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

by Sampson Vryling Stoddard Wilder

"I can tell you perfectly," replied your mother, "for I was present at one of their assemblies. There is nothing grand or striking in their churches; they contain neither altar, chapel, images, nor any ornament whatever, but consist simply of four whitewashed walls. At the lower end is a pulpit, like that used by our priest, in front of which is a table, and around it are seats occupied by the elders. The rest of the church is fitted up with benches, placed in order, on which the congregation seat themselves as they enter.

"I observed that most of them, before they sat down, leaned upon the back of the seat before them, and seemed to be in the act of prayer. Their service was as simple as the building, devoid of ceremony. When the congregation had assembled, one of the elders ascended the pulpit and prayed aloud in French; then he gave notice that he was about to read the word of God; and having requested their attention, he did read, for some time, from a great book, which they told me was the Holy Bible. He then offered prayers, and preached a sermon, which gave me great pleasure at the time, but which I now forget. I well remember that throughout the service there was no noise nor disturbance of any kind in the church, and one feeling seemed to pervade the whole: this struck me forcibly."

In this description of the protestant worship, imperfect as it was, I thought I could recognise those traits of simplicity that characterized the worship of the primitive christians: and when your mother had finished, I said to myself, "This is indeed like the worship recorded in the Acts of the Apostles." But I added, without allowing her to perceive the extreme satisfaction that this information afforded me, "Is this all you know of the protestant worship? Did you never see them receive the sacrament?"

"Yes, I have," she replied, "on that same day, which was the only time I ever entered their church."

"Do tell me, then, how was it conducted?"

"I told you, if you remember, that there was a table in front of the pulpit: this table was their altar; it was covered with a very white cloth: in the middle of it were a plate of bread and two chalices of wine. When the minister had finished preaching, he took a book, and read from it some beautiful passages on the communion, sufferings, and death of Christ; he also spoke of the duty of communicants; then every one stood up while he prayed: after which he descended from the pulpit, and came in front of the holy table; he here repeated aloud some words which I have forgotten, and took a small piece of bread and ate it; this done, he took the two cups in his hands, and again saying something that I did not hear, he drank some of the wine. The elders then approached the table, and each received a piece of bread, which they ate, and drank a little of the wine from the cup which was presented to them. The rest of the congregation did the same, the women after the men; and when all had communicated, the minister re-ascended the pulpit, gave another exhortation, offered a concluding prayer, and closed the whole by urging upon them the care of the poor."

"This," thought I, "is indeed the supper of the Lord!"

The conformity that I had already observed between the practices of the protestants and those of the primitive christians, created in me a feeling of joy which I had never before experienced. I desired, with renewed ardour, to search to the bottom of their doctrines, and from that time I anticipated that I might myself become a decided Protestant. This expectation, my children, soon increased into a certainty.

On the tenth of February last, two pamphlets fell into my hands; one was published by a Roman Catholic priest, and contained an attack on the protestant religion: the other was an answer, in defence of that religion, written by a protestant minister: these were the first words of religious controversy I had ever read, and eagerly did I devour these two little works. That of the first (which had been written on the occasion of a respectable family having recently embraced the Protestant faith) contained nothing that was solid, or that I could not have refuted in the very words of Christ and his Apostles; therefore I did not dwell upon it. But the second, under the title of A Letter to Malanie, was the very thing I wanted, and was so anxiously desiring to find--an exposition of the protestant creed, or at least of its most essential points. It taught me that the Gospel was their only rule of faith, worship, and conduct: that they admitted all that they found established by the Holy Scriptures, but rejected every thing else, and especially prohibited the invocation of saints, the worship of images, of relics, and of the holy Virgin. It taught me that they worshipped God alone, through Jesus Christ his Son; that their only hope of salvation was in his mercy, revealed in the sacrifice of the cross of Christ; that they recognised no other Mediator, no other Advocate, and no other Intercessor with God, than him who gave himself as such, and who alone has the right of saying to sinners, "Come unto me and I will give you rest." It taught me that they believed no more than myself in purgatory, in the supremacy of the pope, or in the real presence, etc. In short, it taught me that the protestants received and professed no other than primitive Christianity.

It would be impossible for me to tell you how rejoiced I was to find my most intimate feelings expressed by a minister of a religion founded on the Gospel. From this, and from all that your mother had told me, I clearly saw that the Protestants were unjustly accused and misrepresented by the wicked or the ignorant, and that they were in truth those christians, according to the word of God, to whom the promises of the Gospel are made. From that time I acknowledged them as my true brethren in Christ Jesus, and my chief desire was to be admitted into their communion.