Her literature lessons were rather unusual. She dealt with the great writers in a great way, and used these lessons for conveying moral teaching that could not very well be given in Scripture lessons. Browning she loved, and her senior girls never left school without having been introduced by Dorothea Beale to some of his great, shorter poems. Her book on Literary Studies gives one an idea of how she dealt with literature in her classes. There is in this book a very interesting dialogue, between a person of the seventeenth and one of the nineteenth century on the theology of “Paradise Lost”. After an interesting discussion on the different conceptions of God and His ways the seventeenth century representative says:—
“You do not do justice to us. You do not think Bunyan meant us to believe Christian took a real journey away from a particular town. Why do you suppose Milton meant that Satan was thrown out of a special place in this, which we call space? You do not think that the Red Cross Knight was believed by Spenser, or Christian by Bunyan, to have been immersed in a dark dungeon.”
On the subject of marriage Dorothea Beale had very high ideals. She urged girls to become independent by their own efforts, so that they should never be tempted to a mercenary marriage. She was very scornful of the type of modern novel that represents men and women as slaves of their passions, unrestrained by the bonds of marriage or the claims of morality. Before she finally accepted her vocation Dorothea Beale was herself for a short time engaged to be married: but the engagement came to an end, and the work of a great school, instead of a quiet home, became her part in life.
Her literary activities were considerable. She wrote on a good many subjects, but chiefly on those connected with her work. Some of her essays were published in the College Magazine, others in periodicals. All her work gives one much food for thought.
The Bishop of Stepney, at the memorial service held for Dorothea Beale in St. Paul’s Cathedral, gave a very true epitome of the things that Dorothea Beale stood for.
“She gave a proof that the personality of a teacher was the most indispensable and enduring power in education. The main object of all her work at Cheltenham and elsewhere was not so much to instruct the mind as to inspire the character. She held before herself a clear ideal of what a cultivated woman ought to be, strong and self-controlled, filling her life with the highest interests, developing herself to the utmost for the glory of God and the service of man.”
CHAPTER XI.
ANOTHER JOURNEY.
“The King there in His beauty
Without a veil is seen:
It were a well-spent journey
Though seven deaths lay between.”
—“Hymn from the last words of Samuel Rutherford.”
To those whose life is extended to even the lower limit of the Psalmist, the world becomes rather sad and lonely. Gradually, one by one, friends and relations of their own generation pass away, and there are few left with the same memories and the same outlook. Dorothea Beale enjoyed perhaps one of the greatest blessings life can give, that of being able to work until the end. Like all energetic souls she wished to die “in harness,” and that wish was granted. But on the personal side her life had become very lonely, though it was brightened by the love of her “children”.
Some months before the end she was haunted by the suspicion of fatal disease, but of this others knew nothing. In the Guild meeting of 1906 there hovered the feeling that perhaps it was the last over which the loved Principal, now old and frail, would preside. “Old Girls” linger affectionately on her last speech; it was full of humorous touches, and ripples of laughter were continually passing through the audience. In it she made her appeal for greater earnestness, greater devotion, so that all the Guild members might be able to say—using the motto of St. Hilda’s, Oxford—Non frustra vixi.