plans, that he was afraid to look into his heart, lest he should discover what he did not like to confess, even to himself—that he did not want to become a Christian. He was fully awake to the vanity of worldly pursuits, and was, on the whole, prepared to yield the palm of excellence to religious ones; but his father had often said he would one day be a great man, and a great man he had resolved to be.” During his college course he began to cherish skeptical views. “It was at this period that French infidelity was sweeping over the land like a flood; and free inquiry in matters of religion was supposed to constitute part of the education of every man of spirit. Young Judson did not escape the contamination. In the class above him was a young man by the name of E——who was amiable, talented, witty, exceedingly agreeable in person and manners, but a confirmed Deist. A very strong friendship sprang up between the two young men, founded on similar tastes and sympathies; and Judson soon became, at least professedly, as great an unbeliever as his friend. The subject of a profession was often discussed between them. At one time they proposed entering the law, because it afforded so wide a scope for political ambition; and at another, they discussed their own dramatic powers, with a view to writing plays. “Immediately on closing the school at Plymouth, Judson set out on a tour through the Northern States. After visiting some of the New England States, he left the horse with which his father had furnished him with an uncle in Sheffield, Connecticut, and proceeded to Albany to see the wonder of the world, the newly-invented Robert Fulton steamer. She was about proceeding on her second trip to New York, and he gladly took passage in her. The magnificent scenery of the Hudson had then excited comparatively little attention, and its novelty and sublimity could not fail to make a deep and lasting impression on one of Judson’s ardent and adventurous spirit. Indeed, during his last illness, he described it with all the enthusiasm that he might have done in his youth. His name was frequently mistaken for that of Johnson; and it occurred to him that, in the novel scenes before him, he might as well use this convenient disguise, in order to see as deeply into the world as possible. He therefore, without actually giving out the name with distinctness, or ever writing it down, became Mr. Johnson. He had not been long in New York before he contrived to attach himself to a theatrical company, not with the design of entering upon the stage, but partly for the purpose of familiarizing himself with its regulations, in case he should enter upon his literary projects, and partly from curiosity and love of adventure.[3]