lustre on the judicial character of England, seem to have rejoiced in every opportunity of bearing testimony to the principles of Toleration, and of. enforcing the most liberal interpretation of that important Statute, by which they are secured. Thus, when it became a question before Lord Chief Justice Willes and the Court of Common Pleas, in the year 1744, whether a Baptist Minister, being also engaged in trade, was exempted from serving a parish office created since the time of King William, the judgment was pronounced in the following emphatic and comprehensive terms: "This is an extremely clear case. This case was not reserved from any doubt in the judge who tried the cause, but from the importunity of counsel. The Toleration Act is grounded on natural rights, and the highest natural right is that of the conscience. The Statute ought to receive a large and beneficial exposition, if the case wanted it; but the present is not only within the intent, but also within the very letter of it. Every person who is in Holy Orders, and is a teacher qualified according to the 1st of William and Mary, c. 18. is exempted from serving any parochial office, or other office, in any parish, &c.; the plaintiff is so qualified, and therefore is exempted. This is a parochial office in the nature of it; the Statute 10th George II. calls it an office. It is appointed by the parishioners, and exercised in a parish. The addition of the plaintiff's being a merchant, or dealer in hops, varies

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not the case; it does not destroy the privilege, any more than a clergyman's holding a farm, or exercising any temporal office. The Toleration Act exempts teachers from all future offices. Judgment for the plaintiff,”*

of

Again, in the case of Atcheson v. Everitt,† where a question incidentally arose on the propriety of indulging the scruples of the Quakers, with respect to swearing, Lord Mansfield took occasion to eulogize the "more liberal way thinking which prevailed after the Revolution. The principles of Toleration (said his Lordship) were explained and justified, in consequence of the writings of Mr. Locke, Lord Somers, and other great men of those times and a Statute passed, which, though not general, was very extensive in the relief it afforded to scrupulous consciences. That Statute was 1st William and Mary, commonly called the Toleration Act."

Mr. Justice Foster, in the clear and forcible language for which he was remarkable, declared that " THE ACT OF TOLERATION IS NOT TO BE CONSIDERED MERELY AS AN ACT OF CONNIVANCE AND EXEMPTION FROM FORMER LAWS; IT WAS MADE THAT THE PUBLIC WORSHIP OF THE DIS

SENTERS MIGHT BE LEGAL; AND THAT THEY

MIGHT BE ENTITLED TO THE PUBLIC PROTEC

TION."

* Kenward v. Knowles, Willes Rep. 463.

+ Cowp. Rep. 389.

Evans v. The Chamberlain of London, cited in 2 Burn's Ecelesiastical Law, 5th Ed. p. 190.

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It is apprehended, however, that such a construction of the Act, as would place a discretionary power of refusing those who may not be considered by the Magistrates as falling within the Act; a power necessarily involved in the supposed right of hearing and examining evidence on that subject,---would not only withdraw the public protection from that worship of the Dissenters, which the Act was intended to legalize, but would hazard even their exemption from punishment, and change the substantial security of a beneficent law, into a precarious dependence on the arbitrary will of individuals.

But if the preceding observations have any weight in them, this difficult and invidious duty, is not cast by law upon the Magistrates. The letter of the Act of Parliament conveys no such meaning; its spirit is completely against it, and the usage has always been directly the reverse. The practice has been followed by no inconvenience, nor can it either give effect to any frauds, or occasion any abuses. It has been sanctioned by universal opinion, from the moment the Act was passed, during a period of a hundred and twenty years;---claimed as a right, by those who were interested to preserve it; granted as an undeniable privilege, by many who would have been well pleased to refuse it. A departure from it, would be wholly ineffectual, for the correction of the mischiefs supposed to result from it, but a most powerful instrument for the vexation and

oppression of those whom the Toleration Act was designed to protect. In truth, the slightest opening for discretionary power on the part of the Magistrates, would consign the whole body of Dissenting Ministers to the mercy of the persecuting laws that disgraced the reign of Charles the Second, unless they were suspended by the will and pleasure of the Quarter Sessions; the Great Charter of religious liberty would be placed on the same doubtful footing with an alehouse license; and the Toleration Act would be virtually repealed.

FINIS.

Erratum et Addendum.

Page 9, Line 10 from bottom, for "Peak's Case," read "Peach's Case."

Page 35, after the first paragraph, add the following note :

Since writing the above, the author has been happy to see his opinions on this point sanctioned and enforced in a very able tract, cntitled, “ An Enquiry into the original and modern Application of the Statute of the 1st of William and Mary, commonly called the Toleration Act. By the Author of 'Hints on Toleration.' London: Maxwell.

1812."

W. Heseltine, Printer, Dowgate Hilb London

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