st
it became evident that in order to effect anything, he must sacrifice
all other prospects in life, and devote himself exclusively to this
work.

He says, after mentioning reasons which prevented all his associates
from doing this: "I could look, therefore, to no person but myself;
and the question was, whether I was prepared to make the sacrifice. In
favor of the undertaking, I urged to myself that never was any cause,
which had been taken up by man, in any country or in any age, so great
and important; that never was there one in which so much misery was
heard to cry for redress; that never was there one in which so much
good could be done; never one in which the duty of Christian charity
could be so extensively exercised; never one more worthy of the
devotion of a whole life towards it; and that, if a man thought
properly, he ought to rejoice to have been called into existence, if
he were only permitted to become an instrument in forwarding it in any
part of its progress.

"Against these sentiments, on the other hand, I had to urge that I
had been designed for the church; that I had already advanced as far
as deacon's orders in it; that my prospects there on account of my
connections were then brilliant; that, by appearing to desert my
profession, my family would be dissatisfied, if not unhappy. These
thoughts pressed upon me, and rendered the conflict difficult.

"But the sacrifice of my prospects staggered me, I own, the most. When
the other objections which I have related, occurred to me, my
enthusiasm instantly, like a flash of lightning, consumed them; but
this stuck to me, and troubled me. I had ambition. I had a thirst
after worldly interest and honors, and I could not extinguish it at
once. I was more than two hours in solitude under this painful
conflict. At length I yielded, not because I saw any reasonable
prospect of success in my new undertaking, for all cool-headed and
cool-hearted men would have pronounced against it; but in obedience, I
believe, to a higher Power. And I can say, that both on the moment of
this resolution, and for some time afterwards, I had more sublime and
happy feelings than at any former period of my life."

In order to show how this enterprise was looked upon and talked of
very commonly by the majority of men in these times, we will extract
the following passage from Boswell's Life of Johnson, in which Bozzy
thus enters his solemn protest: "The wild and dangerous attempt, w