Page:The Black Prince (John Naimbanna).djvu/5

( 5 ) in reading, and that he was al ways thankful to any one who would assist him in learning any thing that was useful. He was never led into company where the time was wasted in idle talk without being sorry, and when left to himself, he would employ no less than eight or ten hours a day in reading.

As it was the main object of the gentlemen to whose care he had been in trusted, to give him right views of Christianity, pains were taken to convince him that the Bible was the word of God, and he received it as such with great reverence and simplicity; "When I found (said he) all good men minding the Bible and calling it the word of God, and all bad men disregarding it, I then was sure that the Bible must be what good men called it, the word of God." But not content with the report of others he read the Bible for himself. He would sometimes complain of being fatigued with other studies, but even when he was most fatigued, if asked to read a little of the Scriptures, he always expressed his readiness by some emotion of joy: he used to say, that he was sure of meeting with something in the Bible which suited every case, and shewed him what was right and what was wrong; and that likewise he found in it good examples to encourage him to do what was right, and bad examples to deter him from doing what was wrong. In short, he was not one of those who read the Bible, and think little or nothing about what they read, but he considered it as the rule of his life; and if at any time his behaviour was amiss, and a text of scripture was mentioned, which proved it to be so he would immediately submit to its authority. Nor was his regard for the Bible merely