This is the only plausible, for there is no true, ground of persecution. As the laws stand, therefore, let us see how we have thought fit to act.

If there is any one thing within the competency of a magistrate with regard to religion, it is this, that he has a right to direct the exteriour ceremonies of religion; that whilst interiour religion is within the jurisdiction of God alone, the external part, bodily action, is within the province of the chief governour. Hooker, and all the great lights of the church, have constantly argued this to be a part within the province of the civil magistrate; but look at the act of toleration of William and Mary, there you will see the civil magistrate has not only dispensed with those things, which are more particularly within his province, with those things which faction might be supposed to take up for the sake of making visible and external divisions, and raising a standard of revolt, but has also from sound politick considerations relaxed on those points which are confessedly without his province.

The honourable gentleman, speaking of the heathens, certainly could not mean to recommend any thing, that is derived from that impure source. But he has praised the tolerating spirit of the heathens. Well! but the honourable gentleman will recollect, that heathens, that polytheists, must permit a number of divinities. It is the very essence of its constitution. But was it ever heard, that polytheism tolerated a dissent from a polytheistick establishment? the belief of one God only? Never, never! Sir, they constantly carried on persecution against that doctrine. I will not give heathens the glory of a doctrine, which I consider the best part of Christianity. The honourable gentleman must recollect the Roman law, that was clearly against the introduction of any foreign rites in matters of religion. You have it at large in Livy, how they persecuted in the first introduction the rites of Bacchus and even before Christ, to say nothing of their subsequent persecutions, they persecuted the Druids and others. Heathenism, therefore, as in other respects erroneous, was erroneous in point of persecution. I do not say, every heathen who persecuted was therefore an impious man: I only say he was mistaken, as such a man is now. But, says the honourable gentleman, they did not persecute Epicureans. No; the Epicureans had no quarrel with their religious establishment, nor desired any religion for themselves. It would have been very extraordinary, if irreligious heathens had desired either a religious establishment or toleration. But, says the honourable gentleman, the Epicureans entered, as others, into the temples. They did so; they defied all subscription; they defied all sorts of conformity; there was no subscription to which they were not ready to set their hands, no ceremonies they refused to practise; they made it a principle of their irreligion outwardly to conform to any religion. These atheists eluded all that you could do; so will all free-thinkers for ever. Then you suffer, or the

weakness of your law has suffered, those great dangerous animals to escape notice, whilst you have nets that entangle the poor fluttering silken wings of a tender conscience.

The honourable gentleman insists much upon this circumstance of objection, namely, the division amongst the dissenters. Why, Sir, the dissenters by the nature of the term are open to have a d vision among themselves. They are dissenters, because they differ from the church of England; not that they agree among themselves. There are presbyterians, there are independents, some that do not agree to infant-baptism, others that do not agree to the baptism of adults, or any baptism. All these are however tolerated under the acts of King William, and subsequent acts; and ther diversity of sentiments with one another did not, and could not, furnish an argument against their toleration, when their difference with ourselves furnished none.

But, says the honourable gentleman, if you suffer them to go on, they will shake the fundamental principles of Christianity. Let it be considered, that this argument goes as strongly against connivance, which you allow, as against toleration, which you reject. The gentleman sets out with a principle of perfect liberty, or, as he describes it, connivance. But for fear of dangerous opinions, you leave it in your power to vex a man, who has not held any one dangerous opinion whatsoever. If one man is a professed atheist, another man the best Christian, but dissents from two of the 3 articles, I may let escape the atheist, because I know him to be an atheist, because I am, perhaps, so inclined myself, and because I may connive where I think proper; but the conscientious dissenter, on account of his attachment to that gene ral religion, which perhaps I hate, I shall take care to punish, because I may punish when I think proper. Therefore connivance being an engine of private malice or private favour, not of good government; an engine, which totally fab of suppressing atheism, but oppresses conscience; say that principle becomes not serviceable, but dangerous to Christianity; that it is not toleration, but contrary to it, even contrary to peace; that the penal system, to which it belongs, is a dangerous principle in the economy either of religion at government.

I

The honourable gentleman, and in him I com prehend all those who oppose the bill, bestowed in support of their side of the question as much argument as it could bear, and much more learning and decoration than it deserved. H thinks connivance consistent, but legal toleration inconsistent, with the interests of Christianity. Perhaps I would go as far as that honourable gentleman, if I thought toleration inconsistent with those interests. God forbid! I may be mistaken, but I take toleration to be a part of religion. I do not know which I would sacrifice; I would keep them both; it is not necessary I should sacrifice either. I do not like the idea of tole rating the doctrines of Epicurus: but nothing

honourable gentleman would have us fight this confederacy of the powers of darkness with the single arm of the church of England; would have us not only fight against infidelity, but fight at the same time with all the faith in the world except our own. In the moment we make a front against the common enemy, we have to combat with all those, who are the natural friends of our cause. Strong as we are, we are not equal to this. The cause of the church of England is

included in that of religion, not that of religion in the church of England. I will stand up at al times for the rights of conscience, as it is such, not for its particular modes against its general principles. One may be right, another mistaken; but if I have more strength than my brother, t shall be employed to support, not oppress, has weakness; if I have more light, it shall be used to guide, not to dazzle him.

I NEVER govern myself, no rational man ever did govern himself, by abstractions and universals. I do not put abstract ideas wholly out of any question, because I well know, that under that name I should dismiss principles; and that without the guide and light of sound, well-understood principles, all reasonings in politicks, as in every thing else, would be only a confused jumble of particular facts and details, without the means of drawing out any sort of theoretical or practical conclusion. A statesman differs from a professor | in an university; the latter has only the general view of society; the former, the statesman, has a number of circumstances to combine with those general ideas, and to take into his consideration. Circumstances are infinite, are infinitely combined; are variable and transient; he, who does not take them into consideration, is not erroneous, but stark mad-dat operam ut cum ratione insaniat-he is metaphysically mad. A statesman, never losing sight of principles, is to be guided by circumstances; and judging contrary to the exigencies of the moment he may ruin his country for ever.

I go on this ground, that government, representing the society, has a general superintending controul over all the actions, and over all the publickly propagated doctrines of men, without which it never could provide adequately for all the wants of society; but then it is to use this power with an equitable discretion, the only bond of sovereign authority. For it is not, perhaps, so much by the assumption of unlawful powers, as by the unwise or unwarrantable use of those, which are most legal, that governments oppose their true end and object; for there is such a thing as tyranny as well as usurpation. You can hardly state to me a case, to which legislature is the most confessedly competent, in which, if the rules of benignity and

This motion was made by Mr. Fox; and was chiefly

prudence are not observed, the most mischievous and oppressive things may not be done. So th after all, it is a moral and virtuous discretion, and not any abstract theory of right, which keeps gvernments faithful to their ends. Crude, unc nected truths are in the world of practice wh falsehoods are in theory.

A reasonable, prudent, provident, and modera coercion may be a means of preventing acts of extreme ferocity and rigour; for by propagating excessive and extravagant doctrines, such extravagant disorders take place, as require the perilous and fierce corrections to oppose them. It is not morally true, that we are bound to establs in every country that form of religion, which our minds is most agreeable to truth, and c duces most to the eternal happiness of manki In the same manner it is not true, that we an, against the conviction of our own judgment, establish a system of opinions and practices d rectly contrary to those ends, only because soor majority of the people, told by the head, may p fer it. No conscientious man would willing establish what he knew to be false and mischievous in religion, or in any thing else. No wise m. on the contrary, would tyrannically set up sense so as to reprobate that of the great preval ing body of the community, and pay no regard to the established opinions and prejudices of mas kind, or refuse to them the means of securing & religious instruction suitable to these prejudices A great deal depends on the state, in which s find men.

his

An alliance between church and state in a Christian commonwealth is, in my opinion, 21 idle and a fanciful speculation. An alliancet between two things, that are in their nature G--tinct and independent, such as between two so

grounded upon a petition presented to the house of co the Unitarian Society.

reign states. But in a christian commonwealth the church and the state are one and the same thing, being different integral parts of the same whole. For the church has been always divided into two parts, the clergy and the laity; of which the laity is as much an essential integral part, and has as much its duties and privileges, as the clerical member; and in the rule, order, and government of the church has its share. Religion is so far, in my opinion, from being out of the province of the duty of a christian magistrate, that it is, and it ought to be, not only his care, but the principal thing in his care; because it is one of the great bonds of human society; and its object the supreme good, the ultimate end and object of man himself. The magistrate, who is a man, and charged with the concerns of men, and to whom very specially nothing human is remote and indifferent, has a right and a duty to watch over it with an unceasing vigilance, to protect, to promote, to forward it by every rational, just, and prudent means. It is principally his duty to prevent the abuses, which grow out of every strong and efficient principle, that actuates the human mind. As religion is one of the bonds of society, he ought not to suffer it to be made the pretext of destroying its peace, order, liberty, and its security. Above all, he ought strictly to look to it when men begin to form new combinations, to be distinguished by new names, and especially when they mingle a political system with their religious opinions, true or false, plausible or implausible.

It is the interest, and it is the duty, and because it is the interest and the duty, it is the right of government to attend much to opinions; because, as opinions soon combine with passions, even when they do not produce them, they have much influence on actions. Factions are formed upon opinions; which factions become in effect bodies corporate in the state;-nay factions generate opinions in order to become a centre of union, and to furnish watch-words to parties; and this may make it expedient for government to forbid things in themselves innocent and neutral. I am not fond of defining with precision what the ultimate rights of the sovereign supreme power in providing for the safety of the commonwealth may be, or may not extend to. It will signify very little what my notions, or what their own notions, on the subject may be; because, according to the exigence, they will take, in fact, the steps, which seem to them necessary for the preservation of the whole; for as self-preservation in individuals is the first law of nature, the same will prevail in societies, who will, right or wrong, make that an object paramount to all other rights whatsoever. There are ways and means, by which a good man would not even save the commonwealth. ****** All things founded on the idea of danger ought in a great degree to be temporary. All policy is very suspicious, that sacrifices any part to the ideal good of the whole. The object of the state is (as far as may be) the happiness of the whole. Whatever makes multitudes of men utterly miserable can

never answer that object; indeed it contradicts it wholly and entirely; and the happiness or misery of mankind, estimated by their feelings and sentiments, and not by any theories of their rights, is, and ought to be, the standard for the conduct of legislators towards the people. This naturally and necessarily conducts us to the peculiar and characteristick situation of a people, and to a knowledge of their opinions, prejudices, habits, and all the circumstances that diversify and colour life. The first question a good statesman would ask himself, therefore, would be, how and in what circumstances do you find the society, and to act upon them.

To the other laws relating to other sects I have nothing to say. I only look to the petition, which has given rise to this proceeding. I confine myself to that, because in my opinion its merits have little or no relation to that of the other laws, which the right honourable gentleman has with so much ability blended with it. With the catholicks, with the presbyterians, with the anabaptists, with the independents, with the quakers, I have nothing at all to do. They are in possession, a great title in all human affairs. The tenour and spirit of our laws, whether they were restraining, or whether they were relaxing, have hitherto taken another course. The spirit of our laws has applied their penalty or their relief to the supposed abuse to be repressed, or the grievance to be relieved; and the provision for a catholick and a quaker has been totally different, according to his exigence; you did not give a catholick liberty to be freed from an oath, or a quaker power of saying mass with impunity. You have done this, because you never have laid it down as an universal proposition, as a maxim, that nothing relative to religion was your concern, but the direct contrary; and therefore you have always examined whether there was a grievance. It has been so at all times; the legislature, whether right or wrong, went no other way to work but by circumstances, times, and necessities. My mind marches the same road; my school is the practice and usage of parliament.

But

Old religious factions are volcanoes burnt out; on the lava, and ashes, and squalid scoriæ of old eruptions grow the peaceful olive, the cheering vine, and the sustaining corn. Such was the first, such the second, condition of Vesuvius. when a new fire bursts out, a face of desolations comes on, not to be rectified in ages. Therefore, when men come before us, and rise up like an exhalation from the ground, they come in a questionable shape, and we must exorcise them, and try whether their intents be wicked or charitable; whether they bring airs from heaven, or blasts from hell. This is the first time, that our records of parliament have heard, or our experience or history given us an account, of any religious congregation or association known by the name which these petitioners have assumed. We are now to see by what people, of what character, and under what temporary circumstances, this business is brought before you. We are to see