that he said, “I never was advanced thus far towards happiness in my life before: though upon the commission of some extraordinary sins, I have had some considerable checks and warnings from within; but still I struggled with them, and so wore them off again. One day, at an atheistical meeting in the house of a person of quality, I undertook to manage the cause, and was the principal disputant against GoD and Religion; and for my performances received the applauses of the whole company. Upon this my mind was terribly struck, and I immediately replied thus to myself,'Good GOD, that a man who walks upright, who sees the wonderful works of GOD, and has the use of his senses and reason, should use them to the defying of his CREATOR!But though this was a good beginning towards my conver-, sion, to find my conscience touched for my sins, yet it went off again: nay, all my life long I had a secret value and reverence for an honest man, and loved morality in others. But I had formed an odd scheme of religion to myself, which would solve all that GOD or conscience might force upon me; yet I was never well reconciled to the business of Christianity; nor had I that reverence for the Gospel of CHRIST which I ought to have had."

This state of mind continued, till the fifty-third chapter of ISAIAH was read to him, together with some other parts of the Sacred Scriptures; when it pleased GOD to fill his mind with such peace and joy in believing, that it was remarkable to all about him. Afterwards he frequently desired those who were with him, to read the same chapter to him; upon which he used to enlarge in a very familiar and affectionate manner, applying the whole to his own humiliation and encouragement.

"O blessed Gon," he would say, can such a horrid creature as I am be accepted by thee, who have denied thy being, and contemned thy power? Can there be mercy and pardon for me? Will GoD own such a wretch as I am?"

In the middle of his sickness he said still farther:-" Shall the unspeakable joys of heaven be conferred on me? O mighty SAVIOUR, never but through thine infinite love and satisfaction! O never but by the purchase of thy blood!" adding" that with all abhorrence, he reflected upon his former life-that

F

from his heart he repented of all that folly and madness of which he had been guilty."

He had a strong and growing esteem for the Sacred Scriptures, and evidently saw their divine fulness and excellency;"For having spoken to his heart, he acknowledged that all the seeming absurdities and contradictions fancied by meu of corrupt and reprobate judgments, were vanished; and the excellency and beauty of them appeared conspicuously, now that he was come to receive the truth in the love of it.”

During his illness he had a hearty concern for the pious education of his children, wishing," his son might never be a wit, one of those wretched creatures who pride themselves in abusing GOD and Religion, denying his Being or his Providence; but that he might become an honest man; and of a truly religious character, which only could be the support and blessing of his family."

more.

One of his companions coming to see him on his death-bed, he said to him:-" O remember that you contemn GoD no He is an avenging GOD, and will visit you for your sins: and will, I hope, in mercy touch your conscience, sooner or later, as he has done mine. You and I have been friends and sinners together a great while, therefore I am the more free with you. We have been all mistaken in our conceits and opinions; our persuasions have been false and groundless; therefore I pray GoD grant you repentance."

When he drew towards the last stage of his sickness, he said, "If GoD should spare me yet a little longer time here, I hope to bring glory to his name, proportionably to the dishonour I have done to him in my whole past life; and particularly by my endeavours to convince others, and to assure them of the danger of their condition, if they continued impenitent; and to tell them how graciously GoD hath dealt with me."

And when he came within still nearer views of dissolution, about three or four days before it, he said, "I shall now die: but, Oh! what unspeakable glories do I see! What joys, beyond thought or expression am I sensible of! I am assured of God's mercy to me through JESUS CHRIST! Oh! how I long to die, and to be with my SAVIOUR!"

For the admonition of others, and to undo as much as

was in his power, the mischief of his former conduct, he subscribed the following Recantation, and ordered it to be published after his death:

"For the benefit of all those whom I may have drawn into sin, by my example and encouragement, I leave to the world. this my last declaration; which I deliver in the presence of the great Gon, who knows the secrets of all hearts, and before whom I am now appearing to be judged; That from the bottom of my soul I detest and abhor the whole course of my former wicked life; that I think I can never sufficiently admire the goodness of GOD, who has given me a true sense of my pernicious opinions and vile practices, by which I have hitherto lived without hope, and without GoD in the world; have been an open enemy to JESUS CHRIST, doing the utmost despite to the HOLY SPIRIT of grace: and that the greatest testimony of my charity to such, is, to warn them in the Name of GOD, as they regard the welfare of their immortal souls, no more to deny his being or his providence, or despise his goodness: no more to make a mock of sin or contemn the pure and excellent religion of my ever-blessed REDEEMER, through whose merits alone, I, one of the greatest of sinners, do yet hope for mercy and forgiveness. Amen.*"

20. We have an account of the conversion of another determined Deist to the faith of CHRIST, in six letters, from a Minister of the Reformed Church abroad, to JOHN NEWTON, late Rector of St. Mary Woolnoth, London. He was born of religious parents, was brought up at school and university for the ministry, became eminent for his literary attainments, but lost all his religion, and commenced Deist. Proud of his

The case of Sir DUNCOMB COLCHESTER, a magistrate in the county of Gloucester, towards the close of the 17th century, was somewhat like this of ROCHESTER. He was a gentleman of excellent parts, a generous spirit, and undaunted courage. Having, however, spent many years in sundry extravagancies, he was at length, by a long and painful sickness, brought to a very serious sense of the excellency of Religion, and of his own great sin and folly in the neglect and contempt of it. He, accordingly, by way of making some small reparation for the mischief he had done by his wickedness, drew up an address to his friends and the public, somewhat like to the above of ROCHESTER, signed by divers witnesses, and caused it to be read in two neighbouring churches, and spread abroad among all his friends and neighbours through the county, as extensively as he was able.

abilities and attainments, and trusting solely to his reasoning powers, he disdained to think with the vulgar, and was too wise in his own esteem to be instructed by Divine Relation. But while he was unacquainted with GOD, he was guilty of secret impurities, and a stranger to peace. Like a ship in a storm, without rudder or pilot, he was hurried along by tumultuous passions, till he grew weary of life. In such a state of soul, and at such a crisis, the light of heavenly truth broke in upon his mind. The LORD spake and it was done. The storm was hushed. The man was powerfully and unexpectedly changed. The servant of sin became the servant of CHRIST; and he now preaches with energy and success, the faith he before laboured to destroy*.

21. Captain JOHN LEE, who was executed for forgery, March 4, 1784, became an Infidel, through reading the elegant, but sophistical writings of DAVID HUME. Deeply, however, did he repent his folly, when he came to be in distressed circumstances. "I leave to the world," said he, in a letter to a friend the night before his execution, "this mournful memento, that however much a man may be favoured by personal qualifications, or distinguished by mental endowments; genius will be useless, and abilities avail but little, unless accompanied by a sense of religion, and attended by the practice of virtue."

22. Another GENTLEMAN, whose name is concealed out of delicacy to his connections, was descended of a noble and religious family. His life was extremely irregular and dissolute, but his natural parts and endowments of mind so extraordinary, that they rendered his conversation agreeable to persons of the highest rank and quality. Being taken ill, he believed he should die at the very beginning of his sickness. His friend, with whom he had frequently disputed against the

* Similar to this instance, in some respects, is the case of the Rev. THOMAS SCOTT, late Chaplain to the Lock Hospital in London. "I feel myself impelled to declare," says he, "that I once was not much more disposed to credit the Scriptures than M1. PAINE: and having got rid of the shackles of education, was much flattered by my emancipation and superior discernment. But twenty years, employed in diligently investigating the evidences and contents of the Bible, have produced in me an unshaken assurance that it is the Word of God."

Answer to PAINE's Age of Reason, p. 23.

existence of a GOD and the truths of revealed religion, came to visit him on the second day after he was seized. He asked him how he did, and what made him so dejected?

"Alas!" said he, "are you so void of understanding, as to imagine I am afraid to die? Far be such thoughts from me. I could meet death with as much courage as I have encountered an enemy in the field of battle, and embrace it as freely as I ever did any friend whom I entirely loved: for I see nothing in this world that is worth the pains of keeping. I have made trial of most states and conditions of life. I have continued at home for a considerable time, and travelled abroad in foreign parts. I have been rich and poor. I have been raised to honour and reversed in a high degree. I have also been exposed to scorn and contempt. I have been wise and foolish. I have experienced the difference between virtue and vice, and every thing that was possible for a man in my station: so that I am capable of distinguishing what is really good and praise-worthy, and what is not. Now I see with a clearer sight than ever, and discern a vast difference between the vain licentious discourse of a Libertine, and the sound argument of a true Believer: for though the former may express himself more finely than the latter, so as to puzzle him with hard questions and intricate notions, yet all amount to no more than the fallacy of a few airy repartees, which are never affected by sober Christians, nor capable of eluding the force of solid reason. But now I know how to make a distinction between them; and I wish from the bottom of my heart I had been so sensible of my error in the time of my health; then I had never had those dreadful foretastes of hell which I now have. Oh! what a sad account have I to give of a long life spent in sin and folly! I look beyond the fears of a temporal death. All the dread that you perceive in me arises from the near approach I am making to an eternal death; for I must die to live to all eternity."

This unhappy Gentleman continued in this manner to bewail his past folly, atheism and infidelity, for forty days, and then expired. His friend, however, took much pains with him to encourage his repentance, faith, and return to a proper state of mind; the particulars of which would be too tedious to record in this place. At last, however, he was brought to entertain some hope, that the REDEEMER of