Haime was a Dorsetshire lad, violent in temper, gross in speech,
utterly lawless in conduct. He was visited with what is to-day
an almost unthinkable spiritual experience--a very violent
temptation to blaspheme God. He yielded at last, in the silence
of his heart framed the dreadful words, and was then told by the
tempter, “Thou art inevitably damned.” The unhappy youth was
broken-hearted. He swung for a time betwixt plans of suicide and
wild rushes into vicious pleasure. The terrors of sin haunted
him. He had experiences which can hardly be paralleled out of
monkish literature.
“One night, as I was going to bed, I durst not lie down without
prayer. So, falling upon my knees, I began to consider, ‘What
can I pray for? I have neither the will nor the power to do
anything good.’ Then it darted into my mind, ‘I will not pray,
neither will I be beholden to God for mercy.’ I arose from my
knees without prayer, and laid me down; but not in peace. I
never had such a night before. I was as if my very body had been
in a fire, and I had a hell in my conscience. I was thoroughly
persuaded the devil was in the room.”--W. H. FITCHETT,
“Wesley and His Century.”
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