e, for a whole morning did he detain me,
tormenting me with reflections on the past, and pointing out the
horrors of the future, until a thousand times I wished myself
non-existent. "I have attached myself to your wayward fortune," said
he, "and it has been my ruin as well as thine. Ungrateful as you are, I
cannot give you up to be devoured; but this is a life that it is
impossible to brook longer. Since our hopes are blasted in this world,
and all our schemes of grandeur overthrown; and since our everlasting
destiny is settled by a decree which no act of ours can invalidate, let
us fall by our own hands, or by the hands of each other; die like
heroes; and, throwing off this frame of dross and corruption, mingle
with the pure ethereal essence of existence, from which we derived our
being."

I shuddered at a view of the dreadful alternative, yet was obliged to
confess that in my present circumstances existence was not to be borne.
It was in vain that I reasoned on the sinfulness of the deed, and on
its damning nature; he made me condemn myself out of my own mouth, by
allowing the absolute nature of justifying grace and the impossibility
of the elect ever falling from the faith, or the glorious end to which
they were called; and then he said, this granted, self-destruction was
the act of a hero, and none but a coward would shrink from it, to
suffer a hundred times more every day and night that passed over his
head.

I said I was still contented to be that coward; and all that I begged
of him was to leave me to my fortune for a season, and to the just
judgement of my Creator; but he said his word and honour were engaged
on my behalf, and these, in such a case, were not to be violated. "If
you will not pity yourself, have pity onme," added he. "Turn your eyes
on me, and behold to what I am reduced."

Involuntarily did I turn at the request, and caught a half glance of
his features. May no eye destined to reflect the beauties of the New
Jerusalem inward upon the beatific soul behold such a sight as mine
then beheld! My immortal spirit, blood and bones, were all withered at
the blasting sight; and I arose and withdrew, with groanings which the
pangs of death shall never wring from me.

Not daring to look behind me, I crept on my way, and that night reached
this hamlet on the Scottish border; and being grown reckless of danger,
and hardened to scenes of horror, I took up my lodging with a poor
hind, who is a widower, and