Of all the dangers to which the Free Church is at present exposed, we deem the danger of _fine-bodyism_ at once the least dreaded and the most imminent. And the evil is in itself no light one: it marks, better than any of the other _isms_--even the heresies themselves--the sinking of a Church that is never to rise again. Churches have been affected by dangerous heresies both of the hot and the cold kinds, and have yet shaken them off and recovered. The Presbyterians of Ireland, now so sound in their creed, were extensively affected, little more than half a century ago, by Arian error and the semi-infidelity of Socinus; and the Church that in 1843 had become vigorous enough to dare the Disruption, recorded in the year 1796 its vote against missions, and framed in the year 1798 its law against church extension. But we know of no Church that ever recovered from _fine-bodyism_ when the disease had once fairly settled into its confirmed and chronic state. In at least this age and country it exists as the atrophy of a cureless decline. It were well, however, that we should say what it is we mean by _fine-bodyism_; and we find we cannot do better than quote our definition from the first speech ever delivered by Chalmers in the General Assembly. 'It is quite ridiculous to say,' remarked this most sagacious of men, 'that the worth of the clergy will suffice to keep them up in the estimation of society. This worth must be combined with importance. Give both worth and importance to the same individual, and what are the terms employed in describing him? "A distinguished member of society, the ornament of a most respectable profession, the virtuous companion of the great, and a generous consolation to all the sickness and poverty around him." These, Moderator, appear to me to be the terms peculiarly descriptive of the appropriate character of a clergyman, and they serve to mark the place which he ought to occupy; but take away the importance and leave only the worth, and what do you make of him? What is the descriptive term applied to him now? Precisely the term which I often find applied to many of my brethren, and which galls me to the very bone every moment I hear it--"_a fine body_"--a being whom you may like, but whom I defy you to esteem--a mere object of endearment--a being whom the great may at times honour with the condescension of a dinner, but whom they will never admit as a respectable addition to their society. Now, all that I demand from the Court of Teinds is to be raised, and that as speedily as possible, above the imputation of being "_a fine body_;" that they would add importance to my worth, and give splendour and efficacy to those exertions which have for their object the most exalted interests of the species.'