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Mary Wilder Tileston
Mary Wilder Tileston was born on August 20, 1843, in Salem, Massachusetts, to Caleb Foote, owner and editor of the Salem Gazette, and Mary Wilder White Foote. Raised in a family with strong intellectual and religious ties—her brother Henry Wilder Foote became a Harvard-educated minister, and her brother Arthur Foote a noted composer—she attended private schools in Salem. On September 25, 1865, she married John Boies Tileston, a publisher’s son, and they had seven children: Mary, Margaret, Roger, Amelia, Wilder, Edith, and Eleanor. The family lived in Concord, Massachusetts, on a 200-acre farm from around 1874 to 1882, then moved to Salem and later Brookline, Massachusetts, where she died on July 3, 1934. Tileston’s career was centered on her literary contributions rather than preaching. Her most notable work, Daily Strength for Daily Needs, a collection of prose, verse, and scripture for daily reading, sold over 250,000 copies by 1910 and was highly regarded. She compiled other devotionals, including Prayers Ancient and Modern (1897) and children’s works like The Child’s Harvest of Verse (1910), reflecting her love for spiritual literature. While not a preacher by occupation, her anthologies served a preaching-like function, offering spiritual guidance to readers. Her legacy lies in these writings, which continue to inspire, rather than in a formal ministerial role.
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Mary Wilder Tileston emphasizes the importance of maintaining unbroken communion with God to experience peace, rest, and joy in our lives. She highlights the need to focus on giving perfect satisfaction to God rather than just getting through a great deal of work. Tileston encourages seeking fulfillment, peace, and rest in God's abiding joy, lifting our souls above worldly distractions to find solace in His presence.
Peace From Wearying Labor
Acquaint now thyself with Him, and be at peace: thereby good shall come unto thee. JOB 12:21 DON'T be unwise enough to think that we are serving God best by constant activity at the cost of headaches and broken rest. I am getting to be of the opinion that we may be doing too much. We want at least this is my own want--a higher quality of work. Our labor should be to maintain unbroken communion with our blessed Lord; then we shall have entire rest, and God abiding in us; that which we do will not be ours, but His. JOHN KENNETH MACKENZIE OUR object in life should not be so much to get through a great deal of work, as to give perfect satisfaction to Him for whom we are doing the work. WM. HAY M. H. AITKEN Let me not seek out of Thee what I can only find in Thee, peace and rest and joy and bliss, which abide only in Thy abiding joy. Lift up my soul above the weary round of harassing thoughts to Thy eternal Presence. Lift up my soul to the pure, bright, clear, serene, radiant atmosphere of Thy Presence, that there I may breathe freely, there repose in Thy love, there be at rest from myself and from all things that weary me; thence return, arrayed with Thy peace, to do and bear what shall please Thee. E. B. PUSEY
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Mary Wilder Tileston was born on August 20, 1843, in Salem, Massachusetts, to Caleb Foote, owner and editor of the Salem Gazette, and Mary Wilder White Foote. Raised in a family with strong intellectual and religious ties—her brother Henry Wilder Foote became a Harvard-educated minister, and her brother Arthur Foote a noted composer—she attended private schools in Salem. On September 25, 1865, she married John Boies Tileston, a publisher’s son, and they had seven children: Mary, Margaret, Roger, Amelia, Wilder, Edith, and Eleanor. The family lived in Concord, Massachusetts, on a 200-acre farm from around 1874 to 1882, then moved to Salem and later Brookline, Massachusetts, where she died on July 3, 1934. Tileston’s career was centered on her literary contributions rather than preaching. Her most notable work, Daily Strength for Daily Needs, a collection of prose, verse, and scripture for daily reading, sold over 250,000 copies by 1910 and was highly regarded. She compiled other devotionals, including Prayers Ancient and Modern (1897) and children’s works like The Child’s Harvest of Verse (1910), reflecting her love for spiritual literature. While not a preacher by occupation, her anthologies served a preaching-like function, offering spiritual guidance to readers. Her legacy lies in these writings, which continue to inspire, rather than in a formal ministerial role.