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H. Rider Haggard - "King Solomon's Mines"

S. A. Reilly, Attorney - "OUR LEGAL HERITAGE"

Sara Cone Bryant - "Stories To Tell To Children"

J.W. von Goethe - "The Sorrows of Young Werther"

The Private Memoirs and Confessions of A Justified Sinner

J >> J. Walker McSpadden >> The Private Memoirs and Confessions of A Justified Sinner




"Then you are an associate well adapted to my present state," said
I. "For this time is a time of great rejoicing in spirit to me. I am
on my way to return thanks to the Most High for my redemption
from the bonds of sin and misery. If you will join with me heart
and hand in youthful thanksgiving, then shall we two go and
worship together; but, if not, go your way, and I shall go mine."

"Ah, you little know with how much pleasure I will accompany
you, and join with you in your elevated devotions," said he
fervently. "Your state is a state to be envied indeed; but I have
been advised of it, and am come to be a humble disciple of yours;
to be initiated into the true way of salvation by conversing with
you, and perhaps of being assisted by your prayers."

My spiritual pride being greatly elevated by this address, I began
to assume the preceptor, and questioned this extraordinary youth
with regard to his religious principles, telling him plainly, if he
was one who expected acceptance with God at all, on account of
good works, that I would hold no communion with him. He
renounced these at once, with the greatest vehemence, and
declared his acquiescence in my faith. I asked if he believed in
the eternal and irrevocable decrees of God, regarding the
salvation and condemnation of all mankind? He answered that he
did so: aye, what would signify all things else that he believed, if
he did not believe in that? We then went on to commune about all
our points of belief; and in everything that I suggested he
acquiesced, and, as I thought that day, often carried them to
extremes, so that I had a secret dread he was advancing
blasphemies. He had such a way with him, and paid such a
deference to all my opinions, that I was quite captivated, and, at
the same time, I stood in a sort of awe of him, which I could not
account for, and several times was seized with an involuntary
inclination to escape from his presence by making a sudden
retreat. But he seemed constantly to anticipate my thoughts, and
was sure to divert my purpose by some turn in the conversation
that particularly interested me. He took care to dwell much on the
theme of the impossibility of those ever falling away who were
once accepted and received into covenant with God, for he
seemed to know that in that confidence, and that trust, my whole
hopes were centred.

We moved about from one place to another, until the day was
wholly spent. My mind had all the while been kept in a state of
agitation resembling the motion of a whirlpool, and, when we
came to separate, I then discovered that the purpose for which I
had sought the fields had been neglected, and that I had been
diverted from the worship of God by attending to the quibbles
and dogmas of this singular and unaccountable being, who
seemed to have more knowledge and information than all the
persons I had ever known put together.

We parted with expressions of mutual regret, and when I left him
I felt a deliverance, but at the same time a certain consciousness
that I was not thus to get free of him, but that he was like to be an
acquaintance that was to stick to me for good or for evil. I was
astonished at his acuteness and knowledge about everything; but,
as for his likeness to me, that was quite unaccountable. He was
the same person in every respect, but yet he was not always so;
for I observed several times, when we were speaking of certain
divines and their tenets, that his face assumed something of the
appearance of theirs; and it struck me that, by setting his features
to the mould of other people's, he entered at once into their
conceptions and feelings. I had been greatly flattered, and greatly
interested by his conversation; whether I had been the better for it
or the worse, I could not tell. I had been diverted from returning
thanks to my gracious Maker for his great kindness to me, and came
home as I went away, but not with the same buoyancy and lightness of
heart. Well may I remember the day in which I was first received into
the number, and made an heir to all the privileges of the children
of God, and on which I first met this mysterious associate, who
from that day forth contrived to wind himself into all my affairs,
both spiritual and temporal, to this day on which I am writing the
account of it. It was on the 25th day of March, 1704, when I had
just entered the eighteenth year of my age. Whether it behoves
me to bless God for the events of that day, or to deplore them, has
been hid from my discernment, though I have inquired into it
with fear and trembling; and I have now lost all hopes of ever
discovering the true import of these events until that day when
my accounts are to make up and reckon for in another world.

When I came home, I went straight into the parlour, where my
mother was sitting by herself. She started to her feet, and uttered
a smothered scream. "What ails you, Robert?" cried she. "My
dear son, what is the matter with you?"

"Do you see anything the matter with me?" said I. "It appears that
the ailment is with yourself and either in your crazed head or your
dim eyes, for there is nothing the matter with me."

"Ah, Robert, you are ill!" cried she. "You are very ill, my dear
boy; you are quite changed; your very voice and manner are
changed. Ah, Jane, haste you up to the study, and tell Mr.
Wringhim to come here on the instant and speak to Robert."

"I beseech you, woman, to restrain yourself," said I. "If you suffer
your frenzy to run away with your judgment in this manner, I will
leave the house. What do you mean? I tell you, there is nothing
ails me: I never was better."

She screamed, and ran between me and the door, to bar my
retreat: in the meantime my reverend father entered, and I have
not forgot how he gazed, through his glasses, first at my mother,
and then at me. I imagined that his eyes burnt like candles, and
was afraid of him, which I suppose made my looks more unstable
than they would otherwise have been.

"What is all this for?" said he. "Mistress! Robert! What is the
matter here?"

"Oh, sir, our boy!" cried my mother; "our dear boy, Mr.
Wringhim! Look at him, and speak to him: he is either dying or
translated, sir!"

He looked at me with a countenance of great alarm; mumbling
some sentences to himself, and then taking me by the arm, as if to
feel my pulse, he said, with a faltering voice: "Something has
indeed befallen you, either in body or mind, boy, for you are
transformed, since the morning, that I could not have known you
for the same person. Have you met with any accident?"

"No."

"Have you seen anything out of the ordinary course of nature?"

"No."

"Then, Satan, I fear, has been busy with you, tempting you in no
ordinary degree at this momentous crisis of your life?"

My mind turned on my associate for the day, and the idea that he
might be an agent of the Devil had such an effect on me that I
could make no answer.

"I see how it is," said he; "you are troubled in spirit, and I have no
doubt that the enemy of our salvation has been busy with you.
Tell me this, has he overcome you, or has he not?"

"He has not, my dear father," said I. "in the strength of the Lord, I
hope I have withstood him. But indeed, if he has been busy with
me, I knew it not. I have been conversant this day with one
stranger only, whom I took rather for an angel of light."

"It is one of the Devil's most profound wiles to appear like one,"
said my mother.

"Woman, hold thy peace!" said my reverend father. "Thou
pretendest to teach what thou knowest not. Tell me this, boy: did
this stranger, with whom you met, adhere to the religious
principles in which I have educated you?"

"Yes, to every one of them in their fullest latitude," said I.

"Then he was no agent of the Wicked One with whom you held
converse," said he: "for that is the doctrine that was made to
overturn the principalities and powers, the might and dominion of
the kingdom of darkness. Let us pray."

After spending about a quarter of an hour in solemn and sublime
thanksgiving, this saintly man and minister of Christ Jesus, gave
out that the day following should be kept by the family as a day
of solemn thanksgiving, and spent in prayer and praise, on
account of the calling and election of one of its members; or
rather for the election of that individual being revealed on earth,
as well as confirmed in Heaven.

The next day was with me a day of holy exultation. It was begun
by my reverend father laying his hands upon my head and
blessing me, and then dedicating me to the Lord in the most
awful and impressive manner. It was in no common way that he
exercised this profound rite, for it was done with all the zeal and
enthusiasm of a devotee to the true cause, and a champion on the
side he had espoused. He used these remarkable words, which I
have still treasured up in my heart: "I give him unto Thee only, to
Thee wholly, and to Thee for ever. I dedicate him unto Thee,
soul, body, and spirit. Not as the wicked of this world, or the
hirelings of a Church profanely called by Thy name, do I dedicate
this Thy servant to Thee: Not in words and form, learned by rote,
and dictated by the limbs of Antichrist, but, Lord, I give him into
Thy hand, as a captain putteth a sword into the hand of his
sovereign, wherewith to lay waste his enemies. May he be a two-
edged weapon in Thy hand and a spear coming out of Thy mouth,
to destroy, and overcome, and pass over; and may the enemies of
Thy Church fall down before him, and be as dung to fat the
land!"

From the moment, I conceived it decreed, not that I should be a
minister of the gospel, but a champion of it, to cut off the enemies
of the Lord from the face of the earth; and I rejoiced in the
commission, finding it more congenial to my nature to be cutting
sinners off with the sword than to be haranguing them from the
pulpit, striving to produce an effect which God, by his act of
absolute predestination, had for ever rendered impracticable. The
more I pondered on these things the more I saw of the folly and
inconsistency of ministers in spending their lives striving and
remonstrating with sinners in order to induce them to do that
which they had it not in their power to do. Seeing that God had
from all eternity decided the fate of every individual that was to
be born of woman, how vain was it in man to endeavour to save
those whom their Maker had, by an unchangeable decree,
doomed to destruction. I could not disbelieve the doctrine which
the best of men had taught me, and towards which he made the
whole of the Scriptures to bear, and yet it made the economy of
the Christian world appear to me as an absolute contradiction.
How much more wise would it be, thought I, to begin and cut
sinners off with the sword! For till that is effected, the saints can
never inherit the earth in peace. Should I be honoured as an
instrument to begin this great work of purification, I should
rejoice in it. But, then, where had I the means, or under what
direction was I to begin? There was one thing clear, I was now
the Lord's and it behoved me to bestir myself in His service. Oh
that I had an host at my command, then would I be as a devouring
fire among the workers of iniquity!

Full of these great ideas, I hurried through the city, and sought
again the private path through the field and wood of Finnieston,
in which my reverend preceptor had the privilege of walking for
study, and to which he had a key that was always at my
command. Near one of the stiles, I perceived a young man sitting
in a devout posture, reading a Bible. He rose, lifted his hat, and
made an obeisance to me, which I returned and walked on. I had
not well crossed the stile till it struck me I knew the face of the
youth and that he was some intimate acquaintance, to whom I
ought to have spoken. I walked on, and returned, and walked on
again, trying to recollect who he was; but for my life I could not.
There was, however, a fascination in his look and manner that
drew me back towards him in spite of myself, and I resolved to
go to him, if it were merely to speak and see who he was.

I came up to him and addressed him, but he was so intent on his
book that, though I spoke, he lifted not his eyes. I looked on the
book also, and still it seemed a Bible, having columns, chapters,
and verses; but it was in a language of which I was wholly
ignorant, and all intersected with red lines and verses. A sensation
resembling a stroke of electricity came over me, on first casting
my eyes on that mysterious book, and I stood motionless. He
looked up, smiled, closed his book, and put it in his bosom. "You
seem strangely affected, dear sir, by looking at my book," said he
mildly.

"In the name of God, what book is that?" said I. "Is it a Bible?"

"It is my Bible, sir," said he, "but I will cease reading it, for I am
glad to see you. Pray, is not this a day for holy festivity with
you?"

I stared in his face, but made no answer, for my senses were
bewildered.

"Do you not know me?" said he. "You appear to be somehow at a
loss. Had not you and I some sweet communion and fellowship
yesterday?"

"I beg your pardon, sir," said I. "But, surely, if you are the young
gentleman with whom I spent the hours yesterday, you have the
chameleon art of changing your appearance; I never could have
recognized you."

"My countenance changes with my studies and sensations," said
he. It is a natural peculiarity in me, over which I have not full
control. If I contemplate a man's features seriously, mine own
gradually assume the very same appearance and character. And
what is more, by contemplating a face minutely, I not only attain
the same likeness but, with the likeness, I attain the very same
ideas as well as the same mode of arranging them, so that, you
see, by looking at a person attentively, I by degrees assume his
likeness, and by assuming his likeness I attain to the possession
of his most secret thoughts. This, I say, is a peculiarity in my
nature, a gift of the God that made me; but, whether or not given
me for a blessing, He knows Himself, and so do I. At all events, I
have this privilege, I can never be mistaken of a character in
whom I am interested."

"It is a rare qualification," replied I, "and I would give worlds to
possess it. Then, it appears that it is needless to dissemble with
you, since you can at any time extract our most secret thoughts
from our bosoms. You already know my natural character?"

"Yes," said he, "and it is that which attaches me to you. By
assuming your likeness yesterday, I became acquainted with your
character, and was no less astonished at the profundity and range
of your thoughts than at the heroic magnanimity with which these
were combined. And now, in addition to these, you are dedicated
to the great work of the Lord; for which reasons I have resolved
to attach myself as closely to you as possible, and to render you
all the service of which my poor abilities are capable."

I confess that I was greatly flattered by these compliments paid to
my abilities by a youth of such superior qualifications; by one
who, with a modesty and affability rare at his age, combined a
height of genius and knowledge almost above human
comprehension. Nevertheless, I began to assume a certain
superiority of demeanour towards him, as judging it incumbent
on me to do so, in order to keep up his idea of my exalted
character. We conversed again till the day was near a close; and
the things that he strove most to inculcate on my mind were the
infallibility of the elect, and the preordination of all things that
come to pass. I pretended to controvert the first of these, for the
purpose of showing him the extent of my argumentative powers,
and said that "indubitably there were degrees of sinning which
would induce the Almighty to throw off the very elect." But
behold my hitherto humble and modest companion took up the
argument with such warmth that he put me not only to silence but
to absolute shame.

"Why, sir," said he, "by vending such an insinuation, you put
discredit on the great atonement, in which you trust. Is there not
enough of merit in the blood of Jesus to save thousands of
worlds, if it was for these worlds that he died? Now, when you
know, as you do (and as every one of the elect may know of
himself) that this Saviour died for you, namely and particularly,
dare you say that there is not enough of merit in His great
atonement to annihilate all your sins, let them be as heinous and
atrocious as they may? And, moreover, do you not acknowledge
that God hath pre-ordained and decreed whatsoever comes to
pass? Then, how is it that you should deem it in your power to
eschew one action of your life, whether good or evil? Depend on
it, the advice of the great preacher is genuine: 'What thine hand
findeth to do, do it with all thy might, for none of us knows what
a day may bring forth.' That is, none of us knows what is pre-
ordained, but whatever it is pre-ordained we must do, and none of
these things will be laid to our charge."

I could hardly believe that these sayings were genuine or
orthodox; but I soon felt that, instead of being a humble disciple
of mine, this new acquaintance was to be my guide and director,
and all under the humble guise of one stooping at my feet to learn
the right. He said that he saw I was ordained to perform some
great action for the cause of Jesus and His Church, and he
earnestly coveted being a partaker with me; but he besought of
me never to think it possible for me to fall from the truth, or the
favour of Him who had chosen me, else that misbelief would
baulk every good work to which I set my face.

There was something so flattering in all this that I could not resist
it. Still, when he took leave of me, I felt it as a great relief; and
yet, before the morrow, I wearied and was impatient to see him
again. We carried on our fellowship from day to day, and all the
while I knew not who he was, and still my mother and reverend
father kept insisting that I was an altered youth, changed in my
appearance, my manners, and my whole conduct; yet something
always prevented me from telling them more about my new
acquaintance than I had done on the first day we met. I rejoiced in
him, was proud of him, and soon could not live without him; yet,
though resolved every day to disclose the whole story of my
connection with him, I had it not in my power. Something always
prevented me, till at length I thought no more of it, but resolved
to enjoy his fascinating company in private, and by all means to
keep my own with him. The resolution was vain: I set a bold face
to it, but my powers were inadequate to the task; my adherent,
with all the suavity imaginable, was sure to carry his point. I
sometimes fumed, and sometimes shed tears at being obliged to
yield to proposals against which I had at first felt every reasoning
power of my soul rise in opposition; but for all that he never
faded in carrying conviction along with him in effect, for he
either forced me to acquiesce in his measures, and assent to the
truth of his positions, or he put me so completely down that I had
not a word left to advance against them.

After weeks, and I may say months of intimacy, I observed,
somewhat to my amazement, that we had never once prayed
together; and, more than that, that he had constantly led my
attentions away from that duty, causing me to neglect it wholly. I
thought this a bad mark of a man seemingly so much set on
inculcating certain important points of religion, and resolved next
day to put him to the test, and request him to perform that sacred
duty in name of us both. He objected boldly; saying there were
very few people indeed with whom he could join in prayer, and
he made a point of never doing it, as he was sure they were to ask
many things of which he disapproved, and that, if he were to
officiate himself, he was as certain to allude to many things that
came not within the range of their faith. He disapproved of prayer
altogether in the manner it was generally gone about, he said.
Man made it merely a selfish concern, and was constantly
employed asking, asking, for everything. Whereas it became all
God's creatures to be content with their lot, and only to kneel
before him in order to thank him for such benefits as he saw meet
to bestow. In short, he argued with such energy that before we
parted I acquiesced, as usual, in his position, and never
mentioned prayer to him any more.

Having been so frequently seen in his company, several people
happened to mention the circumstance to my mother and
reverend father; but at the same time had all described him
differently. At length, they began to examine me with respect to
the company I kept, as I absented myself from home day after
day. I told them I kept company only with one young gentleman,
whose whole manner of thinking on religious subjects I found so
congenial with my own that I could not live out of his society.
My mother began to lay down some of her old hackneyed rules of
faith, but I turned from hearing her with disgust; for, after the
energy of my new friend's reasoning, hers appeared so tame I
could not endure it. And I confess with shame that my reverend
preceptor's religious dissertations began, about this time, to lose
their relish very much, and by degrees became exceedingly
tiresome to my ear. They were so inferior, in strength and
sublimity, to the most common observations of my young friend
that in drawing a comparison the former appeared as nothing. He,
however, examined me about many things relating to my
companion, in all of which I satisfied him, save in one: I could
neither tell him who my friend was, what was his name, nor of
whom he was descended; and I wondered at myself how I had
never once adverted to such a thing for all the time we had been
intimate.

I inquired the next day what his name was; as I said I was often at
a loss for it, when talking with him. He replied that there was no
occasion for any one friend ever naming another, when their
society was held in private, as ours was; for his part he had never
once named me since we first met, and never intended to do so,
unless by my own request. "But if you cannot converse without
naming me, you may call me Gil for the present," added he, "and
if I think proper to take another name at any future period, it shall
be with your approbation."

"Gil!" said I. "Have you no name but Gil? Or which of your
names is it? Your Christian or surname?"

"Oh, you must have a surname too, must you!" replied he. "Very
well, you may call me Gil-Martin. It is not my Christian name;
but it is a name which may serve your turn."

"This is very strange!" said I. "Are you ashamed of your parents
that you refuse to give your real name?"

"I have no parents save one, whom I do not acknowledge," said
he proudly. "Therefore, pray drop that subject, for it is a
disagreeable one. I am a being of a very peculiar temper, for,
though I have servants and subjects more than I can number, yet,
to gratify a certain whim, I have left them, and retired to this city,
and, for all the society it contains, you see I have attached myself
only to you. This is a secret, and I tell you only in friendship,
therefore pray let it remain one, and say not another word about
the matter."

I assented, and said no more concerning it; for it instantly struck
me that this was no other than the Czar Peter of Russia, having
heard that he had been travelling through Europe in disguise, and
I cannot say that I had not thenceforward great and mighty hopes
of high preferment, as a defender and avenger of the oppressed
Christian Church, under the influence of this great potentate. He
had hinted as much already, as that it was more honourable, and
of more avail to put down the wicked with the sword than try to
reform them, and I thought myself quite justified in supposing
that he intended me for some great employment, that he had thus
selected me for his companion out of all the rest in Scotland, and
even pretended to learn the great truths of religion from my
mouth. From that time I felt disposed to yield to such a great
prince's suggestions without hesitation.

Nothing ever astonished me so much as the uncommon powers
with which he seemed invested. In our walk one day, we met with
a Mr. Blanchard, who was reckoned a worthy, pious divine, but
quite of the moral cast, who joined us; and we three walked on,
and rested together in the fields. My companion did not seem to
like him, but, nevertheless, regarded him frequently with deep
attention, and there were several times, while he seemed
contemplating him, and trying to find out his thoughts, that his
face became so like Mr. Blanchard's that it was impossible to
have distinguished the one from the other. The antipathy between
the two was mutual, and discovered itself quite palpably in a
short time. When my companion the prince was gone, Mr.
Blanchard asked me anent him, and I told him that he was a
stranger in the city, but a very uncommon and great personage.
Mr. Blanchard's answer to me was as follows: "I never saw
anybody I disliked so much in my life, Mr. Robert; and if it be
true that he is a stranger here, which I doubt, believe me he is
come for no good."

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