On this page

• Text (1)

  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.

  • 

    Untitled Article

• 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

    that their future interpositions would be Rewarded by similar

    success . In the late proceedings , to which they had alluded , he had also considered himself as advocating the cause of religious liberty . To civil freedom he was sincerely attached . That attachment did not

    proceed from an inconsiderate regard to the name of liberty , or from the perpetuation of the feeling excited in his boyish mind by the narratives of the fabulous and

    tinphilosophicai historians of antiquity . He now loved freedom , because he knew its moral and practical influence on individual character , and on social happiness * He therefore admired those

    writings which explained its principles ^ and regarded with hallowed veneration the memory of the immortal pa « n who had died iq its defence ? Religion possessed yet greater influence on man ; it presented more powerful motives to the human mind than the

    calculations of morality or the terrors of Jaw ; but to be effective , it must be spontaneous and free . He was therefore yet more attached to religious liberty than even to civil freedom . He regarded all

    legislative interference with religU on , as resulting from equal ignorance of the rights of society , the rights of man and the rights of God . Religion might be consi ^ dered as a sentiment of grateful affectiou to the beneficent

    Supreme : —and who should presume to . compel the existence of the sen * timent or to direct in to hat Jan *

    gu ^ ge , by what rattitudes , # t what times , that sentiment should ( be ^ xpresfted . ? yrtyat map oncombination of men should prf ^ umeitorte ; Jl another man how and whom he

    Untitled Article

    should love , and then dare tb punish inattention to their rules by disqualification , by penalties ^ by tortures , by death 2 He could not describe the indignation such

    canduct excited in his mind . —It was of all tyrannies most tvrannous and it was a presumption he must invariably oppose . It was there , fore he opposed the bill introduced by Lord Sidmouth into parliament , which imposing new restrictions on Christian ministers limited

    existing toleration , and was hostile to religious liberty . By generous and general efforts , and especially by the vigilance and energy of the liberal and active committee for whom he acted , and

    of which their Chairman and Secretary constituted most useful members , the attempt had been resisted with complete success .- — At that result he rejoiced with a joy which they . must reciprocate . For in that assembly religious

    liberty must have m every man a champion , and every champion was himself an hosU They daily proved that their professions of regard to the rights of conscience were " not an empty name / ' for

    they avowed their belief in principles to which our imperfect Acts of Toleration did not extend , and they were therefore exposed to all the proscriptions and penalties which the bigotry of Elizabeth and the Stuarts bad imposed .

    They however possessed jone advantage over their tolerated bretb ^ ren . Their sincerity could not beimpugfied . Fpr whoever might disapprove their doctrines roust yat regard with respect the integrity of tfyose men who maintained theiV doctrines , although the sword of punishLrae&t wa . s suspended bu t by a thread .

    Untitled Article

    S 6 & Intelligence . — -Unitarian Fund .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1811, page 368, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2417/page/48/