12 RELIGIOUS IMPRESSIONS. 



school, which met between the hours of eight and ten. 

 The dictionary part of my labors was followed up till 

 twelve o'clock, or later, if my mother did not interfere by 

 jumping up and snatching the books out of my hands. I 

 had to be back in the factory by six in the morning, and 

 continue my work, with intervals for breakfast and dinner, 

 till eight o'clock at night. I read in this way many of the 

 classical authors, and knew Virgil and Horace better at 

 sixteen than I do now. Our schoolmaster — happily 3till 

 alive — was supported in part by the company j he was 

 attentive and kind, and so moderate in his charges that all 

 who wished for education might have obtained it. Many 

 availed themselves of the privilege; and some of my 

 schoolfellows now rank in positions far above what they 

 appeared ever likely to come to when in the village school. 

 If such a system were established in England, it would 

 prove a never-ending blessing to the poor. 



In reading, every thing that I could lay my hands on 

 was devoured except novels. Scientific works and books 

 of travels were my especial delight; though my father, 

 believing, with many of his time who ought to have known 

 better, that the former were inimical to religion, would 

 have preferred to have seen me poring over the " Cloud of 

 Witnesses," or Boston's " Fourfold State." Our difference 

 of opinion reached the point of open rebellion on my part, 

 and his last application of the rod was on my refusal to 

 peruse Wilberforce's "Practical Christianity." This dislike 

 to dry doctrinal reading, and to religious reading of every 

 sort, continued for years afterward ; but having lighted on 

 those admirable works of Dr. Thomas Dick, " The Philoso- 

 phy of Eeligion" and " The Philosophy of a Future State," 

 it was gratifying to find my own ideas, that religion and 

 science are not hostile, but friendly to each other, fully 

 proved and enforced. 



Great pains had been taken by my parents to instil the 

 doctrines of Christianity into my mind, and I had no diffi- 

 culty in understanding the theory of our free salvation by 



