Rigby for instruction, as one distinguished in the republic of letters, as
well as the realm of politics; who assumed the guidance of the public
mind, and, as the phrase runs, was looked up to. Mr. Rigby listened at
first to the inquiries of Coningsby, urged, as they ever were, with a
modesty and deference which do not always characterise juvenile
investigations, as if Coningsby were speaking to him of the unknown
tongues. But Mr. Rigby was not a man who ever confessed himself at fault.
He caught up something of the subject as our young friend proceeded, and
was perfectly prepared, long before he had finished, to take the whole
conversation into his own hands.

Mr. Rigby began by ascribing everything to the Reform Bill, and then
referred to several of his own speeches on Schedule A. Then he told
Coningsby that want of religious Faith was solely occasioned by want of
churches; and want of Loyalty, by George IV. having shut himself up too
much at the cottage in Windsor Park, entirely against the advice of Mr.
Rigby. He assured Coningsby that the Church Commission was operating
wonders, and that with private benevolence, he had himself subscribed
1,000_l._, for Lord Monmouth, we should soon have churches enough. The
great question now was their architecture. Had George IV. lived all would
have been right. They would have been built on the model of the Budhist
pagoda. As for Loyalty, if the present King went regularly to Ascot races,
he had no doubt all would go right. Finally, Mr. Rigby impressed on
Coningsby to read the Quarterly Review with great attention; and to make
himself master of Mr. Wordy's History of the late War, in twenty volumes,
a capital work, which proves that Providence was on the side of the
Tories.

Coningsby did not reply to Mr. Rigby again; but worked on with his own
mind, coming often enough to sufficiently crude conclusions, and often