lutions never to differ from her upon any of those points which, in the ardour and enthusiasm of her character, she was led to espouse.
By such means he flattered himself that in time he should subvert her fine understanding, and, by the contamination of her hitherto unsullied mind, reduce her to a level with himself,—and this he meditated to effect by slow and gradual operations, through the medium of her imagination, which he had discovered to be warm and excursive; and, when occasion offered, by artfully insinuating doubts, such as he conceived might puzzle even philosophy to refute.
Mistaken, however, was the systematic hypocrite! His fallacious reasonings might indeed, when supported by the powers of his energetic language and flowery gloss of style, assume an appearance of plausibility, and tend to impress the minds of his unworthy associates; but they would be found very inadequate to influence the mind of Rosilia, whose well-regulated life, whilst it constantly manifested her perfect love to the Deity, proved at once well fortified and impervious, a sufficient barrier to all the attacks of the sophist.
His utmost copiousness of ideas, his best arranged arguments, he would find but vainly exerted to overthrow that virtue which invested her with ingenuous modesty and grace. She looked down from the mountain of her holiness, upraised for her defence, uninjured by the attacks of infidelity; so pure and
