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Daughters of God
in your character will, if indulged, become confirmed upon you and
grow stronger with every indulgence. Therefore subdue it, control it,
overcome it entirely....
I see, Addie, more especially in you a growing disposition to jeal-
ousy. Jealousy, the Scriptures tell us, “is cruel as the grave.”
Song of
Solomon 8:6
. You may inquire, “What is jealousy”? It is this: thinking
that those around you do not think enough of you and appreciate your
value. You imagine they talk about you and say things of you not
correctly. You feel that others are favored and you are not. Many such
feelings are the outgrowth of jealousy.
Now, Addie, you want to be a Christian, a child of God. And
if you succeed, you will have battles to fight with your own natural
imperfections. You must watch for these defects and war against them
with all your powers. Jesus loves you, He died for you, my children,
Addie and May, and He wants you to have His spirit and His grace
that you may indeed be His lambs, His dear children. You want the
grace of Jesus to subdue every unlovely trait of character that you may
be approved of Jesus and the holy angels.
Addie, I observe you listen and watch to hear what others say,
thinking they may say something in reference to you. Do not do this
anymore. This you should overcome at once. Your mother did in this
way when she was a girl, and she fancied that she was slighted and
blamed and disliked, and this jealousy grew upon her until after she
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was married. She made the life of your father anything but pleasant.
For your good, I enjoin upon you to nip this in the bud.
Again, I see in you a disposition to dictate to May and fret at her.
This is growing upon you. Treat May kindly, make your requests
patiently, not in an ordering manner, but just as one sister should treat
another. You will be disliked by everyone unless you look well to
these things.
You have both many things in your natural disposition that should
be overcome. You must see these things, and then you will see how
you despise them in others, and avoid them yourselves. You may grow
up lovely in character, kind, gentle, meek, lowly of heart, or you may
grow up peevish, fretful, unkind, self-sufficient, esteeming yourselves
above that which you should. Read in the Bible what are the fruits
borne by the Christian tree and then read the fruit borne by the evil tree.
One is good, the other corrupt. Now I have no time to write further,