It will be observed, from the account given of my infancy, that I had been from the first familiarized with popery; that I had been brought up without any horror of it. This was much: but this was all. I knew nothing of the doctrines of the catholic church, but what I had learned from the lies in Guthrie's Geographical Grammar, and from the witticisms in the "Tale of a Tub,"--a book, the whole argument of which may be refuted by a few dates added in the margin. My English reading had filled my head with the usual prejudices on these topics. Of popes I had conceived an idea that they were a succession of ferocious, insolent, and ambitious despots, always foaming with rage, and bellowing forth anathemas. I now perceived that there was some ground in Scripture for believing that St. Peter was superior to the other apostles, ("Simon Peter, lovest thou me more than these?" "A greater charge required a greater love," argues one of the Fathers;) and that, by the consent of all antiquity, the Bishops of Rome were the successors of St. Peter. Of other doctrines I found rational, and what appeared to me plausible explanations. Transubstantiation was still a stumbling-block. I talked without reserve to my mother of my book, and of the impression it had made on me. She had no theological knowledge, but she had a great deal of religious feeling, and this feeling was all on the side of catholicism. Had she consulted an able catholic priest, perhaps had she consulted no one, I had at this time become a catholic: she would have been well pleased with my conversion, and her own would have followed. For her sake, as well as for many other reasons, I most sincerely regret that it did not at this time take place. Not that I doubt of the mercy of God towards innocent, involuntary error, but because, when we want to go to a place, it is better to be in the right road. She consulted my old schoolmaster, a wise and prudent man, as well acquainted with the question as the Anglican clergy in general are. As my mother was perfectly free from poperyphobia, she proposed the matter at once: "Henry has been reading this book, and has a great mind to be a catholic: you know all my family were catholics." My counsellor, without looking even at the outside of the book, put on a grave face,--a tremendously grave face: "I had rather give five hundred pounds than that such a thing should come to pass." I well knew the value he set on five hundred pounds, and conceived an analogous idea of his repugnance. Nevertheless, I pressed the book on his notice. "All this has been said a thousand times over;" meaning, and I so understood him, that it ought to have no more weight with me than with others; though the argument proved nothing but the usual obstinacy of those to whom arguments are addressed.