vice. I do not say this as if
I fancied myself to be a man of importance, for I will gladly be the
meanest of these before the eyes of Jesus. When I think on my former
resistance and stiff-necked behaviour in the work of conversion, I
could strike myself. It causes deep sorrow and repentance within me,
when I consider that I have been most faithfully instructed by my
teachers for so many years, and yet have been like one that had no
ears to hear. But now, not my ears only are unstopped to hear and
understand the doctrine of Jesus and the hymns we sing, but I feel
that what I hear and learn penetrates into my heart, and since I am
thus inwardly affected, warmed, and enlivened, I am the more
astonished and amazed at the change, when recollecting, that I have
been so hard and callous, that whenever any of my nearest relations
departed this life, being taken from my side by death, I was not able
to weep a tear for them; but now I can shed a flood of tears, both
from a fervent desire of living intimately attached to Jesus, and for
delight and pleasure to think what happiness I should enjoy if
incessantly thus disposed. However, since I am so poor and defective,
I find that I cannot procure it by my own efforts; but I am taught
that I may yet enjoy this constant happiness, by entreating our
Saviour for it to-day, to-morrow, and every day. As long as I am on
this earth, I shall remain like a sick one, and be always apt to
stray; for my heart is naturally untoward and hard as a stone, but
when Jesus softens it, then it becomes truly soft and tender. Ah! that
I had not such corrupted senses! yet, being conscious that I am
constantly in danger on account of my depravity, I am determined
faithfully to attend to the gospel, and to my teachers, to be guided
and advised by them and to follow after righteousness. When I search
my own heart, I still find many things condemnable in the sight of
Jesus, of which I had never thought before. Hear these my poor words
to you in love. JONATHAN."

At Okkak, Solomon, a baptized man, thus complained to the brethren: "I
will now utter words of truth only. I am unhappy because I cannot
regain that state of mind I enjoyed when I was baptized. There is as
it were a dark shadow between me and our Saviour; this is the only
thing that gives me pain at present. I feel, 'tis true, some desire
after Jesus, but I cannot always pray to him. This is, alas, my case,
for whole days together, and yet I cannot l