 section 12 part 2 the private memoirs and confessions of a sinner written by himself by James Hogg this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org my life has been a life of trouble in turmoil of change and vicissitude of anger and exaltation of sorrow and of vengeance my sorrows have all been for a slighted gospel and my vengeance has been wreaked on its adversaries therefore in the might of heaven I will sit down and write I will let the wicked of this world know what I have done in the faith of the promises and justification by grace that they may read and tremble and bless their gods of silver and gold that the minister of heaven was removed from their sphere before their blood was mingled with their sacrifices I was born an outcast in the world in which I was destined to act so conspicuous apart my mother was a burning and a shining light in the community of Scottish worthies and in the days of her virginity had suffered much in the persecution of the saints but it so pleased heaven that as a trial of her faith she was married to one of the wicked a man all over spotted with the leprosy of sin as well might they have conjoined fire and water together in hopes that they would consort and amalgamate as purity and corruption she fled from his embraces the first night after their marriage and from that time forth his inequities so galled her upright heart that she quitted his society altogether keeping her own apartments in the same house with him I was the second son of this unhappy marriage and her ever I was born my father according to the flesh disclaimed all relation or connection with me and all interest in me save what the law compelled him to take which was to grant me a scanty maintenance and had it not been for a faithful minister of the gospel my mother's early instructor I should have remained an outcast from the church visible he took pity on me admitting me not only into that but into the bosom of his own household in ministry also and to him I am indebted under heaven for the high conceptions and glorious discernment between good and evil right and wrong which I attained even at an early age it was he who directed my studies a right both in the learning of the ancient fathers and the doctrines of the reformed church and designed me for his assistant and successor in the holy office I missed no opportunity of perfecting myself particularly in all the minute points of theology in which my reverend father and mother took a great delight but at length I acquired so much skill that I astonished my teachers and made them gaze at one another I remember that it was the custom in my patrons house to ask questions of the singular catechism round every Sabbath night he asked the first my mother the second and so on everyone saying the question asked and then asking the next it fell to my mother to ask a factual calling at me I said the answer with propriety and emphasis now madam added I my question to you is what is ineffectual calling ineffectual calling there was no such thing Robert said she but there is madam said I and that answer proves how much you say these fundamental precepts by rote and without any consideration ineffectual calling is the outward call of the gospel without any effect on the hearts of unregenerated and impenitent sinners have not all these the same calls warnings doctrines and reproofs that we have and is not this ineffectual calling has not ardent fairy the same has not Patrick McClure the same has not the lair of dog castle and his reprobate heir the same and will any tell me that this is not ineffectual calling what a wonderful boy he is said my mother I'm feared he turned out to be a conceded gawk said old Barnett the minister's man no said my pastor and father is I shall henceforth denominate him no Barnett he is a wonderful boy and no Marvel for I have prayed for these talents to be bestowed on him from his infancy and do you think that heaven would refuse a prayer so disinterested no it is impossible but my dread is madam continued he turning to my mother that he is yet in the bond of inequity God forbid said my mother I have struggled with the almighty long and hard continued he but have as yet no certain token of acceptance in his behalf I have indeed fought a hard fight but have been repulsed by him who hath seldom refused my request although I cited his own words against him and endeavored to hold him at his promise he hath so many turnings in the supremacy of his power that I have been rejected how dreadful is it to think of our darling being still without the pale of the covenant but I have vowed a vow and in that there is hope my heart quaked with terror when I thought of being still living in a state of reprobation subjected to the awful issues of death judgment and eternal misery by the slightest accident or casualty and I said about the duty of prayer myself with the utmost earnestness I prayed three times every day and seven times on the Sabbath but the more frequently and fervently that I prayed I sinned is still the more about this time and for a long period afterwards a mounting to several years I lived in a hopeless and deplorable state of mind for I said to myself if my name is not written in the book of life from all eternity it is in vain for me to presume that either vows or prayers of mine or those of all mankind combined can ever procure its insertion now I had come under many vows most solemnly taken every one of which I had broken and I saw with the intensity of juvenile grief that there was no hope for me I went on sinning every hour and all the while most strenuously warring against sin and repenting of every one transgression as soon after the commission of it as I got leisure to think but oh what a wretched state this unregenerated state is in which every effort after righteousness only aggravates our offenses I found it vanity to contend for after communing with my heart the conclusion was as follows if I could repent me of all my sins and shed tears of blood for them still have I not a load of original transgression pressing on me that is enough to crush me to the lowest hell I may be angry with my first parents for having sin but how I shall repent me of their sin is beyond what I am able to comprehend still in those days of depravity and corruption I had some of those principles implanted in my mind which were afterwards to spring up with such amazing fertility among the heroes of the faith and the promises in particular I felt great indignation against all the wicked of this world and often wished for the means of ridding it of such a noxious burden I liked John Barnett my Reverend Father serving man extremely ill but from a supposition that he might be one of the justified I refrained from doing him any injury he gave always his word against me and when we were by ourselves in the barn or the fields he rated me with such severity for my faults that my heart could brook it no longer he discovered some notorious lies that I had framed and taxed me with them in such a manner that I could in no wise get off Mike cheek burnt with offense rather than shame and he thinking he had got the mastery of me exalted over me most unmercifully telling me I was a selfish and conceited blackguard who made great pretenses towards religious devotion to cloak a deposition tainted with deceit and that it would not much astonish him if I brought myself to the gallows I gathered some courage from his over severity and answered him as follows who made the judge of the actions or dispositions of the almighty's creatures thou who art a worm and no man in his sight how it befits thee to deal out judgments and anathemas hath he not made one vessel to honor and another to dishonor as in the case with myself and thee hath he not to build in his stories in the heavens and laid the foundations thereof in the earth and how can a being like the judge between good and evil that are both subjected to the workings of his hand or of the opposing principles and the soul of man correcting modifying and refining one another I said this with that strong display of fervor for which I was remarkable at my years and expected old Barnett to be utterly confounded but he only shook his head and with the most provoking grin said there he goes sick and sublime and ridiculous sophistry I never heard come out of another mouth but aim there needs nay eighths to be sworn a for the session why is your father young good man I near for my part saw a son sacked like a dad send my in first opened with that he went away saying with an ill-natured wince you made to honor and me to dishonor dirty boat cow thing that thou beest I will have the old rascal on the hip for this if I live thought I so I went and asked my mother if John was a righteous man she could not tell but suppose he was and therefore I got no encouragement from her I went next to my reverend father and inquired his opinion expecting as little from that quarter he knew the elect as it were by instinct and could have told you of all those in his own and some neighboring parishes who were born within the boundaries of the covenant of promise and who were not I keep a good deal in company with your servant old Barnett father said I you do boy you do I see said he I wish I may not keep too much in his company said I not knowing what kind of society I am in is John a good man father why boy he is but so so a morally good man John is but very little of the leaven of true righteousness which is faith within I am afraid old Barnett with all his stock of morality will be a castaway my heart was greatly cheered by this remark and I sighed very deeply and hung my head to one side the worthy father observed me and inquired the cause when I answered as follows how dreadful the thought that I have been going daily in company and fellowship with one whose name is written on the red letter side of the book of life whose body and soul have been from all eternity consigned over to everlasting destruction and to whom the blood of the anointment can never never reach father this is an awful thing and beyond my comprehension while we are in the world we must mix with the inhabitants thereof said he and the stains which adhere to us by reason of this mixture which is unavoidable shall all be washed away it is our duty however to shun the society of wicked men as much as possible lest we partake of their sins and become sharers with them in punishment John however is a morally good man and may yet get a cast of grace I always thought him to be a good man till today said I when he threw out some reflections on your character so horrible that I quake to think of the wickedness and malevolence of his heart he was raiding me very impertinently for some supposed vault which had no being save in his own jealous brain when I attempted to reason him out of his belief in the spirit of calm Christian argument but how do you think he answered me he did so sir by twisting his mouth at me and remarking that such sublime and ridiculous sophistry never came out of another mouth but one meaning yours and that no oath before Kirk session was necessary to prove who was my dad for that he had never seen a son so like a father as I was like mine he durst not for his soul salvation and for his daily bread which he values much more say such a word boy therefore take care what you assert said my Reverend father he said these very words and will not deny them sir said I my Reverend father turned about in great wrath and indignation and went away in search of John but I kept out of the way and listened at a back window for John was dressing the plot of ground behind the house and I hope it was no sin in me that I did rejoice in the dialogue which took place it being the victory of righteousness over error well John this is a fine day for your delving work hey it's a tolerable day sir are you thankful in heart John for such temporal mercies as these ah doubt we're over a little thankful sir bane for temporal in spiritual mercies but is not a the maced thankful heart that masks the greatest phrase we the tongue I hope there is nothing personal under that remark John again the bad it fits on a body's head their uncle welcome to it sir for me John I do not approve of these innuendos you have an arch malicious manner of vending your aphorisms which the men of the world are too apt to read the wrong way for your dark hints are sure to have one very bad meaning how it's not a sir it's only bad folks that thinks act they find my bits a Gibbs come home to their hearts we a kind of yerk and that guards them wins that saying is ten times worse than the other John it is a manifest insult it is just telling me to my face that you think me a bad man a body cannot help his thoughts sir no but a man's thoughts are generally formed from observation now I should like to know even from the mouth of a misbeliever what part of my conduct warrants such a conclusion nay particular parts sir I draw my conclusions free the halo man's character and I'm know that f and far wrong well John and what sort of general character do you suppose mine to be yours is a scripture character sir and I'll prove it I hope so John well which of the scripture characters do you think approximates nearest to my own yes sir yes I wish to lead a proof why if it be an Old Testament character I hope it is Malchizedek for at all events you cannot deny there is one point of resemblance I like him I'm a preacher of righteousness if it be a New Testament character I suppose you mean the apostle of the Gentiles of whom I am an unworthy representative now Nasser better nor that still and fair closer is the resemblance when you bring me to the point I'm on speak ye are the just Pharisee sir that gate up we the poor public and to pray in the temple and ye are acting the very same pair to this time and saying aye your heart God I thank thee that I am not as other men are and in a way like this poor misbelieving unregenerate sinner John Barnett I hope I may say so indeed there now I told you how it was but do you hear maester here stands the poor sinner John Barnett your beetle and servant man we want to change chances we you in the least world nor conscious in this for ten times of that you possess your justification by faith and off together you are extremely audacious and impertinent John but the language of reprobation cannot affect me I came only to ask you one question which I desire you to answer candidly did you ever say to anyone that I was the boy Robert's natural father how to miss her hi fee nacer I durst they say that for my life I doubt the black stool in the sack gown or maybe the jugs when hey been my portion and I said sick of thing is that how taut fee fee uncle like doing say for a moccasitic or a saint Paul John you are a profane old man and I desire that you will not presume to break your chest on me tell me dare you say or dare you think that I am the natural father of that boy ye cannot hinder me to think whatever I like sir nor can I hinder myself but did you ever say to anyone that he resembled me and fathered himself well enough I hey said money a time that he resembled you sir they body can mistake that but John there are many natural reasons for such likenesses besides that of constant a guinnessy they depend much on the thoughts and affections of the mother and it is probable that the mother of this boy being deserted by her worthless husband having turned her thoughts on me as likely to be her protector may have caused this striking resemblance I it might be sir I could not say I have known a lady John who was delivered of a black a more child merely from the circumstance of having got a start by the sudden entrance of her Negro servant and not being able to forget him for several hours it may be sir but I can this and I had been the layered I won a hey taken that story in so then John you positively think from a casual likeness that this boy is my son man's thoughts are vanity sir they come unasked and gang away without a dismissal and he cannot help them I'm neither gonna say that I think he's your son nor that I think he's know your son say you needed a pose mean a mayor about it here then my determination John if you do not promise to me and faith and honor that you never will say or insinuate such a thing again in your life as that that boy is my natural son I will take the keys of the church from you and dismiss you for my service John pulled out the keys and dashed them on the gravel at the Reverend minister's feet there are the keys a ya kirk sir I hey never made mucklements of them since he entered the Dorot I hate carried them this three and thirty year but they have been like a burn a hole in my pouch sin ever they were turned for your admittance take them again and G them to your whale and muckle gun may he gotto them old John may D a beggar in a hay barn or that to the back of a dyke but he saw a B master of his own thoughts and G them vent or no as he likes he left the man's that day and I rejoiced in the riddance for I disdained to be kept so much under by one who was in bond of inequity and of whom there seemed no hope as he rejoiced in his fro wordness and refused to submit to that faithful teacher his master and of section 12 section 13 the private memoirs and confessions of a sinner written by himself by James Hogg this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org it was about this time that my Reverend Father preached a sermon one sentence of which affected me most disagreeably it was to the purport that every unrepented sin was productive of a new sin with each breath that a man drew and every one of these new sins added to the catalog in the same manner I was utterly confounded at the multitude of my transgressions for I was sensible that there were great numbers of sins of which I had never been able thoroughly to repent and these momentary ones by moderate calculation had I saw long ago amounted to 150,000 in a minute and I saw no end to the series of repentances to which I had subjected myself a lifetime was nothing to enable me to accomplish the sum and then being for anything I was certain of in my state of nature and the grace of repentance withheld from me what was I to do or what was the become of me in the meantime I went on sinning without measure but I was still more troubled about the multitude than the magnitude of my transgressions and the small minute ones puzzled me more than those that were more heinous as the latter had generally some good effects in the way of punishing wicked men froward boys and deceitful women and I rejoiced even then in my early youth at being used as a scourge in the hand of the Lord another J you a Cyrus or a Nebuchadnezzar on the whole I remember that I got into great confusion relating to my sins and repentances and knew neither where to begin nor how to proceed and often had great fears that I was holy without Christ and that I would find God a consuming fire to me I could not help running into new sins continually but then I was mercifully dealt with for I was often made to repent of them most heartily by reason of bodily chastisements received on these delinquencies being discovered I was particularly prone to lying and I cannot but admire the mercy that has freely forgiven me all these juvenile sins now that I know them all to be blotted out and then I am an accepted person I may the more freely confess them the truth is that one lie always paved the way for another from hour to hour from day to day and from year to year so that I found myself constantly involved in a labyrinth of deceit from which it was impossible to extricate myself if I knew a person to be a godly one I could almost have kissed his feet but against the carnal portion of mankind I set my face continually I esteemed the true ministers of the gospel but the prelatic party and the preachers up of good works I abhorred and to this hour I account them the worst and most heinous of all transgressors there was only one boy Mr. Witch's class who kept always the upper hand of me in every part of education I strove against him from year to year but it was all in vain for he was a very wicked boy and I was convinced he had dealings with the devil indeed it was believed all over the country that his mother was a witch and I was at length convinced that it was no human ingenuity that beat me with so much ease in the Latin after I had often sat up a whole night with my reverend father studying my lesson in all its bearings I often read as well in sometimes better than he but the moment Mr. Wilson began to examine us my opponent popped up above me I determined as I knew him for a wicked person and one of the devil's hand fasted children to be revenged on him and to humble him by some means or other accordingly I lost no opportunity of setting the master against him and succeeded several times and getting him severely beaten for faults of which he was innocent I can hardly describe the joy that it gave to my heart to see a wicked creature suffering for though he deserved it not for one thing he richly deserved it for others this may be by some people accounted a great sin in me but I deny it for I did it as a duty and what a man or boy does for the right will never be put into the sum of his transgressions this boy whose name was McGill was at all his leisure hours engaged in drawing profane pictures of beasts men women houses and trees and in short of all things that is I encountered these profane things the master often smiled at and admired therefore I began privately to try my hand likewise I had scarcely tried above once to draw the figure of a man or I conceived that I had hit the very features of Mr. Wilson they were so particular that they could not be easily mistaken and I was so tickled and pleased with the droll likeness that I had drawn that I laughed and moderately at it I tried no other figure but this and I tried it in every situation in which a man and a school master could be placed I often rot for hours together at this likeness nor was it long before I made myself so much master of the outline that I could have drawn it in any situation whatever almost offhand I then took McGill's account book of algebra home with me and at my leisure put down a number of gross caricatures of Mr. Wilson here and there several of them in situations notoriously ludicrous I waited the discovery of this treasure with great impatience but the book chanceing to be one that McGill was not using I saw it might be long enough before I enjoyed the consummation of my grand scheme therefore with all the ingenuity I was master of I brought it before our dominates I but never shall I forget the rage that gleamed in the tyrant's viz I was actually terrified to look at him and trembled at his voice McGill was called upon and examined relating to the obnoxious figures he denied flatly that any of them were of his doing but the master inquiring at him who's they were he could not tell but affirmed it to be some trick mr. Wilson at one time began as I thought to hesitate but the evidence was so strong against McGill that at length his solemn assertions of innocence only proved an aggravation of his crime there was not one in the school who had ever been known to draw a figure but himself and on him fell the whole weight of the tyrant's vengeance it was dreadful and I was once in hopes that he would not leave life in the culprit he however left the school for several months refusing to return to be subjected to punishment for the faults of others and I stood king of the class matters were at last made up between McGill's parents and the schoolmaster but by that time I had got the start of him and never in my life did I exert myself so much as to keep the mastery it was in vain the powers of enchantment prevailed and I was again turned down with the tear in my eye I could think of no amends but one and of being driven to desperation I put it in practice I told a lie of him I came boldly up to the master and told him that McGill had in my hearing cursed him in a most shocking manner and called him vile names he called McGill and charged him with the crime and the proud young coxcomb was so stunned at the atrocity of the charge that his face grew as red as crimson and the word stuck in his throat as he feebly denied it his guilt was manifest and he was again flogged most nobly and dismissed the school forever in disgrace as a most incorrigible vagabond this was a great victory gained and I rejoiced and exalted exceedingly in it it had however very night cost me my life for not long thereafter I encountered McGill in the fields on which he came up and challenged me for a liar daring me to fight him I refused and said that I looked on him is quite below my notice but he would not quit me and finally told me that he should either lick me or I should lick him as he had no other means of being revenged on such a scoundrel I tried to intimidate him but it would not do and I believe I would have given all that I had in the world to be quit of him he at length went so far as first to kick me and then strike me on the face and being both older and stronger than he I thought it scarcely became me to take such insults patiently I was nevertheless well aware that the devilish powers of his mother would finally prevail and either the dread of this or the inward consciousness of having wronged him certainly unnerved my arm for I fought wretchedly and was soon wholly overcome I was so sore defeated that I kneeled and was going to beg his pardon but another thought struck me momentarily and I threw myself on my face and inwardly begged aid from heaven at the same time I felt as if assured that my prayer was heard and would be answered while I was in this humble attitude the villain kicked me with his foot and cursed me and I being newly encouraged arose and encountered him once more we had not fought long at this second turn before I saw a man hastening towards us on which I uttered a shout of joy and laid on valiantly but my very next look assured me that the man was old John Barnett whom I had likewise wronged all that was in my power and between these two wicked persons I expected anything but justice my arm was again enfeebled and that of my adversary prevailed I was knocked down and mauled most grievously and while the Ruffian was kicking and cuffing me at his will and pleasure up came old John Barnett breathless with running and at one blow with his open hand leveled my opponent with the earth take ye that maester said John to learn ye better breeding how to wall man and ye will fight fight fair God's suffice area gentlemen's brode that ye will kick and cuff a lad when he's down when I heard this kind and unexpected interference I began once more to value myself on my courage and springing up I made at my adversary but John without saying a word bit his lip and seizing me by the neck threw me down McGill begged of him to stand and see fair play and suffer us to finish the battle for added he he is a liar in a scoundrel and deserves ten times more than I can give him I can he's a that you say in mayor young man quote John but am I sure that year not so bad and war it says name Michael for only a ye to be ten like tight set one on either here John cocked his cudgel and stood between us threatening to knock the one dead who first offered to lift his hand against the other but perceiving no disposition and any of us to separate he drove me home before him like a bullock and keeping close guard behind me lest McGill had followed I felt greatly indebted to John yet I complained of his interference to my mother and the old officious sinner got no thanks for his pains as I am writing only from recollection so I remember of nothing farther in these early days in the least worthy of being recorded that I was a great and transcendent sinner I confess but still I had hopes of forgiveness because I never sinned from principle but accident and then I always tried to repent of these sins by the slump for individually it was impossible and though not always successful in my endeavors I could not help that the grace of repentance being withheld for me I regarded myself as a no degree accountable for the failure moreover there were many of the most deadly sins into which I never fell for I dreaded those mentioned in the revelations as excluding sins so that I guarded against them continually in particular I brought myself to despise if not to abhor the beauty of women looking on it as the greatest snare to which mankind was subjected and though young men and maidens and even old women my mother among the rest taxed me with being an unnatural wretch I gloried in my acquisition and to this day am thankful for having escaped the most dangerous of all snares I kept myself also free of the sins of idolatry and misbelief both of a deadly nature and upon the whole I think I had not then broken that is absolutely broken above four out of the ten commandments but for all that I had more sense than to regard either my good works or my evil deeds as in the smallest degree influencing the eternal decrees of God concerning me either with regard to my acceptance or reprobation I depended entirely on the bounty of free grace holding all the righteousness of man as filthy rags and believing in the momentous and magnificent truth that the more heavenly load and with transgressions the more welcome was the believer at the throne of grace and I have reason to believe that it was this dependence and this belief that at last ensured my acceptance there I come now to the most important period of my existence the period that has modeled my character and influenced every action of my life without which this detail of my actions would have been as a tale that hath been told a monotonous for rago an uninteresting herong in short a thing of nothing whereas low it must now be a relation of great and terrible actions done in the might and by the commission of heaven amen like the sinful king of Israel I had been walking softly before the Lord for a season I had been humbled for my transgressions and as far as I recollect sorry on account of their numbers and heinousness my Reverend father had been moreover examining me every day regarding the state of my soul and my answers sometimes appeared to give him satisfaction and sometimes not as for my mother she would harp on the subject of my faith forever yet though I knew her to be a Christian I confess that I always despised her motley instructions nor had I any great regard for her person if this was a crime in me I never could help it I confess it freely and believe it was a judgment from heaven inflicted on her for some sin of former days and that I had no power to have acted otherwise towards her than I did in this frame of mind was I when my Reverend father one morning arose from his seat and meeting me as I entered the room he embraced me and welcomed me into the community of the just upon earth I was struck speechless and could make no answer save by looks of surprise my mother also came to me kissed and wept over me and after showering unnumbered blessings upon my head she also welcomed to me into the society of the just made perfect then each of them took me by a hand and my Reverend father explained to me how he had wrestled with God as the patriarch of old had done not for a night but for days and years and that in bitterness and anguish of spirit on my account but that he had at last prevailed and had now gained the long and earnestly desired assurance of my accepted with the almighty in and through the merits and sufferings of his son that I was now a justified person adopted among the number of God's children my name written in the lambs book of life and that no bypassed transgression nor any future act of my own or of other men could be instrumental in altering the decree all the powers of darkness added he shall never be able to pluck you again out of your Redeemer's hand and now my son be strong instead fast in truth set your face against sin and sinful men and resist even to blood as many of the faithful of this land have done and your reward shall be double I am assured of your acceptance by the word and spirit of him who cannot air and your sanctification and repentance onto life will follow in due course rejoice and be thankful for you are plucked as a brand out of the burning and now your redemption is sealed and sure I wept for joy to be thus assured of my freedom from all sin and of the impossibility of my ever again falling away from my new state I bounded away into the fields and the woods to pour out my spirit in prayer before the Almighty for his kindness to me my whole frame seemed to be renewed every nerve was buoyant with new life I felt as if I could have flown in the air or leapt over the tops of the trees an exaltation of spirit lifted me as it were far above the earth and the sinful creatures crawling on its surface and I deemed myself as an eagle among the children of men soaring on high and looking down with pity and contempt on the groveling creatures below end of section 13 section 14 the private memoirs and confessions of a sinner written by himself by James Hogg this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org as I thus wended my way I beheld a young man of a mysterious appearance coming towards me I tried to shun him being bent on my own contemplations but he cast himself in my way so that I could not well avoid him and more than that I felt a sort of invisible power that drew me towards him something like the force of enchantment which I could not resist as we approached each other our eyes met and I can never describe the strange sensations that thrilled through my whole frame at that impressive moment a moment to me fraught with the most tremendous consequences the beginning of a series of adventures which has puzzled myself and will puzzle the world when I am no more in it that time will now soon arrive sooner than anyone can devise who knows not the tumult of my thoughts and the labor of my spirit and when it hath come and passed over when my flesh and my bones are decayed and my soul has passed to its ever lasting home then shall the sons of men ponder on the events of my life wonder and tremble and tremble and wonder how such things should be that strange youth and I approached each other in silence and slowly with our eyes fixed on each other's eyes we approached till not more than a yard intervened between us and then stood still engaged measuring each other from head to foot what was my astonishment up receiving that he was the same being as myself the clothes were the same to the smallest item the form was the same the apparent age the color of the hair the eyes and as far as recollection could serve me from viewing my own features in a glass the features too were the very same I conceived at first that I saw a vision and that my guardian angel had appeared to me at this important error of my life but this singular being read my thoughts and my looks anticipating the very words that I was going to utter you think I am your brother said he or that I am your second self I am indeed your brother not according to the flesh but in my belief of the same truths and my assurance in the same mode of redemption then which I hold nothing so great or so glorious on earth then you are an associate well adapted to my present state said I for this time is a time of great rejoicing in spirit to me I am on my way to return thanks to the most high for my redemption from the bonds of sin in misery if you will join with me heart in hand in youthful Thanksgiving then shall we to go and worship together but if not go your way and I shall go mine ah you little know with how much pleasure I will accompany you and join with you in your elevated devotions said he fervently your state is a state to be envied indeed but I have been advised of it and am come to be a humble disciple of yours to be initiated into the true way of salvation by conversing with you and perhaps of being assisted by your prayers my spiritual pride being greatly elevated by this address I began to assume the preceptor and question this extraordinary youth with regard to his religious principles telling him plainly if he was one who expected acceptance with God at all on account of good works that I would hold no communion with him he renounced these at once with the greatest vehemence and declared his acquiescence in my faith I asked if he believed in the eternal and irrevocable decrees of God regarding the salvation and condemnation of all mankind he answered that he did so hey what would signify all things else that he believed if he did not believe in that we then went on to commune about all our points of belief and in everything that I suggested he acquiesced and as I thought that day often carried them to extremes so that I had a secret dread he was advancing blasphemies he had such a way with him and paid such a deference to all my opinions that I was quite captivated and at the same time I stood in a sort of awe of him which I could not account for and several times was seized with an involuntary inclination to escape from his presence by making a sudden retreat but he seemed constantly to anticipate my thoughts and was sure to divert my purpose by some turn in the conversation that particularly interested me he took care to dwell much on the theme of the impossibility of those ever falling away who were once accepted and received into covenant with God for he seemed to know that in that confidence and that trust my whole hopes were centered we moved about from one place to another until the day was wholly spent my mind had all the while been kept in a state of agitation resembling the motion of a whirlpool and when we came to separate I then discovered that the purpose for which I had sought the fields had been neglected and that I had been diverted from the worship of God by attending to the quibbles and dogmas of this singular and unaccountable being who seemed to have more knowledge and information than all the persons I had ever known put together we parted with expressions of mutual regret and when I left him I felt a deliverance but at the same time a certain consciousness that I was not thus to get free of him but that he was like to be an acquaintance that was to stick to me for good or for evil I was astonished at his acuteness and knowledge about everything but as for his likeness to me that was quite unaccountable he was the same person in every respect but yet he was not always so for I observed several times when we were speaking of certain divines and their tenants that his face assumed something of the appearance of theirs and it struck me that by setting his features to the mold of other peoples he entered it once into their conceptions and feelings I had been greatly flattered and greatly interested by his conversation whether I had been the better for it or the worse I could not tell I had been diverted from returning thanks to my gracious maker for his great kindness to me and came home as I went away but not with the same buoyancy and likeness of heart well may I remember the day in which I was first received into the number and made an heir to all the privileges of the children of god and on which I first met this mysterious associate who from that day forth can try to wind himself into all my affairs both spiritual and temporal to this day on which I am writing the account of it it was on the 25th day of March 1704 when I had just entered the 18th year of my age whether it behooves me to bless god for the events of that day or to deplore them has been hid from my discernment though I have inquired into it with fear and trembling and I have now lost all hopes of ever discovering the true import of these events until that day when my accounts are to make up and reckon for in another world when I came home I went straight into the parlor where my mother was sitting by herself she started to her feet and uttered a smothered scream what ails you Robert cried she my dear son what is the matter with you do you see anything the matter with me said I it appears that the ailment is with yourself and either in your crazed head or your dim eyes for there is nothing the matter with me oh Robert you are ill cried she you are very ill my dear boy you are quite changed your very voice and manner are changed ah Jane haste you up to the study and tell Mr. Ringham to come here on the instant and speak to Robert I beseech you woman to restrain yourself said I if you suffer your frenzy to run away with your judgment in this manner I will leave the house what do you mean I tell you there is nothing ails me I never was better she screamed and ran between me and the door to bar my retreat in the meantime my reverend father entered and I have not forgot how he gazed through his glasses first at my mother and then at me I imagined that his eyes burnt like candles and was afraid of him which I supposed made my looks more unstable than they would otherwise have been what is all this for said he mistress Robert what is the matter here oh sir our boy cried my mother our dear boy Mr. Ringham look at him and speak to him he is either dying or translated sir he looked at me with a continence of great alarm mumbling some sentences to himself and then taking me by the arm as if to feel my pulse he said with a faltering voice something has indeed befalling you either in body or mind boy for you are transformed since the morning that I could not have known you for the same person have you met with any accident no have you seen anything out of the ordinary course of nature no then Satan I fear has been busy with you tempting you in no ordinary degree at this momentous crisis of your life my mind turn on my associate for the day and the idea that he might be an agent of the devil had such an effect on me that I could make no answer I see how it is said he you are troubled in spirit and I have no doubt that the enemy of our salvation has been busy with you tell me this has he overcome you or has he not he has not my dear father said I in the strength of the lord I hope I have withstood him but indeed if he has been busy with me I knew it's not I have been conversant this day with one stranger only whom I took rather for an angel of light it is one of the devil's most profound wiles to appear like one said my mother woman hold thy peace said my reverend father thou pretendest to teach what thou knowest not tell me this boy did this stranger with whom you met adhere to the religious principles in which I have educated you yes to every one of them in their fullest latitude said I then he was no agent of the wicked one with whom you held converse said he for that is the doctrine that was made to overturn the principalities of powers the might and dominion of the kingdom of darkness let us pray after spending about a quarter of an hour in solemn and sublime thanksgiving this saintly man in minister of christ jesus gave out that the day following should be kept by the family as a day of solemn thanksgiving and spent in prayer and praise on account of the calling and election of one of its members or rather for the election of that individual being revealed on earth as well as confirmed in heaven the next day was with me a day of holy exaltation it was begun by my reverend father laying his hands upon my head and blessing me and then dedicating me to the lord in the most awful and impressive manner it was a no common way that he exercised this profound right for it was done with all the zeal and enthusiasm of a devotee to the true cause and a champion on the side he had espoused he used these remarkable words which I have still treasured up in my heart I give him unto thee only to thee holy and to thee forever I dedicate him unto thee soul body and spirit not as the wicked of this world or the hirelings of a church profanely called by thy name do I dedicate this thy servant to thee not in words and form learned by route and dictated by the limbs of antichrist but lord I give him into thy hand as the captain put at the sword into the hand of his sovereign wherewith to lay waste his enemies may he be a two edged weapon in thy hand and a spear coming out of thy mouth to destroy and overcome and pass over and may the enemies of thy church fall down before him and be as dung to fat the land from the moment I conceived it decreed not that I should be a minister of the gospel but a champion of it to cut off the enemies of the lord from the face of the earth and I rejoiced in the commission finding it more congenial to my nature to be cutting sinners off with the sword than to be haranguing them from the pulpit striving to produce an effect which God by his act of absolute predestination had forever rendered impracticable the more I pondered on these things the more I saw of the folly and inconsistency of ministers in spending their lives striving and remenstrating with sinners in order to induce them to do that which they had it not in their power to do seeing that God had from all eternity decided the fate of every individual that was to be born of woman how vain was it in man to endeavor to save those whom their maker had by an unchangeable decree doomed to destruction I could not disbelieve the doctrine which the best of men had taught me and towards which he made the whole of the scriptures to bear and yet it made the economy of the Christian world appear to me as an absolute contradiction how much more wise would it be thought I to begin and cut sinners off with the sword for till that is affected the saints can never inherit the earth in peace should I be honored as an instrument to begin this great work of purification I should rejoice in it but then where had I the means or under what direction was I to begin there was one thing clear I was now the Lord's and it behoved me to bestar myself in his service oh that I had and host at my command then would I be as a devouring fire among the workers of inequity full of these great ideas I hurried through the city and sought again the private path through the field and wood of Finiston in which my reverend preceptor had the privilege of walking for study and to which he had a key that was always at my command near one of these styles I perceived a young man sitting in a devout posture reading a Bible he rose lifted his hat and made an obeisance to me which I returned and walked on I had not well crossed the style till it struck me I knew the face of the youth and that he was some intimate acquaintance to whom I ought to have spoken I walked on and returned and walked on again trying to recollect who he was but for my life I could not there was however a fascination in his look and manner that drew me back towards him in spite of myself and I resolved to go to him if it were merely to speak and see who he was I came up to him and addressed him but he was so intent on his book that though I spoke he lifted not his eyes I looked on the book also and still it seemed a Bible having columns chapters and verses but it was in a language of which I was wholly ignorant and all intersected with red lines and verses a sensation resembling a stroke of electricity came over me on first casting my eyes on that mysterious book and I stood motionless he looked up smiled closed his book and put it in his bosom you seem strangely affected dear sir by looking at my book said he mildly in the name of god what book is that said I is it a bible it is my bible sir said he but I will cease reading it for I am glad to see you pray is not this a day for holy festivity with you I stared in his face but made no answer for my senses were bewildered do you not know me said he you appear to be somehow at a loss had not you and I some sweet communion and fellowship yesterday I beg your pardon sir said I but surely if you are the young gentleman with whom I spent the hours yesterday you have the chameleon art of changing your appearance I never could have recognized you my continence changes with my studies and sensations said he it is a natural peculiarity in me over which I have not full control if I contemplate a man's feature seriously mine ungradually assume the very same appearance and a character and what is more by contemplating a face minutely I not only attain the same likeness but with the likeness I attain the very same ideas as well as the same mode of arranging them so that you see by looking at a person attentively I by degrees assume his likeness and by assuming his likeness I attain to the possession of his most secret thoughts this I say is a peculiarity in my nature a gift of the God that made me but whether or not given me for a blessing he knows himself and so do I at all events I have this privilege I can never be mistaken of a character in whom I am interested it is a rare qualification replied I and I would give worlds to possess it then it appears that it is needless to dissemble with you since you can at any time extract our most secret thoughts from our bosoms you already know my natural character yes said he and it is that which attaches me to you by assuming your likeness yesterday I became acquainted with your character and was no less astonished at the profunity and range of your thoughts that at the heroic magnanimity with which these were combined and now in addition to these you are dedicated to the great work of the Lord for which reasons I have resolved to attach myself as closely to you as possible and to render you all the service of which my poor abilities are capable I confess that I was greatly flattered by these compliments paid to my abilities by a youth of such superior qualifications by one who with a modesty and affability rare at his age combined a height of genius and knowledge almost above human comprehension nevertheless I began to assume a certain superiority of demeanor towards him as judging it incumbent on me to do so in order to keep up his idea of my exalted character we conversed again till the day was near a close and the things that he strove most to incalculate on my mind were the infallibility of the elect and the pre-ordination of all things that come to pass I pretended to contravert the first of these for the purpose of showing him the extent of my argumentative powers and said that indubitably there were degrees of sinning which would induce the Almighty to throw off the very elect but behold my hitherto humble and modest companion took up the argument with such warmth that he put me not only to silence but to absolute shame end of section 14 section 15 the private memoirs and confessions of a sinner written by himself by james hog this is a leverbox recording all leverbox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit leverbox.org why sir said he by vending such an insinuation you put discredit on the great atonement in which you trust is there not enough of merit in the blood of jesus to save thousands of worlds if it was for these worlds that he died now when you know as you do and as every one of the elect may know of himself that this savior died for you namely and particularly dare you say that there is not enough of merit in his great atonement to annihilate all your sins let them be as heinous and atrocious as they may and moreover do you not acknowledge that god hath preordained and decreed whatsoever comes to pass then how is it that you should deem it in your power to eschew one action of your life whether good or evil depend on it the advice of the great preacher is genuine what thine hand findeth to do do it with all thy might for none of us knows what a day may bring forth that is none of us knows what is preordained but whatever it is preordained we must do and none of these things will be laid to our charge i could hardly believe that these sayings were genuine or orthodox but i soon felt that instead of being a humble disciple of mine this new acquaintance was to be my guide and director and all under the humble guise of one stooping at my feet to learn the right he said that he saw i was ordained to perform some great action for the cause of jesus and his church and he earnestly coveted being a partaker with me but he besought of me never to think it possible for me to fall from the truth or the favor of him who had chosen me else that misbelief would balk every good work to which i set my face there was something so flattering in all this that i could not resist it still when he took leave of me i felt it as a great relief and yet before the morrow i weared and was impatient to see him again we carried on our fellowship from day to day and all the while i knew not who he was and still my mother and reverend father kept insisting that i was an altered youth changed in my appearance my manners and my whole conduct yet something always prevented me from telling them more about my new acquaintance than i had done on the first day we met i rejoiced in him was proud of him and soon could not live without him yet though resolved every day to disclose the whole story of my connection with him i had it not in my power something always prevented me till that length i thought no more of it but resolved to enjoy his fascinating company in private and by all means to keep my own with him the resolution was vain i set a bold face to it but my powers were inadequate to the task my adherent with all the suavity imaginable was sure to carry his point i sometimes fumed and sometimes shed tears at being obliged to yield to proposals against which i had at first felt every reasoning power of my soul rise in opposition but for all that he never faded in carrying conviction along with him in effect for he either forced me to acquiesce in his measures an assent to the truth of his positions or he put me so completely down that i had not a word left to advance against them after weeks and i may say months of intimacy i observed somewhat to my amazement that we had never once prayed together and more than that that he had constantly led my attentions away from that duty causing me to neglect it wholly i thought this a bad mark of a man seemingly so much said on incalculating certain important points of religion and resolved next day to put him to the test and request him to perform that sacred duty in name of us both he objected boldly saying there were very few people indeed with whom he could join in prayer and he made a point of never doing it as he was sure they were to ask many things of which he disapproved and that if he were to officiate himself he was as certain to allude to many things that came not within the range of their faith he disapproved a prayer altogether in the manner it was generally gone about he said man made it merely a selfish concern and was constantly employed asking asking for everything whereas it became all god's creatures to be content with their lot and only to kneel before him in order to thank him for such benefits as he saw meat to bestow in short he argued with such energy that before we parted i acquiesced as usual in his position and never mentioned prayer to him anymore having been so frequently seen in his company several people happened to mention the circumstance to my mother and reverend father but at the same time had all described him differently at length they began to examine me with respect to the company i kept as i absented myself from home day after day i told them i kept company only with one young gentleman whose whole manner of thinking on religious subjects i found so congenial with my own that i could not live out of his society my mother began to lay down some of her old hackneyed rules of faith but i turned from hearing her with disgust for after the energy of my new friend's reasoning hers appeared so tame i could not endure it and i confess with shame that my reverend perceptors religious dissertations began about this time to lose their relish very much and by degrees became exceedingly tiresome to my ear they were so inferior in strength and sublimity to the most common observations of my young friend that in drawing a comparison the former appeared as nothing he however examined me about many things related to my companion in all of which i satisfied him save in one i could neither tell him who my friend was what was his name nor of whom he was descended and i wondered at myself how i had never once inverted to such a thing for all the time we had been intimate i inquired the next day what his name was as i said i was often at a loss for it when talking with him he replied that there was no occasion for any one friend ever naming another when their society was held in private as ours was for his part he had never once named me since we first met and never intended to do so unless by my own request but if you cannot converse without naming me you may call me gil for the present added he and if i think proper to take another name at any future period it shall be with your approbation gil said i have you no name but gil or which of your names is it your christian or surname oh you must have a surname too must you replied he very well you may call me gil martin it is not my christian name but it is a name which may serve your turn this is very strange said i are you ashamed of your parents that you refuse to give your real name i have no parents save one whom i do not acknowledge said he proudly therefore pray drop that subject for it is a disagreeable one i am a being of a very peculiar temper for though i have servants and subjects more than i can number yet to gratify a certain whim i have left them and retired to this city and for all the society it contains you see i have attached myself only to you this is a secret and i tell you only in friendship therefore pray let it remain one and say not another word about the matter i assented and said no more concerning it for it instantly struck me that this was no other than the czar peter of russia having heard that he had been traveling through europe in disguise and i cannot say that i had not thence forward great and mighty hopes of high preferment as a defender and avenger of the oppressed christian church under the influence of this great potentate he had hinted as much already as that it was more honorable and of more avail to put down the wicked with the sword than try to reform them and i thought myself quite justified and supposing that he intended me for some great employment that he had thus selected me for his companion out of all the rest in scotland and even pretended to learn the great truths of religion from my mouth from that time i felt disposed to yield to such a great prince's suggestions without hesitation nothing ever astonished me so much as the uncommon powers with which he seemed invested in our walk one day we met with a mr blanchard who was reckoned a worthy pious divine but quite of the moral caste who joined us and we three walked on and rested together in the fields my companion did not seem to like him but nevertheless regarded him frequently with deep attention and there were several times while he seemed contemplating him and trying to find out his thoughts that his face became so like mr blanchards that it was impossible to have distinguished the one from the other the antipathy between the two was mutual and discovered itself quite palpably in a short time when my companion the prince was gone mr blanchard asked me an end him and i told him that he was a stranger in the city but a very uncommon and great personage mr blanchard's answer to me was as follows i never saw anybody i disliked so much in my life mr robert and if it be true that he is a stranger here which i doubt believe me he has come for no good do you not perceive what mighty powers of mind he is possessed of said i and also how clear and unhesitating he is on some of the most interesting points of divinity it is for his great mental faculties that i dread him said he it is uncalculable what evil such a person as he may do if so disposed there is a sublimity in his ideas with which there is to me a mixture of terror and when he talks of religion he does it as one that rather dreads its truths than reverences them he indeed pretends great strictness of orthodoxy regarding some of the points of doctrine embraced by the reformed church but you do not seem to perceive that both you and he are carrying these points to a dangerous extremity religion is a sublime and glorious thing the bonds of society on earth and the connector of humanity with the divine nature but there is nothing so dangerous to man as the resting of any of its principles or forcing them beyond their due bounds this is of all others the readiness way to destruction neither is there anything so easily done there is not an error into which a man can fall which he may not press scripture into his service as proof of the probity of and though your boasted theologian shunned the full discussion of the subject before me while you pressed it I can easily see that both you and he are carrying your ideas of absolute predestination and its concomitant appendages to an extent that overthrows all religion and revelation together or at least jumbles them into a chaos out of which human capacity can never select what is good believe me mr robert the less you associate with that illustrious stranger the better for it appears to me that your creed and his carries damnation on the very front of it I was rather stunned at this but pretended to smile with disdain and said it did not become youth to control age and as I knew our principles differed fundamentally it behoved us to drop the subject he however would not drop it but took both my principles and me fearfully to task for blanchard was an eloquent and powerful-minded old man and before we parted I believe I promised to drop my new acquaintance and was all but resolved to do it as well might I have laid my account with shunning the light of day he was constant to me as my shadow and by degrees he acquired such an ascendancy over me that I never was happy out of his company nor greatly so in it when I repeated to him all that mr blanchard had said his continents kindled with indignation and rage and then by degrees his eyes sunk inward his brow lowered so that I was odd and withdrew my eyes from looking at him a while afterwards as I was addressing him I chanced to look him again in the face and the sight of him made me start violently he had made himself so like mr blanchard that I actually believed I had been addressing that gentleman and that I had done so in some absence of mind that I could not account for instead of being amused at the quandary I was in he seemed offended indeed he never was truly amused with anything and he then asked me sullenly if I conceived such personages as he to have no other endowments than common mortals I said I never conceived that princes or potentates had any greater share of endowments than other men and frequently not so much he shook his head and bade me think over the subject again and there was an end of it I certainly felt every day the more disposed to knowledge such a superiority in him and from all that I could gather I had now no doubt that he was Peter of Russia everything combined to warrant the supposition and of course I resolved to act in conformity with the discovery I had made for several days the subject of mr blanchard's doubts and doctrines formed the theme of our discourse my friend deprecated them most devoutly and then again he would deplore them and lament the great evil that such a man might do among the human race I joined with him in allowing the evil in its fullest latitude and at length after he thought he had fully prepared my nature for such a trial of its powers and abilities he proposed calmly that we too should make a way with mr blanchard I was so shocked that my bosom became as it were a void and the beatings of my heart sounded loud and hollow in it my breath cut and my tongue and palate became dry and speechless he mocked at my cowardice and began a reasoning on the matter with such powerful eloquence that before we parted I felt fully convinced that it was my bound in duty to slay mr blanchard but my will was far very far from consenting to the deed I spent the following night without sleep or nearly so and the next morning by the time the sun arose I was again abroad and in the company of my illustrious friend the same subject was resumed and again he reasoned to the following purport that supposing me placed at the head of any army of christian soldiers all bent on putting down the enemies of the church would I have any hesitation in destroying and rooting out these enemies none surely well then when I saw and was convinced that here was an individual who was doing more detriment to the church of christ on earth than tens of thousands of such warriors were capable of doing was it not my duty to cut him off and save the elect he who would be a champion in the cause of christ and his church my brave young friend added he must begin early and no man can calculate to what an illustrious eminent small beginnings may lead if the man blanchard is worthy he is only changing his situation for a better one and if unworthy it is better that one fall than that a thousand souls perish let us be up and doing in our vocations for me my resolution is taken I have but one great aim in this world and I never for a moment lose sight of it I was obliged to admit the force of his reasoning for though I cannot from memory repeat his words his eloquence was of that overpowering nature that the subpility of other men sunk before it and there is also little doubt that the assurance I had that these words were spoken by a great potentate who could raise me to the highest eminence provided that I entered into his extensive and decisive measures assisted mightily in dispelling my youthful scruples and qualms of conscious and I thought more over that having such a powerful back friend to support me I hardly needed to be afraid of the consequences I consented but begged a little time to think of it he said the less one thought of a duty the better and we parted end of section 15