Channing, both as a revelation of him, and of herself. She
heard him read the psalm, "What shall I render unto God for all his
mercies?" and says, "The ascription of praise which followed was more
truly sublime than anything I ever heard or read." It must have been
an event,--it certainly was for her,--to listen to one of Dr.
Channing's prayers: "It seems often to me, while in the hour of prayer
I give myself up to the thought of heaven, as though I had in reality
left the world, and was enjoying what is promised to the Christian. I
fear, however, these feelings are too often delusive; we substitute
the love of holiness for the actual possession."

There her sanity comes in to check her emotionalism. She is reflecting
upon another experience with Dr. Channing when she comes very near
making a criticism upon him. She tells us that she does not mean him;
he is excepted from these remarks, but she says, "There are few
occasions which will authorize a minister to excite the feelings of an
audience in a very great degree, and none which can make it allowable
for him to rest in mere excitement." To complete the portraiture of
her soul, I will take a passage from a letter written at the age of
twenty-five, when death has at last stripped her of all her family, "I
believe that all events that befall us are exactly such as are best
adapted to improve us; and I find in a perfect confidence in the
wisdom and love which I know directs them, a source of peace which no
other thing can give; and in the difficulty which I find in acting
upon this belief I see a weakness of nature, which those very trials
are designed to assist us in overcoming, and which trial alone can
conquer."

Mary Pickards were not common even in that generation, but this creed
was then common, and this blend of reason and religious feeling,
fearlessly called "piety," was characteristic of Channing, her
teacher, and of Henry Ware, afterward her husband. It was the real
"Channing Unitarianism." Pity there is no more of it.

Mary was sixteen years old,--to be exact, sixteen and a half; the
serene and beautiful faith of Channing had done its perfect work upon
her; and she was now ready for whatever fate, or as she would have
said, Providence, might choose to send. It sent the business failure
of Mr. Pickard, in which not only his own fortune was swept away but
also the estate of Mr. Lovell was involved. Upon the knowledge of this
disaster, Mary wrote a cheerful l