pious interest which a virtuous being may be pleased to take in my welfare. In this point of view, I would not exchange the prayer of the deceased in my behalf for the united glory of Homer, Cæsar, and Napoleon, could such be accumulated upon a living head. Do me at least the justice to suppose, that

"Video meliora proboque,"

however the "deteriora sequor" may have been applied to my conduct. I do not know that I am addressing a clergyman; but I presume that you will not be affronted by the mistake (if it is one) on the address of this letter. One who has so well explained, and deeply felt, the doctrines of religion, will excuse the error which led me to believe him its minister.

(1821, December 8. Letter 964, to John Sheppard, Vol. V., p. 488.)

Mr Southey accuses us of attacking the religion of the country; and is he abetting it by writing lives of Wesley? One mode of worship is merely destroyed by another. There never was, nor ever will be, a country without a religion. We shall be told of France again: but it was only Paris and a frantic party, which for a moment upheld their dogmatic nonsense of theo-philanthropy. The church of

England, if overthrown, will be swept away by the sectarians and not by the sceptics. People are too wise, too well informed, too certain of their own immense importance in the realms of space, ever to submit to the impiety of doubt. There may be a few such diffident speculators, like water in the pale sunbeam of human reason, but they are very few;

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and their opinions, without enthusiasm or appeal to the passions, can never gain proselytes-unless, indeed, they are persecuted-that, to be sure, will increase any thing.

(1821, December 11. Note in the Appendix

to The Two Foscari quoted in Vol. VI., p. 388.)

There is nothing against the immortality of the soul in Cain that I recollect. I hold no such opinions; -but, in a drama, the first rebel and the first murderer must be made to talk according to their characters. However, the parsons are all preaching at it, from Kentish Town and Oxford to Pisa,the scoundrels of priests, who do more harm to religion than all the infidels that ever forgot their catechisms!

(1822, February 20. Letter 977, to Thomas Moore, Vol. VI., p. 23.)

With respect to "Religion," can I never convince you that I have no such opinions as the characters in that drama, which seems to have frightened every body? Yet they are nothing to the expressions in Goethe's Faust (which are ten times hardier), and not a whit more bold than those of Milton's Satan. I am no enemy to religion, but the contrary. As a proof, I am educating my natural daughter a strict Catholic in a convent of Romagna; for I think people can never have enough of religion, if they are to have any. I incline, myself, very much to the Catholic doctrines; but if I am to write a drama, I

must make my characters speak as I conceive them likely to argue.

(1822, March 4. Letter 981, to Thomas Moore, Vol. VI., p. 31.)

In your last letter you say, speaking of Shelley, that you would almost prefer the "damning bigot" to the "annihilating infidel." Shelley believes in immortality, however but this by the way. Do you remember Frederick the Great's answer to the remonstrance of the villagers whose curate preached against the eternity of hell's torments? It was thus:" If my faithful subjects of Schrausenhaussen prefer being eternally damned, let them."

Of the two, I should think the long sleep better than the agonised vigil. But men, miserable as they are, cling so to any thing like life, that they probably would prefer damnation to quiet. Besides, they think themselves so important in the creation, that nothing less can satisfy their pride-the insects!

(1822, March 6. Letter 983, to Thomas Moore, Vol. VI., p. 35.)

This war of "Church and State" has astonished me more than it disturbs; for I really thought Cain a speculative and hardy, but still a harmless, production. As I said before, I am really a great admirer of tangible religion; and am breeding one of my daughters a Catholic, that she may have her hands full. It is by far the most elegant worship, hardly excepting the Greek mythology. What with incense, pictures, statues, altars, shrines, relics, and the real

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presence, confession, absolution,-there is something sensible to grasp at. Besides, it leaves no possibility of doubt; for those who swallow their Deity, really and truly, in transubstantiation, can hardly find any thing else otherwise than easy of digestion. I am afraid that this sounds flippant, but I don't mean it to be so; only my turn of mind is so given to taking things in the absurd point of view, that it breaks out in spite of me every now and then. Still, I do assure you that I am a very good Christian. Whether you will believe me in this, I do not know.

Taaffe dines with me and half-a-dozen English to-day; and I have not the heart to tell him how the bibliopolar world shrink from his Commentary [on Dante]; and yet it is full of the most orthodox religion and morality. In short, I make it a point that he shall be in print. He is such a good-natured, heavy ** Christian, that we must give him a shove through the press.

(1822, March 8. Letter 985, to Thomas Moore, Vol. VI., p. 38.)

They give me a very good account of you, and of your nearly Emprisoned Angels. But why did you change your title?-you will regret this some day. The bigots are not to be conciliated; and, if they were-are they worth it? I suspect that I am a more orthodox Christian than you are; and, whenever I see a real Christian, either in practice or in theory (for I never yet found the man who could produce either, when put to the proof,) I am his disciple. But, till then, I cannot truckle to tithe-mongers,—nor

can I imagine what has made you circumcise your Seraphs.

(1823, April 2. Letter 1064, to Thomas Moore, Vol. VI., p. 182.)

There is a clever but eccentric man here, a Dr Kennedy, who is very pious and tries in good earnest to make converts; but his Christianity is a queer one, for he says that the priesthood of the Church of England are no more Christians than "Mahound or Termagant" are. He has made some converts, I suspect rather to the beauty of his wife (who is pretty as well as pious) than of his theology. I like what I have seen of him, of her I know nothing, nor desire to know, having other things to think about. He says that the dozen shocks of an Earthquake we had the other day are a sign of his doctrine, or a judgement on his audience, but this opinion has not acquired proselytes.

(1823, October 12. Letter 1107, to the Hon. Augusta Leigh, Vol. VI., p. 261.)

I have recently seen something of a zealous Dr Kennedy-a very good Calvinist, who has a taste for controversy and conversion, and thinks me so nearly a tolerable Christian, that he is trying to make me a whole one. I have found, indeed, one indisputable text in St Paul's epistle to the Romans (Chapter 10th, I believe), which disposes me much to credit all the rest of the dicta of that powerful Apostle. It is this (see the Chapter)" For there is no difference between a JEW and a GREEK;" tell Messrs Webb and Barker that I intend to preach from this text to Carriddi and