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me to live with comfort, and lay a little by. What more did I want to render me a happy man, it may be asked; and it may also be answered, I wanted humility; and, in wanting that, I wanted every thing because humility is the only substantial basis on which happiness can be reared; for in wanting humility, as it concerns our spiritual affairs, we must ever remain ignorant of our need of a Saviour; and in wanting it in our temporal affairs, we must be ever going wrong, and heaping up stores for the future of regret and sorrow.

I am about to speak of my wife as she was, and as she would now speak of her former self, without the fear of incurring the smallest displeasure; for I trust that she is now, and has been for some years, a totally changed character.

She was young when I married her; and, being an orphan, she had been brought up at an ordinary school. She was handsome, and had acquired a taste for company, but was not a bad housewife; and, as I was much from home, provided I found a good meal, and my house neat, on my return, and discovered that my bills at Christmas were not larger than I had expected, I was very well satisfied; though, even during the first year of my marriage, my father hinted to me that there were some things in my wife's conduct which it might be well to correct. "Your wife, my dear James," my father said to me, one day, "is young, and you are a great deal from home: her dress is remarked as being too much in the fashion-somewhat out of the common way; and, as your family are known to be plain sort of people, it is not thought consistent. Perhaps a kind word from you might set this matter right;" and he was adding more, when I interrupted him, by saying, "As long as my wife does not do any thing actually immoral, father, I shall not interfere with her. If every person, in unimportant matters, were to be subservient to the will of another, what a miserable condition on earth would ours be rendered! I am a respecter of the rights of women, as well as those of men. The husband and wife bind themselves together in society for mutual convenience. The man takes his part, the woman hers; the woman manages matters in her sphere, the man in his. There is no need of interference on either side, so long as they respect each other's privileges. The shape and form of my wife's bonnets do not affect my comfort; she may

fashion them as she pleases. In these matters I am for liberty of conscience."

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"Your comfort, James," replied my father, "is not what we are talking of, but your respectability. your wife is not prudent in such matters, you will be blamed. A man either derives shame or honour from his wife's appearance. He therefore cannot be so independent of her as you pretend."

"Your ideas, let me tell you, sir," I replied," are quite old-fashioned-obsolete-out of date. Permit me to explain to you the change of views which has taken place since your juvenile days. The march of intellect, during the last thirty years, has been more rapid than for hundreds of years before. The present generation, instead of blindly following the past, has been brought to perceive the fallacy of many opinions which were formerly held as infallible. For instance: that system of domestic tyranny which has pervaded all ranks and degrees of men until the present time, is now exploded, and a new code of morals is introduced-one more suited to the weakness of our nature, and to the laws of the Divine government-one, in fact, more rational, and better suited to the amiable nature of man."

My father looked perplexed as I proceeded, and I was wicked enough to be amused by his very apparent confusion of manner. I was enjoying my triumph, standing behind my counter, and seemingly more engaged with my phials and drugs than with the argument, when a champion, with whom I never could grapple so successfully as with my father, entered the shop. This was my brother; who had scarcely appeared, when my father appealed to him, asking him if he had not heard some very unpleasant remarks made on the dress of his sister-in-law on the Sunday before, as he was coming "And I was just saying to James, Robert," continued the good old gentleman, "that, as his wife is so young, a kind word from him might be advan tageous not that I would make mischief, for the world between man and wife; but, as James is five or six years older than Eliza, he might, you know, just give a gentle hint, and set things all right at once; for, after all, there is no great sin in these fine fashions; only, you know, people will talk."

out of church.

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Robert smiled, and shrugged up his shoulders, hinting that it would never do for him to interfere between

his brother and his wife; and was proceeding to other matters, when I insisted on his hearing what I had to say.

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Robert," I said; "it would save a vast many contentions, in future, if my father could be made to understand my way of thinking; and could learn not to bring my actions to the standard of his own opinions; which, as I just now said, are obsolete and out of date. The progress of intellect," I continued, with much pomposity, "has, it is very certain, proceeded with increased velocity from age to age, in proportion as the shadows of ignorance and darkness have withdrawn. This progress has, no doubt, been precipitated, to an almost incalculable degree, by the art of printing, and the consequent general diffusion of learning." Here I paused, to take breath, and, indeed, to consider what I was going to say, for I began to feel myself somewhat bewildered; and Robert was so provoking as not to attempt any sort of interruption, which, of whatever description, would probably have relieved me considerably, and set me off again with renewed velocity. But he was mischievously silent, and stood in an attitude of mute and respectful attention, as if bowing to my superior genius. I was therefore obliged to proceed; and added, “In shortin short, owing to this rapid march of intellect," and there I hesitated again, for I did not like the expressive smile which rested on Robert's countenance; "in short we consider that-that many things which were once thought right are now wrong, and vice versa.”

"And what was once thought wrong is now right," added Robert: "is that what you mean by vice versâ?" "Vice! vice!" said my father, getting quite warm: "you may well talk of vice and wickedness; too much learning, I am sure, has made you mad, James. I fear you don't deal in such a drug as common sense in your shop, boy, or I should turn doctor myself, and prescribe a few grains for your own use;" and, so saying, he walked out of the door, sighing heavily, as he stepped into the street.

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"There now," said Robert, with displeasure, you have made our father unhappy with your abominable nonsense. Pray, is it among your new discoveries that it is a good and right thing to make a gray-headed parent weep, for I saw the tears in his eyes? but you cannot have taken leave of your senses altogether,

James. What do you mean by all this nonsense? you have some meaning, I suppose?"

I became angry in my turn, and spoke roughly to my brother; but we were both more calm presently; and, as I was just stepping out to visit a patient who resided about half a mile in the country, we walked together, and I then tried to make him understand what I meant. I first began by asking him if he thought that a custom or principle must be good because it was ancient?

He replied, "Certainly not; otherwise the customs and habits instituted before the Flood must have been the best, because they were the first established on earth."

I must remark in this place, that almost all my brother's learning is derived from Scripture.

"You grant, then," I answered, "that old customs may be bad, and old received principles may be false ?" "Neither customs nor principles are necessarily good because they are old,” replied Robert; “neither are they necessarily bad for that reason.

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"True," I replied; "I am willing to argue fairly.” "But is it not probable," I continued, "that, as science and literature advance, many things may hereafter appear right to us which now seem wrong, and the contrary?"

"I allow that every thing is capable of improvement, in theory, and in practice too," replied Robert, "excepting religion and morality. These, indeed, may, and we trust will, be better attended to in practice as knowledge increases, but their theory cannot be amended. We can have no new lights on these subjects beyond what the Bible can supply; and our fathers had the Gospel; and the moral law was declared ages past, and will continue in its perfection for ever. Therefore, I deny what you assert, that the opinion of religious persons can ever change respecting right and wrong."

"Surely," I replied, "the same things may be seen in a different point of view, by an enlightened and an ignorant person.'

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"Not simple matters of wrong," replied my brother. science is an unerring guide. less aware when he is doing wrong. Else why have even the smallest children recourse to concealment when they meditate an immoral act?"

"The fear of shame or punishment," I answered, "is what induces this deceit or concealment, which we see in all children, when they seek to do what they think will not please their parents. And now I am come to the point at which I was aiming. Those persons who have received the new and improved light of which I am speaking would wish to see a more easy and charitable discipline established in the place of those severe laws by which offences are multiplied, and occasions of guilt are created."

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Really, James," replied Robert, "you must explain yourself further before I can understand you."

"For instance: let us first speak of our religious establishment as it exists in this country," I answered. "Why should it be a sin to preach without a gown and cassock? or to pray extempore, instead of using a pre scribed form?"

"I do not know that it is a sin," replied Robert.

"It is so far a sin that those persons who do not conform to these rules are excluded from many offices in church and state," I replied.

"For the same reason," replied Robert, "that you would refuse to take a partner or apprentice in your profession who disapproved of your mode of practice.”

"I don't say that I should refuse any partner or apprentice on that account," I answered; for I was determined to uphold my sentiments through thick and thin. Robert smiled.

Nothing used to provoke me, at that time, so much as the playful way of my brother, though there was not the least appearance of sarcasm in his manner, or, I verily believe, in his mind. And I asked him what amused him so much.

"I was thinking," he answered, "what a plight the poor patients would soon be reduced to, when the doctor and his apprentice chose to think and act upon different principles."

"Robert,” I said, "surely you can never be serious?" "Well, I will," he replied." And to return to our religious establishment. I think it is reasonable that persons whose opinions do not agree with those of the bulk of the nation in spiritual matters should be excluded from situations of authority in the country; though I think it would be very hard to deprive them of the free exercise of their religion."

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