The reader will at once be prepared to admit that Mr. Ballou must have expended much time and labor in the research and study of the Scriptures, necessary to enable him to write and publish these works, in a cause, and upon a theme, wherein he was a pioneer. He steered his barque into new waters, and was obliged himself to stand ever with the "lead" in his hand, to ascertain the true soundings, and keep thus in the narrow channel of truth. Concerning this matter, he has said, in an article furnished for a work entitled "Modern History of Universalism:"-- "I never read anything on the doctrine of universal salvation before I believed it, the Bible excepted; nor did I know, that I can now recollect, that there was anything published in its vindication in the world. Nor had I ever heard a sermon on the subject, except in boyhood I once heard Brother Rich, but concerning that sermon I realized nothing." In speaking of his advance towards the knowledge of the truth, after his conversion, he says, in a published article:-- "It may be proper for me to state one circumstance which had no small tendency to bring me over to the ground on which I have for so many years felt established. It was by reading some deistical writings. By this means I was led to see that it was utterly impossible to maintain Christianity as it had been generally believed in the church. This led me of course to examine the Scriptures, that I might determine the question, whether they did really teach that Jesus Christ died to reconcile an unchangeable God to his own children. You cannot suppose I was long in finding that, so far from teaching such absurdities, the Scriptures teach that 'God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself.' The question concerning the Trinity was by the same means as speedily settled." It is an interesting and curious fact that he should have been aided, as it were, by the darkness of error to find the light of truth. The obvious inconsistency in his former belief, made evident by the deist, did not win him to the faith of the latter, but rather led him to investigate for himself, and to find a religion more congenial with the native promptings of his own heart and the evidences of the Bible. His was an exploring mind; he was not content to receive this faith, or that position, because others believed it, or because it had remained so long the unchallenged and unquestioned creed of the church. He must look into the matter and understand for himself, and make all parts of a doctrine to harmonize with each other, before he could reconcile it with his own reason and convictions.