Amid the darkness and mire and stench of that noisome den, it pleased the Lord that I should be tempted of Satan that I might prevail over him with the strength of the Lord. For when I knelt down to call upon the Lord, being always used to make mention of Chrestus and Eucharis in my prayers, behold, I found myself bereft of the tokens of them both, whereon were written TRUST and HOPE; and then a terror fell upon me and a shuddering that was not of the limbs but of the heart (so did my very spirit seem to shiver within me) and a voice of evil whispered in my ear saying, “_Trust_ no more,” and then again, “Thy _Hope_ is dead;” and methought monstrous shapes moved around me, making my flesh to creep; and I was on the brink of a bottomless gulf wherein I must needs fall, and Satan was waiting below, ready to swallow up my soul.
Then fell I upon my face and I called upon the Lord in my sore trouble, and besought him that he would send me help from heaven; and I repeated over and over again his comfortable words, how he bade us not fear them that could slay the body, and how he promised that, though we should be slain, yet not one hair of our heads should perish; and I bethought myself of my beloved teacher Paulus, how he also had lain in just such another dungeon for nine days and nights, and with what a constancy he had held fast to the faith of the Lord Jesus; and I also called to mind the last words of the elder Philochristus, how he had bidden me play the man and fight the good fight for Christ. Now up to this time I had been still wrestling with Satan and trembling lest, coming upon me a second time, he should gain some advantage over me; but now, taking courage, I besought the Lord, as in old times, for Chrestus and Eucharis, that they also might obtain mercy and be with me in Christ.
Then it pleased the Lord Jesus my Saviour to turn my thoughts wholly upon him, and upon his passion which he endured for men upon the cross; and gazing thereon I was wrapped up with him above the stir and tumult of earth; and methought I saw, looking down from above, how all the past had worked together for me for good; and how all my wanderings and gropings, yea, even my sins, being washed away by the blood of him who suffered, had become helps instead of hindrances, helping me to love much because I had been much forgiven. Then also I saw how the Lord in his mercy had taken from me the hope of Eucharis, and the trust of Chrestus, yea, and the love of my dearest mother, that so he might guide me up unto himself, the source and object of all trust and hope and love. So being filled with all certainty of joy I besought the Lord once more for them, and for the mother whom I had never seen in the flesh, that they also as well as Eucharis (who had received the seal of baptism) might attain to the resurrection of the just, and I prayed that, if it were possible, I might receive from him some sign or vision that it was well with them. And so it was that, as soon as I had thus prayed, I was lifted up in the spirit with the cross of Christ yet higher than before, and the Lord showed me a vast sea of death, and beneath the sea of death, a sea of sin; but beneath the sea of sin and of death I saw a great gulf of life and love, which swallowed up the sea of sin and death, so that they vanished away.