Record Data
Source citation
Wiggins, Sarah Woolfork, ed. The Journal of Josiah Gorgas: 1857-1858. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1995, p. 11.
Type
Diary
Date Certainty
Exact
Transcriber
Scott Ackerman
Transcription date
Transcription
The following text is presented here in complete form, as it originally appeared in print.
June 7th [1857] Spring is at last upon us & in great beauty, yet the weather is still quite cool, cool enough for overcoats and shawls. The transition from bleak bare hills to the luxuriant growth of spring is very sudden and striking.
Willie was delighted yesterday at the receipt of a Donkey which his Uncle Dick brings him from Sicily. It is very tame & gentle & will be a great plaything for him. It is Sunday & I ought to have gone to church, the bells for which are now ringing reproachfully, but I did not feel like it, a poor excuse I fear. In consequence of my defection, Minnie is also at home. If we were members we should feel ourselves compelled to attend more regularly, and after all it is good to have a day set apart for something besides making money, or doing work, something a little more intellectual, if not religious. I do not however, like to go day after day and make professions which do not come wholly from the heart, and which are but too frequently accompanied by a yawn. How many hundreds of times have I gone over the service of the Episcopal Church, and yet I cannot repeat twenty consecutive words in it, beyond the Lords prayer! Yet it is better to attend church regularly even if we do not join in the services. I have often heard the words which made me think, & not infrequently made me for a time being a better man. If we but listen to an earnest, honest man in the pulpit we are not wasting our time. This at least we can do without that feeling of self-doubting, which strikes me when I join in a service which is but too often only words, words, words, most unprofitably spoken. We should be careful not to trifle with our own sincerity, that is to assume the outward token of sincerity when we are not in earnest.
The recent death of the venerable Senator [Andrew] Butler of S.C. and the return of Gen. [William] Walker from Nicaragua are the most noted events of the last month. I trust the failure of Walker & the execution of Col. [Henry A.] Crabbe [Crabb] & some fifty of his followers (in Sonora) [Province in Mexico] will check these buccaneering expeditions, which are a stain on our national character.
Willie was delighted yesterday at the receipt of a Donkey which his Uncle Dick brings him from Sicily. It is very tame & gentle & will be a great plaything for him. It is Sunday & I ought to have gone to church, the bells for which are now ringing reproachfully, but I did not feel like it, a poor excuse I fear. In consequence of my defection, Minnie is also at home. If we were members we should feel ourselves compelled to attend more regularly, and after all it is good to have a day set apart for something besides making money, or doing work, something a little more intellectual, if not religious. I do not however, like to go day after day and make professions which do not come wholly from the heart, and which are but too frequently accompanied by a yawn. How many hundreds of times have I gone over the service of the Episcopal Church, and yet I cannot repeat twenty consecutive words in it, beyond the Lords prayer! Yet it is better to attend church regularly even if we do not join in the services. I have often heard the words which made me think, & not infrequently made me for a time being a better man. If we but listen to an earnest, honest man in the pulpit we are not wasting our time. This at least we can do without that feeling of self-doubting, which strikes me when I join in a service which is but too often only words, words, words, most unprofitably spoken. We should be careful not to trifle with our own sincerity, that is to assume the outward token of sincerity when we are not in earnest.
The recent death of the venerable Senator [Andrew] Butler of S.C. and the return of Gen. [William] Walker from Nicaragua are the most noted events of the last month. I trust the failure of Walker & the execution of Col. [Henry A.] Crabbe [Crabb] & some fifty of his followers (in Sonora) [Province in Mexico] will check these buccaneering expeditions, which are a stain on our national character.