ves. How he came to have so much influence as to defeat their
intentions, still remains a secret to me; but I am convinced he was ever
our warmest sincerest friend.'

'You amaze me, my dear,' cried I; 'but now I find my first suspicions
of Mr Thornhill's baseness were too well grounded: but he can triumph in
security; for he is rich and we are poor. But tell me, my child, sure it
was no small temptation that could thus obliterate all the impressions
of such an education, and so virtuous a disposition as thine.'

'Indeed, Sir,' replied she, 'he owes all his triumph to the desire I had
of making him, and not myself, happy. I knew that the ceremony of our
marriage, which was privately performed by a popish priest, was no way
binding, and that I had nothing to trust to but his honour.' 'What,'
interrupted I, 'and were you indeed married by a priest, and in
orders?'--'Indeed, Sir, we were,' replied she, 'though we were both
sworn to conceal his name.'--'Why then, my child, come to my arms again,
and now you are a thousand times more welcome than before; for you are
now his wife to all intents and purposes; nor can all the laws of man,
tho' written upon tables of adamant, lessen the force of that sacred
connexion.'

'Alas, Papa,' replied she, 'you are but little acquainted with his
villainies: he has been married already, by the same priest, to six or
eight wives more, whom, like me, he has deceived and abandoned.'

'Has he so?' cried I, 'then we must hang the priest, and you shall
inform against him to-morrow.'--'But Sir,' returned she, 'will that be
right, when I am sworn to secrecy?'--'My dear,' I replied, 'if you have
made such a promise, I cannot, nor will I tempt you to break it. Even
tho' it may benefit the public, you must not inform against him. In all
human institutions a smaller evil is allowed to procure a greater good;
as in politics, a province may be given away to secure a kingdom; in
medicine, a limb may be lopt off, to preserve the body. But in religion
the law is written, and inflexible, never to do evil. And this law, my
child, is right: for otherwise, if we commit a smaller evil, to procure
a greater good, certain guilt would be thus incurred, in expectation of
contingent advantage. And though the advantage should certainly follow,
yet the interval between commission and advantage, which is allowed to
be guilty, may be that in which we are called away to answer for the
things we have done, and the volum