soning is not able to remove. Nothing but humble prayer can, indeed, obtain that faith which, when reason and sound judgment have led us to supernatural truth, gives to unseen things the body and substance of reality. But of this I shall have occasion to speak again.

The degree of conviction produced by Paley's Evidences was, however, sufficiently powerful to make me pray daily for divine assistance. This was done in a very simple manner. Every morning I repeated the Lord's Prayer seriously and attentively, offering up to my Maker a sincere desire of the true knowledge of him. This practice I continued three years; my persuasion that Christianity was not one and the same thing with the Roman Catholic religion, growing stronger all the while. As my rejection of revealed religion had been the effect, not of direct objection to its evidences, but of weighing tenets against them, which they were not intended to support; the balance inclined in favour of the truth of the Gospel, in proportion as I struck out dogmas, which I had been taught to identify with the doctrines of

Christ *. The day arrived, at length, when convinced of the substantial truth of Christianity, no question remained before me, but that of choosing the form under which I was to profess it. The deliberation which preceded this choice was one of no great difficulty to me. The points of difference between the church of England and Rome, though important, are comparatively few: they were, besides, the very points which had produced my general unbelief. That the doctrines common to both churches were found in the Scriptures, my early studies and professional knowledge, left me no room to doubt; and as the Evidences of

* Paley, with his usual penetration, has pointed out this most important result of the Reformation: "When the doctrine of Transubstantiation (he says in his address to Dr. Law, Bishop of Carlisle, prefixed to the Principles of Moral Philosophy) had taken possession of the Christian world, it was not without the industry of learned men that it came at length to be discovered that no such doctrine was contained in the New Testament. But had those excellent persons done nothing more by their discovery than abolished an innocent superstition, or changed some directions in the ceremonial of public worship, they had merited little of that veneration with which the gratitude of Protestant churches remembers their services. What they did for mankind was this-they exonerated Christianity of a weight that sunk it."

soning is not able to remove. Nothing but humble prayer can, indeed, obtain that faith which, when reason and sound judgment have led us to supernatural truth, gives to unseen things the body and substance of reality. But of this I shall have occasion to speak again.

The degree of conviction produced by Paley's Evidences was, however, sufficiently powerful to make me pray daily for divine assistance. This was done in a very simple manner. Every morning I repeated the Lord's Prayer seriously and attentively, offering up to my Maker a sincere desire of the true knowledge of him. This practice I continued three years; my persuasion that Christianity was not one and the same thing with the Roman Catholic religion, growing stronger all the while. As my rejection of revealed religion had been the effect, not of direct objection to its evidences, but of weighing tenets against them, which they were not intended to support; the balance inclined in favour of the truth of the Gospel, in proportion as I struck out dogmas, which I had been taught to identify with the doctrines of

Christ *. The day arrived, at length, when convinced of the substantial truth of Christianity, no question remained before me, but that of choosing the form under which I was to profess it. The deliberation which preceded this choice was one of no great difficulty to me. The points of difference between the church of England and Rome, though important, are comparatively few: they were, besides, the very points which had produced my general unbelief. That the doctrines common to both churches were found in the Scriptures, my early studies and professional knowledge, left me no room to doubt; and as the Evidences of

* Paley, with his usual penetration, has pointed out this most important result of the Reformation: "When the doctrine of Transubstantiation (he says in his address to Dr. Law, Bishop of Carlisle, prefixed to the Principles of Moral Philosophy) had taken possession of the Christian world, it was not without the industry of learned men that it came at length to be discovered that no such doctrine was contained in the New Testament. But had those excellent persons done nothing more by their discovery than abolished an innocent superstition, or changed some directions in the ceremonial of public worship, they had merited little of that veneration with which the gratitude of Protestant churches remembers their services. What they did for mankind was this-they exonerated Christianity of a weight that sunk it."

Revelation had brought me to acknowledge the authority of the Scriptures, I could find no objection to the resumption of tenets which had so long possessed my belief. The communion in which I was inclined to procure admission was not, indeed, that in which I was educated; but I had so long wandered away from the Roman fold, that, when approaching the church of England, both the absence of what had driven me from Catholicism, and the existence of all the other parts of that system, made me feel as if I were returning to the repaired home of my youth.

Upon receiving the sacrament for the first time according to the form of the English church, my early feelings of devotion revived; yet by no means, as it might be feared in a common case, with some secret leaning to what I had left; for Catholicism was thoroughly blended with my bitterest recollections. It was a devotion more calm and more rational; if not quite strong in faith, yet decided as to practice. The religious act I performed I considered as a most solemn engagement to obey the laws of the Gospel; and I thank God, that since that period, whatever