and into seafaring
company, all that little sense of religion which I had entertained was
laughed out of me by my messmates; by a hardened despising of dangers,
and the views of death, which grew habitual to me; by my long absence
from all manner of opportunities to converse with any thing but what was
like myself, or to hear any thing that was good, or tending towards it.

So void was I of every thing that was good, or of the least sense of
what I was, or was to be, that in the greatest deliverances I enjoyed
(such as my escape from Sallee, my being taken up by the Portuguese
master of a ship, my being planted so well in the Brazils, my receiving
the cargo from England, and the like,) I never had once the words, Thank
God, so much as on my mind, or in my mouth; nor in the greatest distress
had I so much as a thought to pray to him, or so much as to say, Lord,
have mercy upon me! no, nor to mention the name of God, unless it was to
swear by, and blaspheme it.

I had terrible reflections upon my mind for many months, as I have
already observed, on account of my wicked and hardened life past; and
when I looked about me, and considered what particular providences had
attended me since my coming into this place, and how God had dealt
bountifully with me,--had not only punished me less than my iniquity had
deserved, but had so plentifully provided for me,--this gave me great
hopes that my repentance was accepted, and that God had yet mercies in
store for me.

With these reflections, I worked my mind up, not only to a resignation
to the will of God in the present disposition of my circumstances, but
even to a sincere thankfulness for my condition; and that I, who was yet
a living man, ought not to complain, seeing I had not the due punishment
of my sins; that I enjoyed so many mercies which I had no reason to have
expected in that place, that I ought never more to repine at my
condition, but to rejoice, and to give daily thanks for that daily
bread, which nothing but a crowd of wonders could have brought; that I
ought to consider I had been fed by a miracle, even as great as that of
feeding Elijah by ravens; nay, by a long series of miracles: and that I
could hardly have named a place in the uninhabitable part of the world
where I could have been cast more to my advantage; a place where, as I
had no society, which was my affliction on one hand, so I found no
ravenous beasts, no furious wolves or tigers, to threaten my life