He was a liberal patron of educational schemes, he sang a fervent and fruity tenor in the choir of St.Agnes, he was a regular communicant, his nature looked toward good, and turned its eyes away from evil.

To do him justice he was not a hypocrite, though, if all about him were known, and a plebiscite taken, it is probable that he would be unanimously condemned.
Yet the universal opinion would be wrong: he was no hypocrite, but only had the bump of self-preservation enormously developed.

He had cheated and swindled, but he was genuinely opposed to cheating and swindling.

He was cheating and swindling now, in buying the option of Boston Copper.
But he did not know that: he wanted to repair the original wrong, to hand back to Morris his fortune unimpaired, and also to save himself.

But of these two wants, the second, it must be confessed, was infinitely the stronger.