202 EDITOR. * 



good argument, can be made to fight on the worst side.' 

 Having forwarded his prospectus to Edinburgh, 

 Miller waited with eagerness for tidings from the 

 South. Day by day, week by week, dragged itself 

 away, and no answer came. To increase his anxiety 

 some vague rumour crept northwards that a hitch 

 had occurred in the newspaper project, and that 

 it was likely to fail after all. He saw no public ad- 

 vertisement of the paper, and it was evident that 

 his prospectus had not been printed. At length his 

 patience gave way, and on the 20th of September, 

 exactly two months after the date of Mr Dunlop's last 

 letter, he wrote to Mr Paul, requesting a few lines of 

 explanation. Alluding to the ' vague report of some 

 misunderstanding ' which had arisen, ' I cannot help 

 feeling/ he proceeds, ' that the elements of such a mis- 

 understanding exist in sufficient amount among our 

 friends.' He is ' somewhat uneasy.' Not to be too 

 severe on 'our friends,' he couches his rebuke in the 

 terms of a philosophical reflection. ' It is, I am afraid, 

 a too certain fact that, the more honest any party is, the 

 surer it is of being ill-organized and full of conflicting 

 opinions. The Jesuits have but one heart and mind 

 among them ; the Evangelicals of the Church of Scot- 

 land, on the contrary, differ as much among themselves 

 on minor points as they do from their opponents on the 

 truly important ones.' He returns to the subject of the 

 Dean's pamphlet, of which his opinion has not improved. 

 Its arguments 'have neither the dignity of vigorous 

 thought nor the charm of elegant expression to recom- 

 mend them, they are tedious without the recom- 

 mendation of being just, and sophistical without the 

 merit of being ingenious.' How exactly Miller had 

 at this time caught the tone of the Queen Anne 



