On this page
-
Text (1)
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
468 inielUgenae . ~ -BrQtest < mt Society .
Untitled Article
his purpose would be confirmed by the very threat of opposition by which some might be dismayed . Instant triumph never was expected . TVy and persevere had ever been the motto of the promoters
of truth and freedom , and of the great benefactors of mankind . Could he then forego or postpone his purpose , though Tories clamour , or a minister may frown ! Taught by the masters of ancient song , he would
exclaim—Justum et tenacem propositi virum , Non vultus instantis tyranni , Mente quatit
solida—Or , as one of our bards has versified the sentiment , The man resolved , and steady to his trust , Inflexible to ill , and resolutely just ; The tyrant ' s fierceness he beguiles ,, And the stern brow , and the harsh voice defies ; And with superior greatness smiles .
To him the declaration made by an eminent and highly-talented statesman , that he would oppose our application for redress , appeared as premature as the reason assigned for the opposition was unsound . Usual courtesy should have induced him to suspend his decision until the numbers and importance of the petitions were ascertained , until the facts had been stated , and tfye advocates been heard . The wishes of two
millions of industrious , manly , loyal , useful , religious and enlightened citizens , were . entitled to that attention and respect : and were he a Protestant Dissenter himself , he would be the last of men to treat as merely * ' * theoretic , " the claims which regard to honour and
religious principle , and no mercenary motives , impel them to assert . His spirit would spurn contempt , would feel that degradation is an injury , and would choose a wreath of parsley offered with respect , rather than sell his independence for a crown of gold . But though all parties of ins . and outs opposed , they
had pushed their bark into the sea , and though waves and tides and storms beat them off , season after season , the crew were principled and firm—they were true tars of England . With them he would try and persevere ; and at last , the waves and tides and storms would be surmounted and the shore attained .
Thanks having been voted to Lord Milton , his Lordship , in rising to . acknowledge the compliment , observed , that , as it might be expected of him to
Untitled Article
say something upon the important subject that had that day much occupied their attention , he would allude , in the first place , to the altered condition of the country since the time the laws complained against were passed . Did any one who surveyed the country imagine that any of those causes which induced our ancestors to exclude
Dissenters from the rights of citizens now had existence ? Were we now afraid that Republican Dissenters and Papists would become the advocates of despotism ? Surely no one believed that , in these days , it was the wish of the Catholic to endanger the Church , or of the Dissenter to overturn the Throne . If these wishes and feelings were banished from the hearts and minds of the
different classes of Dissenters , justice demanded that the laws which were enacted to restrain them should be annulled , and Government could not long withstand their righteous claims . He , too , must express his surprise and concern at their disabilities being called theoretic . Were those evils theoretic which were
so luminously detailed in the report they had heard ? Was it only a theoretic evil to the Dissenter , that he could not be admitted into the magistracy except by a conformity which his conscience disapproved , or a miserable evasion of the law through the Act of Indemnity , —the very passing of which every session was a practical proof of the folly and evil of
such objectionable laws ? But it was not only to the civil disabilities he objected : they were likewise , in his opinion , highly injurious to the promotion of true religion . He recollected that when the Bill brought in by his honourable friend , Mr . Smith , of Norwich , for the relief of the Unitarians , was in
its progress through the House of Peers , one of the late Ministers objected to it , on account of its making the Cburch a handmaid to Dissent . But , he would ask , if , under the present laws , the Church was not made an auxiliary to civil rights and legal proceedings , as the only legal evidence of a birth was the parish register of the christening of a child ? He was afraid that a vast
number of the Legislators were Ignorant of the matter : but that was not their fault . It was not usual for men to seek to become acquainted with inconveniences , by which they were not affected ; and it was , therefore , the duty of the Dissenters to make their situation known . To
their passiveness alone , must be attributed the ignorance which unhappily prevailed . He assured the meeting that
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1827, page 458, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1797/page/66/
-