The flowers were threatened with blight in his Eden: but he did
not conjecture, poor fellow, that a serpent had indeed entered it!
CHAPTER VII.
THE GOOD YOUNG MAN IN MEDITATION.
Perhaps, it may be assumed, with tolerable safety, that no first
villany is ever entirely deliberate. There is something in events
to give it direction--something to egg it on--to point out time,
place, and opportunity. Of course, it is to be understood that the
actor is one, in the first place, wanting in the moral sense. What
we simply mean to affirm is, that the particular, single act, is,
in few instances, deliberately meditated from the beginning. We
very much incline to think that some one event, which we ordinarily
refer to the chapter of accidents, has first set the mind to work
upon schemes, which would otherwise, perhaps, never be thought of
at all. Thus, we find persons who continue very good people, as
the world goes, until middle age, or even seniority; then, suddenly
breaking out into some enormous offence against decency and society,
which startles the whole pious neighborhood.
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