I have little to add of these four years following. I was all that time as I may say continually rising and falling, and never without some pain and infirmity. I had frequent agues and fevers, and sometimes such extremity of pain in my head that I was not able to hold it up. The whole time I was not well enough to come down above ten or twelve times to the table, and seldom in a condition to take a little air in the garden, the least forcing myself in this kind would so defeat me that I was often obliged to cast myself upon my bed to recover my strength. When I consider all things, I think I suffered as much the time I was in this languishing condition as when I was in the greatest extremity, my pains these four years were increased by the state I found my soul in. It pleased Almighty God to subtract that abundance of sweetness I had felt in my great sickness. I was chiefly now led on in desolation, and great anxieties would sometimes seize me. I was then, I thought, without any sense of Almighty God, fearing He had abandoned me. These troubles, with a darkness of faith, would almost entirely oppress my mind, neither was I accustomed to discover these temptations to my ghostly father. My prayer was commonly without much consolation, yet I had for the most part a great resignation to the will of God, and great contempt of the world.