A PIOUS SAILOR A LOOSE PROFESSOR. 233 



duty, and keep him from acknowledged sin. 

 On the other hand, a pious sailor, recently 

 returned from a two years' voyage, says that 

 thirty whales were taken by his ship's crew 

 during their absence, Three of these, to his 

 sorrow, were taken on the Sabbath. But in 

 taking these three, five boats were destroyed 

 and five men were seriously wounded, two hav- 

 ing their limbs broken, and one his scull frac- 

 tured. In taking the remaining twenty-seven 

 whales on the other days of the week, only four 

 boats were injured, and one man slightly hurt. 



Now it needs not that we say positively, of 

 so easy a professor and loose a conscience as 

 that of the New Bedford captain just now re- 

 referred to, that such a man cannot be a Chris- 

 tian, or to deny that he may be saved so as by 

 fire. But certain it is, it were a pity for the 

 world if the goodness in it, and fear of God, 

 and practical regard to principle and duty, were 

 no stronger than this man's. The devil might 

 keep it, for all such Christians, a thousand 

 years longer, and we don't know that he would 

 want any better agents than such pliable pro- 



