During the continuance of her indisposition Miss Holmes felt so intensely interested in reading her Bible, that she might clearly understand the sublime theory of the Christian faith, and so absorbed in her spiritual exercises, that her health sustained some injury by the severity of her application. As a very natural consequence, a shade of melancholy was cast over her spirit. She was forewarned of the possibility of such an effect being produced; but the usual apology which she made to her pious mother was, "Can I take too much interest in that important subject, into which angels desire to look? or can I ever hope for a more favourable time for its investigation than the present, when I am precluded from mingling in the employments or the amusements of the world?" The following form of self-dedication to God she now drew up and signed, having vowed in the most solemn manner to observe it to the full extent of her pledge:-- "Eternal and unchangeable Jehovah! thou glorious Creator of heaven and earth, and adorable Lord of angels and men, I desire with the deepest humiliation and abasement of soul, to bow down at this time in thine awful presence, and earnestly pray, that thou wilt impress my heart with a clear perception of thine unutterable and inconceivable glories. "To thee do I now come, invited by the exceeding great and precious promises of thy Word; trusting for acceptance in the efficacy of the Saviour's death, beseeching thee to 'be merciful unto me a sinner.' The irregular propensities of my depraved nature have in ten thousand aggravated instances wrought to bring forth fruit unto death. And if thou shouldst be strict to mark my offences, I must be silent under a load of guilt, and immediately sink into destruction. But thou hast graciously called me to return to thee, though I have been a backsliding child. I come unto thee, O Lord, convinced not only of my sin, but of my folly; and while I implore mercy through the mediation of Jesus Christ, I would be no less importunate for the purifying influences of the Holy Spirit, that I may be entirely conformed to thee. Permit me to bring unto thee those powers and faculties which I have ungratefully alienated from thy service; and receive, I beseech thee, thy poor revolted creature, who is now convinced of thy right to her, and who desires nothing in the world so much as to be thine.