Page:The Adventures of David Simple (1904).djvu/230

 laced waistcoat, and everything which is necessary to show an attention to adorn the person, and yet at the same time with an appearance of carelessness. The first stage they alighted at to breakfast, the two last-mentioned gentlemen made it their business to find out who the third was; and, as he was very well known in that country, hevinghaving [sic] lived there some years, they soon discovered he was a clergyman. For the future, therefore, I shall distinguish these three persons by the names of the clergyman, the atheist, and the butterfly; for, as the latter had neither profession nor characteristic, I know not what other name to give him. As soon as they got into the coach again, the atheist having recruited his spirits with his usual morning draught, accosted the clergyman in the following abrupt and rude manner—"Come on, Mr. Parson, now I am for you; I was not able to speak this morning, when you fancied you were going on with all that eloquence, to prove there must be an infinite wisdom concerned in this creation." As he spoke these words, there happened to be so violent a jolt of the coach, they could hardly keep their feet. "Ay! there," continued he with a sort of triumph in his countenance, "an accident has proved to my hand that chance is the cause of everything, otherwise I would fain know how the roads should become so very rugged, that one cannot go from one place to another without being almost dislocated." Indeed, to have judged by his looks, any one would have thought the least motion would have shook him to pieces. "For my part," said he, "considering the numberless evils there are in the world, it is amazing to me how any one can have the assurance to talk of a deity; especially when I consider those very men, who thus want to persuade us out of our senses, at the same time take our money, and are paid for talking