be bred up as I advise, I think it will be best that he come to my
house at the time when the fatal and decisive period approaches,
that is, before he has attained his twenty-first year complete. If
you send him such as I desire, I humbly trust that God will protect
His own, through whatever strong temptation his fate may subject
him to." He then gave his host his address, which was a
country-seat near a post-town in the south of England, and bid him
an affectionate farewell.

The mysterious stranger departed, but his words remained impressed
upon the mind of the anxious parent. He lost his lady while his
boy was still in infancy. This calamity, I think, had been
predicted by the Astrologer; and thus his confidence, which, like
most people of the period, he had freely given to the science, was
riveted and confirmed. The utmost care, therefore, was taken to
carry into effect the severe and almost ascetic plan of education
which the sage had enjoined. A tutor of the strictest principles
was employed to superintend the youth's education; he was
surrounded by domestics of the most established character, and
closely watched and looked after by the anxious father himself.

The years of infancy, childhood, and boyhood, passed as the father
could have wished. A young Nazarene could not have been bred up
with more rigour. All that was evil was withheld from his
observation--he only heard what was pure in precept--he only
witnessed what was worthy in practice.

But when the boy began to be lost in the youth, the attentive
father saw cause for alarm. Shades of sadness, which gradually
assumed a darker character, began to overcloud the young man's