T hese photographs were sent unto me by dear saints who have likewise taken up the practice of copying the Holy Scriptures with their own hands. It rejoices me much to behold them thus employed, slowly committing the Word of God unto paper, line after line and word after word. There is, I am persuaded, much sweetness and profit in the exercise. It constrains the hurried soul to become still before the sacred text. The eye reads the word, the tongue pronounces it, the ear receives it, and the hand afterward writes it down; and thus the senses are gathered, as it were, about one table, there to feast together upon that which God hath spoken. Bind them upon thy fingers, write them upon the table of thine heart. Proverbs 7:3 How easily do we read and yet scarcely stay long enough to consider what we have read! But here the hand travels slowly, and not so hurriedly as the wandering mind. We are made to linger over the words; and many a little thing which might otherwise have escap...

Journal Entry. Thirty First of August, Twenty Twenty Sixth. Morning. Second hour. I have at length mustered courage enough to begin writing in my notebook; and now that the first chapter of the book of Genesis is committed unto the page, there is no going back. The undertaking before me is no small one. I suppose it may require the better part of two years to accomplish, should the Lord lend me such time; and even this consideration made me somewhat fearful of beginning. For near two weeks I had been preparing myself for it, trying one manner of handwriting and then another, considering carefully how much space each would require, yet unwilling to purchase economy at the expense of plainness. I desired a hand small enough that much might be contained upon the page, but sufficiently clear that what is now written may still be comfortably read in years to come. But preparation must at length give way to doing. The empty page cannot forever remain empty. How far the Lord shall permit my...

..he shall write him a copy of this law in a book out of that which is before the priests the Levites: And it shall be with him, and he shall read therein all the days of his life: that he may learn to fear the LORD his God, to keep all the words of this law and these statutes, to do them: That his heart be not lifted up above his brethren, and that he turn not aside from the commandment, to the right hand, or to the left: to the end that he may prolong his days.. Deuteronomy 17:18-20  I have been much persuaded that this may prove a sweet and profitable exercise for my dear wife and me, namely, to begin scribing the Holy Scriptures with our own hands, copying them word for word. My heart is much drawn unto the undertaking; for whilst the eye reads, the tongue utters, and the hand writes down each sacred word, the mind is constrained to dwell and remain where otherwise it might too quickly pass along.  This is indeed no new practice; yet methinks there is so...