_Mi._ I have preserved innocence, I have detected vice, I have served the cause of humanity: I find a sufficient reward in the feelings of my own heart. But, my good lords, let us quit this scene of horror: suffer me, my son, to unite your hand with Josepha’s at the altar; then retiring to some more virtuous fraternity---- _Vice._ What, father? after such experience of a convent’s interior will you again---- _Mi._ Ah! forbear, my lord, nor brand a whole profession with disgrace, because some few of its professors have been faulty-- tis not the habit but the heart; tis not the name he bears but the principles he has imbibed, which makes man the blessing or reproach of human nature. Virtue and vice reside equally in courts and convents; and a heart may beat as purely and as nobly beneath the monk’s scapulary, as beneath the ermine of the judge, or the breast-plate of the warrior. _Venoni._ The good friar says right, my friend; then let us scorn to bow beneath the force of vulgar prejudice, and fold to our hearts as brethren in one large embrace men of all ranks, all faiths, and all professions. The monk and the soldier, the protestant and the papist, the mendicant and the prince; let us believe them all alike to be virtuous till we know them to be criminal; and engrave on our hearts, as the first and noblest rule of mortal duty and of human justice, those blessed words. “BE TOLERANT!” * * * * * * * * * Errors and Inconsistencies: The Novice Spellings were changed only when there was an unambiguous error, or the word occurred elsewhere with the expected spelling. The spelling “anti-room” is used consistently. Names in stage directions were inconsistently italicized; they have been silently regularized. Missing or invisible periods at line-end and in abbreviations have been silently supplied. In the play, words such as “tis” and “twas” were always written without apostrophe. _Unchanged:_ when suddenly the radience of a thousand torches the nuns opposes her progress _Corrections:_ A marine procession arrives [processsion] to the arbitrary commands [arbritary] for heaven’s love, the viceroy would deign [victory] his countenance and manner [countenace] at my appointment [appoiniment] the donor shall be soon disposed of [diposed] object of never to be sated vengeance, [vengance] heaven had commissioned me [commisioned] _Venoni._ Oh, talk not to me of resistance! [_Vevoni._] Why, Teresa! dawdling here [dwadling] all your past perverseness, [preverseness] _Punctuation and typography:_