the pleasure
will not be quite destitute of profit."

"My dear Sir John," replied Mr. Stanley, "in conversing with Mr. Tyrrel,
I labor under a disadvantage common to every man, who, when he is called
to defend some important principle which he thinks attacked or
undervalued, is brought into danger of being suspected to undervalue
others, which, if they in their turn were assailed, he would defend with
equal zeal. When points of the last importance are slighted as
insignificant in order exclusively to magnify one darling opinion, I am
driven to appear as if I opposed that important tenet, which, if I may
so speak, seems pitted against the others. Those who do not previously
know my principles, might almost suspect me of being an opposer of that
prime doctrine, which I really consider as the leading principle of
Christianity."

"Allow me to say," returned Sir John, "that my surprise has been equal
to my satisfaction. Those very doctrines which you maintained, I had
been assured, were the very tenets you rejected. Many of our
acquaintance, who do not come near enough to judge, or who would not be
competent to judge if they did, ascribe the strictness of your practice
to some unfounded peculiarities of opinion, and suspect that the
doctrines of Tyrrel, though somewhat modified, a little more rationally
conceived, and more ably expressed, are the doctrines held by you, and
by every man who rises above the ordinary standard of what the world
calls religious men. And what is a little absurd and inconsistent, they
ascribe to these supposed dangerous doctrines, his abstinence from the
diversions, and his disapprobation of the manners and maxims of the
world. _Your_ opinions, however, I always suspected could not be very
pernicious, the effects of which, from the whole tenor of your life, I
knew to be so salutary.

"I now find upon full proof that there is nothing in your sentiments but
what a man of sense may approve; nothing but what if he be really a man
of sense, he will without scruple adopt. May I be enabled more fully,
more practically, to adopt them! You shall point out to me such a course
of reading as may not only clear up my remaining difficulties, but, what
is infinitely more momentous than the solution of any abstract question,
may help to awaken me to a more deep and lively sense of my own
individual interest in this great concern!"

Mr. Stanley's benevolent countenance was lighted up with more than its
wonted