Have not many of us, in the weary way of life, felt, in some hours, how far easier it were to die than to live?
The martyr, when faced even by a death of bodily anguish and horror, finds in the very terror of his doom a strong stimulant and tonic. There is a vivid excitement, a thrill and fervor, which may carry through any crisis of suffering that is the birth-hour of eternal glory and rest.
But to live,””to wear on, day after day, of mean, bitter, low, harassing servitude, every nerve dampened and depressed, every power of feeling gradually smothered,””this long and wasting heart-martyrdom, this slow, daily bleeding away of the inward life, drop by drop, hour after hour,””this is the true searching test of what there may be in man or woman.
When Tom stood face to face with his persecutor, and heard his threats, and thought in his very soul that his hour was come, his heart swelled bravely in him, and he thought he could bear torture and fire, bear anything, with the vision of Jesus and heaven but just a step beyond; but, when he was gone, and the present excitement passed off, came back the pain of his bruised and weary limbs,””came back the sense of his utterly degraded, hopeless, forlorn estate; and the day passed wearily enough.
Long before his wounds were healed, Legree insisted that he should be put to the regular field-work; and then came day after day of pain and weariness, aggravated by every kind of injustice and indignity that the ill-will of a mean and malicious mind could devise. Whoever, in our circumstances, has made trial of pain, even with all the alleviations which, for us, usually attend it, must know the irritation that comes with it. Tom no longer wondered at the habitual surliness of his associates; nay, he found the placid, sunny temper, which had been the habitude of his life, broken in on, and sorely strained, by the inroads of the same thing. He had flattered himself on leisure to read his Bible; but there was no such thing as leisure there. In the height of the season, Legree did not hesitate to press all his hands through, Sundays and week-days alike. Why shouldn’t he?””he made more cotton by it, and gained his wager; and if it wore out a few more hands, he could buy better ones. At first, Tom used to read a verse or two of his Bible, by the flicker of the fire, after he had returned from his daily toil; but, after the cruel treatment he received, he used to come home so exhausted, that his head swam and his eyes failed when he tried to read; and he was fain to stretch himself down, with the others, in utter exhaustion.
Is it strange that the religious peace and trust, which had upborne him hitherto, should give way to tossings of soul and despondent darkness? The gloomiest problem of this mysterious life was constantly before his eyes,””souls crushed and ruined, evil triumphant, and God silent. It was weeks and months that Tom wrestled, in his own soul, in darkness and sorrow. He thought of Miss Ophelia’s letter to his Kentucky friends, and would pray earnestly that God would send him deliverance. And then he would watch, day after day, in the vague hope of seeing somebody sent to redeem him; and, when nobody came, he would crush back to his soul bitter thoughts,””that it was vain to serve God, that God had forgotten him. He sometimes saw Cassy; and sometimes, when summoned to the house, caught a glimpse of the dejected form of Emmeline, but held very little communion with either; in fact, there was no time for him to commune with anybody.
–Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom’s Cabin
from the you may not know dept–While living in Brunswick in 1850-1851, when her husband Calvin, of the Bowdoin Class of 1824, was teaching theology, [Harriet Beecher] Stowe wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin, one of the most influential novels in American history.
Stowe wrote in her husband’s study in Appleton hall and in the family home on Federal Street, where she hosted Bowdoin students to read and discuss the book before it was published.
Among the students that gathered at her home was Joshua Chamberlain…
http://www.bowdoin.edu/news/archives/1bowdoincampus/008587.shtml
What else you may not know Dept…
Before Mrs. Stowe wrote her book, she was an unmarried teacher living in Cincinnati, OH. When a flu epidemic arose in the area in 1833, at the age of 22, the then Miss Beecher left Cincinnati to visit one of her students who lived in Washington, KY, then a major Kentucky community established in the latter part of the 18th century. It is now a hamlet, and part of our home town, Maysville, KY.
Whilst visiting in Washington, in a home that still stands, HBS witnessed an event common enough for the time and area – the selling of slaves at auction.
“In 1833 Miss Beecher, at the age of 22, was visiting her pupil, Miss Key, in the Marshall Key home. To entertain her one day, Mr. Key took her to the courthouse lawn to see the slaves being sold on the block. She was much distressed and this vivid scene so impressed Harriet Beecher that she never forgot it, and twenty-odd years later she wrote her book, “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” She received the inspiration for her characters, “Uncle Tom” and a “Topsy,” on this visit. Topsy’s real name was Jane who later married Isham Anderson.”
http://www.washingtonky.com/stowe.html
Thank you for that Luke in #2, not sure I remembered it was Kentucky.