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Untitled Article
read for I had not the benefit of a previous perusal of it ) , that the defendant had represented himself as the author of it . I will not say he has falsely stated , this ( although he comes before the Court in a susp icious situation ) , but he may have been mistaken , and the improbability of
the defendant ' s haying so represented himself appears from the pamphlet itself , which , upon its face , professes to be a translation . It is in fact a compilation from the French infidel writers- and Mincham , possibly an illiterate man , and unaccustomed to the distinction between an
author and a translator , may have mistaken the defendants representation of the character which he bore as to the work . The Attorney-General interrupted to sa \ , that it did not appear by the title-page of the part before him that the work was a translation ; but the Officer of the Court was understood to say , that it did so appear by that in his possession .
Mr . Brougham—I cannot speak from my own knowledge . Though I have seen , I have never read a single paragraph of the work , except the passages on the record ; and am one of the many , many thousands , \ vho would never have seen even these passages , if it had not been for this information . I have now stated the
circumstances , upon which ( by analogy to the case of Eaton ) , I said I was bold enough to expect the defendant would be visited with slight punishment . It is unnecessary to go into other matters . It has heen stated , that the original author or translator in 1799 has been many years dead ; and that all these facts were
distinctly mentioned to the Attorney-General before Eaton ' s death , when , if untrue , they tnight have been contradicted by that person . The defendant , after he was aware of tie tendency of the publication , used all means to suppress it , and refused large
sums for copies of it ; he did not advertise > t ; offered to give up the remaining-copies , and to enter into a security that he had kept pack none . It was therefore unnecessary Jn the Attorney-General to hold oitf the threat he made use of : he knows that
mouths ago he received an offer that everv C should be given up . In an additional ™< lavit , the defendant has suggested the plicate situation in which a publisher « ands ; and the claims which that gives n » n to indul gence , should he overstep the o&snved bounds of kgal publication , are West . He daily sees , in every book-Wrs shop , lying , for sale , yet safe and " nmolesled , works of the most eminent auftU ' conta i « ing- the very sentiments art « l 1 , 1 « m . tlle w « r < ls of this book . He finds og writings in every library , public and hanl * thmu &l" > ut the country ; in the in ra \ ° n * tables > « f persons the highest cipln /* ¦ the m ° * 1 llI > P » ch < Hl prinr ** * ° t the mo * t unquestioned and un-
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questionable respectability . Those distinguished personages he daily sees buying : showing- , reading , lending , the books , both in foreign language and in our own , from which the present is a literal transcript-Ail this passes without the least notice taken , or risk incurred ; and the defendant , in his trade of a publisher or bookseller
( I know not whi ? cn he exercises ) is required nicely to balance the scale of danger and safety , cunningly to trace the line which separates what may from what may not lawfully be circulated ; and with so many examples before his eyes , of the greatest booksellers and worthiest citizens concurring in the traffic of every species of
iniidel composition , beyond all risk of legal vengeance , he is called upon to refuse acting in the line of his business , or expose himself to the vengeance of a law whose course he can hardly follow . This is a large book , consisting , as the Attorney-General says he has read it , of three hundred and fifty pages . If I were acquainted
with it , I might be able to point out in the course of it , passages of less ribaldry , and more unexceptionable , than those which have been read , byway of countervailing the libel ; but I have already said that my knowledge of it is derived entirely from the record ; and but that for this prosecution , I lament to add I , as well as thousands and
thousands who must now see it , would never have known of its existence . In concluding ^ I may be permitted to say one word respecting myself , from the delicacy of my present situation , and after what fell from the Court at an early period of the day . Of the book itself , or the principles of the defendant , I know nothing- ; it is needless to add , that
J am merely his retained advocate : but this I will say from my own observation oj these canting times that there are many better Christians ^ as there are truer men ^ than those mho go balding on t their faith in the high places ; that we may be sincere *
though quiet—devout , though charitablenay , that a jytan may look forward to henefit b j / his piety in the waff of reversion , though lie has not the talevt of turning it to present account by making godliness a great gain !
Mr . Justice Le Bla ? u said , that it was not correct to suppose that the defendant ' s punishment would be apportioned with any reference to the offence of the person alluded to ; for , when he was brought up , the Attorney-General did not pray judg merit against him , and unless the prosecutor did this , the Court could not
pronounce judgment . That offender was no more , and the Court w ^ uld in chari ty suppose , that , before he died , he saw and repented of his errors . The dc-fondant sinned with his eyes open against his better conviction , and , for the" sake of gain , yielded to lend his efForts to aid the purposes of a man . as bad as , ( or worse than , )
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Intelligence— Tkp . King against Houston for Blasphemy . \ Q&
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1815, page 125, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1757/page/61/
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