332 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1800. 



plexity and distress could be ter- 

 minated. A desperation of whiclx 

 feAV among mankind can form a 

 suitable conception, but which it 

 may be hoped many will regard 

 with tender pity, drove him to at- 

 tempt self-murder; and the manner 

 of his preservation in life, or rather 

 of his restoration to it, indicated an 

 unusual interposition of the provi- 

 dence of God. His friends no longer 

 persisted in urging him to retain his 

 office. It was resigned; and with 

 it his flattering prospects vanished, 

 and his connections with the world 

 dissolved. A striking instance of 

 the instability of earthly hopes, and 

 the insufficiency of human accom- 

 plishments to proriiote even tempo- 

 ral comfort ! 



At this awful crisis appears to 

 have commenced Mr. Cowper's se- 

 rious attention to the ways of God. 

 Having been educated in the know- 

 ledge of the Holy Scriptures, and 

 estranged from the fool-hardy arro- 

 gance which urges unhappy youths 

 to infidelity, he had constantly re- 

 tained a reverence for the word of 

 God. His manners were in general 

 decent and amiable; and the course 

 of pleasure in which he indulged 

 himself being customary with per- 

 sons in similar circumstances, he 

 remained insensible of his state as a 

 sinner in the sight of God, till he 

 was brought to reflect upon the 

 guilt of that action by which he had 

 nearly plunged himself into endless 

 perdition. His mind was then, for 

 the first time, convinced of the evil 

 of sin, as a transgression of the law 

 of God; and he was terrified by the 

 apprehension that his late offence 

 was unpardonable in its nature. In- 

 stead of finding relief from reading, 

 every book he opened, of whatever 

 kind, seemed to him adapted to 



increase his distress ; which became 

 so pungent as to deprive him of his 

 usual rest, and to render his broken 

 slumbers equally miserable with his 

 waking hours. While in this state, 

 he was visited by the late rev. 

 Martin Madan, who was related to 

 him. By explaining, from the Scrip- 

 tures, the doctrine of original sin, 

 Mr. Madan convinced him that all 

 mankind were on the same level 

 with himself before God; the 

 atonement and righteousness of 

 Christ were set forth to him as the 

 remedy which his case required; 

 and the necessity of faith in Christ, 

 in order to experience the blessings 

 of this salvation, excited his earnest 

 desire for the attainment. His mind 

 derived present ease from these im- 

 portant truths, but still inclined to 

 the supposition that this faith was 

 in his own power. The following 

 day he again sunk under the horrors 

 of perdition ; and that distraction 

 which he had sought as a refuge 

 from the fear of man, now seized 

 him amidst his terrors of eternal 

 judgment. A vein of self-loathing 

 ran through the whole of his insa- 

 nity ; and his faculties were so com- 

 pletely deranged, that the attempt 

 which he had lately deplored as an 

 unpardonable transgression, now ap- 

 peared to him an indispensable 

 work of piety. He therefore re- 

 peated his assault upon his own life, 

 under the dreadful delusion, that it 

 was right to rid the earth of such a 

 sinner ; and that the sooner it was 

 accomplished, his future misery 

 would be the more tolerable. His 

 purpose being again mercifully frus- 

 trated, he became at length fami- 

 liar with despair, and suffered it to 

 be alleviated by conversation with 

 a pious and humane physicisn at St. 

 Alban's, under whose care he had 



