here, or if it be her desire, to accompany the children. I beg Mr.
Reid will be kind enough to allow her a passage with the rest.

*The two Indian girls.

"And now, my dear friend, as the greatest happiness I can wish
you, may that God whom I have chosen as my own portion, be yours also;
may he, by his outward providence and by the inward operations of his
Spirit on your heart, lead you to himself and convince you of the
truth. But O, my dear friend, shut not your eyes and ears against
conviction. You are not satisfied that the Bible is indeed the word of
God. Is it not worth inquiring into? What would you think of a man who
had a large fortune, and the whole depending on proving some certain
facts, and yet would not be at the pains to inform himself? Are the
interests of this world of such importance, which in a few fleeting
years we must leave and have done with for ever, and our final state
in the next, which is to fix us in happiness or misery through the
endless days of eternity, not worth a thought? Think then, and
seriously ask, 'What if it be so? What if this be indeed the word of
God given by inspiration, for the rule of both our faith and manners,
and by which we are to be judged? What if this same God, who so kindly
reveals his will to men, has with it given the clearest evidences and
strongest proofs that it is his own word?' Think, I say, my dear
friend, if it should be so, what they deserve who either reject or
neglect it without taking the trouble to inform themselves, or to be
convinced that it either is or is not of divine authority.

"How many great, learned, and wise men have sifted these
evidences with the greatest care, and the deeper they entered into the
search, the more clear they appeared, even those whose lives are