ing thus principled, I am at a loss
to account for the unwonted delight I experienced whenever my gun did
its work on the victim, which in a few hours was to smoke on my
solitary board.

Some one affirms it to be as probable for an empty sack to stand
upright, as for a needy man to be honest. The simile is ingenious and
plausible, but as uncharitable. The weakness I have just acknowledged
is undoubtedly attributable to my circumstances, though I trust I am
still beyond the reach of the graver imputation. But I should be
ambitious of proving more than this--the utter extravagance of such a
theory; for it is a cruel one, and has caused both mischief and
misery. How many otherwise inoffensive persons have I known implicitly
to adopt an opinion to the prejudice of their less fortunate
acquaintance, merely from their deficiency of the world's wealth! But,
not content with this, these persons, who are the very people to
esteem poverty as the worst of ills, not satiated with his
destitution, must do their utmost to sink him still lower by their
treatment of him; little suspecting, too, I should hope, that the
most probable means of enticing a man to become a villain, is to
convince him that the world deems him to be such. I have known more
than one victim to this treatment, for all are not gifted with
independency of mind sufficient to defy it.

Owing to an insurmountable detestation of my profession, I spent but a
few days of the week in my parish. It was not that I was careless, and
indifferent for the welfare of my parishioners; for, in spite of
myself, I could not but like them.

Beyond doubt, it is imperative on a clergyman ever to be in the heart
of his parish, employed in bestowing, spiritually and corporally, such
assistance as it may fall to his share to be able to bestow. As to
relieving their distresses arising from poverty, my finances were much
too limited to be of any avail. With regard to those who were
suffering on a sick bed, with but slender hopes of recovery, my powers
of consolation were even more meagre.

I have said that my opinions widely differed from those supposed to be
entertained by a Protestant clergyman, and particularly so on the
efficacy of a death-bed repentance. Could it then be expected that I
was thus to smear myself over with hypocrisy, and to a poor
broken-spirited fellow-creature, looking imploringly for religious
aid and comfort, utter to his confiding ears such doctrines as, at
th