et benignity of Mrs. Carlton's countenance was lighted up at our
entrance with a smile of satisfaction. We had been informed with what
pleasure she observed every accession of right-minded acquaintance which
her husband made. Though her natural modesty prevented her from
introducing any subject herself, yet when any thing useful was brought
forward by others, she promoted it by a look compounded of pleasure and
intelligence.

After a variety of topics had been dispatched, the conversation fell on
the prejudices which were commonly entertained by men of the world
against religion. "For my own part," said Mr. Carlton, "I must confess
that no man had ever more or stronger prejudices to combat than myself.
I mean not my own exculpation when I add, that the imprudence, the want
of judgment, and, above all, the incongruous mixtures and
inconsistencies in many characters who are reckoned religious, are ill
calculated to do away the unfavorable opinions of men of an opposite way
of thinking. As I presume that you, gentlemen, are not ignorant of the
errors of my early life--error indeed is an appellation far too mild--I
shall not scruple to own to you the source of those prejudices which
retarded my progress, even after I became ashamed of my deviations from
virtue. I had felt the turpitude of my bad habits long before I had
courage to renounce them; and I renounced them long before I had courage
to avow my abhorrence of them."

Sir John and I expressed ourselves extremely obliged by the candor of
his declaration, and assured him that his further communications would
not only gratify but benefit us.

"Educated as I had been," said Mr. Carlton, "in an almost entire
ignorance of religion, mine was rather a habitual indifference than a
systematic unbelief. My thoughtless course of life, though it led me to
hope that Christianity might not be true, yet had by no means been able
to convince me that it was false. As I had not been taught to search for
truth at the fountain, for I was unacquainted with the Bible, I had no
readier means for forming my judgment than by observing, though with a
careless and casual eye, what effect religion produced in those who
professed to be influenced by it. My observations augmented my
prejudices. What I saw of the professors increased my dislike of the
profession. All the charges brought by their enemies, for I had been
accustomed to weigh the validity of testimony, had not riveted my
dislike so m