such knowledge of the plague of his own heart, soundness of views concerning salvation, and apparent thirst for Christ and the sanctifying influence of his truth, as warranted the conclusion that he was taught of God. From another prisoner I had previously received a written communication calculated to awaken hope; and there were many whose entire carriage and conduct comported with the knowledge and love of Divine truth, although they had not yet, in words, declared themselves "on the Lord's side." The foregoing pages will shew that the whole of the prisoners were in abiding and immediate contact with the gospel of Christ, were ever, so to speak, moving in the Divine presence, which is promised to accompany the reading of his Word, scriptural exhortation, and prayer; but though we are thus warranted to look for the Divine blessing, yet we may be required to wait long in the exercise of believing patience. About two o'clock on the morning of the 2nd of November, and when nearly in 9° north latitude, and 21° west longitude, the thermometer ranging from 82° to 83°, and the barometer as high as thirty inches, I was suddenly roused from sleep by the most rending peals of thunder, the most vivid flashes of lightning, and in an instant I sprang from my bed, and stood upon the deck. It was an hour in which all were as from heaven called to the footstool of the throne of mercy and grace; even those whose duty required them to be either actively or passively engaged in C works of necessity and mercy, were called to lift up, in the faith of Jesus, their hearts unto God. No language can possibly describe the scene in the midst of which I then stood, and by which I saw and felt myself encompassed. All creation seemed on fire. Thunder, the loudest that ever fell upon my ear, prevailed in every quarter; peal upon peal followed in rapid succession; the distant roar contrasted with that in which I felt myself enwrapped, and the one or the other never ceased; sometimes several peals, either close to us, or at various distances from us, prevailed together. The lightning's flash was too vivid for the eyes to look upon, and, both near and at a distance, scarcely allowed a moment's intermission. The thick Egyptian darkness which intervened was but for a moment; but even that moment gave to the senses and the mind no repose, it was darkness that was terrific in itself, and gave to the winged thunderbolts and the electric coruscations that covered the face of the heavens a more piercing glare, a more overpowering vividness. The rain fell in torrents, the breath of heaven had died away, all things appeared to listen in awe to the voice of the Eternal, and to watch the manifestation and direction of his power. The ship was alone on the face of the wide ocean, and in the midst of threatening and destructive elements. Creation appeared to be breaking up; all things were full of the Divine power: the angry elements testified, to the guilty, the Divine displeasure, and powerfully suggested "the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat." The soul-the conscience-was confronted with God; and the truths of reason, and the inspired truths of revelation, written on the tablets of the heart by the Holy Ghost, were read by the awakened spirit in the light of living fire! The voice of God, heard in the thunder of his power, was heard also in the awful sanctions of his holy law, and in the immutable requirements of a neglected gospel. The scene was well fitted to carry us to the foot of that mount which, in the sight of Israel's hosts, was covered with the thick cloud, encompassed with thunders and lightnings, from the midst of which proceeded the sound of the trumpet, waxing louder and louder, and the voice of God, when he had descended in fire to deliver to man that holy law which announces nought but death to the transgressor; and our guilty souls could find no peace but on Calvary, under the sprinkling of the atoning blood of the Divine Lawgiver, our blessed Emmanuel, on the accursed tree slain for us! The hour, the very hour of death was felt at hand; the moment of the soul's unclothing† and appearance in the immediate presence of the Judge, to be seen in its true character, in the character then worked out, to be dealt with in perfect accordance with that character by God himself in the midst of the seen and felt realities of the eternal world, free from all guise, stripped of all pre tence, disrobed of all garments of human texture, to be fixed, for ever fixed, according to the choice made in life, unalterably fixed for ceaseless ages, in sorrow or in joy, according as Christ shall have been, in life, accepted or put away; according as the Holy Spirit shall have been, in life, received to renewal unto holiness, or criminally resisted, and sin and death preferred. Oh, what is man, sinful and guilty man, when viewed in the light of God's fiery law, of the Divine perfections, the all-pervading light of Omniscience, and surrounded with all the realities of the eternal world? When we feel ourselves encompassed with God's presence, and experience the agonising consciousness of his perfect knowledge of us, and of our utter vileness in his sight, when the soul is about to be removed from the body, and from the sound of the gospel, and to have its own chosen state for ever fixed, what then can avail us anything but a personal, a saving interest in Christ? What can give peace to the conscience, and cover all our iniquities, but his precious blood shed upon the cross as a sacrifice for sin, and effectually applied to our souls, through faith, by the power of the Holy Ghost? What can secure us from shame before him at his coming, and inspire us with holy and child-like confidence when he appeareth, but the anointing* of the Holy Spirit of promise setting his seal upon us,† and bearing witness with our spirits that we are the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus? What then sustains * 1 John ii. 20, 27-29. Ephesians iv. 30. and comforts the mind in reference to our beloved relatives and friends, but scriptural evidence that they have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before them in the gospel, and have become the subjects of a heavenly birth? Oh, how awful, how absolutely insupportable the conviction, then, that we -now about to die-have neglected them, have not been faithful to them concerning their souls, have not with all our might, by consistent example, and in the power of prayer in the Holy Ghost, urged them to flee to Jesus, to flee at once, and in him take refuge from the wrath to come! How true it is that dying moments should have nothing left for them to do but the work of dying; of dying in peace, to the glory of our Redeemer, and to the benefit of souls; dying in the confidence of him in whom we have believed, and still do believe; whom we have loved, and still do love; whose service we have felt to be our perfect freedom, in whose presence we have experienced joy, and hope to experience fulness of joy; and at whose right hand we have, through free and sovereign grace, the well-grounded hope of enjoying pleasures for evermore! The storm continued to rage in all the terribleness of its fury. No human voice was heard, save the voice, and that but rarely, of the officer carrying on duty. The mind was kept in solemn and awful watchfulness: the annihilation of the ship, the destruction of all on board, seemed at hand; we lay on the borders of eternity! At length a body of electric fire, commonly called a "thunder-bolt," struck the |