In conjunction with the good parsons, we have a pleasing remembrance of
the respectable, unaffected old clerks, to be found in most of the
country churches half a century ago. In general, the clerks were small
farmers sufficiently well educated to be able to read the Bible and
church service fluently (occasionally passing over hard words); but,
from their having no other books to read in country schools than the
universal spelling-book, psalter, and Bible, they were incapable of
understanding any work of general literature (as a great part of our
agricultural population are now, in fact.)