His acuteness and cleverness from infancy were great, especially in arithmetic and mathematics.

During his studies, he met with a clever and brilliant friend who had imbibed the deistical teaching of the French Revolution, and infected him with it, and he came home at seventeen the winner of all the honours and prizes that the College afforded, but announcing himself to his parents as a decided infidel! The pastor treated him with stern displeasure, and argued hotly with him, but young Adoniram was the cleverer man, and felt his advantage.

His mother's tears and entreaties were less easy to answer, and the thought of them dwelt with him, do what he would, when he set out on a sort of tour through the surrounding States.

On his journey, he stopped at a country inn, and was told, with much apology, that there was no choice but to give him a room next to that of a young man who was so ill that he could scarcely live till morning.

In fact, Adoniram's rest was broken by the groans of the dying man and the footsteps of the nurses, and there--close to the shadow of death--his infidelity, which had been but pride of intellect and fashion, began to quail, as the thought of the future haunted him.