"Well," said I, musingly, "suppose we take our departure the beginning of
next week?--our way will be the same as far as London, and the plea of
attending you will be a good excuse to my uncle, for proceeding no
farther in these confounded books."

"C'est une affaire finie," replied my mother, "and I will speak to your
uncle myself."

Accordingly the necessary disclosure of our intentions was made. Lord
Glenmorris received it with proper indifference, so far as my mother was
concerned; but expressed much pain at my leaving him so soon. However,
when he found I was not so much gratified as honoured by his wishes for
my longer sejour, he gave up the point with a delicacy that enchanted me.

The morning of our departure arrived. Carriage at the door--bandboxes in
the passage--breakfast on the table--myself in my great coat--my uncle in
his great chair. "My dear boy," said he, "I trust we shall meet again
soon: you have abilities that may make you capable of effecting much good
to your fellow-creatures; but you are fond of the world, and, though not
averse to application, devoted to pleasure, and likely to pervert the
gifts you possess. At all events, you have now learned, both as a public
character and a private individual, the difference between good and evil.
Make but this distinction, that whereas, in political science, though the
rules you have learned be fixed and unerring, yet the application of them
must vary with time and circumstance. We must bend, temporize, and
frequently withdraw, doctrines, which, invariable in their truth, the
prejudices of the time will not invariably allow, and even relinquish a
faint hope of obtaining a great good, for the certainty of obtaining a
lesser; yet in the science of private morals, which relate for the main