About the dead hour of the night I was aroused by the awful howling of a gang of blood-thirsty wolves, which had found us out and surrounded us as their prey, there in the dark wilderness many miles from any house or settlement.
My dear little child was so dreadfully alarmed that she screamed loudly with fear--my wife trembling like a leaf on a tree, at the thought of being devoured there in the wilderness by ferocious wolves.
The wolves kept howling, and were near enough for us to see their glaring eyes, and hear their chattering teeth.

I then thought that the hour of death for us was at hand; that we should not live to see the light of another day; for there was no way for our escape.

My little family were looking up to me for protection, but I could afford them none.

And while I was offering up my prayers to that God who never forsakes those in the hour of danger who trust in him, I thought of Deacon Whitfield; I thought of his profession, and doubted his piety.
I thought of his hand-cuffs, of his whips, of his chains, of his stocks, of his thumb-screws, of his slave driver and overseer, and of his religion; I also thought of his opposition to prayer meetings, and of his five hundred lashes promised me for attending a prayer meeting.
I thought of God, I thought of the devil, I thought of hell; and I thought of heaven, and wondered whether I should ever see the Deacon there.

And I calculated that if heaven was made up of such Deacons, or such persons, it could not be filled with love to all mankind, and with glory and eternal happiness, as we know it is from the truth of the Bible.
The reader may perhaps think me tedious on this topic, but indeed it is one of so much interest to me, that I find myself entirely unable to describe what my own feelings were at that time.