The thought at once arose in the writer’s mind, If the Lord Jesus is indeed everywhere present, and if he is as tender-hearted and compassionate as he was on earth,—and we know he is,—must he not sometimes long to speak to the poor, desolate slave, when he knows that no voice but His can carry comfort and healing to his soul? This instance of Louisa is so exactly parallel to another case, which the author received from an authentic source, that she is tempted to place the two side by side. Among the slaves who were brought into the New England States, at the time when slavery was prevalent, was one woman, who, immediately on being told the history of the love of Jesus Christ, exclaimed, “He is the one; this is what I wanted.” This language causing surprise, her history was inquired into. It was briefly this: While living in her simple hut in Africa, the kidnappers one day rushed upon her family, and carried her husband and children off to the slave-ship, she escaping into the woods. On returning to her desolate home, she mourned with the bitterness of “Rachel weeping for her children.” For many days her heart was oppressed with a heavy weight of sorrow; and, refusing all sustenance, she wandered up and down the desolate forest. At last, she says, a strong impulse came over her to kneel down and pour out her sorrows into the ear of some unknown Being whom she fancied to be above her, in the sky. She did so; and, to her surprise, found an inexpressible sensation of relief. After this, it was her custom daily to go out to this same spot, and supplicate this unknown Friend. Subsequently, she was herself taken, and brought over to America; and, when the story of Jesus and his love was related to her, she immediately felt in her soul that this Jesus was the very friend who had spoken comfort to her yearning spirit in the distant forest of Africa. Compare now these experiences with the earnest and beautiful language of Paul: “He hath made of one blood all nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of the earth; and hath determined the times before appointed _and the bounds_ of their habitation, _that_ THEY SHOULD _seek the Lord, if haply they might_ FEEL AFTER HIM AND FIND HIM, _though he be not far from every one of us_.” Is not this truly “_feeling after God and finding Him_”? And may we not hope that the yearning, troubled, helpless heart of man, pressed by the insufferable anguish of this short life, or wearied by its utter vanity, never extends its ignorant, pleading hand to God in vain? Is not the veil which divides us from an almighty and most merciful Father much thinner than we, in the pride of our philosophy, are apt to imagine? and is it not the most worthy conception of Him to suppose that the more utterly helpless and ignorant the human being is that seeks His aid, the more tender and the more condescending will be His communication with that soul?