I have sworn eternal opposition to slavery, and by the blessing of God, I will never go back.
From Elijah Parish Lovejoy
If I am not safe in Alton, I shall not be safe anywhere.
I know that I have the right freely to speak and publish my sentiments, subject only to the laws of the land for the abuse of that right.
If I have been guilty of no violation of law, why am I hunted up and down continually like a partridge upon the mountains? Why am I threatened with the tar barrel? Why am I waylaid every day, and from night to night, and my life in jeopardy every hour?
Fortune has, in the main, hitherto looked unfavourably upon me since I left home, but I begin to hope for better things. Still, in all my past distresses, one thought has consoled me - I have learned to appreciate a parent's love.
It seems to me scarcely possible that one who has so long lived in sin, who has resisted so much light and has so often grieved away the Holy Spirit, as I have, should again be visited with its heavenly influences. But I hope it is so.
I was, by divine grace, enabled to bring all my sins and all my sorrows and lay them at the feet of Jesus, and to receive the blessed assurance that He had accepted me, all sinful and polluted as I was.
Nothing but a miracle of sovereign mercy could have arrested and saved me from eternal perdition. How I could have so long resisted the entreaties, the prayers, and the tears of my dear parents, and the influences of the Holy Spirit, is, to me, a wonder entirely incomprehensible.
It is the easiest thing in the world to become a Christian - ten thousand times easier than it is to hold out unrepenting against the motives which God presents to the mind, to induce it to forsake its evil thoughts and turn unto Him.
I am sure I ought not to be, but I have great reason to tremble lest Satan and my own wicked heart get the better of me. It is no easy matter to fight such enemies as these, but with Christ strengthening me, I know I shall come off more than a conquerer.
4 perspectives
3 perspectives
2 perspectives
1 perspectives