In some circuits, I induced my colleagues to join me in establishing weekly meetings for mutual improvement in religious knowledge. At each meeting an essay was read, on some subject agreed upon at a former meeting, and after the essay had been read we discussed the merits both of the sentiments it embodied, and of the style in which it was written. When it was my turn to prepare an essay, I generally introduced one or more of the points on which I and my colleagues differed, for the purpose of having them discussed. I stated my views with the utmost freedom, and gave every encouragement to my colleagues to state theirs with equal freedom in return. When my colleagues read their productions, I pointed out what I thought erroneous or defective with great plainness and fidelity. I was anxious both to learn and to teach, and it was my delight, as it was my duty and business, to endeavor to do both. I was not, however, so anxious to change the views of my friends as I was to excite in them a thirst for knowledge. And indeed I did not consider it of so much importance that a man should accept a certain number of truths, or particular doctrines, as that he should have a sincere desire, and make suitable endeavors to understand all truth. It was idleness, indifference, a state of mental stagnation, a readiness carelessly to accept whatever might come in the way without once trying to test it by Scripture or reason, that I particularly disliked; and to cure or abate this evil, I exerted myself to the utmost. When I was stationed in Newcastle in 1831, I met with Foster's Essays, which I read with a great deal of eagerness and pleasure. One of these Essays is "On some of the Causes by which Evangelical Religion has been Rendered Unacceptable to Persons of Cultivated Taste?" Among his remarks on this subject, he has some to the following effect:--