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Untitled Article
provement of public morals , and to the promotion of industry , subordination and loyalty , among the middle and inferior orders of the community , and that to this high degree of religious liberty , under the blessing of Divine Providence , the
preservation of this happy country from the horrors of that revolutionary frenzy which Iras so awfully desolated the nations of the Continent is principally to be ascribed . IV . That our confidence in the
continuance of those rights , which are legally secured to us as our constitutional birthright by the Act of Toleration , has been greatly confirmed by the repeated declations of all our monarchs * from the time of William the Third , ' in
favour of religious liberty ; and especially by the ever memorable assurance of our present venerable and beloved sovereign in his first speech from the throne , that it vashis" invariable Resolution to maintain the toleration inviolate ;"
and that " the religious rights of his subjects were equally dear to him with the most valuable prerogatives of his crown ;"—an assurance with which his Majesty ' s conduct towards us has hitherto uniforml y accorded .
V . That we view with the greatest alarm and concern a Bill which , has been lately introduced jnto the House of Lords by a no-Neman , whose general character we highly respect , which Bill we consider as tending to restrict and finish those loner-established
privilege which are specified in « te fo regoing resolutions . . VI- That the said Bill , if passed jjjto a . law , will materially abridge •[^ unquestionable right of British jects to judge and decide for e mselves concerning the compe-* Ucy of those religious teachers
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whom they conscientiously prefer , and , , therefore , voluntarily support : — that it will be a grievous hardship upon the regular itinerant ministers of our connection ,
( who , though not permanently appointed to separate congregations , are yet wholly devoted to the Christian ministry , ) by depriving them of those exemptions , not merely from pains and penalties , but also from military and other
secular duties , which , on the ground of the public utilit } ' to be derived from their labours , the law ., as it now stands , has wisely granted to persons who are constantly and exclusively employed in the work of religious instruction : —that it will render it very difficult and expensive , and in many cases altogether
impracticable , to obtain legal protection for the numerous body of our occasional preachers and exhorters , who not only form a very useful part of our society , but whose services are essentially necessary as local auxiliaries to the regular itinerant ministers , in order to
supply the various chapels and meeting-houses in which our congregations assemble for divine worship ;—that it will be a serious violation of that confidence which has been reposed in the h : \ vs of their country by the trustees of our numerous chapels , who have
expended large sums ot money , and signed securities to a very considerable amount , on account of the said chapels , on the faith of the Act of Toleration ^ and with the fullest reliance that our present system , as allowed by that Act , would remain undisturbed : —
that it will open new sources of litigation , and furnish to the illdisposed the occasion and the means of obstructing and oppressing their peaceable fellow-subjects
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Toleration Act . 42 £
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 2, 1811, page 427, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2418/page/43/
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