me, in
faith and honour, 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 from my service."

John pulled out the keys, and dashed them on the gravel at the reverend
minister's feet. "There are the keys o' your kirk, sir! I hae never had
muckle mense o' them sin' ye entered the door o't. I hae carried them
this three and thretty year, but they hae aye been like to burn a hole
i' my pouch sin' ever they were turned for your admittance. Tak them
again, an' gie them to wha you will, and muckle gude may he get o'
them. Auld John may dee a beggar in a hay barn, or at the back of a
dike, but he sall aye be master o' his ain thoughts an' gie them vent
or no, as he likes."

He left the manse that day, and I rejoiced in the riddance; for I
disdained to be kept so much under by one who was in bond of iniquity,
and of whom there seemed no hope, as he rejoiced in his frowardness,
and refused to submit to that faithful teacher, his master.

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 catalogue
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 a hundred and fifty thousand in the minute, and I saw no end to the
series of repentances to which I had subjected myself. A life-time 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 to 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 Jehu, a Cyrus, or a Nebuchadnezzar.

On the whol