582 



iJ>(>3 iuo^ yptiul*)) Jbiow 6 :;>nit to IKw wo^ Jbns ,nife 

 Ytw T n oi T0 THE EDITOR OF THE EXAMINER. 



dfrfr 9c!l 



SIB, 



NOTHING could have pleased me so well as the unexpected admission 

 of my letter to you into the last number of The Monthly. I do not 

 mean to disclaim the displeasure to which you goodnaturedly attribute 

 my having surrendered you over to the secular arm. Had private 

 feeling been admissible on such a question, I should by choice have ad- 

 dressed you in print, in the form sanctioned by your handsome reception 

 of my manuscript communications. I am not hard-hearted, and felt 

 something like a qualm of conscience at your allusion to the friendly 

 nature of my former remonstrances. But the public cause, as the 

 Examiner well knows, cannot be duly aided by half expression ; nor 

 will the Radical Parson affect a sqeamish fear of giving offence, when 

 convinced that public truth requires direct and uncompromising ad- 

 vocacy. 3I fo ^ oi fctfre^pq ooj TO i9 fb 9 dmi ooAnibneJaisbnu ^o 



You certainly were not in the least bound to devote any portion of 

 the time you thought could be better, bestowed upon combatting ob- 

 jections of mine. I thought it worth while to try my powers of per- 

 suasion on the Examiner,, injicere scrupulum tanto homini, and without 

 the slightest intention of appearing in print ; but though I received 

 some compliments in return, which, coming from such a quarter, almost 

 made me vain, my only object in writing to you utterly failed. I found 

 it impossible to make the least impression on your convictions. Your, 

 as it seemed to me, extravagant and undiscrimmating bitterness against 

 the body of the clergy, increased, as the crisis of their trial at the national 

 tribunal, drew on; crescebat indulgens sibi dirus hy drops ; till, at last 

 finding that to bandy about compliments with you was to beat the air ; 

 yet burning with desire, if possible, to blunt the edge of your perse- 

 cuting sword, I attacked you in this publication. 



Thus much of preamble was necessary here to prevent an impression 

 on the public to my disparagement. The regret you expressed in your 

 paper of November 4th, that I had thus in displeasure made you over 

 to the secular arm, might have been else misconstrued, as coming from 

 the parson-hunting Examiner, into an implied charge of essential and 

 inherent clerical passion and vindictiveness. I know very well you did 

 not mean this ; but I must not let an opportunity slip of setting myself 

 fair with the public. I have got a giant to deal with, and though con- 

 fident in the justice of my cause, and therefore, and only therefore, not 

 afraid of him, I know too well my adversary's power to dare idly fling 

 away any chance of fair advantage. 



And now to work. In the very onset of your notice of my Jierce 

 attack, you mis-state the scope of it. I must stop here to protest against 

 the unfairness of the title of your article. " The High Priests and. Our- 

 selves." Is it utterly impossible for you to treat the clergy question 

 with decent seriousness ? Have the goodness to cast your eye over my 

 . , . ________ 



* We have great pleasure in inserting a second letter from our friend the 

 " Radical Parson." We, like all true reformers, are as anxious to see a reform 

 equally as sweeping in the church as in the state. When the question is brought 

 forward, we shall have our say : in the mean time our." Radical Parson." ED. , 



