Category: Pansy’s Words of Wisdom

Short pearls of wisdom gleaned from Isabella Alden’s books.

Proof of Our Allegiance to Christ

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Isabella was a teacher at heart, and one of the things she enjoyed teaching the most was how to read and study the Bible.

From an early age she developed a life-long habit of reading the Bible every morning, and she encouraged others to do the same. She regularly made notations and shared Bible verses that helped strengthen her daily walk with God, and she shared those notations to inspire her readers to make a study of their own.

One example was “Daily Thoughts,” a monthly list of Bible verses she personally selected, to be read individually, one per day, for an entire year. (You can read “Daily Thoughts” for January by clicking here.)

Her “Daily Thoughts” differed from other Bible devotionals of her time because Isabella didn’t print the actual verse; she only gave the citation, so her readers would have to open their Bibles to read the verses themselves. She did, however, include a brief question or comment about each verse to help her readers better understand it.

Other times, she paired her study of the Bible with an interesting biography, novel or sermon she recently read. For example when her studied I John, 4:1-21, she gave the Bible chapter a title: “The Proof of Our Allegiance to Christ.”

Then, beside individual verses in the chapter, she noted a word or two about how that verse instructed her to act as someone who loved and followed Jesus:

v. 1.           Thoughtfulness
v. 2.           Confession
v. 4.           Victory over error
v. 5.           Unworldliness
v. 6.           Willingness to hear and heed the truth
v. 7.           Love
v. 8.           Love
v. 9.           Our lives
v. 11          Love  
v. 13          Love
v. 14.         The spirit that is in us
v. 15.         Confession
v. 16.         Love
vs. 17, 18 Fearlessness or courage
v. 21          Love

To this she added a beloved quotation from a sermon she had read by Rev. Charles Stanford, and which she felt perfectly summarized I John, chapter 4:

“Jesus asks not that our love should equal his, but resemble his; not that it should be of the same strength, but of the same kind. A pearl of dew will not hold the sun; but it may hold a spark of its light. A child by the sea, trying to catch the waves as they dash in clouds of crystal spray upon the sand, cannot hold the ocean in a tiny shell; but he can hold a drop of the ocean-water.”

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE METHODS ISABELLA USED TO STUDY THE BIBLE?

DO YOU HAVE A FAVORITE WAY TO READ AND STUDY THE BIBLE?

Things Some People Regret

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In 1891 when Isabella Alden was the editor of The Pansy magazine, she took up a very special project on behalf of her readers.

She wrote to several prominent Christian leaders and asked them to share the one thing they wished they had done, or not done, or managed differently in their lives.

Banner that reads "Things Some People Regret" in an old-fashioned Victorian type. Beside the text is a single pink rose.

Quite a few of the replies she received were from well-respected ministers who had regrets about their early Christian life. Here are a few:

“I regret that in my boyhood I did not read the Bible more, and did not memorize a greater number of its most precious promises.”

E. Hez Swem
Pastor, Second Baptist Church, Washington D. C.

Old black and white portrait photograph from about 1890 of a middle-aged man. He is balding and his hair is closely cut. He wears a dark suit with a vest, white shirt with a high collar, and a white bow-tie.
Pastor E. Hez Swem

“My most painful regret in regard to my early life is, that I did not become a member of the Church before my mother died, that she might have carried into eternity the comfortable knowledge of the fact that her only child was on the Lord’s side, a thing she greatly desired. It was simply postponing my public profession; and she died without the sight!”

Charles F. Deems
Pastor of the Church of the Strangers, New York, New York

“There is nothing in my life that I regret so frequently and so deeply, as that I was not a more earnest and active Christian during the years of my college life. A professed Christian when I entered the institution, though without a thought of the ministry of Christ, my life was largely one of spiritual idleness. It was in the future that I hoped to serve my Master. Present opportunities were neglected.”

Rev. Henry Darling, D. D.
President of Hamilton College

Old black and white portrait photograph from about 1890 of an older man. He is clean shaven and his wavy hair is white or grey and arranged neatly. He wears a dark suit with a white shirt and high collar, and a dark bow-tie.
Rev. Henry Darling

Some of the responses were about not making the most about the time they were given:

“I look back over my life and feel as if I had walked like one with a string of priceless pearls in his hand, and the cord had been carelessly broken, and they had slipped off one by one as I walked, and were forever lost. Only the days are so much more precious than pearls!”

J. H. Ecob, D.D.
Pastor Second Presbyterian Church, Albany, New York

“The great regret of my life is my failure to realize the value of life till the larger part of it has slipped away. I have always been what might be called “a busy man,” but the thing which troubles me is, that I have for the most part been busy with trifles, and have trifled so much with life’s real business.”

P. S. Henson
Pastor, Baptist Church, Chicago, Illinois

A few wrote about not recognizing the value of opportunities they let pass:

“I greatly regret an early want of thoroughness. I was too willing, in my early days, to let a hard thing balk me. Such an enemy of early unthoroughness has been in my late days a miserable and plaguing nuisance.”

Rev. Wayland Hoyt
Pastor, Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota

 “I regret having failed to understand the value of such accomplishments as may be gained along with a more substantial education. For instance, I do not know music, so useful to a pastor, as well as so important to a father as an aid to making his home pleasant to his children. I might easily have gotten it in spare hours at any time before entering my profession; but now there are no spare hours! This is only one of several things that I once underestimated, but whose value I now see very clearly.”

Dr. Teunis S. Hamlin
Pastor of President William Henry Harrison
Pastor, Church of the Covenant, Washington, D. C.

Old black and white portrait photograph from about 1890 of a man in his thirties or forties. His hair is closely cut and he wears a neatly trimmed beard and mustache. He wears a dark colored suit with a white shirt and white tie.
Dr. Teunis S. Hamlin

Isabella and her husband were close friends with Rev. George Hays, who wrote the next “regret.” She noted that despite Rev. Hays’ many plans for his life, he was instead “led, as a child, by his Father’s hand.”

“The number of foolish ambitions that entered my head when young was large. The hard work done to fit myself for places from which God’s good providence saved me, is not any part of my regrets. Not one of the positions I wanted did I ever get.”

Rev. George P. Hays, D.D., LL.D.
Pastor Second Presbyterian Church, Kansas City, Missouri

Some “regrets,” like this one, were about showing kindness to others:

“I regret that I have not better acquired the art of pleasantly acknowledging the kindnesses shown me, and of showing my appreciation of people whom I really do appreciate. My influence with many would be greatly increased if I could but make them understand how warmly my heart goes out to them.”

Dr. William J. Beecher
Professor of Hebrew in Auburn Theological Seminary

Old black and white portrait photograph from about 1890 of an older man. His hair is closely cut and he wears a beard, but no mustache. The top button of his suit coat is right below his neck. Beneath it he wears a white shirt with a high collar that covers his neck, and a necktie arranged with a large knot.
Dr. William J. Beecher

Last, but not least, is a letter Isabella received and almost didn’t share, because she didn’t want it to appear she was praising her very own magazine:

“The greatest regret that I have for lost opportunities in my youth is that I did not have the benefit of such magazines as The Pansy. No amount of reading in after years can make up for this serious loss in youth. I feel this so keenly that I seek every opportunity in my lectures and writings to impress upon parents the necessity of feeding the minds as carefully as they are wont to feed the bodies of the young immortals entrusted to their care. So I thank God for The Pansy, which has such a sweet, tender, yet strong way of putting thoughts into the heads and hearts of the young people.”

Helen M. Gougar
Attorney, newspaper journalist, and women’s rights advocate

Old black and white portrait photograph from about 1890 of an older woman. Her hair is white and is styled in a loose arrangement at the top of her head. She wears a dark dress with a high collar that fastens down the front. In between fastenings she has inserted a few flowers.
Helen M. Gougar

There are many adults today who will agree with Mrs. Gougar!

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE REGRETS THESE CHRISTIAN LEADERS SHARED?

WHAT REGRETS WOULD YOU ADD TO THIS LIST?

Why?

Published on by Isabella Alden2 Comments

As a teacher and a parent, Isabella must have often found herself from time to time on the receiving end of a child’s relentless “Why?” questions. She probably understood that asking “Why?” is an important part of a young child’s learning process, and that it’s more than just a question; it’s a peek inside their busy minds, showing their natural drive to understand the world around them.

In many of the articles she wrote for The Pansy magazine, Isabella demonstrated how astute (and patient) she was in answering the many “Why?” questions she received from her young readers.

In 1891 she published this article that addressed children’s “Why?” questions about Easter:

“Why do people use eggs at Easter?”

“Why do they call a certain day in the spring Easter?”

“Why do Easter cards so often have pictures of butterflies on them?”

Let me see if I can answer your questions. Let me begin in the middle: “Why do they call a certain day in the spring ‘Easter’?”

Away back in the days when people had a great deal to do with imaginary “gods” and “goddesses,” there was one named “Ostara,” who was called the goddess of the spring; our fourth month of the year was set apart for her special service, and called “Eostur-monath,” or “Easter month.”

The heathen festivals in honor of Ostara were times of great rejoicing. The people were so glad that the season for the resurrection of flowers and vines and plants had come again, that they built great bonfires, and with wild shouts and many strange customs, showed their joy. They called it the “awaking of nature from the death of winter.”

An old greeting card showing a bird and her nest of four eggs in a cherry blossom tree. The caption reads, "Easter Greeting. May sweet Hope, the hope of Eastertide, In your heart for evermore abide."

After many years it became the custom for Christians to choose the same time of year for their festival in honor of the “awaking of Jesus from the death of sleep.” So that “Easter” today means to Christians the glad day when Jesus Christ arose from the grave.

Illustration of a wooden cross with cherry blossoms twined around it and a butterfly resting on one of the flowers. The caption reads, "He is Risen."

Now for the second question:

“Why do people use eggs at Easter?”

That is an old, old thought handed down to us. When the festival was held entirely in honor of the return of spring, eggs seemed to be used as symbols of life. As from the apparently dead egg life sprang forth, after the mother hen had brooded over it for awhile, so from the apparently dead earth the life of nature started forth anew. This was the thought.

An old greeting card with an illustration of a chick just hatched as it stares down into half of its former egg shell while the other half is on his back.. Nearby are two brightly dyed pink and red Easter eggs and a small bouquet of blue flowers. A caption reads "Easter Greetings."

The Persians used the brightly-colored eggs as New Year presents in honor of the birth of the solar year, which, you know, is in March!

Illustration of a basket of Easter eggs brightly colored in pink, white, yellow and blue. Behind them is a green glass vase holding an arrangement of white daisies with bright yellow centers.

Christian people have held to the same symbol to represent their faith in the life after death. And in this connection I can best answer that third question about “butterflies.”

Did you ever watch a slow-crawling caterpillar with his awkward, woolly body and sluggish ways, and wonder how it was possible that such a creature could change into the brilliant butterfly, whose swift, graceful circlings through the air charm all eyes? If you have, I think you have answered your own question. Where could we find in nature a better symbol of the wonderful difference between these slow-moving, easily stopped, rather troublesome bodies of ours, and the glorious bodies promised us some day?

Illustration of a group of four children frolicking on a grassy hill. Three of the children pick wild flowers while a fourth reaches up to touch one of four butterflies hovering near them. Nearby a white rabbit sits beside some colored Easter eggs and in the background white sheep and lambs feed on the grass. A caption reads "Loving Greetings and best wishes for a Happy Easter."

More than that, when the caterpillar weaves a coffin for himself and shuts himself into silence and immovableness, does it not seem as though his life was ended? Haven’t you had some such thought when you stood beside an open grave? How still and cold and utterly lifeless the body is which is being placed therein. Is it possible that it can live again?

Illustration of three butterflies hovering near a vase of white and pink roses. Beside them a poem reads "Fair Days. Joy fill your heart, and gladness your days, with content never part, through life's varied ways."

“Oh, yes!” says the butterfly. “Look at me; I was a worm, and I crawled away and the children thought me dead. See me now! If God so clothe the worms of the dust, shall he not much more clothe you, O, ye of little faith?”

Almost as plainly as though he had a tongue, the bright-winged butterfly speaks to me.

Illustration showing three butterflies with their orange, yellow, and black wings spread. Beside them reads "He hath made every thing beautiful in his time."

A better emblem than the egg, I think it is, of the wonders of resurrection; but the egg is the universal emblem. Nearly all nations, and all classes of people, think a great deal about Easter eggs, and spend much time in making them beautiful. Isn’t it a grand thought that such simple, every-day objects are able to remind us of the glory which is to come to those who “love His appearing.”

Pansy.

What do you think of Isabella’s answers to the children’s “Why?” questions about Easter?

What is the most memorable “Why?” question a child ever asked you, and how did you answer?

The True Gentleman

Published on by Isabella AldenLeave a comment

Isabella’s primary purpose in writing her stories and novels was to win souls for Christ. But she also wrote to inspire readers to simply be better people.

Illustration of a young man dressed in the clothes worn about the year 1910. He is standing at a desk near a window. He has one hand in his trouser pocket; with his other hand he holds a book open on the top of the desk.

During Isabella Alden’s lifetime, there was no higher compliment you could pay a man than to call him a “gentleman.” So it’s no surprise that the main male characters in Isabella’s stories—young or old, rich or poor—exhibited many of the characteristics that defined a gentleman.

They had strong moral principles. They were courteous and considerate. They had good manners, a desire to learn and understand the world, and they were willing to help and be kind to others.

For Isabella, a gentleman’s character was closely tied to his Christian beliefs. She illustrated that premise in this scene from her novel, Her Associates Members:

As she walked back and forth thinking her troubled thoughts, she heard footsteps approaching, and was surprised to see Uncle Tommy returning.

“Why, Uncle Tommy,” she said, going to the gate to speak to him; “are you coming back? I thought you had started homeward for the night. Have you seen my charge to her own door already?”

“No, I didn’t see her to the door, ma’am; she met with someone whose company suited her better than mine, and said I need not trouble further, though it would have been no trouble at all, of course.”

“Met someone? Did she meet a friend?”

“Aye, and he turned and walked with her, and seemed glad of the chance, and she likewise, or at least willing; so there was nothing for me to do but turn and leave them.”

“A gentleman was it, Uncle Tommy?”

Illustration of a young man dressed in clothing from about the year 1910. He stands outside with one hand in his trouser pocket and the other holding a Bible. Behind him is a church with a tall steeple.

“Aye, at least that is what he calls himself. I make no doubt there might be two opinions about that.”

 “What is a gentleman?” she asked, more for the purpose of seeming to be friendly with the old man, than because she was interested in his reply.

“Well,” said Uncle Tommy, straightening himself in the moonlight, “there might be different opinions about it; looking on at folks, I’ve no kind of doubt that there are; but if you ask for my views, why, according to my way of thinking, there is only one kind of true gentleman, and that is a man who is keeping to the road He traveled, just as near as he can.”

Not only did Isabella write about gentlemanly behavior, she also shared other authors’ writings that touched on the subject. In one of the magazines she edited, Isabella published this brief essay:

Banner showing a gentleman's top hat and cane with the words "The True Gentleman" printed across the top.
The true gentleman is the man whose conduct proceeds from good will and an acute sense of propriety, and whose self-control is equal to emergencies; 

. . . who does not make the poor man conscious of his poverty, the obscure man of his obscurity, or any man of his inferiority or deformity;
. . . who does not flatter wealth, cringe before power, or boast of his own possessions or achievements;
. . . who speaks with frankness, but always with sincerity and sympathy, and whose deed follows his word;
. . . who thinks of the rights and feelings of others rather than of his own;
. . . who appears well in any company, and who is the same at home what he seems to be abroad;
. . . a man with whom honor is sacred and virtue is safe.

—John Walter Wayland

In today’s world of social media, movies, and television shows that encourage people to behave badly, it’s sometimes difficult to remember there was once a time when honor, honesty and kindness were admired traits. Thankfully, we have Isabella’s stories and novels to remind us of those days.

Do you know someone you would consider a “true gentleman”?

Do you think that being a gentleman has gone out of style?

The Domestic Problem

Published on by Isabella Alden4 Comments

Isabella Alden believed that young Christian women who must earn a living would—for the most part—be better off doing so by hiring themselves out as domestic helpers in Christian homes, rather than taking jobs in factories or stores.

Illustration of a young woman about 1910 wearing a long-sleeved, floor-length dress over which is an apron. In one hand she holds a canned grocery item. With her other hand she gestures toward a large, ornately-decorated cast-iron stove. Beside her is a kitchen work table holding a jar, a bowl, a bucket, a spoon and glass.

She used that idea as the premise for her short story “Their Providence” (which you can read for free by clicking here).

Isabella believed a Christian home offered a safer living environment for a single young woman; and that she would be protected from the coarse worldly influences she would find if she lived in a boarding house.

Illustration of a young girl from about 1910. She wears her brown hair up in a loose bun with a large black bow. Her floor-length dress is black with a white collar, cuffs, and a white lace-trimmed apron.

She also believed that living with a Christian family would reinforce the beliefs and principles Christian girls grew up with, such as keeping the Sabbath holy, regularly attending church, having daily Bible readings, and engaging in mission work.

Isabella knew the arrangement could be problematic. In her novel Ester Ried’s Namesake she wrote about a head-strong, quick-tempered young heroine who was hired as a live-in domestic helper for a Christian family that often treated her very poorly. But in true “Pansy” fashion, the characters in her novel eventually recognized their shortcomings and, with God’s help, learned to forgive and influence each other for good.

Illustration of a woman about 1900 wearing a high-necked, long-sleeved shirt and a brown skirt, over which is a white apron. In one hand she holds a recipe book; in the other she holds a pan of backed bread. Behind her another woman wearing a servant's cap pours a liquid from a saucepan into bowls placed on a table. Behind them is a large cast-iron stove. On top of the stove is a kettle with steam coming from its spout.

She also shared her idea of young women working as domestic help in some of her speaking engagements and in magazine articles she wrote.

But the concept was not always a welcome one. In 1911 Isabella received a letter from a young woman in Ohio who disagreed with Isabella’s advice.

I have recently read, in a paper or yours, a remark about “lovely Christian homes” where self-respecting girls could earn their living as helpers. I wonder if you really have any idea how these “lovely” people treat their hirelings? I think you had in mind the comfort of your well-to-do friends, rather than the girls whom you advised.

When you talk about girls finding good “homes” I don’t think you stop to consider both sides. What does “home” mean, if not a place where one has entire freedom to come and go, to plan one’s work, and work one’s plans?

I cannot see how any self-respecting person who has always had her own home could live as a hireling in other people’s homes. Could you? My observation has shown me that a condescending manner is the very best that even “lovely Christian people” have for their domestic helpers.

—Ohio.

Isabella had heard such criticisms before, some of which were “kind and sensible” and others “supercilious and snappy.” Here’s how she responded to the letter writer from Ohio:

“Notwithstanding the letter writer’s opinion, I believe I had in mind the comfort of both employer and employed when I urged self-respecting girls who had their living to earn to choose an average Christian home in which to earn it, in preference to factories, shops, and other public places. You, my dear girls, who have written to me, are starting this argument from the wrong platform.

“The foundation question is not, “How shall I secure me a home where I can have entire freedom to come and go, to plan my own work, etc.” but, “Is doing housework in other people’s homes a good and respectable way for a young woman to earn her living, and can she in this way hope to secure the reasonable conveniences and comforts of a home?”

“To this question I reply with an unhesitating Yes.

Illustration of a young woman about 1895. She wears a black dress with a high collar and puffed sleeves, and a white apron. She is pouring liquid from a copper pan into a soup tureen that rests on a kitchen table beside a variety of vegetables.

“The only—or almost the only—work open to women in which careful previous training is not demanded, nor even expected, is domestic service. Here the demand has been so much greater than the supply that absolutely untrained and ignorant help has rushed in and created the conditions that now exist.

“The attitude of the average employer toward her servant is endurance: she is unable to commend her work, she can only tolerate it. She has learned to conduct herself accordingly; and the multitude of decently educated, reasonably well brought up American girls who cannot be artists nor teachers nor stenographers, but must, nevertheless, earn their living, have, because of the above state of things, given this form of work a wide berth and rushed into shops and offices and factories, instead.

Illustration of a young woman from about 1895, wearing a green dress with large puffed sleeves. The skirt is floor length and over the skirt she wears a white apron tied around her waise.

“Now, let us look for a moment at one of the exceptions:

“She is an American girl with a partial high school education. She planned to be a teacher, but something happened. Illness, or sudden reverses, or unexpected demands, have made it necessary for her to become an immediate wage-earner. Times are hard and openings few; as a last resort she resolves upon trying domestic service, with every nerve in her body shrinking from the ordeal, because of what she has heard and seen and fancied.

Illustration of a young woman bending over the railing of a staircase. In one hand she holds a bar of soap. In the other hand she holds a cloth she uses to clean the spindles and post of the staircase.

“The woman who employs her (knowing she lacks previous training or recommendations) does so because she is in straits and must have somebody right away. All she knows about the applicant is that she looks “uppish” and as though she would feel above her work; which is precisely what the girl does feel. She is all ready to have her worst fears confirmed, and they are confirmed. She finds a thousand things to flush her cheeks with indignation.

“She resents the “orders” given out by the hurried and worried mistress who yet is not mistress of herself. She resents the poorly furnished room, the solitary meals at the section table, the eternal use of her given name. These and a dozen other grievances keep her in a constant state of irritation and resentment. She cannot do even her best—and none know better than she that, because of the lack of training, her best is not very good, for she is too much tried to give real heart to her work.

Illustration of woman holding a bottle of furniture polish in one hand. In her other hand she uses a cloth to polish the top of a dining table.

“What wonder that, after a short trial, the exasperated mistress and the equally exasperated maid separate, the one to be more convinced than ever that the word “help” as applied to the kitchen is a misnomer, and the other to write letters to someone to prove the impossibility of self-respecting girls earning their living in domestic service?

“For the sake of my correspondent who thinks I am theorizing and do not understand the situation, I want to explain that I have been a housekeeper for forty-five years; that I have been studying this problem carefully in my own home and the homes of certain of my friends for more than a quarter century; that I have known intimately all sorts of “hired girls,” and have helped a few of them to experiment in all sorts of homes.

“I have had the would-be fine lady who was an intolerable nuisance; I was glad when I saw her depart, and endured with what patience I could the unkind and untrue things she said about me; though I really believe they were true from her standpoint; she had so warped a view of the whole situation that she was incapable of even listening correctly.

Illustration of young woman wearing a white apron over an orange dress, and a white dusting cap with an orange bow over her hair. She holds a large feather duster.

“I have had all grades between, and I have had the real lady who came into my kitchen in appropriate dress and with quiet voice and quiet ways, and submitted to the regulation that obtained—many of which must have been new and trying to her—without the raising of an eyebrow to hint that she had all her life been used to different things.

“She came to me without flourish of trumpets, as an ordinary domestic servant at common wages; and when she left me after a year of invaluable helpfulness, it was as a tried and trusted friend, whom every member of my family not only respected, but enjoyed; and whom, as the years pass, we are glad to count as one held close in the bonds of friendship.

Illustration of smiling young woman wearing an apron and carrying a tray on which are glasses of juice and three plates of desserts.

“Nor was she the only “lady” help I have personally enjoyed. Glancing back over the almost half century, I find that five of them stand out in bold relief; strong friends, faithful friends, my “servants” still, in the same sense that I am theirs; and all of us trying to pattern after Him who said, “I am among you as he that serveth.”

“My correspondent asks if I “could live as a hireling in other people’s houses?” To which I reply, I do not know; I have never had the opportunity of trying myself in this way. It would all depend upon whether I was strong souled and resolute and sweet-spirited enough to brave present conditions and help to make them better.

“Yours for service,
“Pansy.”

What do you think of Isabella’s idea?

Do you think you could ever “live as a hireling in other people’s houses?”

You can read Isabella’s short story “Their Providence” for free by clicking here.

Read Isabella’s novel, Ester Ried’s Namesake by clicking here.

Pansy’s Best Advice Giveaway

Published on by Isabella Alden4 Comments

In past blog posts we’ve share some of Isabella’s advice columns that appeared in Christian magazines in the early 1900s. Sometimes humorous, sometimes serious, but always straightforward, Isabella answered reader questions on a variety of topics, from unwanted marriage proposals to a fear of praying in public.

Cathy and Elaine—two longtime readers of this blog—mentioned they would love to be able to have a booklet that contained all of Isabella’s advice columns.

What a great idea!

Thanks to Cathy and Elaine, today’s giveaway is an e-book collection of Isabella’s most popular bits of advice.

Book cover for Pansy's Advice to Readers. Image of a blue teacup and saucer filled with purple and yellow pansies and butterflies against a pink polka-dot background.

You can read Pansy’s Advice to Readers for free!

Choose the reading option you like best:

You can read the e-book on your computer, phone, tablet, Kindle, or other electronic device. Just click here to download your preferred format from BookFunnel.com.

Or you can select BookFunnel’s “My Computer” option to receive an email with a version you can read, print, and share with friends.

This post is part of our 10-Year Blogiversary Celebration! Join us every weekday in September for a fun drawing, giveaway, or Free Read!

We're 10! It's our Blogiversary Celebration! IsabellaAlden.com. September 2023. Join Us!

A Scolding Mood

Published on by Isabella Alden2 Comments

Do you have a pet peeve?

Is there some irritating little thing others do that seems to steadily accumulate until you can’t help but be angry?

Isabella found herself in just such a situation regarding the many letters she received each month from readers of her magazine and books. Here’s what she had to say about it (as published in a Christian magazine):

A Scolding Mood

Photograph of Isabella Alden from about 1898. She is seated at a table. In her lap she holds a piece of paper. Her right hand holds a pen poised above a piece of paper on the table.
Isabella Alden at her writing desk.

Perhaps it would be well for me to own at the outset that I am in a scolding mood this morning. On my desk lie three letters written with as much care and thought as I could give them. Out of my busy life I took time to do my best for the three earnest girls who wrote me on important subjects, all of them of such a character that it was either not wise to bring them into print or so important as regards time that it seemed not well to wait for the printed page. Yet what was the result? Within ten days of their writing, all three letters were returned to me with the words, “Person not found,” written on the envelope.

Now whose fault is that? Not the postmasters’ or postmen’s certainly; for, judging from the appearance of the returned letters, much care has been taken to find their owners. In one instance the information has been volunteered, “Address incomplete.” As if the writer did not know that! But how was I to help it? A name, and the name of a certain city in a certain State; this was all. No street, nor number, nor post-office box—nothing to indicate where in the great city the person was to be found.

If this had been my experience but three times in my life, I should indeed be a happy woman; but oh, dear, the innumerable times I have exhausted my knowledge on a given theme for the attempted benefit of another, only to have to consign my work two weeks afterwards to the waste-basket, and to go about with the injured feeling that someone who had opened her heart to me was smarting under the sense of having been rudely treated!

Dear friends, is not the moral plain? Why will you not give a carefully detailed address? If you are visiting in a strange city, expecting to be there but a short time, by all means give the full address of the person whose guest you are, or of the hotel or boarding-house where you are stopping. If it is possible that you may leave the town before the reply to your letter reaches there, consider how it would expedite matters if you would instruct your correspondent to write on the envelope, “If not there, please forward to —,” etc.

While we are on this subject and I am in the mood, suffer me a few more growls.

How many letters do you suppose I get, asking for immediate replies, with not so much as a postage-stamp enclosed? In most cases this is pure forgetfulness; but if one receives—let us say—one hundred letters a week, requiring private replies, and fifty of the writers have forgotten the return stamp, in the course of a year this amounts to quite a sum.

Let me tell you something. Instead of the stamp (which every well-informed person now encloses when he does not forget it), if those who desire a prompt reply would enclose an envelope properly addressed, with the stamp securely stuck on its own proper corner, their chances for very prompt response would be largely increased. One who has not a large list of correspondents can hardly be made to understand what a relief it is to find letters so prepared, nor what an amount of work it saves in the course of months. So small an item for the writer, such a load lifted from the shoulders of the burdened!

What do you think? Did Isabella have a good reason to scold her readers a little bit?

What’s your pet peeve?

A Hard Text about Gifts

Published on by Isabella AldenLeave a comment

Isabella’s brother-in-law Reverend Charles M. Livingston wrote several articles for The Pansy magazine in which he explained Bible verses that might seem confusing to children. Here’s one he wrote in 1892:

Matthew 13:12:

For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance; but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath.

No, it does not seem fair at all to give to him that has something, and to refuse it to one that hasn’t anything scarcely, and even to take away what little that one has! Just think of giving a rich Pansy five hundred dollars more, and then snatching away the last penny from a poor Pansy!

Surely you don’t suppose the loving, gentle, merciful Lord Jesus meant any such thing? Of course he didn’t.

What did He mean?

Why, simply this, my dear: that one who makes good use of his gifts will have more gifts. He will grow wiser and better, and go up higher all the time, just like a tree that uses well the good ground and good air and good dew around it.

And the tree that, for some reason, won’t send its roots down this way and that, and set every one of its leaves to breathing—such a lazy tree will lose all its life and die, the first wide-awake tree sucking up that very life.

It may be just so with two Pansies. One is good, true, active; the other one isn’t—how one will go up and the other down; how one will increase and the other decrease until one seems to have all the good, even the little the other started out with.

Think on it in this way:

You borrow from a bank one hundred dollars and pay it back with interest when your note is due, and quite likely the bank will loan you two hundred dollars then, if you want it, and so on, increasing it just as you are faithful.

But if you don’t pay as you promised, your one hundred dollars will be taken from you and loaned to one who may have ten thousand dollars, because he makes good use of it.

We are all on trial. How happy we should be to be trusted by the Lord! It’s a fearful thing when he will not loan us any more.

What do you think of Rev. Livingston’s explanation?

You can click on the links below to read more of Rev. Livingston’s “Hard Text” articles:

A Hard Text about Burdens

A Hard Text about Swearing

A Hard Text in Matthew

A Hard Text: Matthew, Mark and Luke

A Hard Text

Getting Ready to Travel

Published on by Isabella Alden6 Comments

As a minister’s wife, Isabella knew a thing or two about thrift. She knew how to prepare nutritious and economical meals, how to decorate a home on a barely-there budget, and how to create useful household items from everyday materials.

She also admired those traits in others, and shared this anecdote in an 1897 magazine article she wrote:

I will tell you a little incident connected with the lives of two girl acquaintances of mine.

They belonged decidedly to the work-a-day world, and something unusual had come into their lives in the form of an opportunity for a short journey.

They met one evening to talk the matter over.

“Each pleasure hath its poison,” quoted one. “Mine comes in the shape of having nothing in which to pack my voluminous wardrobe. There is not a valise owned in our family, except an old carpetbag affair that looks as if Noah’s wife used it. And even that isn’t available. Tom must needs take it.”

Drawing of an old-fashioned satchel with brass buckles and straps to keep it closed.

Mary, who was to be her companion in travel, regarded her thoughtfully.

“It is queer that our perplexities should be the same,” she said. “Only there is no satchel of any sort in our family. I brought away my belongings in an old family trunk so large that it was a question, for a time, whether I had not better set up housekeeping in it, if I could have afforded ground-rent.”

drawing of an old-fashioned steamer wardrobe standing open. On the left side of the wardrobe is a space to hang clothes. On the right is a series of drawers in difference sizes to hold clothing and accesspries.

Then the girl who had complained of the satchel looked remorseful and sympathetic. What were old-fashioned satchels, when one had father and mother and Tom?

“Never mind!” she said cheerily. “We can do our things up in newspapers. It won’t take a very large one to hold mine.”

We did not see them again until two days afterwards, when we met at the train. She of the “carpetbag” came first. Her bundle was characteristic of her, and awkwardly wound about with cord unnecessarily heavy. It was not wrapped in newspaper, it is true; but the brown paper was too stiff. It refused to listen to coaxing fingers, and crackled a good deal.

“I don’t know how to tie up bundles,” its owner said merrily, “and I did this in an awful hurry. I thought I was late. Hasn’t Mary come yet? Oh, here she is. Why, Mary Sheldon!”

The exclamation evidently belonged to Mary’s dress-suit case. That was what it looked like. A neat, trim valise, holding evidently quite a wardrobe, yet so compact and of such shape that it was easy to carry.

Drawing of an old suitcase with brass closures and corner guards.

“Where in the world did you borrow that? How nice it is! It will be ashamed to have my old bundle for a travelling companion.”

“It isn’t borrowed,” said Mary with dignity. “It belongs to me. It cost fifty cents.”

We gathered around her with exclamations and inquiries, and evolved this:

One of the boarders in the act of moving threw out as rubbish a pasteboard box in which a suit of clothes had been sent home from the tailor’s. It was about two feet long, one foot wide, and six inches deep, with a cover exactly the depth of the box.

Drawing of an old box-style suitcase with straps to hold it closed.

Mary, taking possession of it, covered it with dark-green cambric, at seven cents a yard. It took two yards. This was for strength. Then she re-covered it with plain wall-paper of a tint that suggested leather. Nine cents furnished enough for box and cover.

Drawing of various sewing tools: a needle with thread, a paper package of needles, a needle threader, a pin cushion with pins, a cloth tape measure and bolts of fabric.

By that time she thought that she had a very good travelling-case; but, having grown ambitious, she determined to make it still more useful. Twenty-five cents bought a yard of strong gray denim. This she cut and fitted at sides and ends, and, having bound it with dark-green braid, and sewed strings on it at intervals, she had a neat protective cover for her travelling-case, and one that added materially to its strength, as well as to its capacity, should occasion require. A shawl-strap to carry it by (which she already owned) completed the neat outfit.

Drawing of a large suitcase and satchel. Both have brass closures and leather straps.

“You are a regular genius,” said the girl with the bundle, admiringly. “I might have invested fifty cents myself. But then, it was an awful bother to make it.”

Which, let me explain, was the marked difference between the two girls. It was not so much the inventive talent that the one possessed above the other. It was the habit that the other had of considering little common-place efforts of that character “an awful bother.”

I wonder how many girls who are sighing for “Boston bags,” or leather hand-satchels, or even neat, trim two-dollar “telescope bags” as beyond their means, will get a hint from my friend Mary’s management? I see ways of improving on her work. Do any of you?

Drawing of a stack of four old suitcases.

A Wee Booklet

Published on by Isabella Alden2 Comments

Readers often wrote to Isabella asking how they could study the Bible on their own, and Isabella was always happy to suggest a method that seemed to fit their individual circumstance.

Here’s what she wrote to one reader, a harried housewife who had very little time each day to call her own:

As to methods of Bible study, there are numberless ways, and they are all good. The main point is to choose one of them and study. There are books that help wonderfully in the understanding of the Bible. Some of the very little ones contain a great deal of instruction.

This is notably the case with a wee booklet of not more than fifty small pages. It is called “Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth,” and contains ten outline studies on the divisions of the Bible. It is prepared by C. I. Scofield and published by the Asher Publishing Co., St. Paul, Minn.

Black and White photo of Cyrus Ingerson Scofield in his later years. His hair is white and he is dressed in a three-piece suit. He is seated at a table. In one hand he holds a pair of glasses. His other hand points to a passage of text in a Bible open on the table before him. Behind him are bookcases lined with books.
Dr. C. I. Scofield at work in the library at Princeton University.

You can read the “wee booklet” Isabella recommended.

“Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth” by C. I. Scofield is available online.

You can read an electronic version for free on one of these websites:

BibleCentre.org

BibleBelievers.com

Or you can purchase a paperback copy from Amazon by clicking here.

Have you read Scofield’s booklet?

Do you think it’s a helpful guide for someone who is new to studying the Bible?