Sarah Faraday to William Buchanan   31 October 18501

3 o clock AM Octr 31st RI | London

My very dear Friend & Brother

I rise from a restless bed to write to you feeling sure of your kind sympathy in my great anxiety & affliction[.]

My beloved husbands mind has been much disturbed in the view the Church takes of not receiving an excommunicant more than once - & he has had some conversation with our Elders which so far does not seem very satisfactory. Now I have heard him say sometimes your clear view of the scriptures struck him. May I ask you to write me by return of post if possible, your view of this subject - from the scriptures alone - he does not know of my writing, & I hope I am not wrong in so doing[.] I do not write to you as an Elder but as to a dear friend & brother with whom we have had many communings & surely if his mind could be set at rest with out sowing division in the church or casting him out it will be a happy thing[.]

Most affectionately your | sister in the truth (I know) | S. Faraday

My husband has been anxious not to involve me in these considerations & I have not seen the Elders[.] I hope if I am wrong in this step my friends will forgive & feel for my great anxiety[.]

1
Dated on the basis that this letter is the first of a sequence of four letters dealing with Faraday’s possible second (and thus final) exclusion from the Sandemanian Church. Of these four letters only letter 2340 is dated precisely and the others have been dated accordingly. On this episode see Cantor (1991a), 275-7 and 345.

Please cite as “Faraday2335,” in Ɛpsilon: The Michael Faraday Collection accessed on 27 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/faraday/letters/Faraday2335