The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human NatureJames, William
ReligionComparative
The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature
James, William
Conversion; Experience (Religion); Philosophy and religion; Psychology, Religious; Religion
“But a time of trouble was yet to come. The day after my
conversion I went into the hay‐field to lend a hand with the
harvest, and not having made any promise to God to abstain or
drink in moderation only, I took too much and came home drunk. My
poor sister was heart‐broken; and I felt ashamed of myself and got
to my bedroom at once, where she followed me, weeping copiously.
She said I had been converted and fallen away instantly. But
although I was quite full of drink (not muddled, however), I knew
that God’s work begun in me was not going to be wasted. About
midday I made on my knees the first prayer before God for twenty
years. I did not ask to be forgiven; I felt that was no good, for
I would be sure to fall again. Well, what did I do? I committed
myself to him in the profoundest belief that my individuality was
going to be destroyed, that he would take all from me, and I was
willing. In such a surrender lies the secret of a holy life. From
that hour drink has had no terrors for me: I never touch it, never
want it. The same thing occurred with my pipe: after being a
regular smoker from my twelfth year the desire for it went at
once, and has never returned. So with every known sin, the
deliverance in each case being permanent and complete. I have had
no temptation since conversion, God seemingly having shut out
Satan from that course with me. He gets a free hand in other ways,
but never on sins of the flesh. Since I gave up to God all
ownership in my own life, he has guided me in a thousand ways, and
has opened my path in a way almost incredible to those who do not
enjoy the blessing of a truly surrendered life.”
So much for our graduate of Oxford, in whom you notice the complete
abolition of an ancient appetite as one of the conversion’s fruits.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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