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188 unburthen my soul to you of some of its weightiest feelings.

"There is no balm so salutary," replied the Doctor, "as that which I am convinced you are in possession of—and which I conceive is at this day possessed by many—the powerful tendency of which to tranquillize the mind under bodily affliction, I have been delighted to see so strikingly exemplified in yourself." The Doctor paused, and then added, "Correct and useful as you have been, a pattern of filial tenderness, of Christian piety, exemplary in all your conduct, surely in reviewing your past life you cannot find much to press heavily upon your conscience. If too tender, too overcharged, we must allow something on that subject to the present debility of your frame; a state which, in extending itself to the mind, often magnifies past errors."

"Oh! not so," continued Philimore; "the powers of my mind, I grant, a few months back seemed greatly shaken and impaired; I could not bring it under subjection; I could not control its wanderings; I could not think of this hour but with the utmost dread: in proportion, however, as my bodily pains augmented and my frame dissolved, my mind regained its strength—more than regained it. It now soars above this earthly clog of matter; it longs to burst its prison, and soar to other regions, reposing entirely on its Maker's loving kindness for pardon for all its past offences. 'O Death! where is thy sting? O Grave! where is thy victory?'"