MISS NEWMAN.

I reason, Mrs. Dormer, on the supposition that a Christian is to make the unseen realities of a future world his grand scope; 1 and that every thing in this world is to be appreciated by its connection with eternity. If I am wrong in my principle of action, do tell me. But to answer your questions, I verily think that young women in the present age are by far too much in public company; and that thereby many of them become forward, petulant, and loquacious, to the utter destruction of that shamefacedness and sobriety, which the apostle mentions as the highest ornament of the female sex. To read a lecture on education, however, is not my province; and your questions may be answered, without adverting to that subject. For we are highly favoured in having so many families among us which profess godliness, with whom we may maintain a friendly and a profitable intercourse; so that there is no necessity of our

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seclusion from all society, on the one hand; nor of seeking it, to the danger of our peace, and the hinderance of our growth in the divine life, on the other. And therefore, though no plea can excuse a voluntary intrusion of ourselves into worldly company; yet our choice of it is more inexcusable than theirs who are differently situated, and must either bury themselves in absolute privacy, or plunge themselves into temptation.

MRS. DORMER.

But may not Mrs. Philmund innocently.comply with the inclinations of her children? You know that her daughters, at least some of them, make no profession of religion. And would you debar them from all the amusements, which are suited to their age and situation?

MISS NEWMAN.

The conduct of my own honoured and beloved parents, in the management of me and

my sister, appears to me to exhibit a model worthy of imitation. It is only within a very few years, as you must remember, that I have found that satisfaction in religion which renders the pleasures and vanities of the world insipid and its society disgusting. Antecedent to the time from which, I hope, I may date my conversion to God, I felt as many other young persons feel, a powerful attraction to those scenes of vanity of which I had heard by report; though my parents (gratefully do I recall to memory the kind restraint!) had wisely kept me from any experimental acquaintance with them. While, however the piety of those, to whom I looked up as vested with an unlimited right of controling and directing my conduct, prohibited my introduction to places of amusement and the haunts of sinful gratification; they made it manifest that they were not influenced in their conduct by any motive but the promotion of my good; for they afforded me every mean of innocent and profitable amusement which their circumstances would admit; and endeavoured, by degrees, as I was capable of

receiving instruction, to lead my mind, in my juvenile studies, from nature to nature's God. By these efforts my heart, though it sometimes hankered after forbidden diversions, of which it scarcely knew the nature, was kept, in general, satisfied without them; and though as yet I knew not God, my engagements were such as rather tended to habituate my mind to the contemplation and love of his name, and not to alienate it from him. From one species of study which my father proposed, and at which I eagerly caught as a new object, I derived a considerable degree of pleasure and profit. Ever anxious to engage my attention to something useful, he one day said to me, "My dear Ann, a knowledge of the word of God is the most sublime and valuable acquisition we can make. It is essential to our present comfort and future happiness. Under this impression your mother and I, solicitous for your welfare here and hereafter, have endeavoured to instil into your mind, and into that of our dear Eliza, the principles of Christianity. You are both tolerably well instructed in the historical parts of the Bible;

and I am looking forward to the time, when I hope God will enlighten your minds, and captivate your affections, by the doctrinal and preceptive parts of it. To afford you an experimental introspection of its interior mysteries, is beyond our power: this must be derived from divine teaching, which we daily solicit from heaven on your behalf. In the interval I could wish your time to be employed, and your faculties exercised in a way that may be preparatory thereto and with this view, I propose to your consideration an attempt of acquiring some knowledge of the primeval language, in which the first Scriptures were written. You will find the pursuit both amusing and profitable. There are charms in the language which God himself taught our first parents in Paradise,' which no language derived therefrom (as all other languages are) can possibly possess. At present I cannot explain to you the admirable peculiarities, by which it is distinguished from every thing of human invention. But, if you consent

1 See note C. in Appendix.

2 See Rev. Wm. Jones's Letter to the Hon. L. K. on the