346 DR. DEWEY. [CHAP. XXXIX. 



congregation, that whatever might be said against 

 the voluntary system, the pulpit in America seemed 

 to me more independent than the press. &quot; Because 

 every newspaper,&quot; he replied, &quot; is supported by half 

 yearly or annual subscribers, and no editor dares 

 write against the popular sentiment. He knows that 

 a dagger is always suspended over him by a thread, 

 and if he presumed to run counter to the current, 

 his table would be covered next morning with letters 

 each beginning with the dreaded words, f Stop my 

 paper. He has made a bargain like that of Doctor 

 Faustua with the devil, bartering away his immortal 

 soul for a few thousand dollars.&quot; When I after 

 wards reflected on this alleged tyranny of regular 

 subscribers, it occurred to me that the evil must be 

 in a great degree mitigated by the cheapness and 

 variety of daily prints, each the organ of some dis 

 tinct party or shade of opinion, and great numbers 

 of them freely taken in at every reading-room and 

 every hotel. 



I might say of Dr. Dewey s discourse, as I have 

 already said of the preaching of the Unitarians gene 

 rally, that, without wanting spirituality, it was more 

 practical and less doctrinal than the majority of ser 

 mons to which I have been accustomed to listen. 

 But I should mislead my readers, if I gave them to 

 understand that they could frequent churches of this 

 denomination without risk of sometimes having their 

 feelings offended by hearing doctrines they have been 

 taught to reverence treated slightingly, or even with 

 contempt. On one occasion (and it was the only one in 

 my experience), I was taken, when at Boston, to hear 

 an eminent Unitarian preacher who was prevented by 



