2614 UNPROFITABLE READING. the seduced, that the images indulged with delight by the fancy, carry on the reader imperceptibly to a point which is not so far from their indulgence in the act as some imagine. Such soothing apologies for an amiable weakness, that is, in plain English, for the breach of the seventh Commandment, are made by the writer, that the reader begins to think her judgment is convinced, as well as her inclination gratified ; and the polluted mind, brought into the state, of all others, the least willing, and the least able, to resist practical crime, is ready to exclaim, with the satirist of political vices That not to be corrupted is the shame. By the indulgence of seducing images, as if they sought to disqualify themselves for resistance, they prepare their minds for the surrender of their virtue. Thus the violation of as awful a prohibition as any in the Decalogue, is softened down into a pardonable weakness. The stab-
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