delight in seeing her, as Hamlet says, 'bear her faculties so
meekly'. She was entirely void of conceit and vanity, and did not seem
to have found out that her knowledge exceeded that of most persons of
her age, at least she looked upon it as a casual advantage which
reflected no honour to herself but was entirely owing to Mr Selvyn. Her
youthful cheerfulness enlivened the party without rendering the
conversation less solid; and her amiable disposition made the good
minister particularly anxious for her welfare.

He soon found out Mr Selvyn's scepticism and endeavoured to remove it.
He represented to him that his not being able to understand the most
mysterious parts of Christianity was no argument against the truth of
them. That there were many things in nature whose certainty he by no
means doubted, and yet was totally ignorant of the methods whereby many
of them operated, and even of the use of some of them. Could he say what
purpose the fiery comet answers? How is its motion produced, so regular
in its period, so unequal in its motion, and so eccentric in its course?
Of many other things man is in reality as ignorant, only being able to
form a system which seems to suit in some particulars, he imagines he
has discovered the whole, and will think so till some new system takes
place, and the old one is exploded. He asked Mr Selvyn if they descended
to the meanest objects in what manner could they account for the
polypus's property of supplying that part of its body which shall be cut
away? That insect alone, of all the creation, does not continue maimed
by amputation, but multiplies by it. 'To what can we attribute this
difference in an insect, which in all particulars beside, resembles so
many others? Yet who doubts of the reality of these things? If we cannot
comprehend the smallest works of almighty wisdom, can we expect to
fathom that wisdom itself? And say that such things he cannot do, or
cannot choose because the same effects could be produced by other means?
Man no doubt might exert the same functions under another form, why then
has he this he now wears? Who will not reply, because his Maker chose
it, and chose it as seeing it best. Is not this the proper answer on all
occasions, when the decrees of the Almighty are discussed? Facts only
are obvious to our reason; we must judge of them by the evidence of
their reality if that is sufficient to establish the facts; why, or how
they were produced, is beyond our