e been asked, at the time of which we
speak, where was her principle and her consistency, what was her logic, or
whether she acted on reason, or on impulse, or on feeling, or in fancy, or
in passion, she would have been reduced to silence. What did she know
about herself, but that, to her surprise, the more she thought over what
she heard of Christianity, the more she was drawn to it, and the more it
approved itself to her whole soul, and the more it seemed to respond to
all her needs and aspirations, and the more intimate was her presentiment
that it was true? The longer it remained on her mind as an object, the
more it seemed (unlike the mythology or the philosophy of her country, or
the political religion of Rome) to have an external reality and substance,
which deprived objections to it of their power, and showed them to be at
best but difficulties and perplexities.

But then again, if she had been asked, what was Christianity, she would
have been puzzled to give an answer. She would have been able to mention
some particular truths which it taught, but neither to give them their
definite and distinct shape, nor to describe the mode in which they were
realised. She would have said, "I believe what has been told me, as from
heaven, by Chione, Agellius, and Caecilius:" and it was clear she could say
nothing else. What the three told her in common and in concord was at once
the measure of her creed and the ground of her acceptance of it. It was
that wonderful unity of sentiment and belief in persons so dissimilar from
each other, so distinct in their circumstances, so independent in their
testimony, which recommended to her the doctrine which they were so
unanimous in teaching. She had long given up any belief in the religion of
her country. As to philosophy, it dwelt only in conjecture and opinion;
whereas the very essence of religion was, as she felt, a recognition of
the worshippers on the part of the Object of it. Religion could not be
without hope. To worship a being who did not speak to us, recognise us,
love us, was not religion. It might be a duty, it might be a merit; but
her instinctive notion of religion was the soul's response to a God who
had taken notice of the soul. It was loving intercourse, or it was a name.
Now the three witnesses who had addressed her about Christianity had each
of them made it to consist in the intimate Divine Presence in the heart.
It was the friendship or mutual love of person with p