I have given the account of my religious experience exactly as it seemed to me at the time, and as I now remember it.  It corresponded with the common course of religious experiences in the Methodist church, except that with me the struggle was harder than commonly happens.  I did not doubt at the time that it was truly a supernatural change, as much the work of the Spirit as the sudden conversions recorded in the Acts of the Apostles.  Others can form their own opinion about it.  I will only add that subsequent experience has led me to the belief that the reality of a man’s religion is more to be judged of by what he does than by how he feels or what he says.

The change which had taken place in me, however it is to be regarded, was not without a decided influence on my whole future life.  I no longer considered myself as living for myself alone.  I regarded myself as bound to do unto others as I would that they should do unto me; and it was in attempting to act up to this principle that I became involved in the difficulties to be hereafter related.

Meanwhile I resumed my voyages in the Sarah Henry, in which I continued to sail, on shares, for several years, with tolerable success.  Afterwards I followed the same business in the schooner Protection, in which I suffered another shipwreck.  We sailed from Philadelphia to Washington, in the District of Columbia, laden with coal, proceeding down the Delaware, and by the open sea; but, when off the entrance of the Chesapeake, we encountered a heavy gale, which split the sails, swept the decks, and drove us off our course as far south as Ocracoke Inlet, on the coast of North Carolina.  I took a pilot, intending to go in to repair damages; but, owing to the strength of the current, which defeated his calculations, the pilot ran us on the bar.  As soon as the schooner’s bow touched the ground, she swung round broadside to the sea, which immediately began to break over her in a fearful manner.  She filled immediately,—­everything on deck was swept away; and, as our only chance of safety, we took to the main-rigging.  This was about seven o’clock in the evening.  Towards morning, by reason of the continual thumping, the mainmast began to work through the vessel, and to settle in the sand, so that it became necessary for us to make our way to the fore-rigging; which we did, not without danger, as one of the men was twice washed off.

About a quarter of a mile inside was a small, low island, on which lay five boats, each manned by five men, who had come down to our assistance; but the surf was so high that they did not venture to approach us; so we remained clinging with difficulty to the rigging till about half-past one, when the schooner went to pieces.  The mast to which we were clinging fell, and we were precipitated into the raging surf, which swept us onward towards the island already mentioned.  The men there, anticipating what had happened, had prepared for its occurrence; and the best swimmers,