"But you have no idea of his leaving my church?"
"Why, you know very well," Miss Denham remarked, "that none of the evangelicals think you preach the gospel. I have heard Miss Sophia say so many times, and you may be sure that she will try to make her papa believe it, and if he is become an evangelical, he is sure to believe it; for I have noticed that what one believes, they all believe. Really, Sir, there is so much ado made now about the word gospel and evangelical preachers, that the subjects are become quite offensive."
"Yes, to persons of intelligence and taste."
"Exactly so, Sir; you will excuse what I am going to say, but I often think that you are rather severe, too much so I know for some of your hearers; but I have no idea how any people of sense can go and hear such preaching as Mr. Ingleby's. I heard him once, on the loss of the soul. I could not sleep after it—and even now, at times I think of it. But, Sir, you know we have nothing to do with such subjects till we die, or till after death."
"Such preaching," said Mr. Cole, "is as offensive to pure taste, as it is revolting to our feelings."
"Exactly so; you know we are to be allured to a brighter world—not frightened there. Pray, Sir, shall we have the pleasure of meeting you and Mrs. Cole at Mr. Ryder's on Tuesday? By the by, I wonder you do not cure Mr. John of his scepticism. There is to be a large party, and rather a gay one."
"I don't think," replied Mr. Cole, "that Mr. John Ryder has any more scepticism than does him good—it keeps off the gloom which a belief in the Bible almost necessarily brings over the youthful mind. No, I shall not be with you. I have an engagement with a few friends who are going to Bath, to see Romeo and Juliet."
"How dull and insipid is a religious service when compared with a play. What a pity that our Maker requires us to be religious. I have not seen a play for some months, and when I was hearing Mr. Ingleby, I really thought that I should never have courage to see another. Oh, how he did denounce the theatre! He really said that it was the pathway to hell."
"Yes," said Mr. Cole, with high disdain, "that man would interdict us from every social enjoyment; would batter down the temple of the muses, or change it into a house of prayer; and bring before our imagination the awful realities of the eternal world, with so much force, as should compel us to think, with perpetual awe, on death and the future judgment."
"Oh! dear, they are awful realities indeed. When I heard him, he alluded to dear Miss Patterson, who took cold on returning from the play, and died, you know, Sir, a few weeks afterwards? Oh! she was a lovely creature. She was too good to live on earth. Had she been religious, she would have been a saint. But she often used to say that her grandpapa left his religion to her aunts, and his fortune to his grandchildren. Mr. Ingleby, after condemning plays, &c., as impure and sinful, made a long pause, and then proposed his questions with so much solemnity, that my pulse began to beat with feverish rapidity.—'Should you like,' he said, and he looked while he said it so stern and solemn, 'to pass from the theatre to the judgment-seat of Christ? Should you like to leave the gaieties of this world, to associate with the awful realities of another?' There was so much stillness in the church as he went on in this strain of awful eloquence, and so many people were overcome by what he said, and such a serene smile on his countenance when he began to speak about our Saviour, that I do really think, if I had not been very firm and decided, I should have become as religious as any of them. It was, I assure you, very difficult to withstand his fervour."