.
In the power thus gained she had ever before her the thought of
co-operation, of working out salvation, of putting on Christ by daily
dying to self by minute watchfulness, and in every sense of the word
painstaking diligence. At a time when the pulpits of Cheltenham were
ringing with statements which seemed to her to misrepresent the great
doctrine of the Atonement, she was speaking to her children of the true
nature of the Redeemer’s Blood, of the living stream flowing from the
Heart through all the members; she was seeking for herself and for them
the righteousness of Christ, not as a mere substitution, but as a real
attainment won by the union of a soul wholly surrendered to the workings
of the grace of God.
This chapter may fitly close with a passage from the diary, which she
appears to have begun to keep for the first time this year, when she
was to some extent forced back upon herself, when she was making her
own scheme of daily work. Begun on Ash Wednesday, February 17, 1858,
it was continued intermittently at least to 1901, when the increasing
infirmities of age made all reading and writing difficult. Sometimes
dropped for many months, it was taken up again as if with the suggestion
of a sense of culpability for neglect. It was never full; never, so far
as outward events are concerned, of any great interest. Some of these,
indeed, as the writing of certain letters, the visits of certain friends,
or business engagements, are just mentioned and no more; doubtless for
the sake of reference only. It remains for us as a revelation of the
keen self-scrutiny with which she, who had to guide and warn others, was
daily searching her own soul. Very often for weeks there is no mention
of anything done, or seen, or thought as far as the matters of this
world are concerned; but she never failed to note what she regarded as
the real life, spiritual growth or the reverse, right or wrong conduct,
faithful or unfaithful performance of religious duties. This diary cannot
be ignored if a true presentment of Dorothea Beale is to be given.
Hence, intimate as it is, enough extracts as may display the persistent
effort of her life are inserted here. They are not consecutive, but
chosen as characteristic and interesting, and showing to some extent the
occupations of the period. Scanty traces indeed of what she was doing
and thinking, they are yet enough to show a little of the anxiety and
conflict of which she wrote in 1901 to Miss Margaret Richardson, in these
words: ‘Once I had an interval of work, and I thought perhaps God would
not give it me again—but after that interval He called me here. I think
now I can see better how I needed that time of comparative quiet and
solitude, and a time to think over my failures, and a time to be more
helpful to my family.’
EXTRACTS FROM DIARY OF 1858
‘_February 17th._—Ash Wednesday. [To] S. M’s. [Applied] for
school at Holloway. Lip-service. Snappish. _Resolution._ [to
strive for more] humility, patience, charity.
‘_February 26th._—Miss Alston came. Idle [meditation] on peace.
To be less anxious.
‘_February 27th._—History for seven hours. Church. Some
idleness.
‘_March 5th._—Went to see Mr. Sankey about boy’s evening
school. To church. History. Many impatient answers to Mama.
‘_March 6th._—History. Aunt E. came. Cross at not getting my
own way. Some idleness. Impatient manner.
‘_March 7th_, Sunday.—Went to H. E. without prayer. Not a
devoted service. Morning prayer nothing but vain thoughts. At
evening Church. Very cross.
‘_April 14th._—History. Elizabeth. Called on Mrs. Blenkarne.
Dined at Chapter House. Idle. Indulgence in reading story at
my time for evening prayer. Unpunctual in morning. Thoughtless
about Mama.
‘_April 20th._—History, 16th Century. Felt terribly cross. O
grant me calmness.
‘_April 22nd._—Went about servants till 11.30. Wrote to Miss
Hyde. Still some tempest within.
‘_June 2nd._—Copying. Dinner party. Eliza at home. Worldly.
‘_June 3rd._—Headache. To Mrs. Northcote’s. [Wrote] preface.
‘_June 4th._—Saw Mrs. Barrett. Copied. Neglected prayer
greatly. Very worldly.
‘_June 7th._—Wrote letters. A terrible blank of worldliness.
Idle.
‘_June 9th._—Wrote to Miss Elwall. Letter from Cheltenham. M.
copied certificates. Worldly. Spoke angrily to A.
‘_June 10th._—Wrote to Cheltenham. Saxon Exhibition. Selfish
and worldly.
‘_June 13th._—S. Bartholomew’s twice. H. E. Inattentive twice.
Unkind thoughts and words.
‘_June 14th._—Letter to go to Cheltenham.
‘_June 16th._—Elected.’