Ignorantly, rashly, but reluctantly, I gave
you warning to leave your highly respected office and most amiable duty,
as being your servant, and clerk of this your most well wished parish,
and place of my succour and support.
But, dear Sir, I well know it was no fault of yours nor from any of my
most worthy parishioners. It were because I thought I were not
sufficiently paid for the interments of the silent dead. But will I be a
Judas and leave the house of my God, the place where His Honour dwelleth
for a few pieces of money? No. Will I be a Peter and deny myself of an
office in His Sanctuary and cause me to weep bitterly? No. Can I be so
unreasonable as to deny, if I like and am well, to ring that solemn bell
that speaks the departure of a soul? No. Can I leave digging the tombs
of my neighbours and acquaintances which have many a time made me
shudder and think of my mortality, when I have dug up the mortal remains
of some perhaps as I well knew? No. And can I so abruptly forsake the
service of my beloved Church of which I have not failed to attend every
Sunday for these seven and a half years? No. Can I leave waiting upon
you a minister of that Being that sitteth between the Cherubim and
flieth upon the wings of the wind? No. Can I leave the place where our
most holy services nobly calls forth and says, "Those whom God have
joined together" (and being as I am a married man) "let no man put
asunder"? No.
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