“O Lord, many wonders hast thou shown me; thy ways of dealing with me and mine have not been common; add this wonder to the rest:  call, convert, regenerate, and establish a sailor in the faith.  Lord, all things are possible with thee:  glorify thy Son, and extend his kingdom by sea and land; take the prey from the strong.  I roll him over upon thee.  Many friends try to comfort me; miserable comforters are they all.  Thou art the God of consolation; only confirm to me thy gracious word, on which thou causedst me to hope in the day when thou saidst to me, ’Leave thy fatherless children, I will preserve them alive.’  Only let this life be a spiritual life, and I put a blank in thy hand as to all temporal things.  ‘I wait for thy salvation.’  Amen.”

Three months afterwards she learned that a press-gang had boarded the ship in which her son was, and although he was saved from their grasp by a stratagem of the passengers, yet all his effects were taken away from him.  In the following reflections on this event, the anxious mother shows that she would not withdraw the blank she had put into her Redeemer’s hands.

“NEW YORK, August 18, 1791.

“Thus far the Lord hath tried me, and kept me to my choice.  This night I have tidings, through a letter to Dr. Mason, that my son has been seized by the press-gang.  Through God’s help, he escaped; but all his assortment of necessaries that his sisters and I made up with so much care, labor, and expense, they have carried off, and he is once more left naked.  Satan and a corrupt heart unite in tempting me to complain.  Dare I utter a word or harbor a murmuring thought?  Would I withdraw the blank I have put into the Redeemer’s hand?  Has he not hitherto done all things well?  Have not my own afflictions been my greatest blessings?  Have not I asked for my children their mother’s portion?  Has not God chiefly made use of afflictions as means of hedging me in, and shutting me up to my choice of this portion, as well as showing me that He is a sufficient portion without any other?  When matters have been at the worst with me as to this world, my triumphs in God have been highest, and prospects for eternity brightest.

“Has the Lord given me in some measure victory over the world?  Do its honors, riches, and gaudy splendor appear to me empty and vain, and not worth an anxious thought?  Does provision of food and raiment by the way through this wilderness seem all that is necessary? and is it my wish, as well as form of prayer, that the Lord may give that in kind and degree which he sees fittest for me?  And shall I covet that for my child which I despise for myself?  Alas, Lord, it is because he feeds not on better things, and sometimes I fear he has no better portion.  Still, still foolish.  Was it when I was full, or when in want, that I returned to my heavenly Father?  Do I desire, have I asked and persisted in asking for my children, salvation from sin and self?  Do I anxiously wish them to reach and to surpass my present measure of submission and resignation to thy will—­to enjoy God in all things, and nothing without him?  And shall I, dare I complain when I see the Lord making use of the same means which first brought me to myself, and recovered me also from numberless backslidings since I first tasted the blessedness of his chosen?