The Village in the Mountains; Conversion of Peter Bayssière; and History of a Bible

by Sampson Vryling Stoddard Wilder

With regard to what is called "the first communion," (which is considered as the public ratification and confirmation of the vow of my parents,) this I never received in the Romish church, nor did I receive what is called the Sacrament of confirmation.

Before I could be united by the sacred bond of marriage to your virtuous and beloved mother, it was necessary that I should confess. This I did with extreme reluctance, feeling that nothing could be at once more absurd, more tyrannical, or more degrading, than to oblige a man to prostrate himself at the feet of a priest, a mortal, a sinner, a child of corruption like himself, and there to make confessions to him, which offended Deity alone could have a right to require: and to receive absolution from him for faults with which he had no concern. I could not, however, marry without confession, and therefore I was obliged to submit; but no power on earth could have constrained me to go further. The Sacrament, as the Roman Catholics receive it, had, from infancy, excited in me feelings of disgust. My mind had always revolted at the idea, that the great God of heaven could allow himself to be eaten by his creatures in the form of a little flour. Under various pretences, therefore, I contrived to avoid the ceremony, and obtained the nuptial benediction without it.

The Lord, who never leaves himself without the witness of his numerous mercies to us, even when we are offending him in so many ways, was pleased to bless our marriage. Your birth, my dear children, crowned our joy, and left us nothing to wish but to see you grow and prosper, and to devote ourselves to your happiness. Alas! little did we suspect, whilst thus delightfully engaged, that this joy was to be so soon disturbed, and that death would deprive us of her who had given you birth. But our great God, whose ways and whose designs, though often inscrutable, are always full of wisdom, saw good to separate us; you from a tender and excellent mother, and me from a beloved companion and inestimable friend. She died February 11, 1821, after a few days' illness, leaving me in a state of affliction which it would be in vain to attempt to describe.

Nevertheless, terrible as was the stroke, and heart-rending as was the separation, I can now acknowledge, my children, that it was a salutary chastisement, sent by sovereign love; and one of the links of that chain of Providence by which the Lord saw good to deliver me from the miserable state in which I was then living; and to lead me to the fountain of grace and true peace.

In fact, the death of your poor mother gave rise to a train of circumstances, which, by drawing my attention to subjects that I had hitherto totally disregarded, and by exciting in my mind a degree of energy of which I could not have supposed myself capable, ended by engaging me most unexpectedly in the serious study of religion. The particulars I am about to give you respecting these things, will convince you that God can overrule the wickedness of men for good, and will show you that a Romish priest was the means of directing me to the way, (I mean the perusal and free examination of the word of God,) which led me, eventually, to the Protestant church.

Your mother's funeral was conducted with Catholic ceremonies, and, according to my means, I spared nothing to honour her remains. I likewise consented, either from conformity to custom, or from a wish to please my relatives, who were influenced by the fear of purgatory, or perhaps from participating myself in the false notion that bought prayers can mitigate the sufferings of the dead--from one or all of these causes, aggravated by the sorrow which filled my heart and inflamed my imagination, I consented to the performance of the nine customary masses for the rest of the soul.

The priest to whom I first went, told me that he was too busy to undertake the whole, but that I might depend upon him for three. From him I went to another, who engaged to say the remaining six, and did so without delay. Sunday after Sunday, for a considerable time, I went to the first, to inquire whether my three masses would be said in the following week. He always found some excuse, saying that "there were others more urgent than myself--that he was previously engaged--that he had undertaken more than was in his power to perform,". From February to June, I was thus put off under various pretexts. Worn out, at length, by so many fruitless efforts, I resolved to put an end to them, and mentioned the subject to your aunt, your mother's sister, expressing to her my extreme annoyance. She asked me if I had offered the priest the amount of the masses which he had promised to say? "No," I said, "the idea never occurred to me; but even if it had, I should not have dared to do it, for fear of offending him. It is not usual", I added scornfully, "to pay before one is served. No one ever pays me for a saddle before I make it." "No matter," replied your aunt, "my advice to you is to return to the priest, and offer to pay for the masses which you have ordered."

I did as she advised me, and this time my request was favourably received. The priest seized the six-franc piece which I laid on the table, looked at me and said, "Do you wish me to say six?" "No," I replied, with a feeling of indignation which I could hardly repress--"No, sir, I only want three. Return to me the rest of the money; poor folks cannot afford to spend so much at once."

I left the priest, thoroughly ashamed of having contributed to gratify his cupidity, and very much disposed to think the religion we were taught was nothing but a tissue of fables and impostures, to which the thirst of gold and silver had given birth. I cannot tell you all the sad and painful reflections that occupied my mind during the remainder of that day; I was overcome by them, and rejoiced to see the night, hoping to find relief in sleep. I went to bed, but could not close my eyes. Still haunted by the remembrance of what had so disgusted me, a multitude of thoughts crowded on my imagination. I knew that the priests claimed the word of God as their authority for all their doctrines and ceremonies, which word I also knew was contained in the Old and New Testaments, although, to my misfortune, I did not then regard them as a divine revelation. In fact, I believed no more in the Holy Bible as the word of God, than I did in the doctrine of purgatory; still I felt a desire to search and to ascertain whether this lucrative doctrine was contained in the Gospel, and in what manner it was there established: at the same moment I recollected that there was, on the chimney-piece of my room, a New Testament, in which I had learnt to read, but which I had never opened since I was nine or ten years old. I jumped out of bed, and hastily dressing myself, resolved to begin, without delay, my researches on the subject of purgatory.

With this sole object in view, I read through the Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, the Epistles, and the Revelation of St. John; confining my attention exclusively to those points that tended either to establish or controvert this doctrine. This perusal of the New Testament, which, from my eagerness to satisfy my curiosity and resolve my doubts, I accomplished without once stopping, except for refreshment, proved to me that the doctrine of purgatory was not to be found in the Gospel, but must have been derived from some other source.