save my own soul; and according to your own doctrine, I stand now a better chance than my moral cousin, Jane. If you have taught me falsely, I was not to blame; the peril be on your own soul. My mind was a blank, and you put your own impressions on it; God (if there be a God) reward you according to your deeds!"

This horrible letter, of which we have given a brief specimen; and subtracted from that the curses that pointed every sentence, seemed for a little while to swell the clamours of Mrs. Wilson's newly awakened conscience. But, alas! the impression was transient; the chains of systematic delusion were too firmly riveted—the habits of self-deception too strong, to be overcome.

Jane, fearful that the violence of her aunt's passion would destroy her reason, sought only, for the remainder of the day and the following night, to soothe and quiet her. She remained by her bedside, and silently watched, and prayed. Mrs. Wilson's sleep was disturbed, but she awoke somewhat refreshed, and quite composed. Her first action was to tear David's letter into a thousand fragments. She was never known afterwards to allude to its contents, nor to her conversation with Jane. There was a restlessness through the remainder of her life, which betrayed the secret gnawings of conscience. Still it is believed, she quelled her convictions as Cromwell is reported to have done, when, as his historian says, he asked Goodwin, one of his preachers, if the doctrine were true, that the elect should never fall, nor suffer a final reprobation?" Nothing more certain," replied the preacher. "Then I am safe," said the Protector; "for I am sure I was once in a state of grace."

Mrs. Wilson survived these events but a few years. She was finally carried off by scrofula, a disease from which she

had suffered all her life, and which had probably increased the natural asperity of her temper; as all evils, physical as well as moral, certainly make us worse, if they do not make us better. Elvira was summoned to her death-bed; but she arrived too late to receive either the reproaches or forgiveness of her mother. Jane faithfully attended her through her last illness, and most kindly ministered to the diseases of her body. Her mind no human comfort could reach; no earthly skill touch is secret springs. The disease was attended with delirium ; and she had no rational communication with any one from the beginning of her illness. This Jane afterwards sincerely deplored to Mr. Lloyd, who replied, "I would not sit like the Egyptians in judgment on the dead. Thy aunt has gone with her record to Him who alone knows the secrets of the heart, and therefore is alone qualified to judge His creatures; but for our own benefit, Jane, and for the sake of those whose probation is not past, let us ever remember the wise saying of William Penn, 'a man cannot be the better for that religion for which his neighbour is the worse.' I have no doubt thy aunt has suffered some natural compunctions for her gross failure in the performance of her duties; but she felt safe in a sound faith. It is reported, that one of the Popes said of himself, that as Eneas Sylvius, he was a damnable heretic, but as Pius II. an orthodox Pope.""

6

"Then you believe," replied Jane, "that my unhappy aunt deceived herself by her clamorous profession?"

"Undoubtedly. Ought we to wonder that she effected that imposition on herself, by the aid of self-love, (of all love the most blinding,) since we have heard, in her funeral sermon, her religious experiences detailed as the triumphs of a saint; her strict attention on religious ordinances commended, as if they were the end and not the means of a religious life; since

we (who cannot remember a single gracious act of humility in her whole life) have been told, as a proof of her gracious state, that the last rational words she pronounced were, that she was of sinners the chief?' There seems to be a curious spiritual alchymy in the utterance of these words; for we cannot say, that those who use them mean to 'palter in a double sense,' but they are too often spoken and received as the evidence of a hopeful state. Professions and declarations have crept in among the Protestants, to take the place of the mortifications and penances of the ancient church; so prone are men to find some easier way to heaven than the toilsome path of obedience."

CHAPTER XVI.

God, the best maker of all marriages,
Combine your hearts in one.

HENRY V.

WE have anticipated our story, tempted by a natural desire to conclude the history of Mrs. Wilson, that its deep shade might not interfere with the bright lights that are falling on the destiny of our heroine. After the dissolution of her engagement with Erskine, Jane continued her humble vocation of schoolmistress for some months. Rebecca Lloyd had from the beginning been one of her pupils, and a favourite among them; and so devotedly did the child love her instructress, that Mr. Lloyd often thought impulse was as sure a guide for her affections as reason for his. Jane's care of his child furnished him occasion, and an excuse when he needed it, for frequent intercourse with her, and in this intercourse there were none of those mysterious embarrassments (mysterious, because inexplicable to all but the parties) that so often check the progress of affection. Jane, released from the thraldom in which she had been bound to Erskine, was as happy as a liberated captive. Her tastes and her views were similar to Mr. Lloyd's, and she found in his society a delight

ful exchange, and a rich compensation for the solitude to which her mind and affections had been condemned.

We are ignorant, perhaps Jane was, of the precise moment when gratitude melted into love, and friendship resigned the reins to his more fervid dominion. But it was not long after this, nor quite "a year and a day" (the period of mourning usually allotted to a faithful husband) after her separation from Erskine, that, as she was sitting with Mrs. Harvey in her little parlour, Mr. Lloyd entered with his child. After the customary greetings, Mrs. Harvey suddenly recollected that some domestic duties demanded her presence, and saying with an arch smile to Mr. Lloyd that she "hoped he would overlook her absence," she left the room. Little Rebecca was sitting on her father's knee; she took from his bosom a miniature of her mother, which he always wore there, and seemed intently studying the lovely face which the artist had truly delineated. "Do the angels look like my mother?" she asked.

"Why, my child ?”

"I thought, father, they might look like her, she looks so bright and so good." She kissed the picture, and after a moment's pause, added, "Jane looks like mother, all but the cap; dost not thee think, father, Jane would look pretty in a Quaker cap?" Mr Lloyd kissed his little girl, and said nothing. Rebecca's eyes followed the direction of her father's: "Oh, Jane !" she exclaimed, "thou dost not look like mother now, thy cheeks are as red as my new doll's."

The child's observation of her treacherous cheek had certainly no tendency to lessen poor Jane's colour. She would have been glad to hide her face any where, but it was broad daylight, and there was now no escape from the declaration which had been hovering on Mr. Lloyd's lips for some weeks,