The Village in the Mountains; Conversion of Peter Bayssière; and History of a Bible

CONVERSION OF PETER BAYSSIERE
IN A LETTER TO HIS CHILDREN.[4]

[Footnote 4: This Narrative was originally entitled, "A letter to my children, on the subject of my conversion from the Romish church, in which I was born, to the Protestant, in which I hope to die. By Peter Bayssiére, Montaigut, Department Tarn and Garonne." (France.) "As much of the interest of this Narrative," says the preface to the London edition, "depends upon its authenticity, the reader is referred to the subjoined extract of a letter from the Rev. Francis Cunningham, Rector of Pakefield, dated May 20, 1829, which will probably remove any doubts on the subject.

"......The autograph of Bayssiére's letter I saw when I was in the South of France, in the year 1826. It had just then been received by M. Audebez, the minister of Nérac; who, as appears by the Tract, was well acquainted both with Bayssiére and his circumstances. Confident of the genuineness of the account, I am very glad it has been published in French, and translated into English. It cannot but be interesting and profitable to all lovers of the truth."

"FRANCIS CUNNINGHAM."]

MY DEAR CHILDREN--I purpose to give you, in this letter, an account of my conversion to the true Christian religion--that religion which was established by our Lord and his apostles, professed by their followers during the first two centuries of the church, and which is now followed by the protestant or reformed Christians. I am conscious that neither my abilities nor my education qualify me for this task. A mere mechanic, and possessing but few advantages of education, I find it very difficult to express, as I could wish, the thoughts and feelings which crowd upon my mind. But how great and numerous so ever may be the difficulties which I must encounter in such an undertaking, I am impelled to it by the tender affection I bear you, and by the earnest desire and hope of being useful to you. May God be my helper; may he not suffer me to be deterred by any obstacle; and may he grant me the blessing of accomplishing that which I consider as a sacred duty.

It is my imperative duty to make you acquainted with the real motives which have produced the most important, solemn, and decisive step in my life.

It is my duty to give glory to God for the unspeakable mercy which he has deigned to show me, in calling me from darkness into his marvellous light; in opening to me the treasures of his infinite compassion, and in giving me the hope of salvation by faith in his Son, who only "has the words of eternal life," being alone "the way, the truth, and the life."

It is my duty to endeavour to render my experience profitable to you, to show you the path by which it has pleased God to lead me to truth, and to the fountain of living waters; and, above all, to labour in prayer for you, that you may be partakers of the peace and joy with which my spirit is filled under the influence of his blessed word.

May this paper, my dear children, by the blessing of God, contribute to the triumph of the Gospel, and to the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ, by filling your hearts with the love of truth, and by leading you in the way of true religion.

It was in the thirty-third year of my age, in the present year, (1826,) that I openly embraced and professed the Protestant religion, after having given it the most serious and attentive examination, and being convinced that it was indeed the true religion of Christ, agreeable, in every respect, to the revelations of his Gospel.

Like you, my dear children, I was born in the Romish church; but birth has, in fact, very little to do with religion; the utmost that it can effect is to predispose the mind, or to serve as a pretext to timid, interested, or indifferent persons, to justify their external adherence to a form of worship in which their hearts do not unite.

As our Saviour declares to his disciple Peter, it is not flesh or blood that can make known to us the true God, the Creator, Preserver, and Saviour of men. Faith, through which alone we can become children of God, and true members of the church of Christ, is a gift of the Holy Spirit, and by no means transmitted to us with our existence by our parents. St. John teaches us this when he says, "As many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." John, 1: 12, 13.

Thus you see that we are neither Catholics nor Protestants by birth; and it is a great error for any one to feel himself bound to either church, because he has been born within its pale. Religion, like every thing else, must be studied and examined; and no one is truly a member of a church, further than as he understands and acknowledges its doctrines. His adherence on any other ground only proves him credulous, ignorant, and superstitious; the slave of prejudice and habit.

As for me, my children, although born in the Romish church, I can assure you that I never participated in its belief. It would be foreign to the end I have in view, to relate here the various circumstances of my childhood and youth, which preserved me from being brought into the bosom of the Catholic church by the usual rites and ceremonies. God so ordered it, that I made no vow by which I might[5] have afterwards felt myself bound to the church of Rome.

[Footnote 5: "I might have," but I am far from supposing that I ought to have fell myself indissolubly tied to the Roman Catholic church by any sacrament that I might have received, or by any engagement that I might have entered into: on the contrary, I lay it down as an incontestable principle, that every vow and every oath are null, and neither can nor ought to bind any one to a church in which he has discovered errors, or doctrines and habits opposed to the word of God, and contrary to his own conscience. Truth alone, and the full conviction of truth, constitute a tie which can inviolably connect us with any church whatever. From the moment that this conviction no longer exists, and that error is discovered, it is an imperative duty to abandon a mode of worship which does not accord with our true sentiments; and he who perseveres against this conviction becomes a hypocrite, contemptible in the eyes of men, and condemned before God.]

Unknown to me, that is, at an age when I could have no idea of what was done to me, I was doubtless received into the church by the usual ceremony; but as this act was performed without any consent or co-operation on my part, I have never regarded it in the light of an engagement to the Catholic church.

With regard to what is called "the first communion," (which is considered as the public ratification and confirmation of the vow of my parents,) this I never received in the Romish church, nor did I receive what is called the Sacrament of confirmation.

Before I could be united by the sacred bond of marriage to your virtuous and beloved mother, it was necessary that I should confess. This I did with extreme reluctance, feeling that nothing could be at once more absurd, more tyrannical, or more degrading, than to oblige a man to prostrate himself at the feet of a priest, a mortal, a sinner, a child of corruption like himself, and there to make confessions to him, which offended Deity alone could have a right to require: and to receive absolution from him for faults with which he had no concern. I could not, however, marry without confession, and therefore I was obliged to submit; but no power on earth could have constrained me to go further. The Sacrament, as the Roman Catholics receive it, had, from infancy, excited in me feelings of disgust. My mind had always revolted at the idea, that the great God of heaven could allow himself to be eaten by his creatures in the form of a little flour. Under various pretences, therefore, I contrived to avoid the ceremony, and obtained the nuptial benediction without it.

The Lord, who never leaves himself without the witness of his numerous mercies to us, even when we are offending him in so many ways, was pleased to bless our marriage. Your birth, my dear children, crowned our joy, and left us nothing to wish but to see you grow and prosper, and to devote ourselves to your happiness. Alas! little did we suspect, whilst thus delightfully engaged, that this joy was to be so soon disturbed, and that death would deprive us of her who had given you birth. But our great God, whose ways and whose designs, though often inscrutable, are always full of wisdom, saw good to separate us; you from a tender and excellent mother, and me from a beloved companion and inestimable friend. She died February 11, 1821, after a few days' illness, leaving me in a state of affliction which it would be in vain to attempt to describe.

Nevertheless, terrible as was the stroke, and heart-rending as was the separation, I can now acknowledge, my children, that it was a salutary chastisement, sent by sovereign love; and one of the links of that chain of Providence by which the Lord saw good to deliver me from the miserable state in which I was then living; and to lead me to the fountain of grace and true peace.

In fact, the death of your poor mother gave rise to a train of circumstances, which, by drawing my attention to subjects that I had hitherto totally disregarded, and by exciting in my mind a degree of energy of which I could not have supposed myself capable, ended by engaging me most unexpectedly in the serious study of religion. The particulars I am about to give you respecting these things, will convince you that God can overrule the wickedness of men for good, and will show you that a Romish priest was the means of directing me to the way, (I mean the perusal and free examination of the word of God,) which led me, eventually, to the Protestant church.

Your mother's funeral was conducted with Catholic ceremonies, and, according to my means, I spared nothing to honour her remains. I likewise consented, either from conformity to custom, or from a wish to please my relatives, who were influenced by the fear of purgatory, or perhaps from participating myself in the false notion that bought prayers can mitigate the sufferings of the dead--from one or all of these causes, aggravated by the sorrow which filled my heart and inflamed my imagination, I consented to the performance of the nine customary masses for the rest of the soul.

The priest to whom I first went, told me that he was too busy to undertake the whole, but that I might depend upon him for three. From him I went to another, who engaged to say the remaining six, and did so without delay. Sunday after Sunday, for a considerable time, I went to the first, to inquire whether my three masses would be said in the following week. He always found some excuse, saying that "there were others more urgent than myself--that he was previously engaged--that he had undertaken more than was in his power to perform,". From February to June, I was thus put off under various pretexts. Worn out, at length, by so many fruitless efforts, I resolved to put an end to them, and mentioned the subject to your aunt, your mother's sister, expressing to her my extreme annoyance. She asked me if I had offered the priest the amount of the masses which he had promised to say? "No," I said, "the idea never occurred to me; but even if it had, I should not have dared to do it, for fear of offending him. It is not usual", I added scornfully, "to pay before one is served. No one ever pays me for a saddle before I make it." "No matter," replied your aunt, "my advice to you is to return to the priest, and offer to pay for the masses which you have ordered."

I did as she advised me, and this time my request was favourably received. The priest seized the six-franc piece which I laid on the table, looked at me and said, "Do you wish me to say six?" "No," I replied, with a feeling of indignation which I could hardly repress--"No, sir, I only want three. Return to me the rest of the money; poor folks cannot afford to spend so much at once."

I left the priest, thoroughly ashamed of having contributed to gratify his cupidity, and very much disposed to think the religion we were taught was nothing but a tissue of fables and impostures, to which the thirst of gold and silver had given birth. I cannot tell you all the sad and painful reflections that occupied my mind during the remainder of that day; I was overcome by them, and rejoiced to see the night, hoping to find relief in sleep. I went to bed, but could not close my eyes. Still haunted by the remembrance of what had so disgusted me, a multitude of thoughts crowded on my imagination. I knew that the priests claimed the word of God as their authority for all their doctrines and ceremonies, which word I also knew was contained in the Old and New Testaments, although, to my misfortune, I did not then regard them as a divine revelation. In fact, I believed no more in the Holy Bible as the word of God, than I did in the doctrine of purgatory; still I felt a desire to search and to ascertain whether this lucrative doctrine was contained in the Gospel, and in what manner it was there established: at the same moment I recollected that there was, on the chimney-piece of my room, a New Testament, in which I had learnt to read, but which I had never opened since I was nine or ten years old. I jumped out of bed, and hastily dressing myself, resolved to begin, without delay, my researches on the subject of purgatory.

With this sole object in view, I read through the Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, the Epistles, and the Revelation of St. John; confining my attention exclusively to those points that tended either to establish or controvert this doctrine. This perusal of the New Testament, which, from my eagerness to satisfy my curiosity and resolve my doubts, I accomplished without once stopping, except for refreshment, proved to me that the doctrine of purgatory was not to be found in the Gospel, but must have been derived from some other source.

Indeed, my dear children, I did not find a single passage which established it, either directly or indirectly: on the contrary, I was struck with many declarations completely opposed to it. Thus I read in St. Matthew: "The wicked shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal." Matt. 25:46. This absolutely destroys the idea of any intermediate abode between heaven and hell.

I read the song of Simeon, by which it clearly appears that the good old man had no idea that he was to stop in the road to heaven, or that he would have to undergo any purging fire before he could get there; for he exclaims, holding the infant Jesus in his arms, "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation." etc. Luke, 2:29, 30.

I read the promises which Jesus made to the thief on the cross, when he said to him, "Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom." Luke, 23:42, 43. If there were such a place as purgatory, and if any one were likely to be subjected to its fires, surely it would have been this malefactor, condemned by human, laws, and probably guilty of many crimes: yet our Saviour replies, "Verily, I say unto thee, to-day thou shalt be with me in Paradise."

I read in the Epistle of St. Paul to the Romans, that "there is now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus." Rom. 8:1. A doctrine altogether opposed to that of purgatory, which teaches that Christians are, after this life, subjected to a process of torments before they are free from condemnation.

I read in the Epistle to the Hebrews, that "it is appointed to men once to die, but after this the judgment," Heb. 9: 27, which clearly proves that the destiny, both of the bad and good, is irrevocably fixed from the moment of their death; and that there is no purgatory, from which masses, prayers, or rather gold and silver, can deliver any one.

I read also in the first Epistle of St. John, that "the blood of Jesus Christ," the Son of God, "cleanseth us from all sin," 1 John, 1:7, which excludes all other kinds of purification, and formally contradicts the doctrine of purgatory. Finally, I read in the book of Revelation, that "blessed are the dead which die in the Lord, from henceforth: yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours, and their works do follow them."

Here is another declaration which confirms what the preceding and many other passages establish in so convincing a manner. Not having discovered a single text of the New Testament which told in favour of purgatory; but, on the contrary, having observed and meditated on those which I have quoted, and many other equally opposed to this doctrine, I was fully persuaded that it never had been thought of by the writers of the Gospel. You may easily believe, my dear children, that this discovery in no way tended to strengthen the bonds which held me to the Romish church, nor to confirm me in their faith.

Still, however, I was dissatisfied, and still longed to know positively from whence the priests had derived their vain system. This desire filled my mind for some days, and at last it struck me that the Pope must have been the inventor of it. I then naturally began to wish to discover who the Pope was, and what right he had to impose such a doctrine. I had often read and heard, both in conversation and from the pulpit, that St. Peter was the chief and head of the Apostles; that he had been the first pope at Rome; and that all succeeding popes had inherited his rights and prerogatives.

I conceived a wish to know what the New Testament said upon this subject, and I immediately undertook a second perusal of it; in the same state of mind as before, that is to say, absorbed by one sole object, and having nothing in view but to find out whether St. Peter had really been set over all the other apostles, and placed at Rome as head of all the churches.

This examination, which was pursued with a degree of attention of which I should now be scarcely capable, ended in convincing me that the supremacy of St. Peter was no better established by the New Testament than the first doctrine which I had sought for, and that undoubtedly the papacy was without scriptural authority.

I found in St. Matthew the calling of Simon, who was afterwards called Peter; Matt. 4:18, 19,20; but it did not appear to me to differ from that addressed to Andrew his brother, and all the other apostles.

In the tenth chapter of the same Gospel, I also observed that the first mission which Jesus Christ gave to his apostles, was given to all, without any particular prerogative to Peter. It is true that Peter is the first named, but this is merely an accidental priority, which implies neither distinction nor superiority; one must have been mentioned first. I made the same observation on the last mission which they received on the day of their Master's ascension, and which is related by St. Matthew, 28:19, 20; by St. Mark, 16:15; and in the Acts of the Apostles, 1:8. This mission, though variously expressed in the three places, is the same in substance. It is given indiscriminately to all; the promises by which it is accompanied are for all; and on all, the same powers are, equally conferred.

The 18th and 19th verses of chapter 16 of St. Matthew, where it is said, "Thou art Peter, and on this rock I will build my church," startled me for a moment, and I was on the point of mistaking the true meaning of this declaration. But having reflected that Jesus Christ asked the question in the 15th verse, of all his disciples, and that Peter expressed the sentiment of all in his animated reply in the 16th verse, I considered that the words which Christ addressed to Peter, were applicable to all disciples; and that no supremacy could be attributed to him from this passage, more than from any of the preceding.

I was confirmed in this opinion, when I read in the Gospel of St. John, that Jesus, speaking to all had made them nearly the same promise: "Whose so ever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them, and whose so ever sins ye retain, they are retained," (John, 20:23;) and also by what St. Paul says to the Ephesians, "Ye are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone; in whom all the building, fitly framed together, groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord." Ephes. 2:20, 21.

I was still more strengthened, when I found in the Revelation, that St. John says, "the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb." Rev. 21:14.

By these passages, and many others which I think it unnecessary to quote, I discerned that Jesus Christ is the true foundation, the corner stone on which the Christian church rests: that all the apostles and prophets are indeed mentioned as its foundation, but only because all their doctrines refer to Him; and I was convinced that St. Peter was in no degree more distinguished or more elevated than his fellow-labourers. Although I did not then understand, at least not so fully as I do now, the evangelical meaning of the 18th and 19th verses of chapter 16 of St. Matthew, yet I was persuaded that the papacy or sovereignty of St. Peter could not reasonably be deduced from them Finally my conviction that St. Peter was not above the other apostles, was completed by observing what he says himself in his first epistle, "The elders which are among you I exhort, who am also an elder" 1 Pet. 5:1; by what St. Paul says to the Corinthians, "I was not a whit behind the very chiefest apostles," 2 Cor. 11:5; by noticing that St. Paul, according to his own account, "withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed;" Gal. 2:11; and that he severely and publicly reprehended him, because "he constrained the Gentiles to be circumcised;" by seeing how the common disciples of the church of Jerusalem made no scruple of reproving Peter, because "he went in unto men uncircumcised, and did eat with them," Acts, 11:3; how they required from him an explanation of his conduct, and how the apostle hastened to justify himself, by relating to them exactly how the thing had happened. Finally, by observing that "when the apostles which were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John." Acts, 8:14.

"There can be no doubt," thought I, as I perused and re-perused all these testimonies, "that Peter was in every respect equal to the other apostles; that he had no superiority nor jurisdiction over them. Had he been, had he thought himself, or had others thought him, the prince of the apostles and sovereign pastor of the church, would he have called himself an elder like unto the other elders? Is it possible that St. Paul would have declared himself to be 'not a whit behind him;' that he would have 'withstood him to his face,' and blamed him publicly? Is it probable that mere believers, common members of the church, should have ventured to dispute with him, to require an explanation of his conduct, or that he should have thought it necessary to satisfy them by giving one?[6] Is it likely that he would have been sent by the other apostles, or have received their orders, when it would have been his part, had he been their chief, to command and to send them?"

[Footnote 6: The popes, his pretended successors, have not been so obliging; they have been always solicitous to make their authority felt.]

I needed no more evidence to be thoroughly convinced that all which is taught by the Romish church of the supremacy of St. Peter, and of the sovereignty of the popes, his pretended successors, was a fable destitute of the slightest foundation; at all events, a doctrine no more to be found in the Gospel than that of purgatory.

If I were surprised at this, I was no less so when I observed, that in the whole New Testament there was not one word which gave reason to imagine that St. Peter had ever preached, or had even ever been, at Rome, where the Roman Catholics assert, and believe as an article of faith, that he was the first pope. The Acts of the Apostles maintains the most profound silence on this subject, and affords no ground whatever for the supposition. All the Epistles leave it equally in darkness. Those of St. Paul to the Galatians, to the Ephesians, to the Philippians, to the Colossians, the second to Timothy, and the Epistle to Philemon, all written from Rome at different periods, and that to the Hebrews, written from Italy, make no mention of Peter's being there. In the last four, the apostle speaks of his companions in suffering, in labour, and in the work of the Lord, but says not a word of Peter as being with him. Undoubtedly he would have mentioned him, as he mentions Tychicus, Onesimus, Aristarchus, Demas, Prudens, Livius, Claudia, etc. had he been at Rome; but neither his name, nor any allusion to his abode in the capital of the world, is to be discovered in any part of St. Paul's Epistles. In my opinion, there is no proof of his ever having been there, much less of his having held the bishopric. Finally, his own two Epistles furnish no evidence for such a supposition: the first, and in all probability, the second also, is written from Babylon, 1 Peter, 5:13, and addressed, not to the Romans, but "to the strangers (that is to say, the converted Jews) scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia," 1 Peter, 1:1, countries where, it would appear, that he exercised his ministry, after having for some years preached to the church at Antioch.

Thus, my children, I discovered that these two primary doctrines of the Romish church, viz. purgatory and the supremacy of St. Peter, had not, at any rate, been inculcated by the writers of the Gospel. I cannot tell you what interest I felt in the new ideas I had acquired. The New Testament, which I was still far from regarding as a divine revelation, appeared to me a collection of precious documents, in whose authority I then began to feel some degree of confidence. Though I found this study novel and difficult to a poor uneducated artisan like myself, it was at the same time so attractive to me, that I was induced to continue my researches.

I have already mentioned to you, my dear children, the invincible repugnance which I had always felt to receiving the sacrament as administered in the Romish church. I have said that nothing in the world could have forced me to this act, by which it is profanely pretended that the creature EATS his Creator!! I could never even think of it without shuddering. This doctrine, which asserts that Jesus Christ is present, in body and in spirit, in the consecrated wafer, and that every communicant is actually nourished by his flesh and blood, is, of all the tenets of popery, that which contributed the most to alienate me from the Christian religion, to which I attached it, and to drive me to infidelity.

This, therefore, now attracted all my attention; and again I began to read the New Testament, entirely occupied, as previously, by the one object which I had in view.

I found nothing in the three Gospels of St. Matthew, St. Mark, or St. Luke, which gave me the least reason to suppose that their author had recognized the real and corporeal presence of Jesus Christ in the sacrament of the holy supper. The words of the institution, as related by the first, Matt. 26:26, 27, 28, by the second, Mark, 14:22, 23, 24, and by the third, Luke, 22:19, 20, reported with slight variations by the three Evangelists, and which I took great pains to collate and compare, conveyed no other idea than that of a commemorative ceremony, designed to preserve and call to remembrance the sufferings, the passion, and the death of Christ. In my then wretched condition of unbelief, the magnitude, the sanctity, and the power of the sacrament did not strike my mind; but, excepting that, I imbibed from the consideration of these passages the views which I still hold. So far, then, I had not discovered the doctrine of the real presence; but I thought I had indeed found it specifically established when I read these words: "I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. The Jews, therefore, strove among themselves, saying, How can this man give his flesh to eat? Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, we have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him." John, 6:51-56. These words appeared to me to be undoubtedly the foundation of the Romish faith on this head. I even thought that the writer of them had the establishment of this doctrine especially in view. At that moment I was tempted to stop, and to carry no further my researches on a doctrine which I thought I had found clearly set forth, but the absurdity of which had never appeared to me so palpable. I then felt an utter disgust towards the Gospel; nevertheless, internally spurred on by an invisible power, which was then unknown to me, but which I now recognize to have been the Holy Spirit, the author of all divine revelation; and attracted, as it were, in spite of myself, by the Spirit of God, who graciously purposed to teach me to appreciate, and in time to receive, the truth of his word, I resumed my New Testament, which I had for a moment thrown aside, and recommencing the perusal of the sixth chapter of St. John, I read it to the end, which I had not done before.

When I reached the sixty-third verse, I was struck as by a flash of light, which instantaneously discovered to me the mistake that I had at first made in the meaning of the six verses transcribed above, and imparted a new value to the Gospel. When I read "It is the Spirit that quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing--the words that I speak unto you, they are Spirit, and they are Life," John, 6:63, I had, as it were, the key of the chapter, and no longer discerned in it the doctrine of the real presence. I perceived that it in no way referred to swallowing and digesting, with our corporeal organs, the body and blood of Christ: I saw that the expressions of eating and drinking were used figuratively, and that they really signified nothing but knowing Christ, coming to him, and believing in him, as it is explained in the thirty-fifth verse of the same chapter, where Jesus Christ says, "I am the bread of life; he that cometh to me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst."

It was, then, as clear to me as the day, that Jesus Christ used the terms eating and drinking only in a spiritual manner; and (as I now understand them) as referring to that faith, which, while it is living and active in our hearts, unites us to him in an inexplicable manner, and clothes us in his merits at the same time that it purifies and sanctifies our views, our sentiments, and our desires. After having thus discovered my error, I found myself more than ever inclined to persevere in my reading, and to search and see whether the doctrine of the real presence would not he better established in the subsequent parts of the book. The further I advanced, my dear children, the more reason I had to be convinced that neither Jesus nor his apostles ever intended to convey such an idea. I should be too tedious were I to point out to you all the passages which I found expressly contradictory to this revolting tenet; it will be sufficient to quote a few.

I found in the Acts, that the apostles saw Jesus Christ ascend on high, carried upward by a cloud which concealed him from their sight, and that two angels appeared and said unto them, "Men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven." Acts, 1:9, 11. "There never was a priest," said I, "there never was a Roman Catholic, administering or receiving the sacrament, that ever saw Christ descending from heaven, in this manner, to enter into the bread. Nevertheless, the angels declared that he should descend from heaven in the same manner as he went up into heaven."

I found, in the same book, "that the heavens must receive Jesus Christ till the time of the restitution of all things." Acts, 3:21. "He is then," said I, "no longer corporeally on the earth." I found, in the Epistle to the Colossians, that "Christ sitteth on the right hand of God;" chap. 3:1; from whence I drew the inference that he certainly cannot be actually present on so many altars, or in so great a number of wafers, as the doctrine of the real presence necessarily supposes.

I found, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapters 9 and 10, the strongest declarations, not only against the real presence, but against the whole system of the mass, by which it is pretended daily to renew the passion and sacrifice of our Saviour. When the apostle says that "Christ is entered into heaven itself;" Heb. 9:24; when he says that "unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation;" ver. 28; lastly, when he says it is the will of God to sanctify us "through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once made," chap. 10:10, and that "this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever sat down at the right hand of God," ver. 12, having "by one offering perfected for ever them that are sanctified," ver. 14, it appeared to me to prove, with the most unanswerable evidence, that the doctrine of the real presence, and all connected with it, was as far removed from the creed of the apostle as the east is from the west, or as heaven from hell.

Finally, my dear children, the very words of the institution of the Lord's Supper, related by St. Paul, 1 Cor. 11, and to which I paid particular and repeated attention, did not leave a shadow of doubt on my mind that the doctrine of the Romish church, on the subject of the Eucharist, is utterly devoid of any foundation in the Gospel, and must, consequently, have been derived from some other source. In fact, all that our Saviour says on the occasion of instituting the Lord's Supper, clearly shows that it was a memorial of himself which he established, and which he wished to leave behind him. After having taken, blessed, and broken the bread, he commands that it should be eaten in remembrance of him. Having given them the cup to drink, he adds, "This do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me." The words, "this is my body--this cup is the New Testament in my blood," appeared to me only what they really are, figurative expressions, signifying that the bread represented his body, and the wine his blood. These words do in no degree change or modify the principal idea, that of commemoration, which runs throughout this action of our Lord.

Had it even been possible that these words had deceived me; had I taken them in their literal meaning, I should soon have been undeceived by those which immediately follow, which in themselves utterly overthrow the doctrine of the real presence, and the whole system of the mass. These are the words: "As often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till he come." 1 Cor. 11:26. After this declaration, connected with so many others, what further proof was wanting that St. Paul never believed that the bread and wine contained the actual body of Christ? I clearly saw that in this passage he meant that it is really bread we eat, and wine we drink, in the sacrament, and not the actual body and blood of the Son of God. I perceived that he taught that the Lord is not actually present in that ceremony according to the sense of the Romish church, because he distinctly says, "that by participating in it, we do show the Lord's death till he come"

In short, I was convinced that, according to St. Paul, it is not the body and blood of Jesus Christ that the priests hold in their hands, and which they offer as a sacrifice in the mass.

Here, my children, I suspended my researches, convinced, as much as it is possible to be convinced of any thing, that the doctrine of transubstantiation is not to be found in the New Testament. I concluded that it must have the same origin as those of the papacy and of purgatory.

Diverted as I had been from my usual occupation, during the time that I had thus devoted to study and meditation; obliged to maintain myself and you by the sweat of my brow, and having no other immediate subject of perplexity, I returned to my daily labour, and discontinued the perusal of the Gospel. My New Testament had certainly gained much in my esteem; but without stopping to consider exactly in what way I valued it, I think I may say that it was not as containing the Word of God, and the knowledge which is unto salvation.

Thus not being really or heartily interested in it, I replaced it a second time on the spot it had so long occupied on the chimney-piece of my room, and eighteen months or two years passed without my thinking of consulting it anew.

During this period I married again: your tender age, and the care you required, which my business and absence prevented my giving you, were the motives which induced me to take this step. God in his fatherly kindness mercifully directed my choice, though I had never thought of asking him to do so; and you have found a second mother in her who has ever been to me the most estimable and best of friends. During this period also, I thought more of religion than ever before. Though I had read the Gospel only to satisfy my curiosity on the three points of doctrine that I have mentioned, and although my attention had been exclusively directed to these points, it is probable, notwithstanding, that I had almost unconsciously imbibed some of the impressions which the word of God is calculated to produce, and that even then I was in some measure under its secret influence. One thing I am sure of, that from that time some idea of religion, although then comparatively vague and confused, never left me; I frequently caught myself musing on the origin of the universe, on the vicissitudes of nature, and on the future condition of those numerous beings, who are seen for a short time on the earth and then disappear. My own destiny, also, frequently engaged my thoughts. But I was far from referring it to Him, on whom I now see that it entirely depends. In all these thoughts God was excluded from the place he ought to have held. With nothing but false and uncertain notions of him, I was far indeed from regarding him as the vivifying principle, which, to the eye of the Christian, animates and embellishes every thing, and as that pure light "which lighteth every man that cometh into the world."

I am bound to tell you, my children, what was the real state of my soul at that time. I was in so deplorable a condition of blindness and ignorance, that sometimes I thought there was no God, but that he was an imaginary being; and sometimes confounding him with the works of his almighty hands, I attributed divinity to the material world. "The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God," and I dare not deny that these words of David were for a long time, and even perhaps at the period of which I am speaking, applicable to me. But while I acknowledge that the natural corruption of my heart, and the bad books I had read, were in part the causes of the sad state I have described, I cannot help also attributing the greatest part of them to the abuses, the superstition, and the errors which disfigure Christianity in the Romish church, and which had so disgusted me that they had driven me into total infidelity.

Such, then, being in fact my religious state, you may well believe, my children, that I was not happy; for it is impossible to be so without trusting in God, who is the source of supreme good and true peace. I was assiduous in my occupation; I frequented the society of my friends; but, my heart empty and incessantly craving after something which I could not obtain, was never content. My mind, restless and agitated, could no where find an object to fix and satisfy it. Listlessness followed me every where, and seemed to increase upon me. O how unhappy, and how pitiable are those, who are, as was then, without God, without Christ, without hope in the world!

I was in this wretched state when it pleased God to have pity upon me, and to cause a ray of light to penetrate my mind. One evening, after the labours of the day, instead of going as usual to the club which I frequented, I went alone upon the public walk, where I remained till the night was far advanced: the moon shone clear and bright: I had never before been so struck by the magnificence of the heavens, and I felt unusually disposed to reflection. "No," I said, (after contemplating for a long time the impressive scene before me,) "no, nature is not God," (for till then I had entertained this opinion,) "God is certainly distinct from nature: in all this I can only recognise a work replete with harmony, order, and beauty. Although I cannot perceive the Author, whose power, intelligence, and wisdom are every where so strongly imprinted on it; still, both my reason and my feeling combine to convince me of his existence."

This conclusion, which I sincerely adopted, was the result of the reflections in which I had been that evening absorbed.

Some days after this, the examination of a watch, its springs, its various wheels, and its motions, brought me afresh to the same conclusion, and for ever confirmed me in the belief of a God, the Creator of all things. "If this watch," I argued, "could not make itself, and necessarily leads us to suppose an artist who made each part, and so arranged the whole as to produce these movements--how much stronger reasons have we for concluding that the universe has a Contriver and Maker?"

I was no sooner fully satisfied of the existence of a God, than I trembled at the thought of his attributes, and my relationship to him. The sense of my unworthiness and sinfulness deeply affected me. When I called to mind the many years I had passed in forgetfulness of this great God; in indifference to, or in a culpable unbelief of his existence; I felt that I must indeed be, in his sight, the most ungrateful, and the most sinful of his creatures. My next feeling was an anxious desire to amend my conduct, and I determined to lay down such a plan for my future life, as I hoped might not be unworthy of that Being whose eye I then felt was upon me. After having made many efforts to recall the best maxims of wisdom and rules of virtue that I had met with in the course of my reading, I at length came to a resolution of examining what moral precepts the New Testament might contain, and whether it might not afford me the rules I was seeking for the regulation of my conduct.

This was the motive which brought me again to the New Testament, and induced me to undertake a fourth time the perusal of it. I wish it were in my power to recount to you, my dear children, all the effects that the eternal word of God produced upon my heart; for from that time I recognised it to be, what it is in fact, the revelation of sovereign wisdom; the genuine expression of the Divine will; the message of a tender and compassionate Father, addressed to his ungrateful and rebellious children, soliciting them to return and find happiness in him. I wish I could retrace all the impressions that this divine message produced on my mind, the vivid emotions I experienced, and the thoughts and feelings (never, I trust, to be forgotten) excited by that reading.

I was like a man born blind, who should suddenly recover his sight in a magnificent apartment, splendidly illuminated. My feelings at least corresponded with those of a man under such circumstances, were they possible. How glorious was the light of the Gospel to me! I sought for morality, and I found there the most simple, clear, complete, and perfect system of morality that could be conceived; and there I found precepts suited to every circumstance that could present itself in life, as a son, a brother, a father, a friend, a subject, a servant, a labourer, a man, a reasonable creature: my duty in every relation of life I there found inculcated in the most admirable manner. I could not imagine one moral duty for which I did not there find a precept; not one precept unaccompanied by a motive; and no motive that did not appear to me to be dictated by reason, or enforced by an authority against which I felt that I had nothing to object. I observed two kinds of precepts which, though tending to the same end, i.e. perfection, produced a different effect upon me. The positive precepts presented to my mind an idea of the high degree of holiness at which that man would arrive who could keep them without a single violation. The negative precepts, by leading me to a close self-examination, impressed me with a deep sense of my corruption, and convinced me that the authors of them must have possessed a profound knowledge of the human heart in general, and of my heart individually.

"Who then," said I, "were the writers of this book?" And when I reflected that they were poor, uneducated mechanics like myself, the question immediately presented itself--how could fishermen, tax-gatherers, and tent-makers, acquire such extraordinary sagacity, penetration, wisdom, and knowledge? "Ah!" I exclaimed, "this is indeed a problem, which can only be solved by admitting their own assertion, that the Spirit of God directed their pens, and that all they wrote was divinely inspired." Such, my children, was my conclusion after this examination of the morality laid down in the Gospel.

Thus I recognised the divine origin of the New Testament, and took my first step toward Christianity.

When I had once acknowledged the divine origin of the morality of the Gospel, reason and personal experience combined to convince me of the truth and divine source of the doctrines on which it was founded.

"If God inspired the apostles, and enabled them to give to the world the purest and most perfect system of morality that can be conceived, is it to be supposed that in the remainder of their writings he would leave them to themselves, and permit error or imposture to be mixed and confounded with truth?" No: from the same source cannot proceed sweet waters and bitter. As the moral precepts of the Gospel are divinely inspired, so, likewise, must be its doctrines. This reasoning appeared to me incontrovertible, and I received with full conviction the whole contents of the New Testament, as dictated by the Spirit of truth.

From that time Jesus Christ, his history, his divine character, his miracles, the end for which he came into the world, his sufferings and death, attracted and absorbed my whole attention. At the account of his passion, which, till then, I had read with indifference, my heart was melted, and my eyes overflowed with tears. In short, I found and felt such a suitableness between the wants of my sinful soul, destitute as it was of all peace and comfort, and the work which the Saviour had accomplished by his death on the cross, that I no longer doubted that the promises of the Gospel were personally addressed to me. I believed that Jesus Christ had offered himself a sacrifice for me, to expiate my sins, and to reconcile me unto God; and from that moment I have enjoyed an inward peace, the source of which I believe to be faith in Christ alone--a peace which the world can neither give nor take away, and which, as I myself have frequently experienced, is alone able to support and strengthen us through all the sufferings and afflictions of life.

In this manner you see how, a sinner and prodigal as I was, our heavenly Father met me, and received me to the arms of his mercy; how he made known to me his free grace and heavenly gift, of which I was utterly unworthy. It is his grace that has accomplished all in me. He it was who began, who carried on, and who, I trust, will perfect this work of salvation.

Without his intervention, that is to say, without the aid of his Spirit operating upon my heart, it never could have experienced a real conversion. To him also do I ascribe, with gratitude, my admission into the protestant church, of which I have now the privilege of being a member--as I shall proceed to tell you.

Having found, as I have already said, peace and joy in that word of God which I had received with my whole heart, I immediately felt the desire and the need of intercourse with gospel Christians; I was convinced that such there were, because the Saviour had promised "that the powers of hell should never prevail against his church." But not finding them in the Roman Catholic church, which presented to me nothing but a religion of tradition, equally degenerate in doctrine and worship, I was greatly at a loss where to find the real Christians for whom I was in search.

For the first time in my life the thought occurred, Is it possible they may be among the protestants? But instantly I repelled an idea which early prejudice had rendered revolting to me. In places inhabited exclusively by Roman Catholics, where the doctrines and worship of the protestant Christians are little known, the term protestant is regarded by most as synonymous with heretic, blasphemer, and reprobate. The people generally are imbued with these prejudices, which are diligently kept up and disseminated by some among them, and I myself was at that time too much under their influence to admit, at once, that the protestants could be the true Christians for whom I was seeking.

Soon, however, the thought returned; and as I reflected on that declaration of St. Paul, "All that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution," 2 Tim. 3:12, possibly, said I, these protestants may be calumniated on the very ground of their religion being more in accordance with the Gospel. Many other passages of Scripture presented themselves to my mind, which led me to believe that this supposition might be correct. I therefore determined to lose no opportunity of clearing my doubts upon this point.

As there were no protestants either in our town or neighbourhood, whom I could consult, I determined to write to the only one I knew; and though but little acquainted with her, I ventured to request that I might be apprised of, her pastor's next visit, signifying that I was anxious to consult him on a subject of importance. Either she did not understand my letter, or from some other motive, her answer, though obliging was not satisfactory on that point which most interested me.

I waited patiently for some time, and applied myself diligently to reading and meditating on the word of God, which had become like necessary food to my soul. In all my prayers I entreated the Lord that he would condescend to direct me to those true Christians of whom his church was composed, and permit me to become one of their number. I felt a confidence, from all that I had experienced, that my divine Benefactor would grant my request whenever he saw it good for me; this confidence quieted me, but could not remove my desire to ascertain what the protestant religion really was.

One day, particularly, this anxiety became stronger than ever, and degenerated, I acknowledge, into real impatience. I was unhappy at my lonely and isolated situation, without a friend to whom I could communicate my dearest interests; I believe I could have gone a hundred miles to have found any one who thought and felt as I did. It was at this moment of perplexity and weariness, on my return home, at the close of a day's work, that the thought struck me of consulting my wife, your present mother, and I had a presentiment that through her I should discover what I so long wished to know. She is, as you know, a native of Libos, and I remembered having heard her say that there were protestants residing in that town and neighbourhood.

When the supper was ended, and we were seated by the fire, each in our chimney-corner, she took her work, and I began the conversation nearly in the following words:

"Annette," said I, "have I not heard you say that there are many protestants in Libos and the neighbourhood?"

"Yes, Bayssière," she replied, "there are a great many, but they are a good deal scattered about the country. They belong to the church of Mont Flanquin, where their priest or minister resides."

"And do you know any of them? Have you ever spoken to them, or been at their houses?"

"O yes, I was acquainted with many families; I knew Mr. ----, and Mr. ----, etc. etc. (I suppress names.) I have been employed in their houses, and seen them frequently."

Well, then, can you tell me what sort of people they are, and what their characters and habits?"

"O yes, I can assure you that they are the best set of people in the world. They are esteemed, loved, and respected by every one: I never heard any thing but good of those I knew, and they always appeared to me to conduct themselves irreproachably."