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Phoebe Palmer was an early woman evangelist who
also was a leader to starting the first settlement house in New York
City. The first Palmer quotes come the book, Phoebe Palmer:
Selected Writings, ed. Tomas C. Oden.
on slavery
""Tis Ethiopia's vented sigh,
Heard in that grief-imploring moan; Hear, Christians, hear her
anguished cry, 'Restore, restore to us our own; Oh! land with sons
and daughters free, Make our long captive ones like thee. ... Doth
liberty stand mountain-strong, And view such claims unsatisfied,
When she hath cried so loud, so long, And Freemen have her call
denied? Wake! Patriots, wake, cry, now be free! Rise Afric, hail thy
liberty." ("Ode for the Fourth of July, 1831, p. 84)
on Palmer
"For Phoebe Palmer, the experience
of divine grace led directly to an energetic life of active social
service. Rather than following an individualistic patter frequently
association with Protestant pietism, she became a leading innovator
of social action and reform in urban American Protestantism. She
established one of America's earliest prison ministries, visiting
prisoners regularly in New York's notorious prison, The Tombs. She
contributed materially to the relief of the urban poor, worked at
alcoholic rehabilitation, and cared personally for orphans and the
hungry." (p. 12)
This excerpt is from The Life and letters of
Mrs. Phoebe Palmer, 1881.
"When the rebels
took up arms, and made themselves so obviously outlaws, who would
not have thought that the abolishment of slavery, might have gone on
quietly and surely, without so much pandering to the South. ... I do
not doubt but the God of nations has long had a controversy with us
on account of this national sin, and an awful conviction has rested
on my mind that thousands, if not tens of thousands, of those who
are flesh of our flesh, and bone of our bone, may yet fall, if we do
not, as a national, hasten to the thing that is right before God and
man."
The following quotes come from Four Years in
the Old World, by Phoebe Palmer, 1867.
"Men
of wealth and position we have in most churches. These, by virtue of
their station have a work to do which those of lower worldly
position cannot so well reach. But, alas! how few rich men are
willing to be answerable to the responsibilities of their position,
and in faithfulness remind their neighbors, rolling in luxury and
ease, of the necessity of living in preparation for eternity, in
view of the shortness of time and the reckonings of the last
day!" (p. 157-8)
"Every one is
acquainted with European customs , and habits of thought, is aware
that the distinction between the poor and the rich, or the common
people and the aristocracy, is humiliating to a degree unknown in
most parts of America. It is seen in every thing, and everywhere
abounds.
"Now the King of kings, and Lord of
lards, the blessed and only Potentate, seems to be singling out the
most lowly in life as subjects of his kingdom. The rich and
honorable of this world look on with awe and amazement. I would not,
of course, favor the idea that God is a respecter of persons. But
now God is pouring contempt on human pride. The illiterate poor, who
have little opportunity for the attainment of religious knowledge or
instruction of any sort, are being enlightened by the direct rays of
the Sun of Righteousness in a seemingly miraculous manner' while
those who have all their lives listened to the gospel in their
cushioned pews are left to follow what they have long known to be
the voice of conscience, without these extraordinary
influences."
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