the true meaning of it; desirous, if possible, to obtain a gentler interpretation of the matter than my evil conscience would suffer me to fasten on it. O Lord, thou didst vex me with all thy storms, all thy billows went over me; thou didst run upon me like a giant in the night season, thou didst scare me with visions in the night season.'

"In every book I opened I found something that struck me to the heart. I remember taking up a volume of Beaumont and Fletcher, which lay upon the table in my kinsman's lodgings, and the first sentence which I saw was this: "The justice of the gods is in it.' My heart instantly replied, 'It is of a truth :' and I cannot but observe, that as I found something in every book to condemn me, so it was the first sentence, in general, I pitched upon. Every thing preached to me, and every thing preached the curse of the law.

"I was now strongly tempted to use laudanum, not as a poison, but as an opiate, to compose my spirits; to stupify my awakened and feeling mind, harassed with sleepless nights, and days of uninterrupted misery. But God, who would have nothing to interfere with the quickening work he had begun in me, forbade it; and neither the want of rest, nor continued agony of mind could bring me to the use of it: I hated and abhorred the very smell of it.

"I never went into the street, but I thought the people stared and laughed at me, and held me in contempt; and I could hardly persuade myself, but that the voice of my conscience was loud enough for every one to hear it. They who knew me seemed to avoid me; and if they spoke to me, they seemed to do it in scorn. I bought a ballad of one who was singing it in the street, because I thought it was written on me.

"I dined alone, either at the tavern, where I went in the dark, or at the chop-house, where I always took care to hide myself in the darkest corner of the room. I slept generally an hour in the evening, but it was only to be terrified in dreams; and when I awoke, it was some time before I could walk steadily through the passage into the dining-room. I reeled and staggered like a drunken man. The eyes of man I could not bear; but when I thought that the eyes of God were upon me, (which I felt assured of,) it gave me the most intolerable anguish. If, for a moment, a book or a companion stole away my attention from myself, a flash from hell seemed to be thrown

into my mind immediatly; and I said within myself, 'What are these things to me, who am damned?' In a word, I saw myself a sinner altogether, and every way a sinner; but I saw not yet a glimpse of the mercy of God in Jesus Christ.

"The capital engine in all the artillery of Satan had not yet been employed against me. Already overwhelmed with despair, I was not yet sunk into the bottom of the gulf. This was a fit season for the use of it; accordingly I was set to inquire, whether I had not been guilty of the unpardonable sin; and was presently persuaded that I had.

"A neglect to improve the mercies of God at Southampton, on the occasion above mentioned, was represented to me as the sin against the Holy Ghost. No favourable construction of my conduct in that instance; no argument of my brother's, who was now with me: nothing he could suggest, in extenuation of my offences, could gain a moment's admission. Satan furnished me so readily with weapons against myself, that neither scripture nor reason could undeceive me. Life appeared to me now more eligible than death, only because it was a barrier between me and everlasting burnings.

"My thoughts in the day became still more gloomy, and my night visions more dreadful. One morning, as I lay between sleeping and waking, I seemed to myself to be walking in Westminster Abbey, waiting till prayers should begin; presently I thought I heard the minister's voice, and hastened towards the choir; just as I was upon the point of entering, the iron gate under the organ was flung in my face, with a jar that made the Abbey ring; the noise awoke me; and a sentence of excommunication from all the churches upon the earth could not have been so dreadful to me, as the interpretation which I could not avoid putting upon this dream.

"Another time I seemed to pronounce to myself, Evil, be thou my good.' I verily thought that I had adopted that hellish sentiment, it seemed to come so directly from my heart. I arose from bed to look for my prayer-book, and having found it, endeavoured to pray; but immediately experienced the impossibility of drawing nigh to God, unless he first draw nigh to us. I made many passionate attempts towards prayer, but failed in all.

"Having an obscure notion of the efficacy of faith, I resolved upon an experiment, to prove whether I had faith or not.

For this purpose I resolved to repeat the Creed; when I came to the second period of it, all traces of the former were struck out of my memory, nor could I recollect one syllable of the matter. While I endeavoured to recover it, and when just upon the point, I perceived a sensation in my brain, like a tremulous vibration in all the fibres of it. By this means I lost the words in the very instant when I thought to have laid hold of them. This threw me into an agony; but growing a little calmer, I made an attempt for the third time; here again I failed in the same manner as before.

"I considered it as a supernatural interposition to inform me, that having sinned against the Holy Ghost, I had no longer any interest in Christ, or in the gifts of the Spirit. Being assured of this, with the most rooted conviction, I gave myself up to despair. I felt a sense of burning in my heart, like that of real fire, and concluded it was an earnest of those eternal flames which would soon receive me. I laid myself down, howling with horror, while my knees smote against each other.

"In this condition my brother found me, and the first words I spoke to him were, 'Oh! Brother, I am damned! think of eternity, and then think what it is to be damned!' I had, indeed, a sense of eternity impressed upon my mind, which seemed almost to amount to a full comprehension of it. My brother, pierced to the heart with the sight of misery, tried to comfort me; but all to no purpose. I refused comfort; and my mind appeared to me in such colours, that to administer it to me, was only to exasperate me, and to mock my fears.

"At length, I remembered my friend, Martin Madan, and sent for him. I used to think him an enthusiast, but now seemed convinced, that if there was any balm in Gilead, he must administer it to me. On former occasions, when my spiritual concerns had at any time occurred to me, I thought likewise on the necessity of repentance. I knew that many persons had spoken of shedding tears for sin; but when I asked myself, whether the time would ever come when I should weep for mine, it seemed to me that a stone might sooner do it.

"Not knowing that Christ was exalted to give repentance, I despaired of ever attaining to it. My friend came to me;

we sat on the bed-side together and he began to declare to me the gospel. He spoke of original sin, and the corruption of every man born into the world, whereby every one is a child of wrath. I perceived something like hope dawning in my heart. This doctrine set me more upon a level with the rest of mankind, and made my condition appear less desperate.

"Next he insisted on the all-atoning efficacy of the blood of Jesus, and his righteousness, for our justification. While listening to this part of his discourse, and the scriptures upon which he founded it, my heart began to burn within me; my soul was pierced with a sense of my bitter ingratitude to so merciful a Saviour; and those tears, which I thought impossible, burst forth freely. I saw clearly that my case required such a remedy, and had not the least doubt within myself, but that this was the gospel of salvation.

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Lastly, he urged the necessity of a lively faith in Jesus Christ; not an assent only of the understanding, but a faith of application, an actually laying hold of it, and embracing it as a salvation purchased for me personally. Here I failed, and deplored my want of such a faith. He told me it was the gift of God, which he trusted he would bestow upon me. I could only reply, 'I wish he would:'-a very irreverent petition, but a very sincere one, and such as the blessed God, in his due time, was pleased to answer.

"My brother, finding I had received consolation from Mr. Madan, was very anxious that I should take the earliest opportunity of conversing with him again; and, for this purpose, pressed me to go to him immediately. I was for putting it off, but my brother seemed impatient of delay; and, at length, prevailed on me to set out. I mention this to the honour of his candour and humanity; which would suffer no difference of sentiments to interfere with them. My welfare was his only object, and all his prejudices fled before his zeal to procure it. May he receive, for his recompense, all that happiness the gospel, which I then first became acquainted with, is alone able to impart !

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Easier, indeed, I was; but far from easy. The wounded spirit within me was less in pain, but by no means healed. What I had experienced was but the beginning of sorrows, and a long train of still greater terrors was at hand. I slept my

usual three hours well, and then awoke with ten times a stronger alienation from God than ever.

"Satan plied me close with horrible visions, and more horrible voices. My ears rang with the sound of torments, that seemed to await me. Then did the 'pains of hell get hold on me,' and, before daybreak, the very sorrows of death encompassed me.' A numbness seized upon the extremities of my body, and life seemed to retreat before it; my hands and feet became cold and stiff; a cold sweat stood upon my forehead; my heart seemed at every pulse to beat its last, and my soul to cling to my lips, as if on the very brink of departure. No convicted criminal ever feared death more, or was more assured of dying.

"At eleven o'clock my brother called upon me, and in about an hour after his arrival, that distemper of mind, which I had so ardently wished for, actually seized me.

"While I traversed the apartment, in the most horrible dismay of soul, expecting every moment, that the earth would open her mouth and swallow me; my conscience scaring me, the avenger of blood pursuing me, and the city of refuge out of reach and out of sight; a strange and horrible darkness fell upon me. If it were possible that a heavy blow could light on the brain, without touching the skull, such was the sensation I felt. I clapped my hand to my forehead, and cried aloud, through the pain it gave me. At every stroke my thoughts and expressions became more wild and indistinct; all that remained clear was the sense of sin, and the expectation of punishment. These kept undisturbed possession all through my illness, without interruption or abatement.

"My brother instantly perceived the change, and consulted with my friends on the best manner to dispose of me. It was agreed among them, that I should be carried to St. Alban's, where Dr. Cotton kept a house for the reception of such patients, and with whom I was known to have a slight acquaintance. Not only his skill, as a physician, recommended him to their choice, but his well-known humanity and sweetness of temper. It will be proper to draw a veil over the secrets of my prison-house."

S. C.-1.

H