neral study and criticism. For generations it has been assailed on every side, but it stands in the calm, unchanging strength that yonder mountain would maintain, were it surrounded by children shooting against it with arrows. Believe me, I do not fear for the Bible. If all the light of human knowledge were turned upon it in one burning focus, its intrinsic truth would only be revealed more clearly; and if superstition, as in the past, or infidelity, as was the case in France, creates temporary darkness, the moment that, in the light of returning reason, men look for the Bible, they find it like a great solemn mountain, that cannot be moved while the world lasts, just where God has placed it."

"Mr. Hemstead, don't you know that young gentlemen do not talk to young ladies as you do to me?"

"You know very well that I am not a society man."

"O, I'm not complaining. I rather like to be talked to as if I had some brains, and was not a doll. If you are so sure about the Bible, why do you fear to have me read arguments against it?"

"I am not so sure about you. If I should listen to a plausible story against you, without knowing you or giving you a fair hearing, I might come to be prejudiced,—to believe you very unworthy,—when the reverse would be true. So the minds of many, from reading books of this nature, and not giving the Bible a fair hearing, become poisoned and prejudiced."

"Then why do you read it?"

"For the same reason that would influence a physician to study a disease,—not that he may catch it, but that he may understand and know how to treat it. This book is a mental and moral disease, and I do not wish you to run the risk of catching it, though I do not think it would prove fatal if you did. Your own heart and experience would probably correct the error of your head. Such books as these won't answer in times of illn