"The scene at prayers is a most curious one. There is a bell which rings when Mr W begins to dress; another when he finishes dressing; upon which Mr Barningham begins to play a hymn upon the organ and to sing a solo, and by degrees the family come down to the entrance hall where the psalmody goes on; first one joins in and then another; Lizzy calling out "Don't go near dear Mama, she sings so dreadfully out of tune, dear", and William, "Don't look at Papa, he does make such dreadful faces." So he does, waving his arms about, and occasionally pulling the leaves off the geraniums and smelling them, singing out louder and louder in a tone of hilarity: "Trust Him, praise Him, trust Him, praise Him ever more." Sometimes he exclaims "Astonishing! How very affecting! Only think of Abraham, a fine old man, just a kind of man one should naturally pull off one's hat to, with long grey hairs, and looking like an old aloe—but you don't know what an aloe is perhaps: its a tree—no a plant which flowers..." and he wanders off into a dissertation about plants and flowers."
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Marianne Thornton to her sister Henrietta (1828), quoted in E. M. Forster, Marianne Thornton, 1797–1887: A Domestic Biography (1956), pp. 137-138
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/William_Wilberforce
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William Wilberforce
William Wilberforce (August 24 1759 – July 29 1833) was a British politician, philanthropist, theologian, and leader of the movement to abolish the slave trade. His third son was Bishop Samuel Wilberforce.
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