was frequently a visitor. Mr Spry affected wit, and was perpetually rallying Mrs Knowles on the subject of her quakerism, in the presence of this young, gentle and ingenuous girl; who, at the age of eighteen, had received what is called a proper education, one of modern accomplishments, without having been much instructed in the nature and grounds of her religious belief. Upon these visits Mrs Knowles was often led into a serious defence of quaker-principles. She speaks with clear and graceful eloquence on every subject. Her antagonists were shallow theologists, and opposed only idle and pointless raillery to deep and longstudied reasoning on the precepts of Scripture, uttered in persuasive accents, and clothed with all the beauty of language. Without any design of making a proselyte she gained one.

Miss Harry grew pensively serious, and meditated perpetually on all which had dropt from the lips of Mrs Knowles on a theme, the infinite importance of which she then, perhaps, first began to feel. At length, her imagination pursuing this its primal religious bias, she believed quakerism the only true Christianity. Beneath such conviction, she thought it her duty to join, at every hazard of worldly interest, that class of worshippers. On declaring these sentiments, several ingenious clergymen were commissioned to reason

with her; but we all know the force of first impressions in theology. This young lady was argued with by the divines, and threatened by her guardian, in vain. She persisted in resigning her splendid expectations for what appeared to her the path of duty.

Her father, on being made acquainted with her changed faith, informed her that she might choose between an hundred thousand pounds and his favour, or two thousand pounds and his renunciation, as she continued a churchwoman or commenced a quaker.

Miss Harry lamented her father's displeasure, but thanked him for the pecuniary alternative, assuring him that it included all her wishes as to fortune.

Soon after she left her guardian's house, and boarded in that of Mrs Knowles; to her she often observed, that Dr Johnson's displeasure, whom she had seen frequently at her guardian's, and who had always appeared fond of her, was amongst the greatest mortifications of her then situation. Once she came home in tears, and told her friend she had met Dr Johnson in the street, and had ventured to ask him how he did; but that he would not deign to answer her, and walked scornfully on. She added," you are to meet him soon at Mr Dilly's-plead for me."

Thus far as prefatory to those requested minutes, which I made at the time of the ensuing conversation. It commenced with Mrs Knowles saying,—“ I am to ask thy indulgence, Doctor, towards a gentle female to whom thou usedst to be kind, and who is uneasy in the loss of that kindness. Jenny Harry weeps at the consciousness that thou wilt not speak to her.”

"Madam, I hate the odious wench, and desire you will not talk to me about her."

"Yet what is her crime, Doctor?"-" Apostacy, Madam; apostacy from the community in which she was educated."

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Surely the quitting one community for another cannot be a crime, if it is done from motives of conscience. Hadst thou been educated in the Romish church, I must suppose thou wouldst have abjured its errors, and that there would have been merit in the abjuration."

"Madam, if I had been educated in the Roman Catholic faith, I believe I should have questioned my right to quit the religion of my fathers; therefore, well may I hate the arrogance of a young wench, who sets herself up for a judge on theological points, and deserts the religion in whose bosom she was nurtured."

"She has not done so; the name and the faith of Christians are not denied to the sectaries."

"If the name is not, the common sense is." "I will not dispute this point with thee, Doctor, at least at present, it would carry us too far. Suppose it granted, that, in the mind of a young girl, the weaker arguments appeared the strongest, her want of better judgment should excite thy pity, not thy resentment."

"Madam, it has my anger and my contempt, and always will have them."

"Consider, Doctor, she must be sincere.-Consider what a noble fortune she has sacrificed."

"Madam, Madam, I have never taught myself to consider that the association of folly can extenuate guilt."

"Ah! Doctor, we cannot rationally suppose that the Deity will not pardon a defect in judgment (supposing it should prove one) in that breast where the consideration of serving him, according to its idea, in spirit and truth, has been a preferable inducement to that of worldly interest."

"Madam, I pretend not to set bounds to the mercy of the Deity; but I hate the wench, and shall ever hate her. I hate all impudence; but the impudence of a chit's apostacy I nauseate."

"Jenny is a very gentle creature. She trembles to have offended her parent, though far removed from his presence; she grieves to have offended her guardian, and she is sorry to have of

fended Dr Johnson, whom she loved, admired, and honoured."

"Why, then, Madam, did she not consult the man whom she pretends to have loved, admired, and honoured, upon her newfangled scruples ? If she had looked up to that man with any degree of the respect she professes, she would have supposed his ability to judge of fit and right, at least equal to that of a raw wench just out of her primmer."

"Ah! Doctor, remember it was not from amongst the witty and the learned that Christ selected his disciples, and constituted the teachers of his precepts. Jenny thinks Dr Johnson great and good; but she also thinks the gospel demands and enjoins a simpler form of worship than that of the established church; and that it is not in wit and eloquence to supersede the force of what appears to her a plain and regular system, which cancels all typical and mysterious ceremonies, as fruitless and even idolatrous; and asks only obedience to its injunctions, and the ingenuous homage of a devout heart."

"The homage of a fool's-head, madamı, you should say, if you will pester me about the ridi

culous wench."

"If thou choosest to suppose her ridiculous, thou canst not deny that she has been religious, sin