she to me, "I'll fairly own that it was I that instructed my girls to encourage our landlord's addresses. I had always some ambition, and you now see that I was right; for who knows how this may end?"-" Ay, who knows that indeed!" answered I, with a groan: " for my part, I don't much like it; and I could have been better pleased with one that was poor and honest, than this fine gentleman with his fine fortune and infidelity; for depend on 't, if he be what I suspect him, no freethinker shall ever have a child of mine."

"Sure, father," cried Moses, " you are too severe in this for Heaven will never arraign him for what he thinks, but for what he does. Every man has a thousand vicious thoughts which arise without his power to suppress. Thinking freely of religion may be involuntary with this gentleman; so that allowing his sentiments to be wrong, yet as he is purely passive in his assent, he is no more to be blamed for his errors, than the governor of a city without walls for the shelter he is obliged to afford an invading enemy."

"True, my son," cried I; "but if the governor invites the enemy there, he is justly culpable. And such is always the case with those who embrace error. The vice does not lie in assenting to the proofs they see; but in being blind to many of the proofs that offer. So that,

though our erroneous opinions be involuntary when formed, yet as we have been wilfully corrupt, or very negligent in forming them, we deserve punishment for our vice, or contempt for our folly."

My wife now kept up the conversation, though not the argument: she observed, that several very prudent men of our acquaintance were freethinkers, and made very good husbands; and she knew some sensible girls that had skill enough to make converts of their spouses: "And who knows, my dear," continued she, "what Olivia may be able to do. The girl has a great deal to say upon every subject, and to my knowledge is very well skilled in controversy."

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Why, my dear, what controversy can she have read?” cried I. "It does not occur to me that I ever put such books into her hands: you certainly overrate her merit."

"Indeed, papa," replied Olivia, "she does not: I have read a great deal of controversy. I have read the disputes between Thwackum and Square; the controversy between Robinson Crusoe and Friday the savage, and I am now employed in reading the controversy in Religious Courtship."

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Very well," cried I, "that's a "that's a good girl; I find you are perfectly qualified for making converts, and so

go help your mother to make the gooseberry-pie.”

H

-So loud a report, and so near, startled my daughters; and I could perceive that Sophia, in the fright, had thrown herself into Mr. Burchell's arms for protection.

Page 58.

CHAPTER VIII.

PRODUCTIVE OF MUCH.

THE next morning we were again visited by Mr. Burchell, though I began, for certain reasons, to be displeased with the frequency of his return; but I could not refuse him my company and fireside. It is true his labour more than requited his entertainment; for he wrought among us with vigour, and either in the meadow

or at the hay-rick put himself foremost. Besides, he had always something amusing to say that lessened our toil, and was at once so out of the way, and yet so sensible, that I loved, laughed at, and pitied him. My only dislike arose from an attachment he discovered to my daughter: he would, in a jesting manner, call her his little mistress; and when he bought each of the girls a set of ribands, hers was the finest. I knew not how, but he every day seemed to become more amiable, his wit to improve, and his simplicity to assume the superior airs of wisdom.

Our family dined in the field, and we sat, or rather reclined, round a temperate repast, our cloth spread upon the hay, while Mr. Burchell gave cheerfulness to the feast. To heighten our satisfaction, two blackbirds answered each other from opposite hedges, the familiar redbreast came and pecked the crumbs from our hands, and every sound seemed but the echo of tranquillity. "I never sit thus," said Sophia, "but I think of the two lovers so sweetly described by Mr. Gay, who were struck dead in each other's arms. There is something so pathetic in the description, that I have read it a hundred times with new rapture."—" In my opinion," cried my son," the finest strokes in that description are much below those in the Acis and Galatea of Ovid. The

Roman poet understands the use of contrast better, and upon that figure artfully managed, all strength in the pathetic depends."-" It is remarkable," cried Mr. Burch

ell, "that both the poets you mention have equally contributed to introduce a false taste into their respective countries, by loading all their lines with epithet. Men of little genius found them most easily imitated in their defects, and English poetry, like that in the latter empire of Rome, is nothing at present but a combination of luxuriant images, without plot or connexion; a string of epithets that improve the sound, without carrying on the sense. But perhaps, madam, while I thus reprehend others, you'll think it just that I should give them an opportunity to retaliate, and indeed I have made this remark only to have an opportunity of introducing to the company a ballad, which, whatever be its other defects, is, I think, at least free from those I have mentioned."

A BALLAD.

"Turn, gentle Hermit of the Dale,
And guide my lonely way,

To where yon taper cheers the vale
With hospitable ray.

"For here forlorn and lost I tread,

With fainting steps and slow;
Where wilds, immeasurably spread,
Seem length'ning as I go."