The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1875-04-21
Wv UnNErY-FERsr BIRTmDAY
March, Is. Isss-sEarcI IS, 1873.

Tour readers will thank Us for copying
from the Southern Christian Advocate o
last week. the venerable DR.. Pierce
deeply interesting thoughts on his ninety
first birthday.
OH give thanks unto the Lord; fol
He is good for His mercy endureth for
ever. Any man who lives to send forth
the salutation of his ninety-6rst birth
day. certainly has abundant reason tc
preface the occasion with this call toI
thanksgiving. If some one had put tc
me this morning Pharaoh's question to
Jacob, How old art thou?" / could
have replied II am this day ninety years
Old" But l could not have said for the
same class of reasons, Few and evil
have been the years of my life" Meth
er could have said, II have not attained
unto the years of my fathers. for | have
passed the age of my fathers.
The life of Jacob furnishes biogra-
ply, so unique as to find no parallel-at
least as to his marriage. | suppose there
never has been another man whose be-
loved Rachel cost him fourteen years
labor These were part of the evil years
of his life. In this respect had more
pleasant time than the patriarch. OBJ
tanned my wife without money or price
a free and cheerful gift-and in her, the
richest Inheritance earth had 10 bestow.
| was married when | was twenty-four
years, six months, and four days old
We lived together forty-one years and
seven months--which long period only
matured and mellowed first love into
richer affection She closed her noble
life May IA, 1850, while | was absent in
attendance upon our second General Con-
ference at ST. Louis, Mo. Having fin
ished her domestic duties and read her
morning lesson, she sat down to work,
and only exclaiming, what pain in my
head" expired instantly. During her
last years, next to her children, her de-
light was in an Orphan Asylum over
which she presided; and upon my first
visit to her fresh grave | found these
orphan mourners gathered around 1t,
and weeping as for mother gone-a
memorial, more precious far, than the
Jewels of queen. She was one of many
duplicates of Solomon's inspired CON
cepti6n of a true mountaineering
whom we might almost think he despaired
of finding even one. The inspiration,
however, was not to illustrate their scar
city, but to magnify their virtues. Those
whom he calls virtuous, are those in whom
moral courage, adequate to lifes de-
mands, abounds; such as meet its emer-
gencies with prompt executive hrmness
and skill. The price of such woman,
he says, g Is far above rubies. The
heart OF her husband doth safely trust in
her, so that he shall have no need of
spoil" All this | realized in her whom
| welded
will be pardoned for thus introduce
is due to her memory; and my apology
is, that much of the credit awarded me
in those days when [ was in labors more
abundant, was due to her. 1t is truth
fully said that there being a way is of no
avail, unless there be will; and it may
be as truthfullv said that where there is |
a will without way, nothing can be |
done But in my laborious |
everything eonspired to its ac
II; t--L - - n : she
made the way. If half sick, and opei' /
to persuasion to lie up, she was up earl y,
getting everything ready, and with
thousand winning ways, persuaded me
adding: 81 can bear any
thing better. than for you to disappoint
a congregation. OF such a wife, Solo
mon says: "Her children arise up and
call her bIessed her husband also, and
he praiseth her." And it seems to me /
might complete the quotation: ''Many
daughters have done virtuously, but thou
excellest them all. But | will not say
here what always felt in my heart. |
am recalling those precious memories be-
cause | want reason for saying to my
friends, that the wives of itinerant Meth
odist preachers are models of wOmanly
glory, when husband and wife are cast in
the same grand mould of self-sacrifice
for Christ 1t is characteristic of a true
woman that when she accepts the sphere
of an itinerant ministers wife, she in
tends to fill it; and there are now in this
connection many of the finest illustra-
tons of womanly greatness and true
moral courage that are furnished by the
sex.
IF live until MAY next, l shall have
been an uncompanioned pilgrim for
twenty-five years. During most of this
time, | have filled up the chasm which
death made in my life, by more unre-
strained itinerancy. My children being
grown and married, / dissipated my
loneliness and dispelIed the dull monoto-
ny of one place, by constant change of
associates loving and kind. By the
blessing of my Heavenly Father, | was
effective for twenty three of these years,
and labored all over my Conference But
now, | am no longer able to see or to
serve my friends, except by this saluta-
ton of we'll ripened love.
THURSDAY MORNING, MARCH %.
NY ninety first birthday was celebrated
yesterday at Sunshine, by family reunion
of forty loving hearts-twentv-one great
grandchildren. OF course it was alively
time, but sweetly so :; there was nothing
but gushing, joyous life. OF our sump-
tuous dinner, for obvious reasons, [ viii
not speak. But of two elegantly en-
bosSed cakes, with appropriate memo
rial inscriptions in raised letters of icing
one from Sparta, Ga, and the other
from Louisville, Ky. | must say, ard
so said our lady guests, they would have
been among the most conspicuous at a
royal feast At the anniversary of The
ninety-first birthday of worn-down
itinerant Methodist preacher, they com
manded more distinguished respect, and
we all remembered the donors with CRATE
full thanks.
TO see about eighteen great-grand-
children from twelve years of age down
to three, seated with whetted appetites
at the second table of such a dinner, is
sight which hope God viii repeat to my
children and my children's children
Never was any occasion of the kind more
richly enjoyed. Its most memorable fea-
ture was the baptism by myself of one