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    accusation charge that which is not , to open the way for sitting in judgment on that which is ! It is no trifling evil that legal fictions should be so established as to divest fiction of disgrace . How many public forms are full of falsehood ! Each generation may , in succession , become so familiarized to these things , as to be scarcely conscious of the fact ; but is no price paid for that

    familiarity ? Does it not , in succession , bluntthemoralsen . se of each generation ? Then , to fvhat has the competitive system in trade and commerce brought us ? Is a transparent sincerity the common quality of mercantile transactions ? Is it not comparatively rare , and by its rarity honourable ; and by its merited honour a merited condemnation of the prevailing system and spirit , showing that there is something wrong , and which should be amended ? We make our literature a snare and trap for siri *

    cerity ; we make it , by a long array of legal arid social arrangements , most difficult for an honest and independent man , without wealth or party to back him , to get access to the public mind , save by catering to public prejudice . There is a premium for insincerity in every department ; nor least of all in social intercourse . The man who always says what he . thinks on any subject , however admirable his intellect , however benevolent his heart , however bland his manners , however unobtrusive his

    conversation , would stand but a poor chance , for some time at least , in society . He would be odd , eccentric , disagreeable , and outlawed by the conventionalism of the day . There is an established taste , and talk , as well as an established faith . How : many topics there are , on which to keep in with the common run of society , a woman must have no opinion ; a man only one opinion—that perhaps a wrong one . These laws are appropriately

    enforced by wonder , ridicule , sarcasm , coldness , and ultimate proscription . Howard was called a busy , meddling , wrong-headed man , addicted strangely to running about amongst gaols . Men declared Rousseau to be mad till they drove him sd . By a ruder V'ace , Whitfield and Wesley were pelted , by , the very class of which thousands npw sanctify their memories . Would that one could show the mischief and misery of all this fraud , cant , ignorance ,

    hollowness , and intolerance ! Would that one could but display so persuasively as to be » resistless , the beauty , the dignity , the practicability , the blessedness of perfect sincerity and truth in all concerns of religion , law , government * trade , literature , and society ! Many disguises would be torn off which are now worn ; many opinions avowed which now are suppressed ; many forms abolished which are now consecrated : but how much would be

    done for the discovery of truth , how much for the . dignity of character , and how much for the promotion of happiness ! Hypocrisy has been said to be the homage which vice pays to goodness } were the tribute but remitted , the dominion of goodness would be extended . O , it holds good everywhere and always , —* Let your

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    Subornation of Insincerity , 70 S

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Oct. 2, 1832, page 703, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1822/page/53/