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Prentiss, E. (Elizabeth), 1818-1878

"Stepping Heavenward"

"
SEPT. The old pain and cough have come back with the first cool
nights of this month Perhaps I am going to my darling- I do not know
I am certainly very feeble Consenting to suffer does not annul the
suffering Such a child could not go hence without rending and tearing
its way out of the heart that loved it. This world is wholly changed
to me and I walk in it like one in a dream. And dear Ernest is
changed, too. He says little, and is all kindness and goodness to me,
but I can see here is a wound that will never be healed. I am
confined to my room now with nothing do but to think, think, think. I
do not believe God has taken our child in mere displeasure, but
cannot but feel that this affliction might not have been necessary if
I had not so chafed and writhed and secretly repined at the way in
which my home was invaded, and at our galling poverty. God has
exchanged the one discipline for the other; and oh, how far more
bitter is this cup!
Oct. 4.- My darling boy would have been six years old to-day. Ernest
still keeps me shut up, but he rather urges my seeing a friend now
and. People say very strange things in the way of consolation. I
begin to think that a tender clasp of the hand is about all one can
give to the afflicted. One says I must not grieve, because my child
is better off in heaven. Yes, he is better off; I know it, I .


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