o ascribe an undue importance to wealth.
This I should have thought more pardonable under their circumstances,
had I not expected that religion would in this respect have more than
supplied the deficiencies of education. Their religion, however,
consisted almost exclusively in a disproportionate zeal for a very few
doctrines. And though they were far from being immoral in their own
practice, yet, in their discourse, they affected to undervalue morality.

This was, indeed, more particularly the case with the lady, whose chief
object of discourse seemed to be, to convince me of her great
superiority to her husband in polemical skill. Her chaste conversation
certainly was not coupled with fear. In one respect she was the very
reverse of those pharisees who were scrupulously exact about their petty
observances. Mrs. Ranby was, on the contrary, anxious about a very few
important particulars, and exonerated herself from the necessity of all
inferior attentions. She was strongly attached to one or two preachers,
and discovered little candor for all others, or for those who attended
them. Nay, she somewhat doubted of the soundness of the faith of her
friends and acquaintance who would not incur great inconvenience to
attend one or other of her favorites.

Mrs. Ranby's table was "more than hospitably good." There was not the
least suspicion of Latin here. The eulogist of female ignorance might
have dined in comfortable security against the intrusion and vanity of
erudition. She had three daughters, not unpleasing young women. But I
was much concerned to observe, that they were not only dressed to the
very extremity of fashion, but their drapery was as transparent, as
short, and as scanty, there was as sedulous a disclosure of their
persons, and as great a redundancy of ornaments, as I had seen in the
gayest circles.

"Expect not perfection," said my good mother, "but look for
_consistency_." This principle my parents had not only taught me in the
closet, but had illustrated by their deportment in the family and in the
world. They observed a uniform correctness in their general demeanor.
They were not over anxious about character for its own sake, but they
were tenderly vigilant not to bring any reproach on the Christian name
by imprudence, negligence, or inconsistency, even in small things.
"Custom," said my mother, "can never alter the immutable nature of
right; fashion can never justify any practice which is improper in
its