distress him beyond measure; so that he several times declared he would
much rather have marched up to a battery of the enemy's cannon, than have
been obliged, so continually as he was, to face such artillery as this.
But, like a brave soldier in the first action wherein he is engaged, he
continued resolute, though shuddering at the terror of the assault; and
quickly overcame those impressions which it is not perhaps in nature
wholly to avoid; and therefore I find him, in the letter above referred
to, which was written about half a year after his conversion, "quite
ashamed to think of the uneasiness which these things once gave him." In
a word, he went on, as every resolute Christian by divine grace may do,
till he turned ridicule and opposition into respect and veneration.

But this sensible triumph over these difficulties was not till his
Christian experience had been abundantly advanced by the blessing of God
on the sermons he heard, (particularly in the Swiss chapel,) and on the
many hours which he spent in devout retirement, pouring out his whole
soul before God in prayer. He began, within about two months after his
first memorable change, to perceive some secret dawnings of more cheerful
hope, that vile as he saw himself to be, (and I believe no words can
express how vile that was,) he might nevertheless obtain mercy through
the Redeemer. At length (if I remember right, about the end of October,
1719) he found all the burthen of his mind taken off at once by the
powerful impression of that memorable scripture on his mind, Romans iii.
25, 26, "Whom God hath set forth for a propitiation through faith in his
blood, to declare his righteousness in the remission of sins,--that he
might be just, and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus." He had
used to imagine that the justice of God required the damnation of so
enormous a sinner as he saw himself to be; but now he was made deeply
sensible that the divine justice might be not only vindicated, but
glorified, in saving him by the blood of Jesus, even that blood which