“Susanna and the Elder; or the Conventicle in trouble.

“’For some time past we regret, sincerely regret, as Christian men, that a rumor has, by degrees, been creeping into circulation, which we trust is, like most rumors of the kind, without foundation.  The reputation of a very pious professional gentleman, well known for his zeal and activity in the religious world, is said to be involved in it, but, we trust, untruly.  The gentleman in question, has, we know, many enemies; and we would fain hope, that this is merely some evil device fabricated by the adversaries of piety and religion.  The circumstances alluded to are briefly these:  Susanna, says the evil tongue of rumor, was a religious young person, residing in the character of children’s maid in the family.  She was of decided piety, and never known to be absent from morning and evening worship; it seems, besides, that she is young, comely, and very agreeable, indeed, to the mere, secular eye her symmetry had been remarkable, but indeed female graces are seldom long lived; she is not now, it seems, in the respectable gentleman’s family alluded to, and her friends are anxious to see her, but cannot.  So the idle story goes, but we hesitate not to say that it originates in the vindictive malice of some concealed enemy, who envies the gentleman in question his pure and unsullied reputation.  We would not ourselves advert to it at all, but that we hope it may meet his eye, and prompt him to take the earliest measures to contradict and refute it, as we are certain he will and can do.’

“This was all exceedingly kind, and certainly so very charitable that the Equivocal could not, with any claim to Christian principles, suffer itself to be outdone in that blessed spirit of brotherly love and forgiveness, which, it trusted, always characterized its pages.

“‘We are delighted,’ it said, ’at the mild and benevolent tone in which, under the common misconception, a little anecdote, simple and harmless in itself, was uttered.  Indeed, we smiled—­but we trust the smile was that of a Christian—­on hearing our respected and respectable contemporary doling out the mistake of a child, with such an air of solemn interest in the reputation of a gentleman whose name and character are beyond the reach of either calumny or envy.  The harmless misconception on which, by a chance expression, the silly rumor was founded, is known to all the friends of the gentleman in question.  He himself, however, being one of those deep-feeling Christians, who are not insensible to the means which often resorted to, for wise purposes, in order to try us and prove our faith, is far from looking on the mistake—­as, in the weakness of their own strength, many would as a thing to be despised and contemned.  No; he receives it as a warning, it may be for him to be more preciously alive to his privileges, and to take care when he stands lest he might fall.  Altogether, therefore, he receives this thing as an evidence that he is cared