it did. He would not suffer himself to
dwell upon difficulties which he was determined never should be realized.
No; of course a heathen he could not marry, but a heathen Callista should
not be. He did not see the process, but he was convinced she would become
a Christian. Yet somehow so it was, that, if he was able to stultify his
reason, he did not quite succeed to his satisfaction with his conscience.
Every morning found him less satisfied with himself, and more disposed to
repent of having allowed his uncle to enter on the subject with Aristo.
But it was a thing done and over; he must either awkwardly back out, or he
must go on. His middle term, as he hastily had considered it, was nothing
else than siding with his uncle, and committing himself to go all lengths,
unless some difficulty rose with the other party. Yet could he really wish
that the step had not been taken? Was it not plain that if he was to put
away Callista from his affections, he must never go near her? And was he
to fall back on his drear solitude, and lose that outlet of thought and
relief of mind which he had lately found in the society of his Greek
friends?

We may easily believe that he was not very peaceful in heart when he set
out on that morning to call upon Aristo; yet he would not allow that he
was doing wrong. He recurred to the pleasant imagination that Callista
would certainly become a Christian, and dwelt pertinaciously upon it. He
could not tell on what it was founded; he knew enough of his religion not
to mean that she was too good to be a heathen; so it is to be supposed he
meant that he discerned what he hoped were traces of some supernatural
influence operating upon her mind. He had a perception, which he could not
justify by argument, that there was in Callista a promise of something
higher than anything she yet was. He felt a strange sympathy with her,
which certainly unless he utterly deceived himself, was not based on
anything merely natural or human,--a sympathy the more remarkable from the
contrariety which existed between them in matters of religious belief. And
hope having blown this large and splendid bubble, sent it sailing away,
and it rose upon the buoyant atmosphere of youth, beautiful to behold.

And yet, as Agellius ascended the long flight of marble steps which led
the foot-passenger up into that fair city, while the morning sun was
glancing across them, and surveyed the outline of the many sumptuous
buildings whic