"I do not suppose, my dear father, that going to a ball or the opera would shake your belief in the divine mission of Jesus Christ; but I presume that you do not imagine that He would attend them if He were on earth! and ought a disciple to go where his Lord would not go? I grant that _that_ religion which consists only in a speculative belief may not be injured by such amusements; but I am conscious that they produce and nourish sentiments and feelings which are not only unconsonant, but directly opposed to the spirit of vital Christianity. I could not pass from the gaieties of a ball-room to anticipate the happiness of heaven, nor retire, after the fatigues of a lengthened dance, to hold spiritual communion with the Holy One." "But where," said Mrs. Roscoe, "is the necessity of being always religious? Is the world to be turned into a convent, and are we all to become either nuns or monks--forbidden to taste of any of the pleasures of life, and doomed to perpetual fastings and prayers? What! religion every day, and all day long! Why, my Sophia, your remarks alarm me." "I am sorry, my dear mamma, that I should cause you any alarm, but I assure you that there is no occasion for it; the religion which has given me a distaste for pleasures so ephemeral and unsatisfactory, has opened to me sources of enjoyment of a much higher order. I do not stoop to earth or any of its gay scenes for mental bliss, but arise to intercourse with the Great Invisible. I no longer seek for religious impressions amidst the forms and ceremonies of an external devotion, but in the exercise of that faith which brings remote objects near, and which invests those which are unseen with a more attractive power than those which are visible. I no longer hover in a state of uncertainty respecting my final destiny, for I enjoy the bright beamings of that hope which is full of immortality; and can attest that now my mental happiness is more pure, elevated, and stable, than it was when I was a devotee to fashionable amusements." "I am glad," said Mr. Roscoe, "to hear that you are happy; but I must confess that it is a sort of happiness of which I can form no idea. The Almighty is very good; he wishes to make all his creatures happy--some in one way and some in another; we should follow where inclination leads. Inclination is the first law of nature, which all must obey if they wish to be happy; and I think that we ought not to interfere with each other's propensities." "But as by nature we are inclined to evil, ought not _such_ a propensity to be restrained? What are the various laws of civil society but so many proofs of the evil propensity of our nature, and so many restraints on its indulgence?"