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the patronage of ministers; still they are in fact the prolific fountain of his honours and expectations: and for him, so circumstanced, to arrogate an exemption from the partialities of selfish influence in what most intimately concerns the character and condition of his patrons, is to arrogate a superiority over all the weaknesses of human nature, and an equality with the divine. We will accept his pretensions when invariable causes have suspended their activity: when night no longer follows the departure of the sun; when the moon ceases to be eclipsed by falling into the shadow of the earth.

The biographer of Sir Thomas More records the following among other instances of magnanimity in the conduct of that great man.~ "Instead of exerting his power to crush or silence those who opposed or slandered him as a minister, he thought, as their arrows did not hit him, he received more benefit from them than from his friends; and it seems it was his opinion, that no minister, who was innocent of the charge against him, would treat his accusers with insolence, or persecute them with power.

They who sincerely venerate the gospel will come properly prepared for my statement. I propose to your dispassionate attention that transaction in the acts of the apostles, where Peter and his brethren are summoned before a council of Jewish magistrates, to give an account of their conduct for presuming to disobey the injunctions of the sanhedrim, by executing their evangelical office in preaching to the people. Let us exhibit to our minds, as accurately as we can, the different apprehensions and motives of the accusers and defendants in this example. The accusers, men of learning, distinction, and authority, but inattentive, as this description of people are uniformly represented in the scriptures,

to every object not immediately connected with their own emoluments or power, probably knew nothing of the apostles but from rumour, and the relation of those who had apprehended them, in consequence of what was deemed a tumultuary concourse in the city. Common fame had stigmatised them as seditious innovators, disturbers of the public peace, enemies to Cæsar, and to the civil and political constitution of their country. Uuder these impressions and appearances the severities of bodily castigation and imprisonment were exercised in various instances on these faithful followers of their divine master. I suppose we are all very ready to acknowledge the culpability of the jewish rulers on those occasions, and the laudable perseverance of the apostles in their purpose; but observe in one instance, where the simple fact is a tumultuous assemblage in the city, and a presumption of mischievous incitement to confusion lies against Peter and his brethren, observe I say, in one instance, where they were examined for these appearances of outrage, before the sanhedrim: what was the result: a result which all governors in every age, who profess any reverence for the scriptures, are bound to respect, and imitate in similar examples of abstinence, on the side of the arraigned party, from actual violence to the community. Whilst the majority of the judges were recommending or approving severe punishments, under the influence, I presume, of the modern notion of subduing minds by rigour, Gamaliel, a man of learning, interposed with this sensible advice. Refrain from these men, and let them alone: for, if this counsel, or this work, be of men, it will come to nought; but, if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it, lest haply ye be found even to fight against God. The jewish magistrates adopted this wise and moderate counsel. The apostles were discharged, and left to their

pacific employment of refuting error and enforcing truth, after their own discretion, without punishment or molestation. Now every propagator of an opinion, fraught with benevolence, and instinct with universal happiness, though he be the most insignificant of all his species, must be allowed to be so far at least, in a similar situation with the apostle Peter, and his associates. And it will be acknowledged I trust that a belief in the sinfulness of war, among christian nations for example, and also in the efficacy of peace, as essential to the happiness of the world, are opinions, not only inoffensive in themselves, but extremely consonant to the spirit of christianity. I go further; and make no scruple of declaring before men and angels, without any hostility to those who disapprove my sentiments, or any fear of their displeasure, that real christianity, divested of these pacific dispositions and pacific practices, has no existence, and can have no existence beyond an idle name, and an unmeaning ceremonial among men! This propensity to war, and a restless incitement of other European states to its horrid deeds, by the ministers of this country, in conjunction with the unutterable enormities of our traffic in human flesh, is that great offence, that monstrous exhibition of gigantic wickedness, which must pour down the choicest phials of divine wrath on a land of most pre-eminent blood-guiltiness; which must render our utter obliteration from the map of nations, a judgment of of God, almost essential to the very preservation and continuance of our species on earth!

The accomplishment of providential purposes comes not with observa tion. The Babylonians, Samaritans, and inhabitants of Jerusalem in for mer times the Roman empire of Constantinople, at a later periodthe monarchies of France, Sardinia, and Naples, of yesterday said to

themselves, as we say now, peace and safety, (1 Thes. v. 3) but sudden and irretrievable destruction, was at that very moment falling on their heads. Perhaps even now the sentence of fiery indignation is written down against us by the recording angel in the register of supernal vengeance, as a just retribution for our ferocious principles. For myself I regard the friend of war and slaughter as the epitome of all mischief, as the true man of sin, visually exhibited in a human shape: and no considerations of worldly benefit, no supposed political advantages, should ever prevail on me to lift up with deliberation a murderous hand against a fellow creature of any character or country; nor will I prefer a temporary prosperity in the perishable communities of the earth to a polity secure and and permanent in a city which hath foundations, whose contriver and builder is God. The situation in which I am placed has been allowed by the wisest writers to excuse some portion of self-commendation, and I might appeal in corroboration of these positions to those who know me, and they are very numerous, whether my social and familiar intercourse be not tran quil and unassuming, studiously at tentive to the delicate sensibilities and innocent accommodation of all with whom I converse; without malice, asperity, or arrogance: and though it be a motive of inferior consideration, it may not misbecome you to reflect, how far the reputation of this country, as pretending to enjoy a liberal and happy government, will be consulted among the polished nations of Europe by the servile punishment of one, whose writings have furnished a subject for the inaugural orations of professors in foreign universities; of one who

* An article on this subject in my pamphlet was the chief accusation brought against me.

has been honoured by the unsolicited correspondence of the first scholars on the continent, whose names are consecrated to immortality. One opinion, at least, I am well persuaded, must be formed by men of letters both in the present and the future generations of the world; that they who can prevail 'upon themselves so to prosecute, and so to punish such writings as my pamphlet, bring a charge of ferocity against their neighbours, with no sensations of shame and decency. This prosecution differs in degree only, not in kind, in form and semblance, not in principle and spirit, from the most sanguinary excesses of the blackest tyranny. However it is for yourselves to determine whether ye will follow the moderate and bumane counsels of Gamaliel, or imitate the fierceness of others in the Sanhedrim; whether ye will pursue that conduct which is approved or that which is condemned, not by reason only, but by the revealed will of God; this, I say, is a point in which your characters for consistency and justice, as christian magistrates, are most deeply and momentously involved; for I challenge any man to demonstrate the inapplicability of the case which I have stated to the respective circumstances of your selves and me at the present hour; to myself the alternative is comparatively most transitory and insignificant Permit me to request your indulgence, whilst I recal to your memories some examples of true wisdom and magnanimity in princes of ancient and modern times; which will at once illustrate and confirm a sentiment in the former part of my address, touching the security and unconcern of good governments at the censures of the malicious, disingenuous, or mistaken writers. And these sxamples of liberality and he roism, it may be observed, have commanded the applause and admiration not only of every reader, but

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of the historians who have recorded them. Philip the Second of Spain liberated from prison a man, whom the council of state had condemned to die for harsh animadversions on the measures of his government; generously remarking at the same time, "that a king is never more secure “from the malice of his people, than "when their discontents are suffered "to evaporate in complaint." (Wraxall's Hist. of France. Vol. I. p. 96.) Even Caligula at the commencement of-his reign, as we are informed by Seutonius, (Vit. Calig. Sect. 15.) refused to receive informations relative to his own personal safety by secret communication; declaring with a noble sublimity of mind that "he "had done nothing to deserve an enemy, and that he had no ears for an informer." Timoleon the deliverer of Syracuse from the tyranny of Dionysius, told his friends, who were urging him to punish a slanderer of his virtuous atchievements, that "his primary motive to all his

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painful enterprises had been the se"curity of free speech to the meanest "citizen." (Corn. Nep. xx. 5. 23.) Nay, Tiberius himself (for the worst of these Roman emperors admitted an occasional dilution of their rancour and ferocity from the copious draughts of elegance and wisdom which they had imbibed at the fountain of the muses) even Tiberius would often say, when instigated to the punishment of libellers, "that "the tongues and minds of men in

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a free country should be free." (Sueton. in Tiber. sect. 28.) But I forbear to trespass on your patience by a more full detail; and will only recite a few sentiments on this sub ject from the most virtuous and intelligent of mankind.

Socrates was accustomed to declare that the sun might as easily be spared from the universe as free speech from the liberal institutions of society. (Apud Stob. eth. ed, xiii.) It was a saying of Domosthenes,

that no greater calamity could come upon a people than the privation of free speech. (Id. ibid.) Tacitus mentions with singular complacency, and even triumph, the pre-eminent felicity of his own times, the reign of Trajan, in the privilege of free sentiments, and the free utterance of those sentiments. (Hist. i. 1.) But these noble specimens of just and generous conceptions illuminate with wonderful richness and variety the pages of ancient literature, whether in their poets, philosophers or histo

rians.

I shall solicit your indulgence only to one quotation more, from the works of a man, whose name is sacred to genius and to virtue; I mean JOHN LOCKE. This illustrious philosopher mentions a society, which required from every member at his admission an explicit declaration of assent to these three propositions. 15% That he loved all men of what profession or religion soever. 2d. That he thought no person ought to be harmed in his body, name, or goods, for mere speculative opinions, or his external way of worship. 3d. That he loved and sought truth for truth's sake; and would endeavour impartially to find and receive it himself, and to communicate it to others.

Surely now the examples and opinions of such heroes whose heads and hearts conspire to recommend each other with most amicable reciprocations, their philosophy sanctified by their virtue, and their virtues illuminated by their philosophy; the lives and sentiments, I say, of men like these, are calculated, I should think, to excite some mistrust in minds not self-opiniated and obdurate, respecting the reasonableness and equity of their proceedings in such prosecutions, of which it is my fortune this day to have become a victim. I, however, can do no more than present these impressive documents to your dispassionate delibera

tion yet one observation at least I may be permitted to subjoin without offence. He, who approves prosecution for writings and opinions, and gives his suffrage for the punishment of men so persecuted, whatever his station, his intellect, his abilities, or virtues may be, that man most assuredly bears no resemblance in this respect to the noblest of his, species, to Demosthenes and Tacitus, to Socrates and Locke. At the instigation of my family and friends, I shall not hesitate to mention another par ticular for your consideration; but to prevent any misconception in your minds, as if I were inclined to win by supplication, rather than claim by justice and extort by reason, I must beg leave to preface that com munication by some remarks, not very acceptable perhaps for all to hear, but absolutely necessary for me to utter. I mean not, in any thing that I have now said, or may hereafter say, to insinuate the least possible contrition or change of sentiment on the subject of these proceedings-By no means. I understand, I hope, too well that dignified sentiment of a great philosopher,

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a reverence of my own character;" I understand too well the only proper inference from such persecutions of unambitious and pacific men by the children of this generation, the idolaters of secularity and power and preferment; I understand too well the veneration due to all that is lovely in morals, and sacred in religion, to contemplate interminable war and extirpation, with any other feelings than those of irreconcileable hostility to the measures themselves, and of alarm for the promoters of these measures, whenever my mind anticipates their presentment before his tribunal, who came not to destroy men's lives but to save them. Upon these subjects I have constructed my opinions with too much deliberation, and on principles too solid to be shaken by this blast of persecution,

which is rather calculated to fix their roots, encourage their growth, and invigorate their stability: nor is any other depraved and inhuman process at all likely to disabuse one of my persuasion, if such it be, whilst the christian religion continues to be the directory of my conduct, and PEACE with GOOD WILL universal and unbounded, not blood-guiltiness and war, the characteristic attributes of that religion.

[After this provision" for a just appreciation of his motives," Mr. Wakefield proceeded to notify what need not be given at length in the speaker's words: it was indeed a most afflicting malady which ought to have had a strong effect upon the humanity of the parties to whom he addressed himself. Mr. Wakefield was, whenever seized with this complaint, subject to most-acute pain, and a watch fulness which no medical ability could alleviate even for months, so, as he expresses it, to render existence all but insupportable and extinguished. He then adds as follows.] A detail of this peculiarity would appear too singular for credibility except to those who have been witnesses of its reality, or who know me sufficiently to confide in the veracity of my narration, and therefore I forbear to enlarge on this grievance, which may, or may not, eventually occur with serious severity, and has my full permission to influence your determinations just as much, and just as little as it pleases. The cause of liberty, of benevolence, of humanity, and the gospel, in which I feel myself engaged, is able to support me under a much heavier pressure of affliction than what any resentment of my persecutors may wish you to impose upon me. When I embarked on the ocean of public life, I could not but forløde some future tempests, and I am prepared to endure their fury. The vessel may be wrecked, but my purpose no catastrophe shall frustrate; and the voyager will reach his haven. In those heavenly contemplations which

transport the soul beyond the sphere of sublunary vicissitudes to the regions of blessedness permanent and unchangeable, such events as this, the formalities of these courts, the maxims by which they are directed, that authority and power which gives them reverence, dwindle into diminutive and obscure frivolities, scarely discernible, amidst objects of suck mighty magnitude, and transcendent lustre. Can the child of true wis dom disquiet his mind with the solicitude of a single moment about his passage over that short isthmus which separates time and corruption from duration and immortality; which divides the scanty tribes now roving on the surface of the earth from the countless myriads of former generations intombed in her bosom !

I may he told perhaps of the lawś of my country, the wisdom of parliaments, and the constitutions of our ancestors. These are things to which it will be my happiness as well as interest to pay all the respect and obedience in my power: but there are other laws, other wisdom, and other constitutions of much higher dignity, of more deep concernment, and of uncontroulable authority; I mean the laws, the wisdom, and constitutions of the gospel: nor, I apprehend, is it frivolous, or presumptuous to suppose, that divine injunctions and municipal arrangements, the imbecility of man and infallibility of God, may be at variance, and even inconsistency with each other. In such a case, I shall choose to say, in the words of Peter and John to the Jewish council ; "Whether it be right in the sight of God, to hearken unto you more than unto God judge ye." One proposition is unquestionably true, and rests on the immoveable basis of reason and experiment: violent and cruel measures, intimidation and persecution, cannot possibly con spire with the real happiness and improvement of man, in any form whatever, nor will they eventually

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