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health of the body and the enjoyment of the mind , and instead of degrading the human character to the level of a savage , are calculated to elevate man in the scale of rational being's , and to prepare him for a purer state of society hereafter . " I am , Sir , " With much respect , &c . " JOSEPH BROTHERTON "
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tTomerton ^ Sir , May 17 , 1819-IN the Religious Intelligence of your last Number , [ p . 273 , ] is an article headed Anti-Catholic Proceeding ? , in which your readers are informed ,
that " the clergy of London and of several other dioceses , the synod of Glasgow , and a few civil corporations , have followed the example of Oxford in petitioning parliament against the Catholic Claims . The Baptist Dissenters also have in their last magazine ( for April ) declared themselves strongly on the side of intolerance . This ill comports with the boast
which they sometimes make of having been always foremost in the cause of religious liberty . " That many of the clergy , who have reason to be satisfied with things as they are , and some Pissenting ministers who are accustomed to dogmatize and act as if they were infallible , should unite in petitioning against the Catholic Claims * can hardly excite surprise ^ but that the " Baptist
Dissenters should " also have declared themselves strongly on the side of intolerance , " must excite not merely surprise , but feelings of a very painful nature- " This , " Sir , as you justly observe , " ill comports with the boast
which they sometimes make of having been always foremost in the cause of whicti they sometimes make of having been always foremost in the cause of religious liberty . " Hut allow me to ask , Who are these Baptist Dissenters ? Are they the Particular or the General Baptists , or both ? If the two parties
of Baptists have not united in a measure so truly disreputable to themselves , surely it ought in candour , and the justice for which the article pleads , to have been distinctly stated that the Particular or Calvirt ( istic Hai Y > - that the Particular or Mmnistic > n \\
-lists were the persons who had thus rendered thHr claim to be considered as " always foremost in the cause of religious liberty , " completely nugatory . Knowing , however , as 1 do , aornc . of the leading Particular Baptist piinistcrs , who not only claim
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the right of judging for themselves , but are sincerely desirous of seeing the Catholics succeed in their Claims , I suspect that those " Baptist Dissenters" who " have declared
themselves strongly on the side of intolerance , " form only *• a knot" even of the Particular Baptists . Fiat justicia , mat ceelum * To disabuse those of your readers
whom the indefiniteness of the intelligence may have led into a mistake , allow me to state , that on the 11 th of this month the Old or Unitarian General Baptists of the county of Kent ,
held their annual association , at Canterbury . This was considered by some of the aged members as the most numerously attended association they had ever witnessed . And here ,
Sir , Sir ,
I have the happiness of being able to add , that when the article in your Repository was mentioned , it called forth an expression of feeling approaching to indignation , that 4 *
Baptist Dissenters" should have disgraced themselves by " declaring on the side of intolerance against the Roman Catholics . About eighty gentlemen sat down to dinner * and upwards of forty to supper . When the cloth was
removed after supper , the Chairman ( the present writer ) proposed as a subject for discussion the justice of the Catholic Claims . The subject occupied the attention of the company for an hour and half , during which
many gentlemen gave their opinion . And , although , to borrow once more your own term , there was " a knot " who thought it would be dangerous to entrust that sect with power , who had
heretofore so grossly abused it ; yet so decided was the majority in favour of the Catholic Claims * that the meeting refused to break up till the Chairman promised he would convey to the Editor of the Monthly Repository a
declaration , that they consider Catholics a& equally entitled with themselves , or any other class of Dissenters from the Established Church , to every natural and civil right . This the General Baptists of Kent , wish to
be considered as their protest against the injustice , as well as impolicy , of all 4 t Anti-Catholic Proceedings . ' * Their protest needs no comment ; and 1 rely on your candour and impartiality for its immediate insertion . G- S ,
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314 The General Baptists friendly to the Catholic Claims .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1819, page 314, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1772/page/34/
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