Tom. Where did the friendship of it lie?

Jour. Where! why, in preventing your ruining your self. When young boys like you get such haunts, and go out of their master's houses at such hours privately, it is very seldom for any good, and quickly ruins them.

Tom. That word very seldom implies, that you believe it may be sometimes on a good account.

Jour. Aye, aye, sometimes, but very seldom, I say; what good could you be doing at that time of the day, I wonder??

Tom. That is bringing me to a second examination. I have given an account of that to my master, aud to my father already, and they are satisfied; why should you tak me to task?

Jour. Nay, that's true; I have nothing to do with it; I care not what hours you keep, nor what company you keep, nor how you ruin yourself; what is that to me?,

Tom. Well, I am the less obliged to you for that.

Jour. Why, so you are. But when you say your master is satisfied, I must beg your pardon for that, Thomas. I do not believe a word of that, I assure you.

· 1 Pren. Nay, now you wrong him, indeed; for I assure you, my master told me that he was satisfied about it, and that I should not hinder him, as I had resolved to do, by taking the key out of the warehouse door, and carrying i. up to my master every night.

Jour. Nay, if my master be satisfied, I have done, either there must be some mystery in it then, or he has told him some fine story that has deceived him. The young rogue. has a soft tongue.

1 Pren. I could say more of it, if I thought Thomas would not think I spoke to expose him.

Tom. Your withholding it in such a manner, is more my disadvantage another way; for now it looks as if it were some very bad thing; though I have not been forward to tell it, yet I am not so shy of it, as to be willing to have it thought a crime.

R

Jour. I am very glad if it is no erime, Thomas, I never wished you any ill.

full

1 Pren. Truly it is so far from a crime, that if I had known before how it was, I would have gone with him, if they would have let me; for to be free with you, upon examination, it appears that he went over to Mr. the clothier's, night and morning to prayers; and my mas ter has examined it to the utmost, and is satisfied that it has been nothing else.

Jour. To prayers! nay, if that is all, that's very well indeed, and of that presently; but you make me smile to hear you say you would have gone along with him.

2 Pren. Aye, that would make any body laugh; I dare say he never said his prayers in his life.

1 Pren. 'Tis no matter for that, Jonathan; nor is that any thing to you; if I have not, there is the more need to begin now: I doubt but you have need to reprove me. 2 Pren. Why so?

1 Pren. Why, han't I heard you ridicule all such things, and banter the honest man over the way for going to prayers in the cold mornings before it was day? And did not you use to jeer poor Thomas, when he came first, because, when he went to bed at night, he would kneel down by his bedside to say his prayers?.

2 Pren. Why, now you do, as you did before, charge me with your own crime. Did not you do so as well as 1, and Mr. M-(that's the journeyman) too?

Tom. I committed a greater crime than any of you, in that part; I wish I had not.

1 Pren. What's that, Thomas?

Tom. In letting your wicked scoffing at me prevail with me more wickedly, to neglect my duty. If I had continued to pray to God, as I ought to have done, he would soon have made you ashamed of mocking me, or have made me not regard it.

[The lad weeps.}

1 Pren. Indeed, Thomas, I was ashamed of it, when I

did it, and 1 am more sorry for it now, since you tell me it mastered your resolution, and made you leave it off. I have thought of it a hundred times since that, with regret, that, though I did not pray to God myself, I should not discou rage another; for whether I performed it or not myself, I never thought the worse of another that did; for I knew it was what every one ought to do."

Tom. That makes your fault the worse, to neglect it when you know you ought to have done it; and this is just my fault, I am in the same casegidien wond L

...1 Pren. No, Thomas, there's this difference between you and I, you have repented and amended it, and I have not.

Tom. I think it almost broke my heart; and yet I know not whether to call it repentance or not; for what is all my trouble at it, in proportion to the crime? There may be much sorrow where there is little repent

ance.

...Jour. Why, Thomas, has that been the cause you have been so melancholy of late?

Tom. Is not that cause enough? However, I do not say that has been all the cause.

Jour. Well, he has been ill used by us all, I must own that; and he does not deserve such usage from us. I think. we have acted by him like perfect infidels; there never was a poor young man so treated for serving God sure. What kind of creatures have we been?

1 Pren. I confess I am amazed at it; I did not use to do so; I know not what possessed me at that time. · Jour. And was this the reason of your going over 'to, Mr., Thomas?

1 Pren. No, no, it was because they kept a regular family there, and go constantly to prayers night and morning. Mr. is a very good man, every body knows that; and' I observe every body, nay the wickedest people in the parish, love that man. I never heard any body speak a disrespectful word of him, but our Jonathan there, that laughed

at bim for rising before day, in the cold weather, to go to prayers.

1

2 Pren. Yes, you have heard his own apprentice Will do the same thing,

Jour. That's a wicked young rogue, indeed; you have named a pretty youth for our example.

2 Pren. You see all his prayers, and his being so good a man does him no good: he can't make him a good boy.

Tom. You know nothing of the boy, and very little of what you talk of. I wish I was as good a boy as that Will is now?

1 Pren. It is very true, that hoy is the wonder of this town; he is the greatest penitent, and is. turned the soberest most religious young man that ever was heard of.

Jour. I am amazed at it. Why then you see, Jona than, what the having a good master has done.

1 Pren. Nay, that has not been it neither; and to do justice, though Thomas says modestly that he wishes himself as good as William, I have a very good account, that Thomas was the first means of reclaiming him..

Tom. God's grace has been the means, and a religious good instructor at home. I am incapable to do any thing of that kind; his master and mistress have been the instruments: he is very happy in coming into such a family.

Jour. But was this really the reason of Thomas's going over thither so every night and morning.

1 Pren. Yes, it was; my master says he has examined it: why are you so unbelieving?

Jour. Nay, for no ill; I could not have expected it; but I shall love him the better for it as long as I know him. I wonder what my master thinks of it, or says to it.

1 Pren. Says! I told you, didn't I? He is very well satisfied in it, and ordered me that I should not hinder bim. Jour. God forbid any should hinder him; for my part, if I was ten times wickeder than I am, I would never wish *o make another so.

2 Pren. You are all grown mighty good of a sudden; this fit of religion will be over with you by and by, when you come to Kate's* down the street.

1 Pren. Your eyes shall never see that of me again, nor see me at that wicked house again.

Tom. Do not undertake for that in your own strength, lest you are left to know yourself by your fall.

1 Pren. I hope God will give me grace to keep that resolution.

Tom. You must seek it then-" Ask and thou shalt receive."

1 Pren. I wish I had been in such a house as that clothiers; 1 was never brought up to live as we do here.

2 Pren. Why can't our master go to prayers with us, as well as that poor man does?

Jour. What, for you to laugh at him, as you did at the poor clothier, and at Thomas too?

2 Pren. You have all done it as much as I.

Tom. I don't doubt; we all fare the worse for it, as well those who are not guilty, as those who are.

2 Pren. How do you mean?

Tom. Mean! why it is plain enough,—my master and mistress go to prayers every night and morning with themselves and the little children,-and if he did not take us for a scoffing, irreligious, reprobate pack, that would be Bover the better for it, and would but make a jest of it, and of him too,-to be sure he would call us all up: but he sees how we live, and docs not count us worthy to be admitted.

1 Pren. Are you sure of that, Thomas?

Tom. Sure of it! why, is there any sober man in the world, that calls himself a Christian, and does not do it? i Jour. Poor Thomas, thou knowest but little of the

An ale-house in the town, which it seems they haunted too much.