I have been wont to kneel at the threshold when I went out in the morning for the first time. It seems natural, loving, and right in every way to ask God’s blessing the first thing before touching the world’s work, and when I do it, the day’s efforts always seem successful.
Nov. 29, 1885.
God in great mercy has relieved me of my cold and given me an exchange at Harpswell, so that I preached to my old people. I have had a fire in my study, read my mother’s Bible, visited the old willows, the rock, the old maple, the Skolfield barn, the burnt tree, all my old praying spots, and read over the “record of the years of the right hand of the Most High.”
May 19, 1886.
Went to the old pine, read the Word at the foot of it, and prayed for wisdom. It did me good. My heart warmed to the spot. Went to Knowlton; he was very kind, left his recitations, and got me the book I wanted.
July 4, 1886.
Rose at six-thirty. Prayed and gave thanks. I strove to put myself into the hand of God. Mr. Little came for me in a chaise. We went to my father’s old church where I prayed and pronounced the benediction. At two-thirty we went to the city hall. About two thousand people were there. I spoke twenty-one minutes to the apparent satisfaction of those who listened and those who brought me here, and the friends and benefactors who have stood by me in my trouble. I call upon my soul and all that is within me to bless the holy name of God who has turned this thing I so dreaded into an ovation, and has given me strength, patience, and perseverance to prepare for it under the pressure of work and still not neglect anything.... I thank God that in this city where I was born, where my father preached so many years, I have received from the city authorities so much respect, they sending a carriage for my wife and me, honoring me as his son, and fulfilling the promise of a covenant-keeping God, who declares that He will show mercy unto those that love Him even unto the third and fourth generations. I cannot express my feelings of gratitude that I who so tried him and my mother have been made by God the means of honoring their memory.
July 6, 1886.
Rose early. Prayed and gave thanks. A carriage was sent to take my wife and me to the city hall to listen to the oration by Hon. Thomas B. Reed. I was given a seat beside him. From there we went to a clam bake on Long Island, and there I met and had much talk with Phillips Brooks. In the evening we went to the last meeting, which consisted in a general talk on reminiscences. Thus has closed this Portland centennial. I have here received the most kindly attention, not only from religious people, but from the civil authorities; have been introduced to a great many people who have read my books and who have spoken “Spartacus,” Phillips Brooks among the rest. I now humbly thank God and ask Him to keep me.... Went to see Mr. Ezra Carter; he is confined to his bed. He was very glad to see me. There was not time to see him and go to my parents’ graves where I wanted to thank God for the manner in which my father’s name had been honored in me. But Ezra Carter has been my friend for years. He helped me put my father in his coffin, and was for years his friend, and therefore, as I could not do both, I thought it would be more acceptable to God to comfort the living than to pray at the grave of the dead.
Oct. 19, 1886.