oth sexes, may be dismissed as quite
worthless. They are merely using the language placed in their mouths by
professional evangelists, and the similarity of the confessions carry
their own condemnation. Leading a sinful, or even a vicious life,
usually means no more than visiting a theatre, or a music hall, or
playing cards, or non-attendance at church, or not troubling about
religious doctrines. Very often the vague feeling of restlessness
incident to adolescence is interpreted as due to sin or estrangement
from God, and after conversion the convert is, for purposes of
self-glorification, given to magnify the benefits and comforts derived
from his religious convictions. The magnitude of the change increases
the value of the convert, and with well-known characters there has been
as great an exaggeration of vices before conversion as of virtues
subsequently. The way in which evangelical Christianity has created a
life of the wildest dissipation for the earlier years of John Bunyan is
an instructive instance of this procedure.

So far as older converts are concerned, everyone of balanced judgment
will regard stories of conversion from extreme vice to extreme virtue
with the greatest suspicion. Character does not change suddenly,
although there may be cases of 'sports' in the moral world as elsewhere.
Where some modification of conduct, but hardly of character, results,
the machinery is very obvious, and does not in the least necessitate an
appeal to the intrusion of a supernatural influence for an explanation.
The religious gathering opens--as any non-religious meeting may open--a
new circle of associates with different ideals and standards of value.
So long as the newcomer is desirous of retaining the respect of his
fresh associates, so long he will try to act as they act and think as
they think. There will be a change of conduct, but not, as I have said,
of character. Those who look closely will find the same character still
active. The mean character remains mean, the untruthful one remains
untruthful. The only difference is that these qualities will be
expressed in a different form. Moreover, the same thing may be seen
occurring quite apart from religion. Every association of men and women
exerts precisely the same influence. In the army, a regiment that has a
reputation for steadiness and sobriety develops these qualities in all
who enter it. Regiments with a reputation for opposite qualities do not
fail to convert n