TWICE-BORN MEN
REMARKABLE CONVERSIONS OF WELL-KNOWN MEN
IN DIFFERENT AGES AND IN VARIED RANKS OF LIFE
Compiled by HY. PICKERING
A Roman Catholic Priest
MARTIN BOOS was a Romanist. In the discharge of his office as a priest he went, in 1789, to visit a woman distinguished by her humility and piety, who was dangerously ill. “I do not doubt,” said Boos, endeavouring to prepare her for death, “that you die calmly and happily.” “And why ?” said the woman. “Because,” replied Boos, “your life has been a continued chain of good actions.”
The woman smiled and said, “If I were to die relying for my salvation on the works which you mention, I am certain that I should be condemned; but that which makes me calm at this awful moment is that I rely on Jesus Christ my Saviour.”
“Those few words,” said Boos afterwards, “in the mouth of a dying woman who was looked upon as a saint, opened my eyes for the first time. I understood the meaning of ‘Christ for us;’ like Abraham, I saw His day. From that time I announced to others the Saviour whom I had learned to know, and there were many who rejoiced with me.”
He was used of God as the instrument of a religious awakening, and his labours were blessed in an extraordinary manner. After a long life of much usefulness, when he felt the end drawing near, he wrote: “Even now I feel that none shall see the Lord without having washed his robes in the Blood of the Lamb.”