se--that of the
parent--is a _natural_ right, not an _ecclesiastical_ one; and the
sole modification which it can receive from the superadded element of
Church membership is simply that modification to which we refer as
founded on the religious duty of both member and minister, in its
relation to ecclesiastical law and the baptismal vow.

Nor, be it observed, does this our recognition, in our character as a
Church member, of ecclesiastical rule and authority, give our minister
any true grounds for urging that it is our bounden duty, in virtue of
our parental engagements, and from the existence of such general texts
as the often quoted one, 'Train up a child,' etc., to send our
children to some school in which religion is expressly taught. Far
less does it give him a right to _demand_ any such thing. We are Free
Church in our principles; and the grand distinctive principle for
which, during the protracted Church controversy, we never ceased to
contend, was simply the right of choosing our own religious teacher,
on the strength of our own convictions, and on our own exclusive
responsibility. We laughed to scorn the idea that the three items of
Dr. George Cook's ceaseless iterations--life, literature, and
doctrine--formed the full tale of ministerial qualification: there was
yet a fourth item, infinitely more important than all the others put
together, viz. _godliness_, or religion proper, or, in yet other
words, the regeneration of the whole man by the Spirit of God. And on
this last item we held that it was the right and duty of the people
who Chose for themselves, _and for their children_, a religious
teacher, and of none others, clerical or lay, solemnly to decide. And
while we still hold by this sacred principle on the one hand, we see
clearly, on the other, that the sole qualifications of our Free Church
teachers, as prepared in our Normal Schools, correspond to but Dr.
Cook's three items; nay, that instead of exceeding, they fall greatly
short of these. The certificate of character which the young
candidates bring to the institution answers but lamely to the item
'_life_;' the amount of secular instruction imparted to them within
its walls answers but inadequately to the item '_literature_;' while
the modicum of theological training received, most certainly not equal
to a four years' course of theology at a Divinity Hall, answers but
indifferently to the crowning item of the three--'_doctrine_.' That
paramount item