"If, mamma, I looked back on my former sources of gratification with a lingering eye, and still longed to participate in them, I certainly should feel the restraining power to be painful; but _the grace of God_, by renewing my mind, has entirely changed my taste; and now the theatre, the ball, or the card-party, would be to me as much a source of actual pain as they once were of ephemeral joy. While sojourning in this vale of life, the enjoyment of fellowship with my heavenly Father is more than a recompense for the loss of those pleasures which I have abandoned." On which Mr. Roscoe remarked: "If the revelation of mercy was intended to promote our happiness, it certainly would fail in accomplishing its design if it proved a source of misery." "But," said Mrs. John Roscoe, "I have never yet conceived of religion as being a source of _mental bliss_. I have felt it a duty to be religious, but never a pleasure. I have read over my prayers, but they never came from my heart. I have practised some of the self-denying virtues of religion, but it has been more from a sense of duty than from actual preference. I have sometimes thought of going to heaven, but I have never derived any gratification from anticipating it." "O no," said Mrs. Roscoe, interrupting her, "neither have I." "But," replied Mrs. John Roscoe, "one thing is certain, there is some essential difference in the origin and the character of that religion which is a source of real pleasure, and that which is embraced from a mere sense of duty."