tice of the Court in having menaced the Jury, who were his judges by the Great Charter of England, and in having rejected their verdict, the Lord Mayor exclaimed, "Stop his mouth, jailor, bring fetters, and stake him to the ground." William Penn replied, "Do your pleasure, I matter not your fetters." The Recorder observed,

"Till now I never understood the reason of the policy and prudence of the Spaniards in suffering the Inquisition among them; and certainly it will never be well with us, till something like the Spanish Inquisition be in England." Upon this the Jury were ordered to withdraw to find another verdict: but they refused, saying, they had already given it, and that they could find no other, The Sheriff then forced them away. Several persons were immediately sworn to keep them without any accommodation as before, and the Court adjourned till seven the next morning.

On the fifth of September the Jury, who had received no refreshment for two days and two nights, were again called in, and the business resumed. The Court demanded a positive answer to these words, “ Guilty or Not guilty?" The Foreman of the Jury replied

¢

replied "Not guilty." Every juryman was then required to repeat this answer separately. This he did to the satisfaction of almost all in court. The following address. and conversation then passed.

Recorder." Gentlemen of the Jury, I am

sorry you have followed your own judgements rather than the good advice which was given you. God keep my life out hands! But for this the Court

of

your

fines you forty marks a man, and imprisonment till paid."

W. Penn." I demand my liberty, being freed by the Jury."

Mayor.-"No. You are in for

W. Penn." Fines for what?"

your fines."

Mayor." For contempt of Court."

W. Penn." I ask if it be according to the fundamental laws of England, that any Englishman should be fined or amerced but by the judgement of his peers or jury, since it expressly contradicts the fourteenth and twenty-ninth chapters of the Great Charter of England, which says, "No freeman shall be amerced but by the oath of good and lawful men of the vicinage."

Recorder.-"Take him away."

W. Penn.

W. Penn. "I can never urge the fundamental laws of England but you cry Take him away; but it is no wonder, since the Spanish Inquisition has so great a place in the Recorder's heart. God, who is just, will judge you for all these things."

These words were no sooner uttered than William Penn and his friend, William Mead, were forced into the bale-dock, from whence they were sent to Newgate. Every one of the Jury also were sent to the latter prison. The plea for this barbarous usage was, that both the prisoners and the Jury refused to pay the fine of forty marks which had been put upon each of them; upon the former, because one of the Mayor's officers had put their hats upon their heads by his own command; and upon the latter, because they would not bring in a verdict, contrary to their own consciences, in compliance with the wishes of the Bench.

Thus ended this famous trial, through which, as sustained by William Penn with so much ability at the age of twenty-five, I have conducted the reader by as short a path as I well could, considering its vast importance; a trial, by which we see the assertion proved,

proved, that the noble institution of Juries is the grand palladium of our liberties; a trial, which for the good it has done to posterity ought to be engraved on tablets of the most durable marble; for it was one of those events, which in conjunction with others of a similar sort, by showing the inadequacy of punishment for religion to its supposed end, not only corrected and improved the notions of succeeding ages in this respect, but by so doing lessened the ravages of persecution, and the enmity between man and man. Nor ought posterity to be less grateful for it as a monument of the ferocity and corrupt usages of former times; for, contrasting these with the notions and customs of our own age, we behold that which we ought to contemplate, of all other things, with the greatest gratitude and delight, namely, the improvement of our social and moral being. In those times of bigotry the world seemed to be little better than a state of warfare between man and man; a state of warfare between man and his government; and this merely because the one differed from the other in those matters, of which God only was the proper and lawful judge. now happily the case is altered. We behold

But

indeed the fabric of the tower yet remaining. We see Newgate with its renovated walls upon the same spot. But we know these no longer as the receptacles of innocent individuals suffering for conscience sake. We have our courts of law remaining; but we see an order, a decorum, and an improvement in the administration of justice unknown at the period of this memorable trial. Nor will the prospect be less grateful, if we quit the present for a moment and direct our eyes to the future. We have the best reason to hope, on contemplating the signs of the times*, that the day is rapidly approaching, when the Christian religion, which is сараble of cementing men in the strongest possible union and for the noblest purposes, will be no longer the cause either of unnecessary division or of unmerited suffering.

1

William Penn and William Mead, though acquitted by the Jury, continued in Newgate.

* I allude to the voluntary repeal on the part of Government, last year, of this very Conventicle Act, and of the Five Miles Act; also to an extension of privilege to Dissenters; and particularly to those most noble institutions" The British and Foreign Auxiliary BibleSocieties," the business of which is conducted by an equal number of Churchmen and Dissenters acting harmoniously together.

They