mouth, to be brought forth in the time of approaching trouble. No, my goodness was like the morning cloud, and all my serious thoughts as the early dew, or the writing on the sea shore. The first wave of temptation swept them all away. I can assure him, although not more than three months could have elapsed between the writing the above prayer and my being actually called to attend the chain-pumps, until they choked, and the ship was filled, yet I do not remember that I once thought of it, or offered up a single line of its petitions throughout that sad catastrophe! On the contrary, when daylight appeared, and our real situation was known, I felt such a state of mind as bordered on despair. The gloomy sky over our heads, the trembling wreck under our feet, and the roar of the tempestuous surf breaking around us, were but faint pictures of the agitation of my soul when I thought on death. In the heat of battle it is not only possible, but easy, to forget death, and cease to shrink; but in the cool and protracted hours of a shipwreck, where there is often nothing to engage the mind but the recollection of tried and unsuccessful labours, and the sight of unavoidable and increasing harbingers of destruction, it is not easy or possible to forget ourselves or a future state. With all my might I strove to shake off the terrors of a guilty conscience, but could not. In my distress I viewed the Almighty as a dreadful being; and could I have sunk into a state of nothingness, I should have preferred it to living in his presence. I did not love him; I did not think I had any claim or pretensions to his favour; and I could not but wish to escape his wrath. 66 At length the fear of that God, whom I could neither forget nor escape, compelled me to open my mouth; but it was not with those of old, to say, Lord, be merciful to me a sinner!" "What shall I do to be saved?" or, "Lord! what wilt thou have me to do?"-No! but it was to insult the Majesty of heaven with a string of proposals and promises; how, on my part, I would in future live and act, if He, on his part, would save me from my present danger!! Gracious God! why did the waves spare me, thus to add one sin and presumption to another. When thy merciful ear heard me protesting against a course of life, of which I no further disapproved than as I feared it might expose me to thy just anger, why didst thou not doom me to that "hell which is moved from beneath to meet the sinner at his coming?" Precious and adorable Intercessor! it was thy plea, thy presence at thy right hand of Power, which prevailed to the averting of that judgment, which otherwise must have been poured out in full vials of wrath on one whose prayers were a very abomination in the sight of thine offended Father!" The heart of man is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked!" Yes! let pride and ignorance write or say ever so much to the contrary, I have nothing more to do than to examine what my own is, and has been; and all their vain janglings fall to the ground. What else could induce me, the instant I was clear of the wreck, to forget all my vows and proposals, and to sing, with others, "Where's the tempest now? who feels it! And yet so far was this my conduct from being considered an outrage against morality and good order by my superiors, that they absolutely showed me much marked attention, and considered me "a very worthy young man!" I mention this, lest any advocate for the purity and dignity of human nature should say that I was a notorious reprobate beyond others, and therefore no fair specimen of the descendants of Adam. On the other hand, that my goodness did not make me "meet to receive or deserve grace of congruity,"* will still appear from the sequel of my narrative. * Art. XIII.-Of Works before Justification. "THOU HAST MADE ME TO SERVE WITH THY SINS, THOU HAST WEARIED ME WITH THINE INIQUITIES." YES, most gracious God! I plead guilty to this tby charge; "I acknowledge my rebellion; I know I have walked in a way that was not good: I have walked after my own thoughts, and provoked thee to anger continually to thy face. O that I may henceforth live under the abiding and increasing sense of thy long forbearance and tender compassion, and never, never grieve thy blessed Spirit more! Surely, were I in hell itself, I must proclaim thee in thine own words; and while evil spirits vented their execrations, methinks I must often cease from my weeping and wailing to say, Nay, for "He is the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin." And now, such of my readers as are disposed to see this character of a covenant God further exemplified in the life of an unworthy fellow-sinner, must follow me from the German Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea. As yet I had never been afflicted with any dangerous illness; at least I was too young and thoughtless to consider the small-pox, measles, and a typhus fever as such, when I passed through them. But soon after the E, my next ship, arrived on her station, the events of war threw some famished prisoners into our hands, who, in return, introduced a pestilential fever. Our ship was, in consequence, obliged to repair to Minorca; the sick were put on shore for refreshment, and five of the most desperate cases, including myself, were left at the hospital. From the hour of quitting the dreary wreck of the N-, to that in which I was left at sick quarters, and became perfectly delirious, I had never employed my reason or my thoughts on the subject of my vows and proposals of leading a better life. Three years had elapsed since I rushed from the means of grace on shore; and, up to this period, I had never read one sentence of the word of God. I had gone, like Pharaoh, from one degree of hardened rebellion to another, until the presence of the Lord seemed to be withdrawn, and Satan promised to reign the undisturbed possessor of my heart. No remorse of conscience, no desires to do better, no remembrance of former mercies, had, for some time past, found place |