as well as highly dangerous; and for aught I could tell, might be partly the suggestions of the devil.

I then recollected my geometrico-metaphysico speculations, my circles and triangles of spiritual measurement, which had so strongly assisted in morally demonstrating to me the necessary existence, as I thought, of the evil spirit. Ah! thought I, the stories which we learn to ridicule of the enchanted circles of witches, have then some foundation in truth, and, perhaps, I am thus caught in the snares of hell. At least I should most probably become so, were I to continue to speculate on such subjects. I have, with a daring but ignorant hand, drawn aside the curtain which divides the visible from the invisible world. I have presumed to enter on the awful limits, and who knows what I may meet there? No doubt many miserable creatures, led on by a proud profane curiosity, have thus been caught, and, not being rescued by a special grace, have perished for ever.

In all these reflections there was a mixture of truth with error, which I was then unable to discriminate; much less did I suspect that they were the artful snares of this very enemy; who finding that the cobweb labours of so many years had been destroyed, and swept away, as in an instant, by the infinite grace of my Re

deemer, was not therefore discouraged or embarrassed; but, with peculiar art and address, shifted his mode of attack in a moment, to an opposite quarter; and knowing the confused, humbled, astonished, and timid state of my soul, assailed me immediately with all the terrors of superstition, and all the horrors of despair; hoping by this tempest, which he was raising in my imagination, to wash my feet from the rock on which my Saviour had just fixed me. But as the Lord was resolved to support, by His Almighty power, the gracious work which he had so mercifully begun in my soul; and as the strength, inveteracy, corruptions, and evil habits of my long apostacy, required unusual force of conviction to repress and subdue them, and to confirm my newlyacquired faith; so he was pleased to permit the adversary to assault me in a very severe, and, as I thought, uncommon manner (which, however, prudence forbids me to relate), that I might be fully convinced every way, both spiritually and naturally, how certain were those eternal truths which he had in infinite grace condescended to reveal to me.

I then found myself unable to return to my former studies; for my whole soul was filled with a variety of new and strange emotions, which I could not discriminate, nor controul. I only felt that I was become as it were a new

creature; that henceforth I had a new circle of duties to perform, and of objects to contemplate; and I thought that the first thing necessary was to purge off my old stains, and purify my heart by repentance, and prayers for pardon and peace; not daring to believe that I was already pardoned, and ignorantly supposing that I must of course do something towards my own justification.

About this time a circumstance occurred to me, which might have a powerful tendency to make my bodily organs assimilate with the troubled state of my mind, and particularly my nervous system, which appeared to be more immediately affected by this event; and as it certainly seems to have had this effect, and happened at so very critical a period, when it most decidedly favoured the efforts of my spiritual enemy to overwhelm me with fear, horror, and despair; so I do not doubt in my own mind, that it might be induced by him, and permitted for wise and gracious purposes.

The situation that I was in, among the hills, was in some respects very unhealthy, especially to the natives; and I had no medical assistance of any kind, which indeed I did not want for myself or my companion; for the great exercise that we took, and our airy quarters in the upper fort, on the top of the hill, preserved us both in vigorous health; but it was necessary for

many of the Sepoys, who were much troubled with fevers, and agues, and obstinate sores, which broke out chiefly in their legs and feet. For all these cases there was no physician or surgeon, except myself; but as it was my custom always to carry with me, every where, bark, James's Powders, Goulard's Extract, and Tartar Emetic, so I dressed and administered to all of them, to the best of my ability.

At this time then, one of my Sepoys had a foul and obstinate ulcer in his foot; and he had, as is common among the natives, by the power of strong astringents, and such kind of applications, scarred it over at the surface, whilst in the mean time (an emblem of their moral state) the noxious matter had formed a sinus beneath, and a collection of death the most putrid and abominable. As I was not aware of the consequences of suddenly opening such a pit of corruption, I carelessly stooped down, with my face directly over the part, and removed the thin covering, which concealed all this filth; but I had no sooner done this, than there arose from the ulcer such a column of deadly effluvia, and with such wonderful force, that it seemed to penetrate even to my brain in an instant, and by its subtle and potent poison wholly overpowered it, and took away my senses for a few seconds. I was with great difficulty able to stagger back into my chair, where I

* Figuratively speaking, but naturally subtil.

sat for some time, quite overpowered and almost insensible.

So soon as I came to myself I felt my nose, palate, and throat, to be tainted with the same abominations, which I plainly both smelt and tasted, to a degree that made me sick. I then called for vinegar, and applied it profusely to my nose and mouth, which might be of service to mitigate, but was unable to expel the poison, or prevent the mischief, which began and was completed in the same instant, as I apprehend; and I think that it probably did impart to the nervous fluid, or power, or organ (whichever physicians please), a deadly poison which clouded and disordered my natural brain; in the same manner and degree, as the spirit of legal fear and guilty horror from my enemy, did my intellectual sensorium.

If this matter be considered with attention, it will (or at least it may) appear, that the mischief which happened to my body, according to my belief, was an exact emblem of that which was offered to my mind; and it was also communicated in a manner perfectly similar. The object to be attained mentally, was to excite such a guilty fear and horror in my soul, from the sudden sense of my own wickedness, by reflection* upon all my former impurities, abomi

*This mental reflection is the action of the spiritual or intellectual brain upon the spiritual ulcer, and its deadly