My Search

My awakening had come in earnest. I was then about sixteen and a half, and from that time onward, my soul thirsted to make myself worthy of the glorious destiny of which I felt I had caught a glimpse. Even deeper than this was the longing to become acquainted with the God who had created the unimaginable wonders I had been reading about. I have no recollection of feeling any particular trouble about my sins; it was the magnificence of God that had enthralled me. I felt that the grandest thing in life would be to come to know Him. And so, then and there, my search began. But alas — what a blind, ignorant search it was at first.

My only confidante was my friend Anna. Not for the world would I have said anything on the subject to my parents. Their Quaker habits of reserve on all matters of religion made it seem impossible. But to my friend, after that day of awakening, I poured out my heart in a long letter full of aspirations and yearnings. In my diary, I have a copy of her reply, with these comments: “Anna wrote me a little note in reply to my letter. Never have I received one that thrilled me more deeply than that! She begged me to give up all to my Saviour, to pray for strength, and to strive earnestly after holiness, no matter what it cost me. ‘Oh , dearest Hannah,’ she said, ‘do let us try. Let us seek to journey together toward His glorious kingdom! Let us struggle for a portion of Hi s spirit.’

“Oh, that I could follow her advice! I sat here alone in my study and tried to feel as if I could give up all. But I could not. I could not even feel repentance for the many, many sins I have committed, and far worse than all, I could not feel as though I truly loved God. It is dreadful.

What shall I do? I must repent; I must love my Heavenly Father, or I shall be eternally ruined.

But I cannot do it on my own. God alone can help me, and I know not how to pray. Oh, what shall I do? Where shall I go? It is said, ‘Ask, and ye shall receive.’ But I cannot become really righteous until I repent, and I cannot repent.”

From this time onward, my religious diary is one long record of wrestlings and agonies, with scarcely a ray of light. My friend did her best to help me, but she, like myself, supposed that the only way to find God was to search for Him within. Our Quaker education had taught us always to turn to “the light within” for teaching and guidance, and we believed that only when God revealed Himself there could we truly come to know Him. In an old Quaker tract among my papers called What Shall We Do to Be Saved? , there is a passage that clearly sets forth the kind of teaching with which we had grown up. It reads: “I cannot direct the searcher after truth who is pensively enquiring what he shall do to be saved, to the ministry of any man; but would rather recommend him to the immediate teaching of the word nigh in the heart, even the Spirit of God. This is the only infallible teacher and the primary adequate rule of faith and practice. It will lead those who attend to its dictates into the peaceable paths of safety and truth. ‘Ye need not,’ said the Apostle to the Church formerly, ‘that any man teach you, save as this anointing teacheth, which is trut h and no lie.’”

The natural result of this teaching was to turn our minds inward, upon our feelings and emotions, and to make us judge our relationship with God entirely by what we found within ourselves.

What God had said in the Bible seemed to us far less authoritative than what He might say to us in our own hearts. I have no recollection of ever, even for a moment, turning to the Scriptures for instruction. The “inward voice” was to be our sole teacher— and for me at that time, the inward voice meant only my own feelings and emotions. As there is absolutely nothing more unreliable or unmanageable than one’s inward feelings, it is no wonder that I was plunged into a hopeless struggle.

In vain I tried to work myself up into what I supposed would be feelings acceptable to God. No thought of salvation in any other way ever crossed my mind. I talked about “my Saviour,” as I called Him, but I never imagined for a moment that He could — or would — save me unless I made myself worthy to be saved. And as this worthiness consisted mostly, I believed, of inward pious emotions, I thought only of trying somehow to force these emotions into being. Anyone who has ever tried to do this will know what a weary, hopeless task it is. The records in the diary of my religious life from the age of sixteen onward are a sad illustration of the false methods of religion that were all I knew. As I read them now, I cannot help pitying the eager, hungry soul reaching out so vainly after light but finding only confusion and darkness.

One thing, however, consoles me in this retrospect: none of these religious struggles seems, as far as I remember, to have darkened the skies of my outward happiness. My times for attending to my religious life were in our Quaker meetings, or when I was alone in my study during twilight, or at night after everyone else had gone to bed — and all the tragic records in my diary were written then. Throughout the day, I was generally too happy and too full of outward interests to be troubled by what had taken place in my religious hours. I feel this was a great cause for thankfulness, for if the struggles I endured in our silent meetings or in my hours of meditation had extended into the daytime as well, I do not like to imagine what the consequences might have been.

I believe my diary was my safety valve, for I remember well that after writing there the most tragic and despairing entries, I would somehow feel as though my religious exercises were finished, and would go off to bed quite happily, sleeping the sleep of the ju st without a moment’s wakeful anxiety or worry, and waking the next morning full of the joys of a new day, having forgotten all the miseries I had so despairingly recorded the night before. I recall being occasionally surprised by this easy transition, and I find the following in my diary from this time: “I cannot understand my feelings. Such a hungering and thirsting after righteousness, and yet, except in a few moments of retirement (when I write in my diary), such lightness, gaiety, and indifference. It seems almost wrong to laugh, and yet I indulge in it continually… I know not how God can look upon me, even in pity; I am so wicked. So often have I entered into a covenant to serve Him wholly and entirely, with fervour of spirit; but when the impression of my hours of retirement has faded, and the temptations of the world have assailed me, I have yielded, and have forgotten my high and holy calling through fear of the world’s dread laugh, and through the love of sin. Oh that I could do otherwise! The mercy of God will some day be exhausted —and where shall I be then? I dare not think.”

I can see now that it was, as I have said, my salvation from an utterly morbid and false sort of religion that my naturally happy and joyous temperament continually delivered me out of its snares — even though at the time this seemed wicked to me. How morbid and false all my ideas of religion were during this period a few further extracts from my diary will reveal.

Diary: “Oh, it is a sorrowful thought that upon myself depends th e salvation of my soul, and yet I can do absolutely nothing! Wherever I turn, all looks dark and gloomy. Oh, I must renew my efforts… Oh, that I could repent! But I cannot. I know it is wrong; I dread the anger of God; but I cannot feel what I know true repentance to be. Oh, that I could! I almost wish I could be as indifferent as I once was — could forget all that I have felt — for it seems impossible for me ever to be a Christian… “This afternoon in meeting, I was favored to feel, more perhaps than ever before, the spirit of supplication. My exercise was so great that I could scarcely sit still. My head throbbed painfully, and my heart felt as though it would break with the agony. Oh, how awful to feel that I have no power of myself even to think a holy thought, and yet I must gain the salvation of my soul! I cannot repent; I cannot love my Savior; and I do not believe I ever will. What —what shall I do?”

Three months after my awakening I wrote: Diary: “It has been more than three months since I began in ea rnest to seek the salvation of my soul, and I have not advanced one step. Could I have seen then all that was before me, I would have given up in despair. I would have thought it impossible to wait, and pray, and struggle for three months — and gain nothing. Now I look forward to many, many more months of prayer and struggling and waiting, with a fear — almost a certainty — that all of that, too, will be in vain.

“If there were only some outward work, entirely distinct from the inward change that is necessary — something to be done, not something merely to be prayed for — a cutting off of a hand or a foot, or some self-inflicted austerity — then perhaps I might become a Christian, for such things I could do. But the inward change I cannot effect, and yet I am accountable if it is not effected. Accountable for not doing what I cannot do! It is a dreadful thought.

“I feel as if I were seated, sick and weary, at the base of a high and inaccessible mountain peak whose summit I must reach — alone, and in the darkness of night. Oh, Heavenly Father, wilt Thou not enable me to be faithful, to strive earnestly, and to endure to the end?… “I am so ignorant and inexperienced that I am almost afraid to do anything. There are many, many things I long to inquire about, but whom shall I ask? I cannot speak to my parents until I know for certain that I am accepted; I love them too dearly to cause them the anguish of seeing me give up in despair. My dear friend Anna says she is not a Christian, and she dares not counsel or comfort me. And there is no one. Alone, I must bear all my burdens! Alone, I must seek the entrance to the straight and narrow way! Alone, I must work out my soul’s salvation. And I can of myself do nothing. Oh, what shall I do?”

As an illustration of the sort of teaching I was receiving at this time, the following entry is valuable: Diary: “Went to Twelfth Street Meeting this morning, where I was favored to have a few moments of real prayer. But my discouragement was very great, so that I could scarcely avoid crying aloud for help; and in my despair, I besought my Father in Heaven, if it seemed good unto Him, to put a few words of encouragement into the mouth of one of His servants.

“My prayer was answered. Almost immediately Samuel Bettle rose and spoke in a manner remarkably applicable to me, bidding the poor and needy — though now they might seem to be in the depths of tribulation, in darkness seeing no light, and thirsty yet finding no water — to put their trust in the Lord Jesus and patiently abide His time; and they would be filled with the light of His Holy Spirit, and fountains of living wate r would flow from them freely.”

Of what it meant to put one’s trust in Jesus, I had not the faintest conception, and I do not remember giving it a moment’s thought. But to patiently abide God’s time seemed something I could understand, and I went home from the meeting that day with a weary sense of an interminable waiting for the light of the Holy Spirit to shine in my heart and give me the longed- for joy and peace.

And so day after day went by in a hopeless watching of my feelings and emotions, which I could never bring up to the right pitch of fervor; and my unrest and darkness of spirit only grew more and more despairing.

One final extract from my diary will suffice: Diary: “Third Month 1, 1849. Very sad. The fear that this longing for salvation may be all a delusion attends me always, and everything is so completely veiled in gloom that I can scarcely take a single step. It seems to me that I cannot bear this state much longer. But oh Father! Thy will, not mine, be done.”