that instant onward he was cured of his wicked habit, and people
wondered at the change.

"Quickly after this I fell into company with one poor man that made
profession of religion; who, as I then thought, did talk pleasantly
of the Scriptures and of the matter of religious. Wherefore, falling
into some love and liking of what he said, I betook me to my Bible,
and began to take great pleasure in reading, but especially with the
historical part thereof; for as for Paul's Epistles, and such like
Scriptures, I could not away with them, being as yet ignorant either
of the corruption of my nature, or of the want and worth of Jesus
Christ to save me. Wherefore I fell into some outward reformation,
both in my words and life, and did set the commandments before me for
my way to heaven; which commandments I also did strive to keep, and,
as I thought, did keep them pretty well sometimes, and then I should
have comfort; yet now and then should break one, and so afflict my
conscience; but then I should repent, and say I was sorry for it, and
promise God to do better next time, and there got help again; for
then I thought I pleased God as well as any man in England. Thus I
continued about a year; all which time our neighbours did take me to
be a very godly man, a new and religious man, and did marvel much to
see such great and famous alteration in my life and manners; and
indeed so it was, though I knew not Christ, nor grace, nor faith, nor
hope; for, as I have well since seen, had I then died, my state had
been most fearful. But, I say, my neighbours were amazed at this my
great conversion, from prodigious profaneness to something like a
moral life; and so they well might; for this my conversion was as
great as for Tom of Bedlam to become a sober man. Now, therefore,
they began to speak well of me, both before my face and behind my
back. Now I was, as they said, become godly; now I was become a