I continued in this thankful frame all the remainder of my time;
and the conversation which employed the hours between Friday and me
was such as made the three years which we lived there together
perfectly and completely happy, if any such thing as complete
happiness can be formed in a sublunary state. This savage was now
a good Christian, a much better than I; though I have reason to
hope, and bless God for it, that we were equally penitent, and
comforted, restored penitents. We had here the Word of God to
read, and no farther off from His Spirit to instruct than if we had
been in England. I always applied myself, in reading the
Scripture, to let him know, as well as I could, the meaning of what
I read; and he again, by his serious inquiries and questionings,
made me, as I said before, a much better scholar in the Scripture
knowledge than I should ever have been by my own mere private
reading. Another thing I cannot refrain from observing here also,
from experience in this retired part of my life, viz. how infinite
and inexpressible a blessing it is that the knowledge of God, and
of the doctrine of salvation by Christ Jesus, is so plainly laid
down in the Word of God, so easy to be received and understood,
that, as the bare reading the Scripture made me capable of
understanding enough of my duty to carry me directly on to the
great work of sincere repentance for my sins, and laying hold of a
Saviour for life and salvation, to a stated reformation in
practice, and obedience to all God's commands, and this without any
teacher or instructor, I mean human; so the same plain instruction
sufficiently served to the enlightening this savage creature, and
bringing him to be such a Christian as I have known few equal to
him in my life.
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