"A most melancholy one; I should not like to return to live amidst such signs of decay and scenes of moral desolation—it is as Eden in ruins."
"Your removal, Sir, to England has proved a very important event in your history."
"It has indeed; a local change often leads to many other changes. If I had tarried in Berlin, I had not known my wife or had my three dear children; and most likely I should still have remained a disciple of Goethe, rather than become a disciple of Jesus Christ."
"Will you permit me to ask you one question, What circumstance induced you to come to the chapel the first time you came?"
"Your question, Sir, revives in my recollection a proposition which you illustrated by a series of facts, when delivering a discourse on John iv. 6, 7, and which, if my memory does not fail me, you stated in the following words:—'When a crisis approaches in the history of a nation, or even of a private individual, we may sometimes observe prognostic signs of its coming; and in taking a review after its occurrence, we may sometimes see a marked conjunction of determining events naturally leading to it.' The fact is, on the Sunday of my first visit to your chapel, we had arranged with a few friends to take a drive into the country; but just as we were in readiness to start, a tremendous thunderstorm compelled us to give up our jaunt. After it had cleared off, as it was too late for our country excursion, I took a walk into the town to see an old friend; but the rain again came down in torrents, just as I was passing your chapel; I ran into it for shelter, not for worship. I had no more thought of being converted to the faith of Christ when I entered your chapel, than the woman of Samaria expected to see the Messias when she left home to get some water from Jacob's well."
"The Psalmist, when calling on all the powers of the celestial and terrestrial creation to praise the Lord (Psal. cxlviii.), speaks of fire and hail, of snow and vapour, and stormy wind as fulfilling the Divine purpose; they come and go at his command, doing the work he assigns to them."
"So I now believe. I recollect, when watching the coming up of the dark thunderstorm, feeling vexed that it should come just then, when we were all in such high glee, and in complete readiness to be off. I did not then know that on that storm my future destiny was depending. Had it not come when it did come, we should have been desecrating the Sabbath by recreative indulgence; and had it not been followed by the second storm, I should have been with my friend enjoying the convivialities of hospitality and mirth. In either case, when laying my head on my pillow, on that memorable night, my bosom would have heaved to other emotions than those which your discourse had stirred up within it. There and then I felt what I never expected to feel; and if the strange commotion had been predicted by an angel of God, I should have ridiculed it as a mere phantom. Indeed, my philosophy, which led me to believe that such a moral change as I have experienced was unnecessary, compelled me also to believe that it was impossible."
"I recollect the text from which I preached on the occasion to which you refer, but I do not recollect employing any arguments to expose the fallacy and delusions of scepticism, or any in confirmation of the Divine origin of the Christian faith."
"Argument, Sir, in favour of Christianity I could have withstood; but I could not withstand the great moral power by which I felt awe-struck and subdued."
"Do you think you were renewed in the spirit of your mind during the first service you attended at the chapel?"