"Yes, and the worst of it is," said Locke, "that while the raw material remains the same, revolutions only bring us a change of evil, not an extirpation of it."

"That would be difficult," replied the Doctor, "since it appears to me that in all revolutions or political convulsions, the principle-or rather the want of it-upon which the sworn allies of the upsetting party act, is the same upon which Luther and his boon companion Ausdorf, on the one hand, and Melancthon, his disciple, successor, and in every respect superior, acted on the other. Ausdorf going one step beyond his sensual master, and maintaining that good works are a hindrance to salvation! in vindication of his fradulent tenet that of imputed justice,' to the exclusion of all acts of virtue and good works. Upon this, what I should call rank heresy, here is the Christian humility! with which Doctor Martin Luther vaunts himself. "This article,' he writes, shall remain in spite of all the world. It is I, Martin Luther, Evangelist, who say it; let no one, therefore, attempt to infringe it; neither the Emperor of the Romans, nor the Turks, nor of the Tartars, neither the Pope, nor the Monks, nor the Nuns, nor the kings, nor the princes, nor the devils in hell. If they attempt it, may infernal flames be their recompense. What I say here is to be taken for an inspiration of the Holy Ghost!'”

"Yet, notwithstanding this pretty piece of fiatical blasphemy, and despite the terrible threats and imprecations of their master, Melancthon, with the rest of the Lutherans, immediately after his death abandoned this monstrous article, and went over to the opposite extreme of Semipelagianism—that is, they not only admitted the imperative necessity of good works, but by way of clenching their recantation, they also taught that good works are before the grace of God! And so it is with political reformers; they generally part company to climb the faster, and thus jump from one heretical extreme to the other, troubling their heads as little about their former desperately contested and vehemently maintained opinions as about the apples they stole, and the tarts they eat in childhood; once these have given place to venison and champagne. Neither are

they without the means of raising a large auxiliary force of precedents, like one Oliander, a Lutheran, who asserted that for and against good works there were twenty-seven different opinions, all drawn from scripture, and held by different members of the Augsburg or Lutheran Confession, and your mob leader-for all politicians are mob leaders-or at least, mob seekers, 'with a difference,' will never be at a loss to find double that number of reasons to prove that the two opposite extremes of his words and deeds

were drawn equally from the same (of course) pure! source-to wit, their zeal for the common weal, Credat Judeas!"

"Well, may Dryden say," said Hartsfoot, "that

'Luther, Calvin, Zuinglius, holy chiefs,

Have made a battle royal of beliefs;

And, like wild horses, several ways have whirled,
The tortured text about the Christian world !'"

"Aye," rejoined Dr. Fairbrace; " and no wonder that the Roman Catholics say that the staple of Protestant faith seems to be doubt."

"All of which," said Locke, "only proves the truth of Sir Dudley Carleton's dictum-' that there will be mistakes in Divinity while men preach, and errors in government while men govern.'"

"That will there," assented the Doctor and Hartsfoot simultaneously.

"And now," added the latter, "I am going to tell you of a discovery I have made, and although I don't think it will exactly rival any of Lord Worcester's in a scientific point of view, I still think it a very valuable one in a social point of view, and you shall both judge whether I overrate my discovery; it is as to the way of preparing and drinking the new China shrub, which we call tay, but which, I understand, should be tea."

"The

"Horrid stuff!" interrupted Locke. best tay-or tea-house, as you say it ought to be called, is at The Mulberry Tree;' and yet it appears to me always like a very indifferent sort of physic, which one would get much better, and without so much parade, at the apothecary's."

"Exactly," said Hartsfoot, "because they stew, as it were, the life and soul out of it, by keeping it like some poor wretch in Chancery, so long in hot water, till it becomes flat and bitter, and conveys to one a perfect idea of demented senna; but the sea captain, who told me that it should be called tea, and who has been many voyages to China, tells me that the Celestials, who even drink it with their dinner, make it very quickly. That is, with quite boiling water, taking care the teapot is well warmed first, by being rinced with boiling water first before the tea is put in, and then, instead of at first putting little water, as we do, and then adding more, they pour in all the boiling water at once, and hardly let it stay a minute, but pour out the tea quickly, which from not standing or stewing, has then a delicious aroma, though my friend, the captain, told me also that we never can drink tea in perfection, as in Cathay they gather it fresh from their gardens as they want it, as we do our salads. Well, I tried this plan of making it

quickly, and truly found it a wonderful improvement; but that is not my grand discovery, but only the sea captain's experience. But here is mine, and judge for yourselves," added he, pouring out two cups full, into which he put not only sugar, but cream.

"Oh! come," cried Locke; "this is really delicious. As many more cups of that as you please to give me.'

"And you, doctor; what say you?"

"I say—that is, I shall say, when you have given me another cup-that it is some superior sort of nectar, reserved exclusively for the goddesses; for it is ten thousand times too good for such an old scamp as that Jupiter, and all his fellow disreputables."

"I'm glad you both so thoroughly appreciate it. Well, the cream was my grand discovery— mine, remember, exclusively mine-for in China they have no milk, or at least drink none; and so, cæteris paribus, could not have cream."

"I'll tell you what though, Hartsfoot, would be a still greater improvement, sans equivoque, if one could drink that now really delicious beverage out of larger cups, for these confounded little acorn cups are only fit for Oberon and Titania, though quite large enough, in all conscience, for the demented senna, as you truly call it, that one gets at the taverns," said Locke.