Jewett Texts

These manuscripts are among her Jewett's papers at the Houghton Library of Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. Sarah Orne Jewett Correspondence bMS Am 1743 Box 7, Item 279. As they are unsigned, and I am no handwriting expert, I cannot be sure she wrote all of them. though she clearly wrote some. Some seem likely to be parts of letters, and some must be from drafts of essays.
I have given them titles.

Notes on the Presentation of Manuscript Materials

^ ^ : The author has inserted text.
~~abc~~ : The author has deleted text.
[ ] : Editorial comments and descriptions.
{ } : Editorial insertions in pursuit of clarity.

Jewett's periods often appear as dashes, and also often are indistinguishable from commas. Where her intentions seem clear, I have placed commas and periods; when not sure I have given the dashes or included a note.
She is not consistent in using apostrophes. I have presented words needing apostrophes as she presents them.

Fragments from c. 1874*

Pleasure*

God is helping us -- It seems very hard when a young person starts out in life and finds this or that inclination and pleasure and somebody ~~seems~~ says, you must conquer this or it will lead you to ruin -- you must give up your love of ease and your self-indulgence -- It makes life very cold and uncomfortable and unworth living. And the girl or the boy says, 'What is the use of my depriving myself of all this pleasure? and what did God give me all these wishes and tastes and this pleasure-loving body for -- and then say it is wicked to gratify myself. But as time goes on -- the reason of it comes out plainer -- one sees that there are

Critique of John Tyndall* on Science and Religion

I have been reading Tyndall's address and I should so much like to talk it over with you. It is grandly comprehensive and one must feel great respect for the man who can grasp such an argument and state his theory of the origin and growth of the world & the worlds life in the way Prof Tyndall has -- But with all its grandness it comes so ^as^ short of the mark ^as an ant hill of one of Gods high and [ solemn written over something ] mountains.^ After all it seems ~~to me~~ narrow and feeble. (which [ is / seems ] undoubtedly a most impertinent remark, on my part!) For he has given a resumé of what has been done so far, and he is sweetly confides in the certainty that inasmuch as we know so well the plan upon which the Creative Power (rather mysterious & indefinable ^he thinks^ but no matter) has worked, we can have no ~~doubt~~ uncertainty as to ~~the~~ affairs in future ages -- There is at times in the address a tone which seems arrogant.

Reflection on Age

= That old woman I watched going up over the hill ~~with~~ so slowly with a stick, while I was waiting by the Old Fields schoolhouse for Miss Huntress* -- I though how very old she looked, and it seemed so strange -- our growth to physical perfection and then gradual loss & deterioration & decay -- This law which is the law of all material life -- And that the mind grows old and useless like the body -- I wonder if it does not seem very strange to an old person who dies and goes to heaven and has a sudden freshening of and renewing of body & mind & a better power than ever of using them --

[ 2nd page on same sheet ]

[ These lines are deleted: ] Where ever it went the daisies bent while the rest stood straight and [ end deleted lines ]

When they go a-pleasuring they make hard work of it --

Notes

Fragments:
Both pages are on the same size and color of paper, a full sheet. The "Critique" seems to have been folded in thirds and addresses a "you," suggesting that it was intended for a particular reader. "Pleasure" shows no folds, suggesting that it was not mailed and was part of a journal.

Pleasure: This piece may be addressed to young readers. Given its physical similarity to the second piece, one may speculate that it was composed at about the same time.

Tyndall: Almost certainly, this page responds to the 1874 address by John Tyndall (1820-1893) at the British Association for the Advancement of Science. Wikipedia says:

Tyndall played his part in communicating to the educated public what he thought were the virtues of having a clear separation between science (knowledge & rationality) and religion (faith & spirituality).... The speech gave a favourable account of the history of evolutionary theories, mentioning Darwin's name favourably more than 20 times, and concluded by asserting that religious sentiment should not be permitted to "intrude on the region of knowledge, over which it holds no command".

If this was written, as seems likely, when Tyndall's address was "in the news," in 1874, and Jewett is the author, then it might well be addressed to her father, Theodore Herman Jewett (1815-1878) or to another mentor with whom she corresponded on religious topics, Theophilus Parsons (1797-1882), a retired judge and apologist for Swedenborgian doctrines of the New Church. The latter seems more likely, as she has put her thoughts in writing.

Huntress: Old Fields is an area in the southern part of South Berwick.
William Huntress was a cabinet maker and prominent businessman in late 19th-century South Berwick, ME. A talk on Jewett by Rebecca O. Young is reported in the Lewiston Evening Journal (23 November 1918, p. 7). Young says that Jewett's two teachers at Olive Raynes' school were Miss Raynes and Miss Huntress. It may be that one of these clues points toward the Miss Huntress whom Jewett awaited.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.

It is from Eugenie that we get most of the charming detail of their simple country life [ in corrected ] the old chateau, the close acquaintance with the [ deletion ] peasants who came to kind M. de Guerin pere for sympathy & assistance of every sort. Mme G. Sand* does not [ deletion ] make us see her

[ Page 2 ]

[ deletion ] humble friends more clearly than we see them some times in Eugenie's Journal & [ Letters corrected ] -- But all the ^[ deletion ] Cayla^ landscape, the pure thought, the knowledge of humanity and the delights of rural life are crystallized in Maurice's exquisite sentences.

Note
Though held in a folder of letters, this seems to be part of a draft for an essay or review. Probably this fragment was part of the drafting process for Jewett's short essay, "A French Country Girl," which appeared in The Congregationalist of 15 February 1883.
Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.