TO THE EDITOR OF THE EXAMINER. 471 



this practice in other writers ? Are not my habits of life, ray employ- 

 ment and location, as little suited as any, to afford me knowledge of my 

 own, of the general body of the clergy ? Do I ever take the least pains 

 to find out the proportion of the bad subjects amongst them to the good, 

 so far good at least, that I have no right to abuse them ? In short, do I 

 not, as far as regards my clerical brethren, act in the teeth of the pre- 

 tence of my paper ; am I not towards them a bitter party man, and a 

 Taker- forrgranted, instead of an Examiner ? If you can think your- 

 self justified in refusing to question your conscience thus in a matter of 

 such serious consequence ; or, having done so, can feel satisfied with 

 yourself for the spirit of hostility to the clergy, you are not so good a 

 fellow as I hope you are at bottom. 



You see I do not mince the matter with you ; I speak plain, though 

 I hope not offensively, I have, I feel, a right to be more severe than I 

 have been, should I think it would serve my purpose ; nor would you, 

 I believe deny me thisright. You are yourself a dealer out of full measure 

 of chastisement to public characters, who suit not your views, and a warm 

 encourager of others to pursue the same course. Witness the letters of 

 Junius Kedivivus to Burdett, not that I object to these letters ; but they 

 are calculated to wound the public man's feelings deeply. Equal 

 severity if I chose to inflict it, I should think you, as a public man 

 bound to tolerate from me, as one of the public, and should expect ycur 

 good sense to agree to this. Now then, Sir, pray do me the favour and 

 justice to receive my evidence of knowledge in favour of the parsons 

 You attack all the parochial parsons (though you sometimes affect to 

 possess a certain degree of respect for curates; who by the bye, are 

 still paid hy the levy of tythe pigs) for your abuse extends to the 

 incumbent of every parish that can produce a tythe pig. Take my 

 word for it, you are quite abroad respecting the behaviour of the paro- 

 chial clergy. I have lived amongst them, and know all about them, and 

 am as much better informed as to their general conduct than you are, as 

 you use more cognizant with the habits and behaviour of the newspaper 

 reporters of the metropolis than I am. You have a notion, that parochial 

 parsons care about nothing ; but their own sordid interests, under the 

 figure of your eternal tithe-pig ; that they are a curse, rather than a 

 comfort to the poor ; that the tithe-payers have need of all their vigilance 

 and ingenuity, to save their goods from unjust appropriation by these 

 cormorants; in short, that whereas others, their neighbours may 

 be worthy men, and useful, and set a good moral example, parsons are 

 generally the reverse of this, and the main cause of anti-social mischief 

 in their respective parishes : add to this that very few of them reside ons 

 their benefices. 



Now Sir, with respect to all these notions, you labour under gross 

 delusion. I have been used to observe the parochial clergy, and qan 

 vouch for their being generally conscientious, aud anxious to promote, in 

 what the country has hitherto encouraged them to consider the best 

 way, the interests of their parishioners. If you and I think we know 

 how they might make themselves much more useful than they are, as I 

 believe we do, can that warrant us in abusing them for un conscientious 

 neglect of duty ? You, and your vituperative coadjutors of the press, may 

 be, and doubtless are very sharp fellows ; but surely you are not so far 

 gone in egotism, as to expect the clergy to act in concert with you, 

 instead of with the aristocracy and middle ranks, who, even now seem 

 to consider the old womanish practise of the clergy, witli their stupid 



