PAMPHLET. 257 



an entire want of delicacy, there is no " taste or tact " 

 shown in the handling of public questions, and " the 

 damage done by certain recent editorial articles to the 

 Sabbath cause is," he holds, " incalculable." In short, 

 a great crisis has arrived in the history of the Paper ; 

 and Dr Candlish, to prevent its rapid sinking, can be- 

 think himself of but one expedient : the individual who 

 now addresses you must retire forthwith from his place 

 as Editor of the Witness, to make way for an Editor of 

 taste, tact, and delicacy, a gentleman connected with 

 the Parliament House. 



' NOAV, while I entirely agree with Dr Candlish that a 

 crisis has arrived in the history of the Newspaper with 

 which I have been so long connected, may I not add, 

 identified ? I differ from him very considerably regard- 

 ing the means best suited for obviating the danger. On 

 the policy of my removal from the Editorship I am, of 

 course, incapacitated from deciding. It may be the 

 best possible policy in the circumstances, and yet, from 

 the disturbing influence of personal feeling, may seem 

 bad policy to me. But on some of the other points my 

 judgment is, I think, less open to bias. The Doctor 

 communicated his scheme to my co-partner in the Paper, 

 Mr Eairly, whom it took somewhat aback; and who, 

 not exactly seeing at the moment how much it involved, 

 or perhaps with some tacit reference to my standing as a 

 bond fide proprietor in the concern, asked him whether it 

 should be the new Editor or the old whose decision should 

 be the final one, were we to come to differ on some point 

 of principle or policy ? The matter, replied Dr Candlish, 

 might be referred to a Committee. There are thus, 

 obviously, two elements in the Doctor's scheme, the 

 element of a Parliament-House Editor, prepared, doubt- 

 less, by the peculiar practices of his profession, to take 



VOL. II. 



