is, to me, a mystery. But she had her
reward; at least, in part. For in the fall and retirement of her husband
from public life, and in the consciousness--which was the most terrible
of all--of his guilt, must not her sufferings have been terrible?

It is indeed true that she may not have been wise enough--for this
wisdom has not yet been made public property, in the fullest sense--to
look at the subject in one point of view, which would be calculated to
add to the poignancy of her anguish. So that we may be almost ready to
say, in her case, "Ignorance is bliss." I refer, here, to the infliction
of scrofula and nervousness, by high living, on the next generation.

For while Mrs. Y. was bowing down to public opinion, and preparing rich
viands for her guests, and practically compelling her husband and
children to eat up what they had nibbled at and left, she was not only
fastening dyspepsia upon the former and nervousness upon herself, but
imparting more or less of a tendency to nervousness and scrofula upon
the rest of her family. Of the two thousand children born in a day, in
the United States, from two hundred to three hundred--perhaps nearer
four hundred--come into the world with a scrofulous tendency; and of
these, it is highly probable, that at least one hundred per day are
manufactured at just such tables as those which were set by Mrs. Y. for
the teachers of the religion of Jesus Christ.

I have quoted the old adage, that "Ignorance is bliss;" but alas! is it
not to trifle with the most solemn considerations? Can that be regarded
as blissful which leaves a mother, who, in general, means to love and
honor the Saviour, to destroy her husband and one or two of his
children? There is little doubt that, besides shutting her husband out
of the sacred enclosure, after she had destroyed his health, Mrs. Y. was
the means of destroying at least one or two of her children. One of
them, who was scrofulous, ran at last--a very common occurrence--into
consumption, and perished early, in the beginning of active usefulness.

I may be suspected of exaggeration, by some of my readers. Would to God,
for humanity's sake and for Christ's sake, it were so! For though I
cannot subscribe to the creed of those who profess to be willing to come
into everlasting condemnation for the glory of God, yet, so long as
opportunity for repentance shall last, I would willingly be convicted of
untruth, if so that the falsehood might be made palpab