In answer to some further remarks of Sir John, Mr. Stanley said, smiling, "I have sometimes amused myself with making a collection of certain things, which are now considered and held up by a pretty large class of men as the infallible symptoms of methodism. Those which at present occur to my recollection are the following: Going to church in the afternoon, maintaining family prayer, not traveling, or giving great dinners or other entertainments on Sundays, rejoicing in the abolition of the slave-trade, promoting the religious instruction of the poor at home, subscribing to the Bible Society, and contributing to establish Christianity abroad. These, though the man attend no eccentric clergyman, hold no one enthusiastic doctrine, associate with no fanatic, is sober in his conversation, consistent in his practice, correct in his whole deportment, will infallibly fix on him the charge of methodism. Any _one_ of these will excite suspicion, but all united will not fail absolutely to stigmatize him. The most devoted attachment to the establishment will avail him nothing, if not accompanied with a fiery intolerance toward all who differ. Without intolerance, his charity is construed into unsoundness, and his candor into disaffection. He is accused of assimilating with the principles of every weak brother whom, though his judgment compels him to blame, his candor forbids him to calumniate. Saint and hypocrite are now, in the scoffer's lexicon, become convertible terms; the last being always implied where the first is sneeringly used." "It has often appeared to me," said I, "that the glory of a tried Christian somewhat resembles that of a Roman victor, in whose solemn processions, among the odes of gratulation, a mixture of abuse and railing made part of the triumph." "Happily," resumed Mr. Stanley, "a religious man knows the worst he is likely to suffer. In the present established state of things he is not called, as in the first ages of Christianity, to be made a spectacle to the world, and to angels, and to men. But he must submit to be assailed by three different descriptions of persons. From the first, he must be contented to have principles imputed to him which he abhors, motives which he disdains, and ends which he deprecates. He must submit to have the energies of his well-regulated piety confounded with the follies of the fanatic, and his temperate zeal blended with the ravings of the insane. He must submit to be involved in the absurdities of the extravagant, in the duplicity of the designing, and in the mischiefs of the dangerous; to be reckoned among the disturbers of that church which he would defend with his blood, and of that government which he is perhaps supporting in every possible direction. Every means is devised to shake his credit. From such determined assailants no prudence can protect his character, no private integrity can defend it, no public service rescue it."