PUBLICARY 145873 ASTOR, LENOX AND TILDEN FOUNDATIONS. 1900. ENTERED, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1849, BY JOHN FREDERICK SCHROEDER, In the Clerk's Office of the Southern District of New York. PRINTED BY T. J. STAFFORD: NEW HAVEN, PREFACE. THE design of this volume is to delineate the character, and collect the precepts, of a beloved and lamented Mother. It is not a book intended for "the public." Like a family portrait, it will be valued chiefly by the children and relatives of her who is the subject of it. Yet the object contemplated by putting it in print, and distributing it among our kindred and our intimate friends, is beyond the mere indulgence of those domestic feelings which would cherish, with tender affection, the memory of a lovely Mother. There is in the lineaments of her character an unearthly expression, calculated to awaken devout and influential reflections, by a contemplation of her sacred lines of thought and feeling, which exhibit so remarkable a family likeness to the most revered and honored members of that household of faith, of which He who was meek and lowly in heart constitutes the Head, and Chief Example. All who knew her, knew that she belonged to Christ's Holy Family. She is still, we doubt not, one of His, and will assuredly be recognized and owned by Him at the last day; for she was not only endued with His heavenly gifts, but was, in an eminent degree, like Him, meek and lowly in heart. It is the wish of her children, to preserve this beautiful ideal of holiness, which, like a precious jewel, she has bequeathed to us, and to transmit it as a legacy to our descendants. The perusal of the following pages may, we trust, open springs of emotion, and prompt holy thoughts and heavenly aspirations, over which our mother may hereafter rejoice with us. We wish it to be distinctly borne in mind, however, that we do not exhibit her portrait to the public eye. She ever studiously shunned the gaze of the world's observation. It is true, indeed, that the veil which her humility and meekness thus threw over her, served but to increase the attractions which it was intended to conceal. Yet we should do violence to our associations with her name, did we, in any manner, blazon forth her virtues and her graces. This Memoir of her life and character is not printed for sale, but for private distribution, as a Family Memorial, to be presented by us to our kindred, and to our intimate friends. Any observations, and any letters or documents, which they or others may have it in their power to communicate, for the enlargement or correction of the historical, biographical, genealogical, or other facts and inferences in the volume, are respectfully solicited, and will be thankfully received. Should some cold critic, however, intrude into the sanctuary of our fond affection, and either seek to repress the glowing emotion of our tributes, or question the propriety of the verdict of our hearts, we trust that a vindication will be furnished, and a rebuke uttered, in our behalf, by every one on whose memory is impressed the image of a loved mother, and who has sympathies that can appreciate the charter of filial love. ST. ANN'S HALL, New York, May 22d, 1849. J. F. S. |