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    do business in the Neapolitan manner / ' "We have this had custom here /' , said a Neapolitan , " that we ask a stranger sixty carlini for what we should be . glad to sell for three . " I was myself asked eighteen carlini for a small me * morandum-book , whereas I found I could obtain a similar article for a little more than one carlino * Nor is fraud the worst feature m the Neapolitan

    character ; a general want of principle prevails , and vices at which nature shudders are said to occur with an awful frequency . Most families are pro < - vided with an indulgence from the Pope or one of the archbishops , at least this is the case among the lower class ; and upon inquiring what was the meaning of it , I was always told , " that it insured them the forgiveness of their sins , and going straight to Paradise , if they died during the period

    specified in the indulgence : " so that they had nothing to do but to purchase a fresh indulgence in good time . I have now spent a considerable time amongst two opposite classes of people , the Waldenses and the Neapolitans ; and I have thought it not amiss to avail myself of your indulgence , Mr , Editor , by presenting them in contrast to the view of your readers . Local circumstances may have had some

    share in forming their respective characters , but 1 have no hesitation in concluding , that the pure morals of the former and the enormous wickedness of the latter are mainly owing to the fact , that while the one have the consoling , ennobling , and heart-searching word of God affectionately , sincerely , and powerfully proclaimed amongst them , amongst the other a system of false philosophy and " old wives' fables , " of cunning evasion and childish cere- * monies , has been substituted in its place .

    What a task for the Christian hero to preach the gospel of Christ in its purity and power in the city of Naples ! Send him forth , O Great Lord of the Vineyard ! with the zeal of Calvin , the tender persuasion of Doddridge , the eloquence of Bossuet . With what astonishment would this new doctrine be listened to ! How would sorrow of a godly sort take the place of affected contrition ! With what indignation would the people tear their amulets from their hearts and strive even to erase the indelible emblems

    of superstition with which they have marked their flesh itself ! With what joy would the sincere inquirer , thus encouraged , open his eyes , like our first parent , upon a new creation in the word of God ! But we cannot anticipate a single link in the great chain of events , some portion of which is for ever passing before our sight , and one extremity of which is lost in the eternity behind us , while the other stretches forward into the eternity before us . Nor is it given us even to know the times " which the Father hath reserved wi his manpower" But let us not neglect that which is allowed and required of us . Let us take warning from the condition to which the corruptions of Christianity have brought one ol * the fairest portions of the earth , never to allow ourselves to consider it a small matter that the Christian

    doctrine should , by our guilty connivance , be in the slightest degree adulterated ; and let us beware , lest by any attempts to coerce , to oppress or to injure our Catholic brethren , we give a colour of reason to the heartless maxim of the unbeliever , that the tendency of all religions is the Rame .

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    292 Narrative of a Residence of Four Afonih * at Nap ie ^

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1828, page 292, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2560/page/4/