I observed, that the two who swam were yet more than twice as long swimming over the creek than the fellow was that fled from them. It came now very warmly upon my thoughts, and indeed irresistibly, that now was my time to get a servant, and perhaps a companion, or a.s.sistant, and that I was called plainly by Providence to save this poor creature's life. I immediately got down the ladders with all possible expedition, fetched my two guns, for they were both at the foot of the ladder, as I observed above; and getting up again with the same haste to the top of the hill, I crossed towards the sea; and having a very short cut, and all down hill, clapped myself in the way between the pursuers and the pursued, hallooing aloud to him that fled, who, looking back, was at first perhaps as much frighted at me as at them; but I beckoned with my hand to him to come back; and in the meantime I slowly advanced towards the two that followed; then rushing at once upon the foremost, I knocked him down with the stock of my piece; I was loath to fire, because I would not have the rest hear, though at that distance it would not have been easily heard; and being out of sigh of the smoke too, they would not have easily known what to make of it. I having knocked this fellow down, the other who pursued him stopped, as if he had been frightened, and I advanced apace towards him; but as I came nearer, I perceived presently he had a bow and arrow, and was fitting it to shoot at me; so I was then necessitated to shoot at him first; which I did, and killed him at the first shot. The poor savage who fled, but had stopped, though he saw both his enemies fallen, and killed, (as he thought) yet was so frighted with the fire and noise of my piece, that he stood stock-still, and neither came forward, nor went backward, though he seemed rather inclined to fly still, than to come on. I hallooed again to him, and made signs to come forward, which he easily understood, and came a little way, then stopped again, and then a little farther, and stopped again; and I could then perceive that he stood trembling, as if he had been taken prisoner, and had just been to be killed, as his two enemies were. I beckoned him again to come to me, and gave him all the signs of encouragement that I could think of; and he came nearer and nearer, kneeling down every ten or twelve steps, in token of acknowledgment for saving his life. I smiled at him, and looked pleasantly, and beckoned to him to come still nearer. At length he came close to me, and then he kneeled down again, kissed the ground, and laid his head upon the ground, and taking me by the foot, set my foot upon his head. This, it seems, was in token of swearing to be my slave for ever. I took him up, and made much of him, and encouraged him all I could. But there was more work to do yet; for I perceived the savage, whom I knocked down, was not killed, but stunned with the blow, and began to come to himself: so I pointed to him, and showed him the savage, that he was not dead: upon this he spoke some words to me; and though I could not understand them, yet I thought they were pleasant to hear, for they were the first sound of a man's voice that I had heard, my own excepted, for above five-and-twenty years. But there was no time for such reflections now: the savage, who was knocked down, recovered himself so far as to sit up upon the ground; and I perceived that my savage began to be afraid; but when I saw that, I presented my other piece at the man, as if I would shoot him: upon this my savage, for so I call him now, made a motion to me to lend him my sword, which hung naked in a belt by my side: so I did: he no sooner had it, but he runs to his enemy, and at one blow cut off his head so cleverly, no executioner in Germany could have done it sooner or better; which I thought very strange for one, who, I had reason to believe, never saw a sword in his life before, except their own wooden swords: however, it seems, as I learnt afterwards, they make their wooden swords so sharp, so heavy, and the wood is so hard, that they will cut off heads even with them, nay, and arms, and that at one blow too. When he had done this, he comes laughing to me in sign of triumph, and brought me the sword again, and, with abundance of gestures, which I did not understand, laid it down, with the head of the savage that he had killed, just before me.

But that which astonished him most was, to know how I had killed the other Indian so far off; so pointing to him, he made signs to me to let him go to him: so I bade him go, as well as I could. When he came to him, he stood like one amazed, looking at him; turned him first on one side, then on t'other; looked at the wound the bullet had made, which it seems was just in his breast, where it had made a hole, and no great quant.i.ty of blood had followed; but he had bled inwardly, for he was quite dead. Then he took up his bow and arrows, and came back; so I turned to go away, and beckoned him to follow me, making signs to him that more might come after them.

Upon this he signed to me, that he should bury them with sand, that they might not he seen by the rest, if they followed; and so I made signs again to him to do so. He fell to work, and in an instant he had sc.r.a.ped a hole in the sand with his hands, big enough to bury the first in, and then dragged him into it, and covered him, and did so also by the other; I believe he had buried them both in a quarter of an hour: then calling him away, I carried him not to my castle, but quite away to my cave, on the farther part of the island; so I did not let my dream come to pa.s.s in that part; viz. that he came into my grove for shelter.

Here I gave him bread and a bunch of raisins to eat, and a draught of water, which I found he was indeed in great distress for, by his running; and having refreshed him, I made signs for him to go lie down and sleep, pointing to a place where I had laid a great parcel of rice-straw, and a blanket upon it, which I used to sleep upon myself sometimes; so the poor creature lay down, and went to sleep.

He was a comely handsome fellow, perfectly well made, with straight long limbs, not too large, tall, and well-shaped, and, as I reckon, about twenty-six years of age. He had a very good countenance, not a fierce and surly aspect, but seemed to have something very manly in his face, and yet he had all the sweetness and softness of an European in his countenance too, especially when he smiled: his hair was long and black, not curled like wool; his forehead very high and large, and a great vivacity and sparkling sharpness in his eyes. The colour of his skin was not quite black, but very tawny, and yet not of an ugly yellow nauseous tawny, as the Brasilians and Virginians, and other natives of America are, but of a bright kind of a dun olive colour, that had in it something very agreeable, though not very easy to describe. His face was round and plump, his nose small, not flat like the Negroe's, a very good mouth, thin lips, and his teeth fine, well-set, and white as ivory.

After he had slumbered, rather than slept, about half an hour, he waked again, and comes out of the cave to me, for I had been milking my goats, which I had in the enclosure just by: when he espied me, he came running to me, laying himself down again upon the ground, with all the possible signs of an humble thankful disposition, making many, antic gestures to shew it. At last he lays his head flat upon the ground, close to my foot, and sets my other foot upon his head, as he had done before; and after this, made all the signs to me of subjection, servitude, and submission imaginable, to let me know how much he would serve me as long as he lived. I understood him in many things, and let him know I was very well pleased with him. In a little time I began to speak to him, and teach him to speak to me; and first, I made him know his name should be Friday, which was the day I saved his life; and I called him so for the memory of the time; I likewise taught him to say Master, and then let him know that was to be my name; I likewise taught him to say Yes and No, and to know the meaning of them. I gave him some milk in an earthen pot, and let him see me drink it before him, and sop my bread in it; and I gave him a cake of bread to do the like, which he quickly complied with, and made signs that it was very good for him.

I kept there with him all that night; but as soon as it was day, I beckoned him to come with me, and let him know I would give him some clothes; at which he seemed very glad, for he was stark-naked. As we went by the place where he had buried the two men, he pointed exactly to the spot, and shewed me the marks that he had made to find them again, making signs to me that we should dig them up again, and eat them: at this I appeared very angry, expressed my abhorrence of it, made as if I would vomit at the thoughts of it, and beckoned with my hand to him to come away, which he did immediately, with great submission. I then led him up to the top of the hill, to see if his enemies were gone, and pulling out my gla.s.s, I looked, and saw plainly the place where they had been, but no appearance of them, or of their canoes; so that it was plain that they were gone, and had left their two comrades behind them, without, any search after them.

But I was not content with this discovery; but having now more courage, and consequently more curiosity, I took my man Friday with me, giving him the sword in his hand, with the bow and arrows at his back, which I found he could use very dexterously, making him carry one gun for me, and I two for myself, and away we marched to the place where these creatures had been; for I had a mind now to get some further intelligence of them. When I came to the place, my very blood ran chill in my veins, and my heart sunk within me at the horror of the spectacle: indeed it was a dreadful sight, at least it was so to me, though Friday made nothing of it: the place was covered with human bones, the ground dyed with the blood, great pieces of flesh left here and there, half-eaten, mangled, and scorched; and, in short, all the tokens of the triumphant feast they had been making there, after a victory over their enemies. I saw three skulls, five hands, and the bones of three or four legs and feet, and abundance of other parts of the bodies; and Friday, by his signs, made me understand that they brought over four prisoners to feast upon; that three of them were eaten up, and that he, pointing to himself, was the fourth; that there had been a great battle between them and their next king, whose subjects, it seems, he had been one of; and that they had taken a great number of prisoners, all which were carried to several places by those that had taken them in the flight, in order to feast upon them, as was done here by these wretches upon those they brought hither.

I caused Friday to gather all the skulls, bones, flesh, and whatever remained, and lay them together on an heap, and make a great fire upon it, and burn them all to ashes. I found Friday had still a hankering stomach after some of the flesh, and was still a cannibal in his nature; but I discovered so much abhorrence at the very thoughts of it, and at the least appearance of it, that he durst not discover it; for I had, by some means, let him know that I would kill him if he offered it.

When we had done this, we came back to our castle, and there I fell to work for my man Friday; and first of all, I gave him a pair of linen drawers, which I had out of the poor gunner's chest I mentioned, and which I found in the wreck; and which, with a little alteration, fitted him very well; then I made him a jerkin of goat's skin as well as my skill would allow, and I was now grown a tolerable good tailor; and I gave him a cap, which I had made of a hare-skin, very convenient, and fashionable enough: and thus he was dressed, for the present, tolerably well, and mighty well was he pleased to see himself almost as well clothed as his master. It is true, he went awkwardly in these things at first; wearing the drawers was very awkward to him, and the sleeves of the waistcoat galled his shoulders and the inside of his arms; but a little easing them, where he complained they hurt him, and using himself to them, at length he took to them very well.

The next day after I came home to my hutch with him, I began to consider where I should lodge him; and that I might do well for him, and yet be perfectly easy myself, I made a little tent for him in the vacant place between my two fortifications, in the inside of the last, and in the outside of the first: and as there was a door or entrance there into my cave, I made a formal framed door-case, and a door to it of boards, and set it up in the pa.s.sage, a little within the entrance: and causing the door to open on the inside, I barred it up in the night, taking in my ladders too; so that Friday could no way come at me in the inside of my innermost wall, without making so much noise in getting over, that it must needs awaken me; for my first wall had now a complete roof over it of long poles, covering all my tent, and leaning up to the side of the hill, which was again laid cross with small sticks instead of laths, and then thatched over a great thickness with the rice straw, which was strong like reeds; and at the hole or place which was left to go in or out by the ladder, I had placed a kind of trapdoor, which if it had been attempted on the outside, would not have opened at all, but would have fallen down, and made a great noise; and as to weapons, I took them all in to my side every night.

But I needed none of all this precaution; for never man had a more faithful, loving, sincere servant than Friday was to me; without pa.s.sions, sullenness, or designs; perfectly obliging and engaging; his very affections were tied to me, like those of a child to a father; and I dare say, he would have sacrificed his life for the saving mine, upon any occasion whatsoever: the many testimonies he gave me of this put it out of doubt; and soon convinced me, that I needed to use no precautions as to my safety on his account.

This frequently gave me occasion to observe, and that with wonder, that, however it had pleased G.o.d in his providence, and in the government of the works of his hands, to take from so great a part of the world of his creatures the best uses to which their faculties, and the powers of their souls, are adapted; yet that he has bestowed upon them the same powers, the same reason, the same affections, the same sentiments of kindness and obligation, the same pa.s.sions and resentments of wrongs, the same sense of grat.i.tude, sincerity, fidelity, and all the capacities of doing good, and receiving good, that he has given to us; and that when he pleases to offer them occasions of exerting these, they are as ready, nay more ready, to apply them to the right uses for which they were bestowed, than we are. And this made me very melancholy sometimes, in reflecting, as the several occasions presented, how mean a use we make of all these, even though we have these powers enlightened by the great lamp of instruction, the Spirit of G.o.d, and by the knowledge of his word, added to our understanding; and why it has pleased G.o.d to hide the life saving knowledge from so many millions of souls, who, if I might judge by this poor savage, would make a much better use of it than we did.

From hence I sometimes was led too far to invade the sovereignty of Providence; and, as it were, arraign the justice of so arbitrary a disposition of things, that should hide that light from some, and reveal it to others, and yet expect a like duty from both: but I shut it up, and checked my thoughts with this conclusion: first, that we do not know by what light and law these should be condemned; but that as G.o.d was necessarily, and by the nature of his being, infinitely holy and just, so it could not be, but that if these creatures were all sentenced to absence from himself, it was on account of sinning against that light, which, as the Scripture says, was a law to themselves, and by such rules as their consciences would acknowledge to be just, though the foundation was not discovered to us: and, secondly, that still, as we are all clay in the hand of the potter, no vessel could say to him, "Why hast thou formed me thus?"

But to return to my new companion: I was greatly delighted with him, and made it my business to teach him every thing that was proper to make him useful, handy, and helpful; but especially to make him speak, and understand me when I spake: and he was the aptest scholar that ever was; and particularly was so merry, so constantly diligent, and so pleased when he could but understand me, or make me understand him, that it was very pleasant to me to talk to him. And now my life began to be so easy, that I began to say to myself, that could I but have been safe from more savages, I cared not if I was never to remove from the place while I lived.

After I had been two or three days returned to my castle, I thought, that, in order to bring Friday off from his horrid way of feeding, and from the relish of a cannibal's stomach, I ought to let him taste other flesh; so I took him out with me one morning to the woods: I went, indeed, intending to kill a kid out of my own flock, and bring it home and dress it: but as I was going, I saw a she goat lying down in the shade, and two young kids sitting by her. I catched hold of Friday: "Hold," said I, "stand still;" and made signs to him not to stir.

Immediately I presented my piece, shot and killed one of the kids. The poor creature, who had, at a distance indeed, seen me kill the savage his enemy, but did not know, or could imagine how it was done, was sensibly surprised, trembled and shook, and looked so amazed, that I thought he would have sunk down: he did not see the kid I had shot at, or perceive I had killed it, but ripped up his waistcoat to feel if he was not wounded; and, as I found, presently thought I was resolved to kill him: for he came and kneeled down to me, and, embracing my knees, said a great many things I did not understand but I could easily see that his meaning was to pray me not to kill him.

I soon found a way to convince him, that I would do him no harm; and taking him up by the hand, laughed at him, and pointing to the kid which I had killed, beckoned to him to run and fetch it, which he did: and while he was wondering and looking to see how the creature was killed, I loaded my gun again, and by and by I saw a great fowl, like a hawk, sit upon a tree within shot; so, to let Friday understand a little what I would do, I called him to me again, pointing at the fowl, which was indeed a parrot, though I thought it had been a hawk: I say, pointing to the parrot, and to my gun, and to the ground under the parrot, to let him see I would make him fall, I made him understand that I would shoot and kill that bird; accordingly I fired, and bid him look, and immediately he saw the parrot fall; he stood like one frighted again, notwithstanding all that I had said to him; and I found he was the more amazed, because he did not see me put any thing into the gun; but thought there must be some wonderful fund of death and destruction in that thing, able to kill man, beast, bird, or any thing near or far off; for the astonishment this created in him was such, as could not wear off for a long time; and I believe, if I would have let him, he would have worshipped me and my gun; as for the gun itself, he would not so much as touch it for several days over; but would speak to it, and talk to it, as if it had answered him, when he was by himself; which, as I afterwards learnt of him, was to desire it not to kill him.

Well; after his astonishment was a little over at this, I pointed to him to run and fetch the bird I had shot, which he did, but staid some time; for the parrot, not being quite dead, had fluttered a good way off from the place where she fell; however, he found her, took her up, and brought her to me; and, as I had perceived his ignorance about the gun before, I took this advantage to charge the gun again, and not let him see me do it, that I might he ready for any other mark that might present; but nothing more offered at that time; so I brought home the kid; and the same evening I took the skin off, and cut it out as well as I could, and having a pot for that purpose, I boiled or stewed some of the flesh, and made some very good broth; after I had begun to eat some, I gave some to my man, who seemed very glad of it, and liked it very well; but that which was strangest to him, was, to see me eat salt with it. He made a sign to me that the salt was not good to eat; and putting a little into his own month, he seemed to nauseate it, and would spit and sputter at it, washing his mouth with fresh water after it. On the other hand, I took some meat in my mouth without salt, and I pretended to spit and sputter for want of salt, as fast as he had done at the salt; but it would not do, he would never care for salt with meat, or in his broth; at least, not a great while, and then but a very little.

Having thus fed him with boiled meat and broth, I was resolved to feast him the next day with roasting a piece of the kid: this I did by hanging it before the fire in a string, as I had seen many people do in England, setting two poles up, one on each side the fire, and one cross on the top, and tying the string to the cross stick, letting the meat turn continually: this Friday admired very much; but when he came to taste the flesh, he took so many ways to tell me how well he liked it, that I could not but understand him; and at last he told me he would never eat man's flesh any more, which I was very glad to hear.

The next day I set him to work to beating some corn out, and sifting it in the manner I used to do, as I observed before; and he soon understood how to do it as well as I, especially after he had seen what the meaning of it was, and that it was to make bread of; for after that I let him see me make my bread, and bake it too; and in a little time Friday was able to do all the work for me, as well as I could do it myself.

I began now to consider, that, having two mouths to feed instead of one, I must provide more ground for my harvest, and plant a larger quant.i.ty of corn, than I used to do; so I marked out a larger piece of land, and began the fence in the same manner as before, in which Friday not only worked very willingly and very hard, but did it very cheerfully; and I told him what it was for, that it was for corn to make more bread, because he was now with me, and that I might have enough for him and myself too: he appeared very sensible of that part, and let me know, that he thought I had much more labour upon me on his account, than I had for myself, and that he would work the harder for me, if I would tell him what to do.

This was the pleasantest year of all the life I led in this place.

Friday began to talk pretty well, and understand the names of almost every thing I had occasion to call for, and of every place I had to send him to, and talk a great deal to me; so that, in short, I began now to have some use for my tongue again, which indeed I had very little occasion for before; that is to say, about speech. Besides the pleasure of talking to him, I had a singular satisfaction in the fellow himself; his simple unfeigned honesty appeared to me more and more every day, and I began really to love the creature; and on his side, I believe, he loved me more than it was possible for him ever to love any thing before.

I had a mind once to try if he had any hankering inclination to his own country again; and having learnt him English so well, that he could answer me almost any questions, I asked him, whether the nation that he belonged to never conquered in battle? At which he smiled, and said, "Yes, yes, we always fight the better;" that is, he meant, always get the better in fight; and so we began the following discourse. "You always fight the better!" said I: "how came you to be taken prisoner then, Friday?"

_Friday._ My nation beat much for all that.

_Master_. How beat? if your nation beat them, how came you to be taken?

_Friday_. They more than my nation in the place where me was; they take one, two, three, and me: my nation over-beat them in the yonder place, where me no was; there my nation take one two great thousand.

_Master_. But why did not your side recover you from the hands of your enemies then?

_Friday_. They run one, two, three, and me, and make go in the canoe; my nation have no canoe that time.

_Master_. Well, Friday, and what does your nation do with the men they take? Do they carry them away, and eat them as these did?

_Friday._ Yes, my nation eat mans too, eat all up.

_Master_. Where do they carry them?

_Friday_. Go to other place where they think.

_Master_. Do they come hither?

_Friday_. Yes, yes, they come hither; come other else place.

_Master_. Have you been here with them?

_Friday_. Yes, I been here [points to the N.W. side of the island, which, it seems, was their side.]

By this I understood, that my man Friday had formerly been among the savages, who used to come on sh.o.r.e on the farther part of the island, on the said man eating occasions that he was now brought for; and some time after, when I took the courage to carry him to that side, being the same I formerly mentioned, he presently knew the place, and told me, he was there once when they ate up twenty men, two women, and one child: he could not tell twenty in English, but he numbered them by laying so many stones in a row, and pointing to me to tell them over.

I have told this pa.s.sage, because it introduces what follows; that after I had had this discourse with him, I asked him, how far it was from our island to the sh.o.r.e, and whether the canoes were not often lost? He told me there was no danger, no canoes ever lost; but that after a little way out to sea, there was a current, and a wind always one way in the morning, the other in the afternoon.

This I understand to be no more than the sets of the tide, as going out, or coming in; but I afterwards understood it was occasioned by the great draught and reflux of the mighty river Oroonoque; in the mouth of which river, as I thought afterwards, our island lay; and that this land, which I perceived to the W. and N.W. was the great island Trinidad, on the north point of the mouth of the river. I asked Friday a thousand questions about the country, the inhabitants, the sea, the coast, and what nations were near: he told me all he knew with the greatest openness imaginable. I asked him the names of the several nations of his sort of people, but could get no other name than Caribs; from whence I easily understood, that these were the Caribees, which our maps place on that part of America which reaches from the mouth of the river Oroonoque to Guinea, and onwards to St. Martha. He told me, that up a great way beyond the moon, that was, beyond the setting of the moon, which must be W. from their country, there dwelt white-bearded men, like me, and pointed to my great whiskers, which I mentioned before; and that they had killed much mans, that was his word: by which I understood he meant the Spaniards, whose cruelties in America had been spread over the whole countries, and were remembered by all the nations from father to son.

I inquired if he could tell me how I might come from this island, and get among those white men; he told me, Yes, yes, I might go in two canoe; I could not understand what he meant by two canoe; till at last, with great difficulty, I found he meant, that it must be in a large great boat as big as two canoes.

This part of Friday's discourse began to relish with me very well; and from this time I entertained some hopes, that one time or other I might find an opportunity to make my escape from this place, and that this poor savage might be a means to help me to do it.

During the long time that Friday had now been with me, and that he began to speak to me, and understand me, I was not wanting to lay a foundation of religious knowledge in his mind; particularly I asked him one time, Who made him? The poor creature did not understand me at all, but thought I had asked who was his father: but I took it by another handle, and asked him, Who made the sea, the ground he walked on, and the hills and woods? He told me, it was one old Benamuckee that lived beyond all: he could describe nothing of this great person, but that he was very old; much older, he said, than the sea or the land, than the moon or the stars. I asked him then, if this old person had made all things, why did not all things worship him? He looked very grave, and with a perfect look of innocence said, All things said O! to him. I asked him, if the people who die in his country, went away any where? He said, Yes, they all went to Benamuckee. Then I asked him, whether those they ate up, went thither too? he said, Yes.

From these things I began to instruct him in the knowledge of the true G.o.d. I told him, that the great Maker of all things lived there, pointing up towards heaven; that he governs the world by the same power and providence by which he made it; that he was omnipotent, could do every thing for us, give every thing to us, take every thing from us: and thus, by degrees, I opened his eyes. He listened with great attention, and received with pleasure the notion of Jesus Christ being sent to redeem us, and of the manner of making our prayers to G.o.d, and his being able to hear us, even into heaven: he told me one day, that if our G.o.d could hear us up beyond the sun, he must needs be a greater G.o.d than their Benamuckee, who lived but a little way off, and yet could not hear, till they went up to the great mountains, where he dwelt, to speak to him. I asked him, if ever he went thither to speak to him? He said, No, they never went that were young men; none went thither but the old men; whom he called their Oowookakee, that is, as I made him explain it to me, their religious, or clergy; and that they went to say O! (so he called saying prayers,) and then came back, and told them what Benamuckee said. By this I observed, that there is priestcraft even amongst the most blinded ignorant Pagans in the world; and the policy of making a secret religion, in order to preserve the veneration of the people to the clergy, is not only to be found in the Roman, but perhaps among all religious in the world, even among the most brutish and barbarous savages.

I endeavoured to clear up this fraud to my man Friday; and told him, that the pretence of their old men going up to the mountains to say O!

to their G.o.d Benamuckee, was a cheat; and their bringing word from thence what he said, was much more so; that if they met with any answer, or spoke with any one there, it must be with an evil spirit: and then I entered into a long discourse with him about the devil, the original of him, his rebellion against G.o.d, his enmity to man, the reason of it, his setting himself up in the dark parts of the world to be worshipped instead of G.o.d, and as G.o.d, and the many stratagems he made use of, to delude mankind to their ruin; how he had a secret access to our pa.s.sions and to our affections, to adapt his snares so to our inclinations, as to cause us even to be our own tempters, and to run upon our own destruction by our own choice.

I found it was not so easy to imprint right notions in his mind about the devil, as it was about the being of a G.o.d: nature a.s.sisted all my arguments to evidence to him even the necessity of a great First Cause, and over-ruling governing Power, a secret directing Providence, and of the equity and justice of paying homage to Him that made us, and the like: but there appeared nothing of all this in the notion of an evil spirit, of his original, his being, his nature, and, above all, of his inclination to do evil, and to draw us in to do so too: and the poor creature puzzled me once in such a manner, by a question merely natural and innocent, that I scarce knew what to say to him. I had been talking a great deal to him of the power of G.o.d, his omnipotence, his dreadful aversion to sin, his being a consuming fire to the workers of iniquity; how, as he had made as all, he could destroy us, and all the world, in a moment; and he listened with great seriousness to me all the while.

After this, I had been telling; him how the devil was G.o.d's enemy in the hearts of men, and used all his malice and skill to defeat the good designs of Providence, and to ruin the kingdom of Christ in the world, and the like: "Well," says Friday, "but you say G.o.d is so strong, so great, is he not much strong, much might, as the devil?"--"Yes, yes,"

said I, Friday, "G.o.d is stronger than the devil, G.o.d is above the devil, and therefore we pray to G.o.d to tread him under our feet, and enable us to resist his temptations, and quench his fiery darts."--"But," says he again, "if G.o.d much strong, much might, as the devil, why G.o.d not kill the devil, so make him no more wicked?"

I was strangely surprised at his question; and after all, though I was now an old man, yet I was but a young doctor, and ill enough qualified for a casuist, or a solver of difficulties: and, at first, I could not tell what to say; so I pretended not to hear him, and asked him what he said; but he was too earnest for an answer to forget his question; so that he repeated it in the very same broken words, as above. By this time I had recovered myself a little, and I said, "G.o.d will at last punish him severely; he is reserved for the judgment, and is to be cast into the bottomless pit, to dwell with everlasting fire." This did not satisfy Friday; but he returns upon me, repeating my words, "Reserve at last! me no understand: but why not kill the devil now, not kill great ago?"--"You may as well ask me," said I, "why G.o.d does not kill you and me, when we do wicked things here that offend him: we are preserved to repent and be pardoned." He muses awhile at this; "Well, well," says he, mighty affectionately, "that well; so you I, devil, all wicked, all preserve, repent, G.o.d pardon all." Here I was run down again by him to the last degree, and it was a testimony to me, how the mere notions of nature, though they will guide reasonable creatures to the knowledge of a G.o.d, and of a worship or homage due to the supreme being of G.o.d, as the consequence of our nature; yet nothing but divine revelation can form the knowledge of Jesus Christ, and of a redemption purchased for us; of a Mediator; of a new covenant; and of an Intercessor at the footstool of G.o.d's throne; I say, nothing but a revelation from Heaven can form these in the soul; and that therefore the Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, I mean the word of G.o.d, and the Spirit of G.o.d, promised for the guide and sanctifier of his people, are the absolutely necessary instructors of the souls of men in the saving knowledge of G.o.d, and the means of salvation.

I therefore diverted the present discourse between me and my man, rising up hastily, as upon some sudden occasion of going out; then sending him for some thing a great way off, I seriously prayed to G.o.d, that he would enable me to instruct savingly this poor savage, a.s.sisting, by his Spirit, the heart of the poor ignorant creature to receive the light of the knowledge of G.o.d in Christ, reconciling him to himself, and would guide me to speak so to him from the word of G.o.d, as his conscience might be convinced, his eyes opened, and his soul saved. When he came again to me, I entered into a long discourse with him upon the subject of the redemption of man by the Saviour of the world, and of the doctrine of the Gospel preached from Heaven, viz. of the repentance towards G.o.d, and faith in our blessed Lord Jesus: I then explained to him, as well as I could, why our blessed Redeemer took not on him the nature of angels, but the seed of Abraham, and how, for that reason, the fallen angels had no share in the redemption; that he came only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, and the like.