business before me in this life than to pursue this lofty and
delightful task. I may add, as a blessing, not in the same
_positive_ sense as that which I have just mentioned, because not
of a nature to contribute so hourly to the employment of the thoughts,
but yet in this sense equal, that the absence of either would have been
an equal affliction,--namely, a conscience void of all offence. It was
little indeed that I, drawn by no necessities of situation into
temptations of that nature, had done no injury to any man. That was
fortunate; but I could not much value myself upon what was so much an
accident of my situation. Something, however, I might pretend to beyond
this _negative_ merit; for I had originally a benign nature; and,
as I advanced in years and thoughtfulness, the gratitude which
possessed me for my own exceeding happiness led me to do that by
principle and system which I had already done upon blind impulse; and
thus upon a double argument I was incapable of turning away from the
prayer of the afflicted, whatever had been the sacrifice to myself.
Hardly, perhaps, could it have been said in a sufficient sense at that
time that I was a religious man: yet, undoubtedly, I had all the
foundations within me upon which religion might hereafter have grown.
My heart overflowed with thankfulness to Providence: I had a natural
tone of unaffected piety; and thus far, at least, I might have been
called a religious man, that in the simplicity of truth I could have
exclaimed,

'O, Abner, I fear God, and I fear none beside.'

But wherefore seek to delay ascending by a natural climax to that final
consummation and perfect crown of my felicity--that almighty blessing
which ratified their value to all the rest? Wherefore, oh! wherefore do
I shrink in miserable weakness from--what? Is it from reviving, from