HOLKER, Sunday, March 8th, 1874.
—Finished this evening a book that has taken great hold upon me, and that one ought to thank God for, Miss Yonge's Life of Bishop Patteson. It is a glorious shining proof from beginning to end of what our own dear Church can bring forth. His life was given in single-minded, pure devotion to God's work in the Melanesian Islands; and without sensational results though it might be, the seed sown went deep down and he lived to see it take root downward and bear fruit upward. Oh, what it is to see the Divine Life and Power as fresh and prevailing as ever, when once the Love of Christ is shining! What but that could produce in the heathen converts the blessed gifts of joy and hope and true penitence: their very words the same as of old, speaking of "all things being made new" to them. And then the Bishop's own shining character! Thro' toil and anxiety and loss of home and friends, loneliness, and, latterly, weakness and suffering, what blessedness and peace! what humility, faith, and love!
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