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258 sentence, seemed for a little while to swell the clamours of Mrs. Wilson's newly awakened conscience. But, alas! the impression was transient; the chains of systematic delusion were too firmly rivetted—the habits of self-deception too strong, to be overcome.

Jane, fearful that the violence of her aunt's passion would over destroy her reason, sought only, for the remainder of the day and the following night, to sooth and quiet her. She remained by her bedside, and silently watched, and prayed. Mrs. Wilson's sleep was disturbed, but she awoke somewhat refreshed, and quite composed. Her first action was to tear David's letter into a thousand fragments. She was never known afterwards to allude to its contents, nor to her conversation with Jane. There was a restlessness through the remainder of her life, which betrayed the secret gnawings of conscience. Still it is believed, she quelled her convictions as Cromwell is reported to have done, when, as his historian says, he asked Goodwin, one of his preachers, if the doctrine were true, that the elect should never fall, nor suffer a final reprobation?—"Nothing more certain," replied the preacher. "Then I am safe," said the protector; "for I am sure I was once in a state of grace."

Mrs. Wilson survived these events but a few years. She was finally carried off by the scrofula, a disease from which she had suffered all her life, and which had probably increased the natural asperity of her temper; as all evils, physical as well