Godley's sisters, who showed me great kindness, like him, I suppose, had no wish concerning me than to encourage me in becoming pious and good, and I got to read a few pious books which they recommended. 'The Pilgrim's Progress,' Doddridge's 'Life of Colonel Gardiner,' Alleine's 'Alarm,' were some which I remember taking great effect upon me; so that when I returned from Chester to Eton, though I cannot recall many particulars of my feelings, I know that the chief prevailing one was, an ardent desire to keep myself untainted at Eton, and to keep from all fellowship with the set of boys whom I knew to be particularly profane mockers of piety. I bought a book of prayers, and during the three weeks that I yet remained with this tutor, after our return from Chester, and when first I went home to the summer holidays, I took no delight like that of being by myself at prayer. Ah! how grievous would be the thought if we could but understand how to {10} lament such a calamity as it deserves, of a pious child's tender, pure soul denied, made forgetful of all its good, and hardened. O God, grant me wisdom to understand the magnitude of such an evil, grant me a heart now at length to mourn over the devastation and uprooting which it was, at this time, Thy holy will to permit, of all those fair flowers of grace which Thy hand had planted in my heart; and grant me to mourn my fall, that I may now once at last recover that simplicity of childlike piety, the feelings of which I now recollect, indeed, though faintly, but never have since again enjoyed. Oh! God, if a child's love, pure through ignorance of sin, is never to be mine again, oh! give me at least that depth of penance for which my fall has given me such ample matter.