and the meetings comprising it. This was the only Yearly Meet-
ing of the seven I had not visited, as no way had opened before
for that service. It was our intention to attend the conferences at
Swarthmore and then go to Ohio. Just before the time for at-
tending the conferences my wife was taken with a serious attack
of dysentery and for a time it looked very doubtful about our
attending either, but she so far recovered that I deemed it prudent
to start with her for the conferences after they had been in session
for two days, arriving in time to take part in the Religious Con-
ference, before which I had a paper on the past and future of
Quakerism. My wife was unable to attend but part of two of
the meetings, being too weak to bear the strain of a two and
one-half hours meeting, but strong enough for me to attend
them. After these were over we went on to Ohio and attended
that meeting and most of its constituent branches. In some meet-
1 86 Autobiography of John J. Cornell
ings I found a prejudice had been created against me on account
of my radical views, but still there was an openness to hear and
all passed off in the end very satisfactorily.
We returned to our Mendon home to make our preparations
for a final leave-taking of it, having sold the farm, and now
expecting to make Baltimore our permanent place of residence.
Since our return to Baltimore we have made a visit to Burling-
ton Quarterly Meeting, held at Trenton, New Jersey, to good
satisfaction.
This closes the narration of this phase of my life up to the First
of First month, 1897. If I shall be permitted to remain several
years longer in active service I may be able to add a supplement,
or perhaps some of my friends who may survive me, may add all
that will be necessary.
CHAPTER IX.
Some Incidents Not Recorded in Chronological Order.
In the early part of my ministry I felt drawn for three succes-
sive days to address a state I felt to be present in our meeting,
and each time to encourage it to be faithful to what appeared to be
required of it or else its spiritual growth would be dwarfed.
It seemed strange to me why this should have occurred, but so
clear was the intimation of duty I dared not withhold. A fevv
months afterwards, while visiting a friend, she asked me if I
remembered speaking to a state three first days in succession.
I said, " I did and had often wondered who and why it was."
" Well," said she, " it was for me. I had bought a new fur cape
and it had some tassels of fur on it which I thought were very
pretty (they were fashionable then), and I wore it once to meet-
ing, and I could not think of anything else but those pretty tassels,
so when I took it out the next First day I felt I ought to take
them off, but they looked so pretty I did not, and went to meet-
ing struggling with the feeling, when thee got up and described
my state exactly and counselled me to give up, but I did not. So
the next First day morning as I put it on again the same feeling
came and I again resisted and said to myself, ' If John speaks to
me to-day I will take them off,' so sure enough thee spoke even
more closely than before and I was touched and resolved when
I got home I would take them off, but they looked so pretty to me
that I laid them away again without keeping my promise. When
the next First day came I went through the same struggle and
said again ' If John speaks to me to-day I will not hesitate any
longer,' so when I got to meeting very soon after it gathered thee
spoke again and warned me seriously that unless I obeyed it
1 88 Autobiography of John J. Cornell
would dwarf my spiritual growth, and I then resolved I would
do it on getting" home, and when I arrived I took the scissors and
severed them, and have felt glad ever since." This may seem to
have been a slight thing, but I mention it to show how clear were
these intimations to me, and how by being faithful I was able
to help this woman do what she knew was required of her.
After I had been acknowledged a little over a year, as I sat
in the Quarterly Meeting of Ministers and Elders, I was brought
under a deep exercise and scarcely knew which way to turn. I
had a clear view that one of the members present was not what
he appeared to be, though I could not see who it was ; that he
was making a great profession, but inwardly exercising unkind
and envious feelings, and soon came the command to bear
testimony to what I saw. I struggled with it. I thought I knew
intimately every one present, and I could not conceive it was pos-
sible that such a description belonged to any individual there, but
there was no peace. The command became stronger and stronger,
and under its power I stood up, commencing with the words, " I
see with my mental eye that there is a wolf in sheep's clothing
amongst us, and we must beware of his devastating work or it will
destroy us," and spoke for several minutes with unusual power
and depth of feeling. As I sat down the solemnity which rested
over the meeting exceeded anything I had ever witnessed. The
human power within me kept saying, " Thou art mistaken," but
the Divine, " Thou art right," and at last a quiet, peaceful feeling
settled over me and I was at rest. Contrary to my expectations
when the meeting closed, though several grasped my hand with
an unusual warmth of feeling, no questions were asked, nor was
my testimony ever alluded to in my presence, but it was only a few
years before it developed who it was and that my testimony was
strictly true, and its remembrance in a severe hour of trial with
that spirit aided me materially in preserving my integrity.
In the year 1870 I went to Philadelphia to attend the convention
on Indian Affairs and on Seventh day went to West Chester tc
be at meeting on First day, and made my home with Jonathan
Incidents out of Chronological Order 189
Travilla, with whom E. Newport was staying. After meeting,
which Elizabeth was unable to attend, just before leaving she
wanted a quiet time, she told me she had been travailing with me
throughout the meeting, and although she was not there and no
one had had an opportunity to tell her anything of it, as I had
been with her all the time after we returned, she told the heads
of my discourse ; said she had followed me through it with great
unity, " but I have seen further. Thou will meet with more and
bitter opposition than thou hast ever known and seen, and that
from those thee loves, but I have seen thee will keep thy place and
be preserved through it all." And that fall the storm broke upon
me, and I sometimes thought had it not been for those words of
encouragement I would have given out or lost that self-control by
which, under the guidance of the Divine Spirit, I was able to
thwart every attack designed to destroy me.
I had a little previous to this been very closely led towards
Martha E. Travilla. During my correspondence with her mother
(a long time had elapsed since I had heard from her), when she
had Martha write to me for her, she added some for herself.
Martha at that time was a stranger to me personally. I had just
seen her pass through the room and been introduced. As soon
as I read the letter I turned to my wife and said here is a letter
from Martha Travilla, E. Newport's daughter, and I felt while
reading it that she will have to take up her mother's work and
follow in her footsteps in her peculiar mission. There was noth-
ing in the letter to indicate it but such was the impression on
my mind, so when I responded to it I told her what T saw
and exhorted her to be faithful to the openings made to her. I
did not hear anything from her for nearly three years, and until
after she had lost a loved sister and had appeared in the ministry.
Then while writing to her mother I spoke of her loss and the
comfort Martha's course must be to her, when she replied at once
suggesting that I should write to Martha, as she stood in
need of just what I could give. So I soon wrote and received a
reply stating that when my first letter came she was staying away
190 Autobiography of John J. Cornell
from meeting so she would not have to speak. She was at first
indignant that I should have written as I did, then softened, and
spent the night in tears, but under the strength given, in that I
had confirmed her feelings, she went back to meeting and soon
appeared in the ministry, and between us there grew a
spiritual intimacy by which we were able to sustain each other
through many a trial as the dear Father would give one or the
other, as each most needed that insight into the other's condition,
necessary to send or speak the counsel required for our encourage-
ment, and this continued unbroken until her death.
One day as I sat down in our week-day meeting I was in spirit
taken into the home of a dear friend who was young in the
ministry, who lived over two hundred miles away, and I found
her in a depressed state of mind, surrounded by so many cares,
and her husband, though a kind man, did not appreciate the sit-
uation in which he had placed her, and because of it she was
deprived of occupying her unusually sweet gift. When I ar-
rived home from meeting I was so deeply impressed with what
had passed before my mental vision I felt it would be right for
me to write to her and encourage her by letting her know I had
seen her and to keep up hope, for a deliverance would come, and
to enclose a note to the husband, bidding him loose the bands by
which he had bound his loved one and let her go on the Lord's
mission.
I soon received a response, saying I had seen their true condi-
tion and my words had been a great comfort to her, and from
her husband who thanked me for opening his eyes to his thought-
lessness ; he had not taken her into consideration ; he was employ-
ing a number of men, making a large family for her to cook for,
with only one girl, and he was looking only to the emoluments to
be derived from their labor, which alas were not realized, but it
produced a change in his management afterwards.
Just before I entered the work of the ministry we had a con-
dition in our meeting of an old man marrying for the third time,
and its proving an unhappy connection. He being a prominent
Incidents out of Chronological Order 191
minister it occasioned some considerable feeling in the meeting
and in my impetuous nature I could not bear to hear him speak
when I knew he was living in such a state with his wife. So on
one occasion after our Yearly Meeting a number of strangers were
at our meeting and after they had spoken this old friend appeared
in supplication, and I kept my seat, as it was the custom then for
all to rise at such times. Soon after one of the strangers also
appeared in the same manner and I rose. This act was noticed
by one of these strangers who went to my father's to dine and
afterward to my home to tea, and on our way thither he spoke
to me about it, and I replied I could not conscientiously do it, to
which he said, " I would have once done as thee did, but I
would not do so now," and thus wisely forbore saying anything
more, but it had found a lodgment, and upon close reflection I saw
I was wrong, that however much he was out of the wa\
it was no justification for my showing my dissatisfaction in a
public meeting. One year from the next fall, while working in
my field, I was arrested with the impression that I must go to
Farmington Meeting on First day morning, which was about
fifteen miles from my home. I could not see why this would be
required, but as I had covenanted to be obedient I made the
needed preparations and with my wife drove over there. We
had been there but a few moments when the friend who had
administered the rebuke to me so kindly, came in and then I
saw why I was sent there. He was at a sanitarium not many
miles away, but I did not know but he was at his home near
Philadelphia. After meeting, in which our communications
blended harmoniously, I told him I could now see the proprietv
of his counsel, for I would not do so now and thanked him
for his kindness and wisdom in stopping when he did, for had he
argued the case with me I was prepared to defend myself from
the human standpoint at every point, but he had completely dis-
armed me.
I had felt my mind drawn at one time to hold a meeting in the
large Congregational church in the city of Rochester, and after
192 Autobiography of John J. Cornell
having made the arrangements for the meeting, to be held some
ten days in the future, during the week before while busy in my
field cutting up corn, the text from which I was to speak sud-
denly was opened to me, and the different heads under which I
was to present it, and what I should say, and so clearly and
vividly was this impressed upon my mind that I could have written
out the whole sermon just as I afterwards delivered it, for it re-
mained with me clearly until it was delivered. This was a new
experience to me under which I was taught that the Divine
Spirit could instruct me what must be delivered even before the
meeting had been held, and confirmed me in what I have written
as a previous experience that we are not always required to wait
until we are gathered in the meeting to know what to say. And I
may now add to this, that since I have been living in Baltimore
that I have seldom gone to meeting on First day morning without
having a sight of the subject to be presented, but not how it was
to be spoken.
At another time I felt a drawing to hold a meeting in a Baptist
house, the congregation of which was very aristocratic, but T
succeeded in making the necessary arrangements to attend their
regular meeting in the evening, and during the afternoon previous
I called to see the minister to ascertain how the meeting would be
conducted, so that there would be no confusion or jar. His wife
met me and said her husband was lying down and she would not
disturb him as he needed the rest, but invited me into the parlor,
and after a few minutes conversation asked me what college I
was a graduate of, and as I told her I had never been to any
college she looked at me in perfect amazement and soon left me
alone, and I waited about three-quarters of an hour before the
minister came down. When he came he was very distantly polite
and very reserved, but I completed my arrangements and was to
meet him in the chapel just before the hour of the meeting. When
I went there he was even more cold than in the afternoon, but
we soon went into the pulpit and after conducting the opening
exercises he gave me a very shabby introduction to the audience.
Incidents out of Chronological Order 193
I, however, went on as though nothing had happened.. He sat
down at some distance from me and buried his face in his hands,
as though he expected to be extremely mortified by one who had
not been educated at a college, but soon after I began to speak he
raised his head, and a little further on straightened himself up with
a look of profound astonishment on his face as I proceeded in
a logical manner to elucidate my text, and when the meeting
closed greeted me with as much warmth as he had with coldness
before the meeting, saying, " Brother Cornell, I have been deeply
interested and instructed by your elucidation of that text and I
know it has been a profitable opportunity for my people." And
here again the truth triumphed over fear and opposition.
At one time while attending a funeral at Scipio, Cayuga county,
I fell in company with a Methodist minister who was going to
exchange pulpits nearby, and as we both returned the next day
by the same train and had an hour and a half to wait the minister
approached me and said, " You are the minister who attended that
funeral yesterday." I assented. " Well," he said, " I have heard
about the Friends, but I never met one before to whom I could
talk and I would like to make some inquiries." I told him if his
object was information I would be happy to oblige him, but if it
was controversy I must decline. He said it was information, and
we had not talked long before it became necessary to tell him to
which branch I belonged, when he at once said, " What is the
difference between you ? " I told him we differed in our idea of
what constitutes the Divinity of Christ and in regard to the atone-
ment, which we rejected from the standpoint of the evangelical
church. He said, " What then do you believe to have been the
mission of Jesus? " I told him " To bear before the world an ex-
ample of a humanity tempted in all points as we are and yet by
obedience to the Divine Spirit to be kept from the commission of
sin." " Then you look upon the crucifixion of Jesus as nothing less
than an atrocious murder." I replied, " That is about the size of it,
as the small boys would say." The tears started down his cheeks
and he grasped my hand warmly and said, " I am with you in
13
194 Autobiography of John J. Cornell
that view." I was very much surprised to hear him say it. He
asked me a number of questions of a theological character, and
I told him I had not time then to give him a clear answer but I
had written a little book, which I would send him when I arrived
at home and he would find the answers to his questions in that.
The cars then came and we took a seat together as we were going
the same way for a short distance. After a few moments he
turned to me and asked me to give him briefly my idea of the
Divinity of Christ, which I did in as brief a manner as I could.
He listened attentively and then said, " Do you see the Andover
Review? " I said, " No." " Well," he replied, " this is a strange
coincidence. There is an article in the last number on this subject
in which it is treated in the exact manner which you have
just stated, in almost your very words." This was also a surprise
to me that so evangelical a body as that University would admit
such views into the Reviezv. We soon arrived at the station
where he was to leave, and we parted in such tenderness that both
were in tears though only two hours before we were entire
strangers. I sent him my " Essays on the Views of Friends " as
soon as I got home, and in a few days received a letter from him,
in which he said, " I have read your little book and will say with-
out flattery that I have a large library of theological works from
the grossest materialism to the strictest orthodoxy, but there's
more in your little book for me than in any work I have, and I
want you to come and preach for me."
As soon as I could arrange it I went to his home and occupied
his pulpit morning and evening, and when out of meeting and out
of bed we talked on almost every conceivable religious subject
and we did not find any ground for disagreement. As we parted
the next morning he said to me, " I anticipated much, but my
anticipations have been more than realized. I look upon you as
a father to me in religious experience, and you must come to me
once a year as long as I am near you," which I did, and our
friends life deepened until he left New York and went to Ohio,
since which time I have only heard from him twice. This was in-
Incidents out of Chronological Order 195
teresting to me because I found the same Divine Spirit had in-
structed him in a similar manner it had myself though we were
placed in very different circumstances and surrounded by different
influences.
Another incident I deem worthy of record. I went at one time
with my step-mother to attend the funeral of an uncle of hers, who
was a member among the Orthodox Friends, but as there was no
minister of that sect near that they could get, they called in a Pres-
byterian. When I went into the house and was invited with mother
into the parlor, a son-in-law of the deceased, who knew me, soon
went out and returned for me and gave me an introduction to the
minister, who invited me to take part in the service and seeing I
hesitated a little he said, " I understand your people, for I have
known a good deal about the Friends and must acknowledge while
we are paying a good deal of attention to the husks you go directly
to the kernel. If you feel like it I want you to use the liberty to
speak." I said I would, and we went in together and after read-
ing some Scripture texts he commenced by saying, " There are no
tw r o words in the English language that have had more power to
move me than the words ' I live,' " and then proceeded for twenty
minutes in a clear, beautiful style to elucidate his thought and,
closing a sentence, stopped abruptly and sat down. I was ready
and arose immediately just where he stopped and carried on the
same thought for about twenty minutes longer, both communica-
tions blending as though they had been delivered by the same per-
son, and if I spoke by inspiration, which I certainly did, so did he.
I met him once after that (where he had charge of a large church)
at the funeral of one of our members, but whose daughter was a
member of his congregation, and we mingled again in our exer-
cises as harmoniously, though not in the same manner, and while
on our way to the grave he gave me a hearty invitation to come to
his church, and as I then had a minute to appoint such meetings I
accepted it. He proposed it should be in the evening and he
would secure a union meeting, which he did, and here I learned
a lesson of value to me as a public speaker. I arose with this
196 Autobiography of John J. Cornell
language, " I am not insensible to the responsibility I assume in
attempting to address such an audience from this pulpit, for you
have been. accustomed to listen to men trained in public speaking,
and as I have not had that advantage, while I shall make no
apology for the matter delivered, I ask you to be lenient in your
criticism of the manner in which it may be delivered." We had
a grand meeting. Many gathered around me after meeting, ex-
pressing the satisfaction it had been to them and the greeting
of the minister was very tender and loving.
The next morning as I started for home and had taken a seat
in the cars I noticed a gentleman walk up and down the aisle
several times and then he stopped and accosted me with, " I heard
you preach last night." " Yes," I said, " there were a good many
there." " I liked everything you said but one." I said, " It
would be strange if no objection could be made to so long a
sermon." He replied, " That was your apology. That was not
necessary." And so I learned to leave that out from that time
and go at once into my subject, and I am convinced that it is an
important lesson for public speakers to learn. The people do not
care about the apology, but the substance of the address, let it be
upon any subject it may.
The following statement of a Friend, regarding a revelation of
duty, in which I subsequently had a part, I deem worthy of a
place in these experiences. " He said in his young life he took
to reading sceptical works and these had exerted a good deal
of influence over him. One night he had been reading one of
Shakespeare's plays up to 12.30, and after he had gone to sleep he
was awakened by hearing his name called, so that answering the
call, but receiving no response, he arose and went to the door, and
finding no one concluded some one was playing a trick on him and
laid down again, but not to sleep. Soon he heard the call again,
and again he answered, but got no response. He then arose,
lighted the lamp and went to each of the rooms in which the dif-
ferent members of the family slept and found them all quietly
Incidents out of Chronological Order 197
sleeping. After he returned to his room he sat down on the side
of the bed, somewhat disturbed and not a little provoked. Soon
a form rose before his vision which he recognized as a minister liv-
ing in Philadelphia, and a voice said, " Young man, I have a
message for thee," and then went on to spiritualize the birth and
life of Christ and showing him how this could take place within
him, and how it would grow, until it had control, if he would allow
it, and then said, " Go to Yearly Meeting this fall, someone will
be there who has a message for thee." About two weeks before
the Yearly Meeting the subject came up in the family as to who
would go and he said " I am going." This seemed to surprise
them. He was asked how long he would attend, to which he re-
plied, " I do not know." When the time arrived, he went and at-
tended the three meetings on First day. I was in attendance at the
Yearly Meeting that year. He said I with others spoke at all
three of the meetings, but no message for him, nor was there until
Fourth day. I was speaking at some length and he said