of that precious gift. God ceases to be God only for those who can admit
the possibility of His non-existence, and that conception is in itself
the most severe punishment they can suffer.

Man is free; yet we must not suppose that he is at liberty to do
everything he pleases, for he becomes a slave the moment he allows his
actions to be ruled by passion. The man who has sufficient power over
himself to wait until his nature has recovered its even balance is the
truly wise man, but such beings are seldom met with.

The reader of these Memoirs will discover that I never had any fixed aim
before my eyes, and that my system, if it can be called a system, has
been to glide away unconcernedly on the stream of life, trusting to the
wind wherever it led. How many changes arise from such an independent
mode of life! My success and my misfortunes, the bright and the dark days
I have gone through, everything has proved to me that in this world,
either physical or moral, good comes out of evil just as well as evil
comes out of good. My errors will point to thinking men the various
roads, and will teach them the great art of treading on the brink of the
precipice without falling into it. It is only necessary to have courage,
for strength without self-confidence is useless. I have often met with
happiness after some imprudent step which ought to have brought ruin upon
me, and although passing a vote of censure upon myself I would thank God
for his mercy. But, by way of compensation, dire misfortune has befallen
me in consequence of actions prompted by the most cautious wisdom. This
would humble me; yet conscious that I had acted rightly I would easily
derive comfort from that conviction.

In spite of a good foundation of sound morals, the natural offspring of
the Divine principles which had been early rooted in my heart, I have