Tuesday, April 7, 2015

Diary of Margaret Junkin Preston: February 23, 1863

This day nine years ago my precious Mother was called hence. I thank God for her holy life and blessed death; for her teaching, her prayers, and her example. Surely one of the chiefest joys of heaven will be to sit at her feet, and tell her how infinitely below her merit I now realize my love for her to have been. How constantly I dream of her, almost every night. How devoted — how judicious — how selfdenying — how humble-minded — how sweet tempered — how forbearing — how faithful — how deeply Christian-spirited she was! Few have had such a mother to lose. I often weep over her loss with bitter tears still; and yet I wonder even that time has been able to heal the wound which has been so deep, as much as it has been healed. I can never attain to such a character, to such usefulness, as my Mother! She had such heavenly patience, and how exceedingly impatient am I. But these pages are not for reflections or confessions — only for bald facts.

SOURCE: Elizabeth Preston Allan, The Life and Letters of Margaret Junkin Preston, p. 160

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