 using ill those whom her merit has captivated, and her judgment can not accept."

After admiring in the warmest terms the purity and generosity of her heart, I pressed Dr. Barlow still further, as to the interior of her mind. I questioned him as to her early habits, and particularly as to her religious attainments, telling him that nothing was indifferent to me which related to Lucilla.

"Miss Stanley," replied he, "is governed by a simple, practical end, in all her religious pursuits. She reads her Bible, not from habit, that she may acquit herself of a customary form; not to exercise her ingenuity by allegorizing literal passages, or spiritualizing plain ones, but that she may improve in knowledge and grow in grace. She accustoms herself to meditation, in order to get her mind more deeply imbued with a sense of eternal things. She practices self-examination, that she may learn to watch against the first risings of bad dispositions, and to detect every latent evil in her heart. She lives in the regular habit of prayer, not only that she may implore pardon of sin, but that she may obtain strength against it. She told me one day when she was ill, that if she did not constantly examine the actual state of her mind, she should pray at random, without any certainty what particular sins she should pray against, or what were her particular wants. She has read much Scripture and little controversy. There are some doctrines that she does not pretend to define, which she yet practically adopts. She can not perhaps give you a disquisition on the mysteries of the Holy Spirit, but she can and does fervently implore his guidance and instruction; she believes in his efficacy, and depends on his support. She is sensible that those truths, which from their deep importance are most obvious, have more of the vitality of religion, and influence practice more, than those abstruse points which unhappily split the religious world into so many parties.

"If I were to name what are her predominant virtues, I should say sincerity and humility. Conscious of her own imperfections, she never justifies her faults, and seldom extenuates them. She receives reproof with meekness, and advice with gratitude. Her own conscience is always so ready to condemn her, that she never wonders, nor takes offense, at the censures of others."

"That softness of manner which you admire in her is not the varnish of good breeding, nor is it merely the effect of good temper, though in both she excels, but it is the result of
