presented to him; he must hang to it as the politician does to his party; he must trust to it,--not merely for the God and Saviour whom he knows through its assistance, but for his very politics, thoroughly believing that all its doctrines and all its formularies are essentially necessary, and that they must be taken with the exact tenets and with all the twists which have been given to them by his side in church disputes. Of all men the Irish beneficed clergyman is the most illiberal, the most bigoted, the most unforgiving, the most sincere, and the most enthusiastic. He is too often an unhappy man, being poor, aggrieved, soured by the misfortunes of his own position, conscious that something is wrong, though never doubting that he himself is right, aware of his own unavoidable idleness, aware that when he works he works to little or no effect, feeling that prayers said and sermons preached to his own family, to three policemen and his clerk, cannot be said to have been preached to much effect. It is a life-long grief to him that in his parish there should be four hundred and fifty nominal Roman Catholics, and only fifty nominal members of the Church of England. But yet he is staunch. There is a good day coming, though he will never see it. He consoles himself as best he may with the certainty of the coming triumph; but cannot refrain from sadness as he tells himself that it certainly will not come in his days. There is nothing more melancholy to a man’s heart, nothing more depressing to his feelings, than a doubt whether or no he truly earns the bread which he eats. The beneficed clergyman of the Church of England in Ireland has no doubt as to his right to his bread,--as to his right either by the law of man or by the law of God; but he cannot but have a doubt as to his earning it. He tells himself that it is the fault of the people,--that it comes of their darkness; that he is there if they will only come to him. But they do not come; and he has on his spirit the terrible weight of wages received without adequate work performed. It is a killing weight. To preach to three policemen is as hard as to preach to three hundred educated men and women,--nay, perhaps it is much harder; but he who so preaches feels that his preaching is nothing. He is as the convict labourer who moves sand from one hole to another;--and who can get no comfort from his work.