My friend could bear it no longer, but cries out aloud, "St. Paul! St.
Paul! behold he prayeth." I was afraid Atkins would hear him, therefore
I entreated him to withhold himself a while, that we might see an end of
the scene, which to me, I must confess, was the most affecting that ever
I saw in my life. Well, he strove with himself for a while, but was in
such raptures to think that the poor heathen woman was become a
Christian, that he was not able to contain himself; he wept several
times, then throwing up his hands and crossing his breast, said over
several things ejaculatory, and by the way of giving God thanks for so
miraculous a testimony of the success of our endeavours. Some he spoke
softly, and I could not well hear others; some things he said in Latin,
some in French; then two or three times the tears would interrupt him,
that he could not speak at all; but I begged that he would contain
himself, and let us more narrowly and fully observe what was before us,
which he did for a time, the scene not being near ended yet; for after
the poor man and his wife were risen again from their knees, we observed
he stood talking still eagerly to her, and we observed her motion, that
she was greatly affected with what he said, by her frequently lifting up
her hands, laying her hand to her breast, and such other postures as
express the greatest seriousness and attention; this continued about half
a quarter of an hour, and then they walked away, so we could see no more
of them in that situation.
I took this interval to say to the clergyman, first, that I was glad to
see the particulars we had both been witnesses to; that, though I was
hard enough of belief in such cases, yet that I began to think it was all
very sincere here, both in the man and his wife, however ignorant they
might both be, and I hoped such a beginning would yet have a more happy
end. "But, my friend," added I, "will you give me leave to start one
difficulty here? I cannot tell how to object the least thing against
that affectionate concern which you show for the turning of the poor
people from their paganism to the Christian religion; but how does this
comfort you, while these people are, in your account, out of the pale of
the Catholic Church, without which you believe there is no salvation? so
that you esteem these but heretics, as effectually lost as the pagans
themselves."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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