wrote in her journal:--

'Father, let me not injure my fellows during this period of
repression. I feel that when we meet my tones are not so sweet
as I would have them. O, let me not wound! I, who know so well
how wounds can burn and ache, should not inflict them. Let my
touch be light and gentle. Let me keep myself uninvaded, but
let me not fail to be kind and tender, when need is. Yet I
would not assume an overstrained poetic magnanimity. Help
me to do just right, and no more. O, make truth profound and
simple in me!'

Again:--

'The heart bleeds,--faith almost gives way, to see man's
seventy years of chrysalis. Is it not too long? Enthusiasm
must struggle fiercely to burn clear amid these fogs. In what
little, low, dark cells of care and prejudice, without
one soaring thought or melodious fancy, do poor
mortals--well-intentioned enough, and with religious
aspiration too--forever creep. And yet the sun sets to-day as
gloriously bright as ever it did on the temples of Athens, and
the evening star rises as heavenly pure as it rose on the
eye of Dante. O, Father! help me to free my fellows from the
conventional bonds whereby their sight is holden. By purity
and freedom let me teach them justice.'

And yet again:--

'There comes a consciousness that I have no real hold on
life,--no real, permanent connection with any soul. I seem a
wandering Intelligence, driven from spot to spot, that I may
learn all secrets, and fulfil a circle of knowledge. This
thought envelopes me as a cold atmosphere. I 'do not see how I
shall go through this destiny. I can, if it is mine; but I do
not feel that I can.'

Casual observers mistook Margaret's lofty idealism for personal pride;
but thus speaks one who really knew her:--"You come like one of the
great powers of nature, harmonizing with all beauty of the soul or
of the earth. You cannot be discordant with anything that is true and
deep. I thank God for the noble privilege of being recognized by so
large, tender, and radiant a soul as thine."

EUROPE.

LETTERS

"I go to prove my soul.
I see my way, as birds their trackless way.
In some time, God's good time, I shall arrive
He guides me and the bird. In his good time!"

BROWNING.

"One, who, if He be called upon to face
Some awful moment, to which Heaven has joined
Great issues