glory of God from beds of burning coals. But, on the whole, and bating this beautiful item, tell me, Alice, how did you like the meeting?"

Alice made no response save by pressing the arm of her companion with her own, with an emphasis which indicated that she was in no mood for discourse, but rather for silent communionwith her own thoughts; and they, accordingly, prosecuted the residue of the short walk to Miss J's paternal residence in silence.

I may here inform the reader that Miss J-lives in the first house above the humble edifice in which Alice holds her school; it is in nearly the most pleasant part of the valley; to the west-ward may be seen, at some distance across the beautiful plain, some glimpses of the Susquehanna, meandering like broad riband of silver through the lovely landscape, and laughing in the sunbeams, as if conscious it were imparting to that landscape its principal charm. On the east, the part of the hill just opposite, is somewhat depressed, and marked with one or two slight openings or defiles, formed probably by the occasional rivulets which congregate after heavy rains; it is also somewhat rounded from the same cause, and presents several convex slopes, with narrow passages between, which are smooth, or ap-pear so in the distance, and covered with grass; these give to this point of the valley a very picturesque effect. It was by one of these passages that Alice gained the position on the hill side, where she found the "Old Squire," (as described in chapter 3) and she was now irresistibly led to seek the same spot, that she might be perfectly alone, and once more feast her eyes with the prospect to be obtained from that eminence. I have said once more, for her parents had by letter expressly enjoined her instant: return to Connecticut.

CHAPTER VII.

"OH! for an angel's harp! and an angel's skill to touch its chords and awaken its harmonies! for human language falls immeasurably short of themes so grand and extatic. Henceforth. and forever I abjure all impious distrusts of my almighty Father's.

Love! I shall as soon believe that infinite duration can be exhausted by its successive flow of moments or of ages, as that the infinite ocean of divine love can be drained by its ceaseless expatiation upon the innumerable myriads of creatures to which it has given existence. Henceforth as I walk abroad, I shall perceive in everything and everywhere its all-pervading presence, its allbeautifying and vitalizing influences. "Twill sparkle in every star of night; 'twill scintillate in every solar ray; in all the voices of nature I shall hear its music; it will touch with balm the wounds of my heart in sorrow and bereavement; it will shed its mild light on the darkness of adversity and in the strife of the passions, and amid the storms and alarms of life, borrowing the voice of its once embodied and crucified representative on earth; it will say "peace," and an immediate "calm" shall succeed. I am I am constrained to be-a universalist, and, whatever obloquy may attach to that name, such for the future will I avow myself, for life and death, time, and eternity, all things, present in the light of this faith a new and beauteous aspect."

Call this rhapsody, reader, if it so please you, it is the language in which the full soul of our heroine vented itself, when she had been for some minutes seated in the shade of the clump of sumachs afore-noticed, where she had had her interview with the "Old Squire." The afternoon was most lovely-the atmosphere pure and serene-and the wide-spread panorama before her seemed even more beauteous than before. The main road through the bottom, and the several paths diverging from it in various directions, seemed teeming with life-persons on foot, on horseback, in carriages, were repairing from the meeting to their several homes; here and there stood groups of friends reciprocating adieus, and invitations for future visits: it was in a double sense a moving scene. "Oh!" continued Alice, as she gazed upon it, "most truly said Mr. S, 'this is a beautiful world; it is indeed so; and more especially now to me, since my perceptions, I trust, are much improved; for yonder NARRows, as they are termed, both in name and nature might well represent my former state of mind; but I now see the heavens, the earth, all things, to be mantled with the smiles of almighty love, and every living creature to be a subject of his benign regards. Yes, I am quite brought into a new faith, new hope, new

feelings; and I shrink not from henceforth bearing the despised name corresponding to these new views."

I need only add, that the above resolution has been faithfully adhered to: Alice has been for some time at her native home, in Connecticut, where, although opposed on every hand, and by those too whom she respects and loves, she unshrinkingly avows herself a believer in the plainly scriptural doctrine, that ‘The Lord is good unto all, and his tender mercy is over all his works ;' and this glorious faith is a principal theme in the epistolary correspondence which she maintains with Miss J-, her intimate and amiable companion while a sojourner in the Pennsylvania Valley. We will close our story with an extract from a recent letter of hers to this young lady, from which the reader will perceive, that, at whatever sacrifice to her private interests, Alice is bent on maintaining her despised faith in the midst of its most violent, but perhaps, conscientious opponents.

*

"I did not inform you that in returning to my native home, I chose the longer route up the Susquehanna to the very pleasant village of Unadilla, on the western margin, and just above the mouth of a lovely river of the same name : thence across to the Katskil turnpike, from which I diverged to Delhi, a beautiful town on the Delaware, and but little more than a score of miles from its sources: thence over the most barren and dreary mountain ranges conceivable to Kingston or Sopus; and to Roundout, on the North river, where the Delaware and Hudson canal terminates: thence across to Hyde Park, distinguished for its elegant country seats; and so on to Poughkeepsie, Dover Plains, &c. I might have gone by the shorter way of the Great Bend, Cosheeton, and Newburgh, but I had no particular motives for haste, and merely consulted pleasantness.

"In the sitting-room at Roundout, an animated conversation ensued on the subject of religion. A young universalist minister being there on a professional visit, his doctrine became the topic of discussion. Of course I was an interested auditor. My attention had been attracted toward an intelligent German in the com-. pany, by the peculiar benevolence of his sentiments. Governor Shultz, of Pennsylvania, had pardoned a criminal under sentence of death, as his last official aet. All the company (being believers.

in endless woe) reprobated the ex-Governor on this ground, with the exception of the German, who bestowed unqualified praise upon his clemency; remarking, that if forgiveness be a crime, then God has committed more of it than any other being.' Indeed all he said was so much in the spirit of him who told the sinful woman, 'neither do I condemn thee-go and sin no more,' that I concluded within myself, Surely this person does not believe in a Deity who will damn his creatures to an eternity of misery for their sins of a few years; or if he does, his dispositions are not conformed to those of that Deity.'

"I was correct in regard to my German fellow-traveller; he had, to be sure, never before heard of the Universalist sect, but when informed of what the term implied his eyes sparkled with delight, and especially on being told that this denomination is numerous and rapidly increasing: he assured us that all benevolent literary men, whether catholic or protestant, were secretly of this persuasion; and although the most of them did not choose to incur ecclesiastical censure by openly avowing it, yet that it is sufficiently intelligible in their writings, and he entertained us with very numerous quotations which fully sustained the remark.

"If the fact is as stated, I conceive it to form a strong consideration in favor of the truth of our sentiments; but then I reflected that Cowper, that most benevolent of all poets, was a rigid Calvinist, and, therefore, an undoubted exception to the truth of the observation; and yet, upon further thought, I find that it does hold good even in regard to him, for there are passages in his TASK which show that from his better nature a benign light occasionally flashed upon the darkness of his educational creed; or, in other words, that his kind heart often dragged per force his head (vitiated by false religious culture) into a purer and manlier train of thinking than that which his gloomy creed inspired. Take the following sample.

Thus heavenward all things tend, for all was once
Perfect, and all at length must be restored.

So God hath wisely purposed, who would else
In his dishonor'd works, himself endure

Dishonor, and be wrong'd without redress."

"The mind that dictated these lines could not possibly, at the time, have believed that Jehovah will be eternally dishonored by

the total and irreparable ruin of the fairest portion of his workmanship.

“I find, indeed, my dear J—, that all that is beautiful in sentiment is in reality connected with this doctrine; and that the most sublime and admired minds have indeed in every nation and age, so far as my reading extends, been more or less illumined by it. Who that has read with attention the works of Pope, Addison, Goldsmith, Akenside, Thompson, Gray, Fenelon, Schiller, Goethe, and others, can seriously doubt the fact? Would that the minds of my aged parents could be open to perceive its truth! How serene would the evening of their existence be, if the divine light of this faith were blended with the beams of their setting sun!

"I am more than ever convinced, my friend, that the doctrine of unending misery, in the proportion in which it is sincerely believed, blunts the natural sensibilities. How else could its advocates remain so manifestly indifferent with the dreadful prospect before them, that countless multitudes of human beings are constantly drifting on the tide of time to never-ceasing burnings? My parents, for instance, (and they are to the full as kind as parents commonly are,) seem to have quite given me over to eternal reprobation: yet they appear but little affected by this circumstance! I ventured to ask them as we sat around the fire a few evenings since, whether, if I were bound to a stake to be burned alive in their presence, they would not be unspeakably afflicted by the event. We would, undoubtedly,' replied my father, but spiritual things are not to be compared with natural our carnal attachments will have ceased when we reach the eter nal world; and we shall not retain a single feeling in oppositior to the will of God; whether that will be to damn or to save.' 1 was strongly tempted to respond, that except the divine Being shall undergo as great a change as we, his will must be, as it now is, to have all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.' But I knew that to reason with him on this subject would rather tend to irritate than to convince him: and I therefore preferred to be silent, as it better comported with the respect due to the parent from the child.

66

My new faith subjects me to numerous petty annoyances. If I attend upon preaching in any of the churches, I am sure to find a part of the sermon pointed against myself; and the heads of