extensive foundation which the history of the kirk afforded, during
its short-lived triumph and long tribulation, David, with length of breath and
of narrative, which would have astounded any one but a lover of his daughter,
proceeded to lay down his own rules for guiding the conscience of his friend, as
an aspirant to serve in the ministry. Upon this subject, the good man went
through such a variety of nice and casuistical problems, supposed so many
extreme cases, made the distinctions so critical and nice betwixt the right hand
and the left hand - betwixt compliance and defection - holding back and stepping
aside - slipping and stumbling - snares and errors - that at length, after
having limited the path of truth to a mathematical line, he was brought to the
broad admission, that each man's conscience, after he had gained a certain view
of the difficult navigation which he was to encounter, would be the best guide
for his pilotage. He stated the examples and arguments for and against the
acceptance of a kirk on the present revolution model, with much more
impartiality to Butler than he had been able to place them before his own view.
And he concluded, that his young friend ought to think upon these things, and be
guided by the voice of his own conscience, whether he could take such an awful
trust as the charge of souls without doing injury to his own internal conviction
of what is right or wrong.
    When David had finished his very long harangue, which was only interrupted
by monosyllables, or little more, on the part of Butler, the orator himself was
greatly astonished to find that the conclusion, at which he very naturally
wished to arrive, seemed much less decisively attained than when he had argued
the case in his own mind.
    In this particular, David's current of thinking and speaking only
illustrated the very important and general proposition, concerning the
excellence of the publicity of debate. For, under the influence of any partial
feeling, it is certain, that most men can more easily reconcile themselves to
any favourite measure, when agitating it in their own mind, than when obliged to
expose its merits to a third party, when the necessity of seeming impartial
procures for the opposite arguments a much more fair statement than that which
he affords it in tacit meditation. Having finished what he had to say, David
thought himself obliged to be more explicit in point of fact, and to explain
that this was no hypothetical case, but one on which (by his own influence and
that of the Duke of Argyle) Reuben Butler would soon be called to decide.