By the martyrs’ toils and sufferings,
      By their patience, zeal, and love;
    By the promise of the Mighty,
      Bending from His throne above;
    By the last command so precious,
      Issued by the risen God;
    Christians!  Christians! come and help us,
      Ere we lie beneath the sod!”

Sarah, from her earliest years took great delight in reading.  At four years, says her brother, she could read readily in any common book.  Her rank in her classes in school was always high, and her teachers felt a pleasure in instructing her.  On one occasion, when about thirteen, she was compelled to signify to the principal of a female seminary, that her circumstances would no longer permit her to enjoy its advantages.  The teacher, unwilling to lose a pupil who was an honor to the school, and who so highly appreciated its privileges, remonstrated with her upon her intention, and finally prevailed on her to remain.  Soon after she commenced instructing a class of small children, and was thus enabled to keep her situation in the seminary, without sacrificing her feelings of independence.

Her earliest journals, fragmentary as they are, disclose a zeal and ardor in self-improvement exceedingly unusual.  “My mother cannot spare me to attend school this winter, but I have begun to pursue my studies at home.”  Again:  “My parents are not in a situation to send me to school this summer, so I must make every exertion in my power to improve at home.”  Again, in a note to a little friend, “I feel very anxious to adopt some plan for our mutual improvement.”  How touching are these simple expressions!  How severely do they rebuke the apathy of thousands of young persons, who allow golden opportunities of improvement to slip away from then forever—­opportunities which to Sarah Hall and such as she, were of priceless value!  Yet it is not one of the least of the compensations with which the providence of God abounds, that the very lack of favorable circumstances is sometimes most favorable to the development of latent resources.  Thus it was with Sarah.  Her whole career shows that her mind had been early trained and disciplined in that noblest of all schools, the school of adverse fortune.

CHAPTER II.

CONVERSION.—­BIAS TOWARD A MISSIONARY LIFE.—­ACQUAINTANCE WITH MR. BOARDMAN.

Amiable as she was, and conscientious in a degree not usual, Sarah knew that “yet one thing she lacked;” and this knowledge often disquieted her.  But her first deep and decided convictions of sin, seem to have been produced, about the year 1820, under the preaching of Mr. Cornelius.  Her struggles of mind were fearful, and she sunk almost to the verge of despair; but hope dawned at last, and she was enabled to consecrate her whole being to the service of her Maker.  She soon after united with the first Baptist church in Salem, under the care of Dr. Bolles.