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12 AMALIE SIEVEKtNG.
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
^ Amalie Wilheimine Sieyekin© Was Born I...
was not fulfilled ; it does not appear why , but she probably suffered less than is usual under such _circura stances , as she kept lier feelings
too much under control for them to have become passions . Once too , in later life , she received a proposal from a very worthy man ,
but declined it on this occasion because he did not possess that superiori ty which she judged to be essential to a happy marriage .
In 1817 , the loss of her beloved brother Gustav caused her the deepest sorrowand to divert her grief she indulged in a visit of a ,
, few weeks to her brother in England , having hitherto declined his most pressing invitations , from unwillingness to leave lier classes .
The sickness , too , of various members of the family took her occasionally from her self-imposed teaching duties , and she gave them up
entirely for a time during the serious illness of Madame B ., wlio now proposed that she who had so long been _Linto her as a daughter , should
also give her the name of mother , to which ., after some hesitating scruples , she acceded . But she always returned to her classes with _,
renewed ardor , and found peace and contentment in these obscure labors . " I used to dream , " she wrote at this time , " that I should
some day do something great in the eyes of the world ; but now I know that it is not in my power to attain to tlie extraordinary , I
will try to fulfil with double faithfulness the little , common , dailyreturning duties of life . " Truly the best possible preparation for
what was in store for her , though she was all unconscious to what it was tending ! And thus some years passed : she increased the
number of her scholars , and devoted herself more entirely to them , though her love of society made this often to be no slight sacrifice ;
her journal even was discontinued as a needless expenditure of time . But she was also occupying herself with a different kind of
composition , and in 1823 appeared her volume of " Reflections on Select Passages of Scripture . " It was published anonymously , but its
authorship was soon guessed , and the discovery was attended with ratlier painful results . Her faith in doctrinal matters having now
become settled , was plainly expressed in this volume , and , as she said , " the eyes of the parents were first opened to what was
considered my mysticism ; and if they left their children with me until their confirmation , in the hopes that they would then give up these
supposed errors , they were sure to be taken from me at that time , and I never had so little pleasure in any class as in the one I was then
conducting . One child wrote to me that she had renounced my errors , and I never heard any more of her , and my dear little C . F .
also left me on this account . " She also wrote to PI . soon after , telling her that she had joined a society for the distribution of tracts
to the poor , but begging her not to mention it as this also had given rise to much calumny .
But amid all these strivings and difficulties , one thought was ripening in her mind , which had been nurtured there ever since her
eighteenth year . She thus described how the idea grew , " When I
first began to reflect on what was the _peculiax' calling of -woman , I ,
12 Amalie Sievektng.
12 AMALIE SIEVEKtNG .
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), March 1, 1860, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01031860/page/12/
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