me to say that amidst our bereaving sorrows we have the comfort of beholding this saint put into the rightful possession of that happiness of living desir’d and dying lamented.  She liv’d commendably four and fifty years with her dear husband, and my dear father:  and she could not well brook the being divided from him at her death; which is the cause of our taking leave of her in this place.  She was a true and constant lover of God’s Word, worship and saints:  and she always with a patient cheerfulness, submitted to the divine decree of providing bread for her self and others in the sweat of her brows.  And now ... my honored and beloved Friends and Neighbors!  My dear mother never thought much of doing the most frequent and homely offices of love for me:  and lavished away many thousands of words upon me, before I could return one word in answer:  And therefore I ask and hope that none will be offended that I have now ventured to speak one word in her behalf; when she herself has now become speechless."[100]

How many are the tributes to those “mothers in Israel”!  Hear this unusual one to Jane Turell:  “As a wife she was dutiful, prudent and diligent, not only content but joyful in her circumstances.  She submitted as is fit in the Lord, looked well to the ways of her household....  She respected all her friends and relatives, and spake of them with honor, and never forgot either their counsels or their kindnesses....  I may not forget to mention the strong and constant guard she placed on the door of her lips.  Whoever heard her call an ill name? or detract from anybody?"[101]

And, again, note the tone of this message to Alexander Hamilton from his father-in-law, General Philip Schuyler, after the death of Mrs. Schuyler:  “My trial has been severe....  But after giving and receiving for nearly half a century a series of mutual evidences of affection and friendship which increased as we advanced in life, the shock was great and sensibly felt, to be thus suddenly deprived of a beloved wife, the mother of my children, and the soothing companion of my declining years.”

The words of President Dirkland of Harvard upon the death of Mrs. Adams, show how deeply women had come to influence the life of New England by the time of the Revolution.  His address was a sincere tribute not only to this remarkable mother but to the thousands of unknown mothers who reared their families through those days of distress and death:  “Ye will cease to mourn bereaved friends....  You do then bless the Giver of life, that the course of your endeared and honored friend was so long and so bright; that she entered so fully into the spirit of those injunctions which we have explained, and was a minister of blessings to all within her influence.  You are soothed to reflect, that she was sensible of the many tokens of divine goodness which marked her lot; that she received the good of her existence with a cheerful and grateful heart; that, when called to weep, she bore adversity with an equal mind; that she used the world as not abusing it to excess, improving well her time, talents, and opportunities, and, though desired longer in this world, was fitted for a better happiness than this world can give."[102]