is in the living
God, in whom they had committed their all, because of their honest
sacrifice and anxious waiting for their coming Lord; turned out of their
former employment and reproached for keeping God's holy Sabbath day;
whipped by cruel, unmerciful men for shouting the praises of their God and
king, and still persevering in their faith, &c. And then, for a contrast,
to step on board the cars and be rolled away to your own comfortable and
commodious house, with well stocked barn and granaries, beef and pork
barrels--the produce of your own valuable farm--with all things that heart
could wish for, and set down by your comfortable fire with your family,
(all believers with you in the coming of Jesus,) and recount to them the
strange scenes you had witnessed among an afflicted people, who once
listened with anxiety and delight to every word you had to say about the
second coming of Jesus, and they were so delighted with this, to them,
joyful news, that they wanted to hear about it all the time. We may
imagine your conversation to proceed somewhat in the following strain:

"You remember how elder Himes used to insist on my going with him from
city to city, and from state to state, because of the people's anxiety to
hear me preach about the coming of Christ in 1843 and '44."

"Yes, father, I remember it well--for when I was with you it seemed as
though the people were hardly willing to let us come home and rest a
little while."

"I know it, my son, and I used to think that God never would have
sustained me in such continued and incessant labors as I was then called
to perform, if it were not his cause. Why, when I saw the wonderful effect
that it produced on backsliders and sinners, in bringing them to God, and
the glow of joy that lit up in the countenances of God's honest, believing
children, and how they hung upon every word; and then the contrary effect,
when some of their learned ministers raised their objections--I said I know
this is God's cause, and as it rolled on through that cry at midnight,
down to its closing scene, you all remember with what joy and glory I was
filled, and how I publicly declared my faith, and stated that 'I might be
called a FANATIC, but, I said, call me what you please, Christ will come,'
&c. Well, these singular people are some of the very ones that used to
hang on my words and others, who preached to them of this doctrine. And
during this cry at midnight they made a sacrifice of all