"honest fame”—and which long afterwards was so extensively embraced by the French philosophers and guillotiners-that Mary Wolstonecraft imbibed in early life; and Miss Wright, and her deluded followers, have lately been disseminating in this country, a little disguised, perhaps, though essentially the same.

But what was the effect of it on the unfortunate MARY?

The answer is, that it led her to form an unlawful connection with one IMLAY, an American Speculator, then in Paris-that he abused the trust she reposed in him, and abandoned her to a fate, the necessary consequence of her weak and wicked principles, and the delusive confidence with which they inspired her in the promises of a heartless profligate.

But what next? Do we behold this lovely, but infatuated woman, supported, like Lady Russell, under the pressure of that adversity in which IMLAY's treachery had involved her, by the consolatory promises of the gospel to the faithful and pure in heart? O no! O no! To her the gospel was not only unknown, both in theory and practice; but she had cherished principles and affections which it forbids and condemns. She had not only neglected the Sacred Volume; but she had studied volumes which deride its Divine Origin, and mock its holy inspirations. She could not, therefore, heal or mitigate her anguish, by the hopes that prayer and supplication to the Throne of Divine Grace give birth to.

She could not rest upon the RocK OF AGES; for on that she had no foothold. Society discarded her; for although not intentionally criminal, she had forfeited her claim to its respect, by setting at defiance one of its essential and most salutary laws. Thus abandoned by the world, and perhaps despairing of the mercy of God, she attempted suicide, from which she was saved by the interposition of the man who was the chief cause of her misery: But given up to despondency, if not to despair, she made a second attempt, by throwing herself from Westminster bridge intothe Thames. She was again providentially rescued, and resuscitated, consciousness having forsaken her. This second deliverance she owed to the buoyancy of her costume, which prevented her from sinking, till a boatman, who had seen her plunge into the stream, came to her relief and snatched her from a watery grave! This happened in 1795. Her mind afterwards became so far tranquillised, as to reconcile her to life. In 1796 she was married-having previously given up her platonic principles-to William Godwin, who had at one time propagated the same vicious and ruinous theory. She died in London, in September,

2797.

I now invite you, my fair readers, seriously to reflect on the contrast exhibited in the two distinguished female characters, which are here presented for your examination. You must, in so doing, perceive clearly, in the erring and ill-fated career of Mary Wolstonecraft, lovely as she was in person,

and brilliant as she was in intellect, the horrible con sequences of Infidelity, and that disregard of the wise, virtuous and salutary regulations of society, which it begets in the minds of its deluded votaries; whilst, on the other hand, in the sublime moral courage, the heroic firmness and fortitude, the Joblike patience, and the unshaken faith in Christ and his promises, which distinguished Lady RUSSELL, through all her awful and heart-rending trials and afflictions, you behold the benign influence of the gospel, the soul-saving power of Christianity: And thus will it ever be: The Sceptic and the Infidel fly from calamity to the sword, the dagger or the bowl, or plunge into a watery grave to get rid of it: But the faithful believer, to whom the gospel has imparted its Holy Spirit of Divine Grace, not only soars above the ills of life, but is enabled in the last and most awful extremity to exclaim-0! grave, where is thy victory! O! death, where is thy sting!

Cherish, then, I beseech you, this precious, this pure and holy emanation of the justice, love and mercy-the wisdom, grace and goodness-of your Heavenly Father and Eternal Benefactor and Friend. Make it, in spite of every obstacle, your morning and your evening study. Fail not, I conjure you, to impress its high and unspeakable value on the minds and hearts of your offspring. So soon as they can articulate a word, let that word he the name of Jesus; and so soon as they can imbibe a principle or a precept, begin to unfold to their ten-.

der minds the moral, intellectual and spiritual treasures of the Sacred Volume: And above all, as you regard your own eternal welfare, never for a moment suffer your faith to be shaken in its divinity, or your steps to be led away from its pure and hallowed light.

If there be zeal in these remarks, believe me, it flows from no fanatical spirit, but from a thorough knowledge of the evils, against which it is my aim to forewarn you. Experience is the best teacher; there is none like it: And it is through a long and intimate acquaintance and intercourse with Infidelity, and with Infidels personally, that I have had a fair opportunity of knowing to what licentiousness in practice the principles of Voltaire, Hume, Paine, and their congenial authors, may and too often do lead their votaries. Rejecting the Bible, as the word and the law of God, which it undoubtedly is, they have no guide left, but the law of the land, and what is called human reason. The law of the land, we must recollect, reaches but a part, and a small one too, of the vices, crimes and corruptions, which frail humanity is heir to by the fall, and is constantly tempted to commit by the insidious wiles of the Arch Deceiver. The law is the bond of society, and not the shield or the buckler of private and individual worth and virtue: It protects society against the crimes of individuals; but it cannot protect individuals against themselves, against the evil inclinations of their own hearts, and the turbulence of their passions: And as to

human reason, the boasted light of Infidelity, its vanity and weakness are exhibited in as many shapes as there are various nations, complexions and statures of the human race. In one age and clime it makes theft a virtue, and deifies mere men and women, making gods and goddesses of the vilest if not the weakest of their species! In another, it bows down and worships Idols of brass and marble, on one side of a lake or river; whilst nearly or directly opposite, on the other side, we behold it doing the same homage to a heifer, an ox, or an ass, or some other equally stupid and insensible brute. Here it sanctions malice, revenge and murder, under the lex talionis; and there it drinks the blood and devours the flesh of the human victims it has captured in war! Here it is seen seeking for truth and justice in the absurd and uncertain trial by battle, or the equally untenable and still more barbarous fiery ordeal; and there burning at the stake, or hanging and drowning, innocent and unoffending men and women as wizzards and witches! Here it determines the fate of an army, or an empire, by the casual flight of a flock of crows, or a brace of cormorants; and there it does the same, or something equally momentous, by inspecting the entrails of a fowl, a sheep, or a hog!* This is human rea

* We have seen it lead the Persians to deify the SUN-the Egyptians to worship a Cat or a Serpent, and the modern Hindoos to prostrate themselves at the approach of Juggernaut. In the highlands of Scotland it has given birth to those fanciful beings called Fairies; and in the metropolis of Great Britain it was long enchained by faith in the existence of the famous Cocklane Ghost! It led many of the primitive fathers of New England to believe, that to kill a swallow would cause their cows to give bloody milk;