If I could always live with you, and daily read the Bible with you--if
your lips and mine could at the same time drink the same draught, from
the same pure fountain of mercy--I hope, I trust, I might one day
become better, far better than my evil, wandering thoughts, my corrupt
heart, cold to the spirit and warm to the flesh, will now permit me to
be. I often plan the pleasant life which we might lead together,
strengthening each other in that power of self-denial, that hallowed
and glowing devotion, which the first saints of God often attained to.
My eyes fill with tears when I contrast the bliss of such a state,
brightened by hopes of the future, with the melancholy state I now
live in, uncertain that I ever felt true contrition, wandering in
thought and deed, longing for holiness, which I shall _never_, _never_
obtain, smitten at times to the heart with the conviction that ghastly
Calvinistic doctrines are true--darkened, in short, by the very
shadows of spiritual death. If Christian perfection be necessary to
salvation, I shall never be saved; my heart is a very hotbed for
sinful thoughts, and when I decide on an action I scarcely remember to
look to my Redeemer for direction. I know not how to pray; I cannot
bend my life to the grand end of doing good; I go on constantly
seeking my own pleasure, pursuing the gratification of my own desires.
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