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A man named John Welsh lay in prison in Chicago under sentence of death. His friends tried to get his sentence commuted to imprisonment for life. The day before that fixed for his execution arrived without any favourable reply being received. The prisoner sat in his cell listening and longing earnestly for a respite. Presently he heard the rumbling of a car. It brought the materials for the scaffold, and soon he heard the stroke of the hammers, and pictured himself hanging on the scaffold he could hear them raising. The sound almost drove him frantic, and he begged that he might be taken anywhere away from the dreadful noise. He was taken to a distant cell, and there he sat on the edge of his bed, haunted with gloomy thoughts, all hope gone. He was startled from his reverie by a hurried step along the corridor. The key was thrust into the lock, and one of the officers of the prison stood before him. He held in his hand a paper signed by the Governor of the State of Illinois. It was a commutation of his sentence. How the truth burst upon his mind! When the paper was handed to him he could not read it for tears, but it was a paper bringing him his life, and he hugged it and kissed it.

(H. W. Taylor.)

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KJV: In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins:

WEB: in whom we have our redemption, the forgiveness of our sins;