nefactions received from various individuals, still
nearly three-fourths of my stipend this year has been expended on
this object, in terms of my voluntary obligation. The large sum
which I am now in advance, I believe, will be eventually repaid; but
for this I have no security beyond my confidence in the goodness of
the cause, and the continued liberality of my countrymen. All this
respecting the West Church is known to few, and would not have been
mentioned by me at this time, had it not been for the perseverance
with which some, inaccessible to higher motives themselves, have
endeavoured to persuade my hearers that mercenary considerations have
produced the position I have felt it my duty to take in the present
discussion.'--_Dialogue 1st_, p. 5.

For a few seconds the true Mr. Clark seemed as if struck dumb by
the intelligence. 'Ah! fast anchored!' he at length ejaculated.
'Fairly tethered to the Establishment by a stake of fifteen
hundred pounds. Demas, happy man, had a silver mine to draw him
aside--a positive silver mine. The West Church is merely a negative
one. Were it to get into the hands of the Moderates, it would become
waterlogged to a certainty, and not a single ounce of the precious
metal would ever be fished out of it; whereas you think there is
still some little chance of recovery when you remain to ply the
pump yourself. Most disinterested man!--let your statement of the
case be but fairly printed, and it will serve you not only as an
apology, but as an advertisement to boot.'

'Printed!' said the conjurer; 'I have already printed it in English,
and Mr. M'Donald the schoolmaster is translating it into Gaelic.'

But we have far exceeded our limits, and have yet given scarce a tithe
of the controversy. We found ourselves sitting all alone in front of
our own quiet fire long ere it was half completed; and we recommend
such of our readers as are desirous to see the rest of it in the
originals, to possess themselves of the Rev. Mr. Clark's _Sermon_, and
the Rev. Mr. Clark's _Dialogues_. They form, when bound up together,
one of the extremest, and at the same time one of the most tangible,
specimens of inconsistency and self-contradiction that controversy has
yet exhibited; and enable us to anticipate the character and standing
of the evangelic minority in the Erastian Church. 'If the salt has
lost its savour, wherewithal shall it be salted?'

_April 12, 1843._

PULPIT DUTIES NOT SECONDARY.