Year: 1868

appeared late in the year 1888. The lit
erary circles of Boston were anxiously
awaiting its publication, for Prescott had
already won for himself certain reputa-
lion in that city by articles published in
periodical reviews. He was, besides per-
sonally much liked and esteemed and
every one was wondering how he could
have surmounted his well-known infrmity
in writing such lengthy history. In
few days 500 copies were sold, and four or
five weeks later the first edition was ex-
hausted. Fashion, that great auxiliary TO
success, had also a share in its rapid sale
for, from the moment of its publication,
the" History of Ferdinand and Isabelle"
was considered the only fashionable New
Years present. The publisher received
orders from all parts of the United States,
and he sold, in few months, more copies
than he had right to issue in five years,
according to his contract. The literary
reviews we're filed with euloglums, and the
enthusiasm was SO great that Boston
newspaper having claimed Prescott as
native of that city, it gave rise to violent
protest on the part of the Salem journals
against such an unjust pretension.


The great success of his first work hav-
ing proved that he was following his true
vocation, Prescott, from that time, really
became remarkable writer, and devoted
his life to the study of history. The peace
ful uniformity of his life was only disturbed
by those unavoidable misfortunes which
must agitate the happiest existence. First
among these is to be placed the great sor-
row he experienced in losing his eldest
child, a little girl of four years, his greatest
fayorite. Al can never suffer again what
/ then suffered" he wrote, fifteen years
after the sad event, " and / do not believe
it possible to shed twice in life such bitter
tears"


That death turned his mind towards
things of higher order and of more
serious nature than his usual occupations.
He had then an opportunity of putting to
the test the firmness of his belief in the
Christian doctrines taught him in his
childhood. He entered upon these new
studies with the same conscientious love
of truth as that eyinced by him in his his
torical researches, reading with impartial
attention both sides of the question, and
examining the arguments produced by the
adversaries and the supporters of revealed
religion; opposing Hume to Butler, and
Gibbon to Paley. The main result of his
meditations was to make of him an ad-
herent of Unitarianism, and, while admit
ting the authenticity of the Scriptures,
and the superiority of Christianity as a
moralizing influence, he was brought to
deliberately cast aside, as Mr.. Ticknor in
forms US, the doctrines commonly called
Orthodox, of which he could not find any
vestige in the Gospels, nor in the rest Of
the New Testament. This assertion, says
Mr.. Ticknor, is supported by letter from
Prescott, in which the following lines are
found a greatly shocked lady when /
told her was an Unitarian. This word
is considered abominable here, (England,)
and equivalent to the words Jew and Mo-
hammedan, and they compare an Unita-
tartan to a wolf amongst flock of sheep"
Prescott was, then, disciple Of that new
belief, but it does not appear that he ad-
hered to it as man whose conscience is
at rest when be feels that his doctrines
are put upon an unchanging basis. Eight
years later, the uneasiness of his mind in
duced him to resume his study of the
subject, but even then, he could not find
the tranquility he longed for. "Polemics
and religious controversy" said he, =" far
from settling convictions and calculating
doubts, do nothing but shake the one and
multiply the other. TO live honestly; to
act in accordance with justice; to fear and
love God; TO love ones neighbor as ones
self-this is true religion"


If, in an orthodox point of view, Pres
colt was but an imperfect Christian, he
was very good one in moral sense, by
his way of living, and his constant aim at
bettering his soul. He was oyer-scrupu-
lous and conscientious, and in order to
master the temptations to which he was
almost always yielding, he adopted sin
gular method. When be had entered in
his journal a resolution to be followed, he
would lay wager with one of his friends
that if, at the end of a certain time, he
had not failed in his resolution, his friend
was to give him the stipulated amount, or,
in the contrary case, he was to pay the
voluntary fine. The strangest of all was
that Prescott was the only judge to decide
who had won or lost in that mysterious
compact. Many time he would silently
come up to his friend, and put in his hand
the money he had lost, or would claim
from him some small amount, with a tri-
umphant smile on his face, and his friend
would not know the nature of the good or
had Incl II IL naadIass IN add that Pras