He had the misfortune to lose his mother when he was
fourteen years old, and though he was confirmed in 1820 no deep
impression had been made by God's grace in his heart.
When he was sixteen he went to Brunswick, and putting up at an hotel
lived expensively, and had to part with his best clothes to pay the
bill. Later on, for leaving an hotel without paying, he was put in
prison, and had to stay there till the money was sent for his release.
He had, indeed, grown so hardened that he could tell lies without
blushing. He pretended to lose some money which had been sent to him,
and his friends gave him more to replace it. He got into debt, and
pawned his clothes in order to procure the means to go to taverns and
places of amusement.
But the hand of God was upon him, and he did not do these things
without suffering in his mind. About this time too he began to study
the Bible earnestly.
At the age of twenty the great change came. He attended a prayer
meeting, and there his eyes became opened, and he saw there was no
hope for him but in Christ. He read the Bible anew, and from that time
commenced leading a _new life_.
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