About a year after her settlement in Devon, she became a decided invalid, and except in the year 1827, she never moved beyond the garden, and only two or three times ventured into the outward air. For the last two years she was entirely confined to her room, and unable to be dressed. During the whole of that period she was watched over by her mother, and surrounded by books. Her beloved Bible was always under her pillow, the first thing in her hand in the morning and the last at night. For a short time before her death, the enemy was permitted to harass her soul, and her lively apprehensions of the gospel were occasionally obscured. Her bodily sufferings were most severe, arising from a complication of diseases. Life terminated at last by a rapid mortification in one of her legs. The last words she was heard to utter, were: “I am come into deep waters; O God, my rock. Hold Thou me up, and I shall be safe.” The next morning, Friday, December 10th, 1830, without a sign or struggle, she entered into her eternal rest. Her lungs, which had been supposed to be sound, were discovered after death to have been fatally diseased. Her heart also was found to be enlarged.
Thus upheld by the good hope of the gospel, this blessed sufferer, ransomed sinner, and victorious believer, fell asleep in the arms of her Saviour and her God. With hearts clad in the habiliments of sorrow, relatives and friends followed all that could die of Miss Graham to the lonely graveyard. The Christian has always a garden around the sepulchre. To such death is not the penalty of sin, but the gracious summons of the Saviour—the introduction to that world where the pure earth, unsmitten by a curse, shall never be broken for a grave.
THE GREAT CHANGE.
From her own history we learn that Miss Graham was converted to God when only seven years old. Yet it must be admitted that instability marked her early course in the ways of religion. The general tone, however, of her spiritual feeling manifested the habitual operation of a high measure of Divine influence; while her occasional depressions seem not to have sunk her below the ordinary level, and were doubtless connected with those exercises of humiliation described in her correspondence which will find an echo in the hearts of all generous Christians. A deep sense of her own unworthiness was a prominent feature of her life. In all her natural loveliness, with all her gentle and amiable attractions, she lay down before God profoundly in the dust, and poured out from the very bottom of her heart the often repeated cry, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” The Holy Spirit had taught her, that the Searcher of hearts sees guilt in the fairest characters; and that to be saved she must be Divinely renewed, and to see the kingdom of God she must be born again. While Miss Graham was, in the estimation of her parents and of all the members of the household, all that their hearts could wish, she felt her need of an entire and implicit dependence on Jesus Christ for salvation. She was also deeply anxious to bring others to the Saviour, that His Cross might be covered with trophies, and His crown blaze with jewels. If she heard of any that were awakened to a sense of their state and condition in the sight of God, it was always with great delight. Often has she been known on such occasions to shed tears of joy. While her love for the ministers and ordinances of God are worthy of special remark, we must not forget to mention her love to the brethren—these are conscious and unequivocal marks of vital Christianity.
THEOLOGICAL ATTAINMENTS.
The fine, powerful, and spiritual mind of Miss Graham, is abundantly illustrated in her writings and correspondence. For sound divinity, clear reasoning, and fervent piety, there is probably no book in the English language superior to her “Test of Truth.” Scott’s “Force of Truth,” though a valuable work, will bear no comparison with it. In a posthumous work, “The Freeness and Sovereignty of God’s Justifying and Electing Grace,” she furnishes us with a full, clear, and scriptural statement on the humbling doctrine of original sin. “It is the very first lesson in the school of Christ: and it is only by being well rooted and grounded in these first principles that we can hope to go on to perfection. The doctrine is written in Scripture as with a sunbeam. If we do not feel some conviction of it in our own hearts, it affords a sad proof that we still belong to that ‘generation that are pure in their own eyes, and yet is not washed from their filthiness.’” After adducing most convincing Scriptural evidence, she forcibly illustrates the subject by the case of infants, and appeals to the sacred records of Christian experience. To the doctrine of the total depravity of man, she thus applies the reductio ad absurdum method of proof: “If man be not utterly depraved, he must be in one of these two states—either perfectly good, without any mixture of sin; or good, with some mixture of evil and imperfection. The first of these suppositions carries its own absurdity upon the face of it. The second is plausible, and more generally received. Yet it is not difficult to prove, that if man had any remaining good in him, that is—towards God—he could not be the creature he now is. There could not be that carelessness about his eternal welfare, that deadness to spiritual things, which we perceive in every individual whose heart has not been renewed by Divine grace.” Thus she finds that the doctrine of man’s partial depravity involves absurd consequences—conclusions wholly at variance with fact. The utter helplessness of man she adduced with great clearness and power, to prove that the work of grace is all of God. Then having proven her statement by Scripture, she proceeds to exhibit in connection with it, the perfect freeness of Divine grace. Miss Graham must not be confounded with those exclusive writers who address the free invitations of the gospel to the elect only. The freeness of Divine mercy—not the secret decree of the Divine will—was the ground and rule of her procedure.
On subjects of theological discussion she is as much at home as on the great doctrines of the gospel. She thus concludes a discussion on the consistency of conditional promises with free salvation: “The great question then about the promises seems to be, not so much whether they are conditional, as whether God looks to Christ, or us, for the performance of those conditions. If to Christ, the burden is laid upon one that is mighty: if to us, then we are undone: ‘for the condition of man after the fall is such, that he cannot turn and prepare himself, by his own natural strength and good works.’” This is strong and uncompromising; yet it is neither unguarded, unscriptural, nor discouraging. Her views of the personality of the Holy Spirit were remarkably clear. She was accustomed, as her “Prayer before Study,” plainly proves, to address Him in direct, and probably frequent supplication. In reference to the deceitful and superficial arguments of infidelity, she observes, “Let us disentangle the artful confusion of words and ideas. Let us set apart each argument for separate and minute scrutiny. Let us analyse the boasted reasonings of the infidel philosophy. We shall find that they may be classed under two heads: assertions which are true, but no way to the purpose; and assertions which are to the purpose, but they are not true.” Her remarks upon the millennium are interesting, but to attempt an analysis of these views, is foreign to our purpose.
On the way of salvation, Miss Graham’s correspondence is highly interesting and instructive. It is delightful to observe in all her letters, not only extensive and accurate views of science and sound theological opinions, but unostentatious piety, glowing love to the Saviour, and a tender, earnest longing for the salvation of souls. No service is more valuable to the sincere but intelligent inquirer, than to enter into his case with tenderness and forbearance. In these letters there are no vague and ill-defined directions—no deficiency of spiritual understanding. They are rich in evangelical sentiment. Pardoning grace is proclaimed to the guilty; melting and subduing grace to the hard-hearted; and sanctifying grace to the unholy; grace to live and grace to die.
PRACTICAL RELIGION.
It is a truth endorsed by universal Christendom, that the more we are disentangled from speculative inquiries, and occupied in the pursuit of practical realities, the more settled will be our conviction of the genuineness of the testimony, and our consequent enjoyment of its privileges. Miss Graham was naturally open to the temptation of a cavilling spirit. She was prone to begin with the speculative instead of the practical truths of revelation, and to insist upon a solution of its difficulties as a prerequisite to the acknowledgment of its authority, and personal application of its truths. To this we trace her painful, though temporary apostasy. The following passage, written about two months before her death, gives an interesting view of her own search after truth, and indicates a practical apprehension of the gospel: “I am grieved that you should for a moment imagine that I think our dear —— must be lost, because she does not subscribe to the doctrines of Calvin. I do not so much as know what all Calvin’s doctrines are, or whether I should subscribe to them myself. I have read one book of Calvin’s, many parts of which pleased me much: I mean his ‘Institutes,’ which Bishop Horsley says ought to be in every clergyman’s library. Further than this I know nothing of Calvin or his opinions. I certainly did not form one single opinion from his book, for I had formed all my opinions long before from the Bible. You may remember my telling you some years ago I declined greatly, almost entirely (inwardly) from the ways of God, and in my breast was an infidel, a disbeliever in the truths of the Bible. When the Lord brought me out of that dreadful state, and established my faith in His word, I determined to take that word alone for my guide. I read nothing else for between three and four months, and the Lord helped me to pray over every word that I read. At that time, and from that reading, all my religious opinions were formed, and I have not changed one of them since. I knew nothing then of Calvin. I have said so much, dear ——, because I think it a very wicked thing to do, as you seem to think I do, to call Calvin or any man ‘master on earth,’ or to make any human writer our guide in spiritual things.” Miss Graham’s religion consisted in receiving the whole Bible without partiality or gainsaying, loving God, and doing good to man.