A case of conscience came to be discussed not long since, in which I took a part. We had been speaking of the beauty of truth, and that nothing could justify the slightest deviation from the plain letter of it. This was doubted; and the case supposed was, that of a ruffian or a madman pursuing an innocent person with intent to murder. You see the flight and pursuit; the pursuer is at fault, and questions you as to the way taken by the fugitive. Are you justified in deceiving the pursuer by a false direction of the way his intended victim had taken? Are you to say the person went to the right, when the way taken was the left? The advocate for the downright truth maintained that you were not to deceive--though you felt quite sure that by your telling the truth, or by your silence altogether, immediate murder would ensue. The advocate declared, that without a moment's hesitation he should act upon his decision. He would have done no such thing. People are better than their creeds, and, it should seem, sometimes _better_ than _their_ principles. In which case would his conscience prick him most, when the heat was over--as accessory to the murder or as the utterer of untruth? I cannot but think it a case of instinct, which, acting before conscience, _pro hac vice_ supersedes it. The matter is altogether and at once, by an irresistible decree, taken out of the secondary "Court of Conscience" and put into the primary "Court of Nature." Truth, truth! well may Bacon speak of it thus--"'What is truth?' said laughing Pilate, and wouldn't wait for an answer." If there be danger in the deviation shown in the case stated, what a state are we all in? All, as we do daily in some way or other, putting our best legs foremost. Look at the whole advertising, puffing, quacking, world--the flattering, the soothing, the complimenting. Virtues and vices alike driving us more or less out of the straight line; and, blindfolded by habit, we know not that we are walking circuitously. And they are not the worst among us, perhaps, who walk so deviatingly--seeing, knowing--those that stammer out nightly ere they rest, in confession, their fears that they have been acting if not speaking the untrue thing, and praying for strength in their infirmity, and more simplicity of heart; and would in their penitence shun the concourse that besets them, and hide their heads in some retired quiet spot of peace, out of reach of this assault of temptation. And this, Eusebius, is the best prelude I can devise to the story I have to tell you. It is of a poor old woman; shall I magnify her offence? It was magnified indeed in her eyes. Smaller, therefore, shall it be--because of its very largeness to her. But it will not do to soften offences, Eusebius. I see already you are determined to do so. I will call it her crime. Yes, she lived a life of daily untruth. She wrote it, she put her name to it--"litera scripta manet." We must not