After we were married, as I call it--that is, after we had agreed to become man and wife--I frequently prayed before her, and with her (for by this time she understood a good deal of my language); at which, though contrary to my expectation, she did not seem surprised, but readily kneeled by and joined with me. This I liked very well; and upon my asking her one day after prayer if she understood what I had been doing (for I had a notion she did not)--"Yes, verily," says she, "you have been making petitions to the image of the great Collwar."*--"Pray," says I (willing gently to lead her into a just sense of a Supreme Being), "who is this Collwar? and where does He dwell?"--"He it is," says she, "that does all good and evil to us."--"Right," says I, "it is in some measure so; but He cannot of Himself do evil, absolutely and properly, as His own act"--"Yes," says she, "He can; for He can do all that can be done; and as evil can be done, He can do it."--So quick a reply startled me. Thinks I, she will run me aground presently; and from being a doctor, as I fancied myself, I shall become but a pupil to my own scholar. I then asked her where the great Collwar dwelt? She told me in heaven, in a charming place.--"And can He know what we do?" says I.--"Yes," replied she, "His image tells Him everything; and I have prayed to His image, which I have often seen, and it is filled with so much virtue that it is His second self; for there is only one of them in the world who is so good: He gives several virtues to other images of Himself, which are brought to Him, and put into His arms to breathe upon; and the only thing I have ever regretted since I knew you is, that I have not one of them here to comfort and bless us and our children." * God. Though I was sorry for the oddity of her conceptions, I was almost glad to find her so ignorant, and pleased myself with thinking that as she had already a confused notion of a Supreme Power, I should soon have the satisfaction of bringing her to a more rational knowledge of Him.