"self entirely to thy God....Thy heart "burneth with ardor.....thy soul pan"teth with holy ambition,.....but thy "perfection is not the work of an "hour....Dost thou feel thy constancy "so firm that no dangers can appal.... no artful temptation beguile........no " tedious labors deter........no morti"fications dismay thee?"

He concluded with exhorting me to persevere, and gave me some rules for my conduct, which he said would lighten the fatigues of my journey.

A few days after this.......Kerinthus was called away.......and I returned to Parium.

I was now such a bigot as to offer to Hegesias......treasurer of the public purse.......a transfer of my. whole property.....He received the proposal very coolly....as if indeed it had been the business of a few drachmas instead of two hundred talents, which, as a faith

ful steward, I promised to account with the community for....He desired I would re-examine my heart, lest pride or vanity should have instigated me to the act.

I then little suspected all to be a jugler's trick...that, by a hocus pocus, the subtle minister of God changed places with his Master,.....applied to his own use the donations of the simple, who artlessly fancied, they were lending to the Lord........while they acted under the influence of specious knaves, who, .......by a crafty and well regulated ascendeney....domineered over the mind .....and mastered the purses of the unwary.

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I however had no suspicion at the time...All my anxiety was, to become a brother.....I believed all they told me ....and, considering myself now as the agent of the community, I redoubled my diligence.....I pursued my business

as I would work a mine, which was to increase those riches I had predisposed towards building the kingdom of God.

In a few years my father died.....his death was sudden......though not altogether unexpected,......for his habit of body and style of living had long predicted the fatality of an apoplexy....... I am confident not a creature at Parium ........least of all myself........could have thought it possiblesuch an event should be excruciated into the infamous report you took from that malicious declaimer at Elca, and confidently sat down as a crime against me.....I had always lived on terms of the utmost affection with my father.......and the uniform habits of my life had hitherto gained me the esteem of my fellow citizens. ......I cannot believe I had an enemy in the city..........unless it was old Menecrates........who had long been

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cringing round my father's infirmities, with the hopes of inheriting a considerable legacy at his death......He,....it is true.......was less warm in his professions towards me, when he found my father had not named him in his will, and merely left a trifling legacy to Calippe as his niece.

Indeed, my fair cousin had abated somewhat of her regard.......but the reason was so natural......I must excuse it.

At my return to Parium, she began, .......by indirect overtures.......to revive those claims in me which accident alone prevented from being much stronger than they were.......But as I did not meet her views with the warmth she wished.......I committed that crime which a woman never forgives.......Still we did not come to an avowed rupture......whatever her re-.

sentments were, she locked them in her own bosom.

But when I quitted my native place to settle among strangers........and it was confidently asserted that I had turned Christian.......a general buz of disapprobation took place at Parium ......and then it was my fair cousin found a sweet opportunity to vent her revenge, and she embraced it by hinting a calumny......which was soon established.......I shall speak of it in its proper place.

I was now free to obey my own will.....in possession of a large fortune .......and thus I acted.

When the arrangement of my father's affairs had taken place......and all legacies........debts.......and contingencies of every nature were discharged......my surplus amounted to two hundred and twenty talents.

I wrote to Hegesias, stating these