Like a freed vernal stream. I may not tread
With them those pathways—to the feverish bed
Of sickness bound; yet, O my God! I bless
Thy mercy, that with Sabbath-peace hath fill’d
My chasten’d heart, and all its throbbings still’d
To one deep calm of lowliest thankfulness!
26th April 1835.
[443] After the exhausting vicissitudes of days when it seemed that the night of death was indeed at hand—of nights when it was thought that she could never see the light of morning—wonderful even to those who had witnessed, throughout her illness, the clearness and brightness of the never-dying principle, amidst the desolation and decay of its earthly companion, was the consecrated power and facility with which, on Sunday, the 26th of April, she dictated to her brother the “Sabbath Sonnet,” the last strain of the “sweet singer,” whose harp was henceforth to be hung upon the willows.
Amongst the many tributes of interest and admiration elicited by a poem, so remarkable to all readers—so precious to many hearts—the following expressions, contained in a letter from the late venerable Bishop of Salisbury to Mrs Joanna Baillie, and already published by the latter, are too pleasingly applicable not to be inserted here. “There is something peculiarly touching in the time, the subject, and the occasion of this deathbed sonnet, and in the affecting contrast between the ‘blessed groups’ she describes, and her own (humanly speaking) helpless state of sickness; and that again contrasted with the hopeful state of mind with which the sonnet concludes, expressive both of the quiet comforts of a Christian Sabbath, and the blessed fruits of profitable application. Her ‘Sweet Chimes’ on ‘Sabbath-peace,’ appear to me very characteristic of the writer.”—Memoir, p. 311-12.