ly
a religious book. I felt that my heart had grown harder than before
I had wished to become a Christian. The greatest trial was that I
had no faith, and for that reason I used not to believe in prayer,
but still I longed to become a real Christian. I left school in the
year 1852, and went to live at home with my mother. I was taken
ill, and when I was ill I was very much afraid of death, for I felt
that God was very angry with me.

Till about two years after I left school, I had no religion at all.
One evening a young man from Abeih came to our house. His name is
Giurgius el Haddad, who is now Mr. Calhoun's cook. After a little
while he began to talk about religion, and to read the book,
"Little Henry and his Bearer." I felt very much ashamed that others
who did not have the opportunity to learn about religion had
religion, and I, who had learned so much, had none. That was the
blessed evening on which I began to inquire earnestly about my
salvation. I was three months praying and found no answer to my
prayers. Christian friends tried to lead me to Christ, but I could
not take hold of Him, till He Himself appeared to my soul in all
His beauty and excellency. Before I found peace Dr. Eli Smith and
Mr. Whiting wanted me to teach a day school for them. That was
about three years after I left off learning. "Oh," thought I, "how
can I teach others about Christ when I do not know Him myself?"
However I began the school by opening and closing it with prayer,
without any faith at all. So I began by reading from the first of
Matthew, till I came to the 16th chapter. When I came to that
chapter I read as usual, with blinded eyes; but when I came to the
(13th) thirteen verse, and from there to the seventeenth, where it
says, "Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood hath
not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven," I
felt that this had been said to me, and were these words sounded
from heaven I would not have felt happier. How true it is that no
flesh could reveal unto me what God had revealed, because many
Christian friends tried to make me believe, but I could not, I
felt as if everything had become new and beautiful, because my
Heavenly Father had made them all. I was sometimes with faith and
sometimes doubting, and by t