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over all opposition , and that Unitarianism would in time become the prevailing belief of the Christian world , and would overthrow ail other systems . A violent spirit of hostility wa ^ now raised against the Dissenters , and particularly against Dr . Priestley ; and the cry of Church and King was raised
through the nation ^ an union of words , with respect to which Bishop vSlnpley well observed , that no one could suspect him of dislike to either part taken separately , but he knew , when thus united , they meant a chur-ch above the state , and a king above the Jaws , and such he hoped never to see in this country .
On the 14 th of July , 1791 , meetings were held in various parts of the kingdom , to commemorate the destruction of the Bastille . The more horrible parts of the French Revolution had not then begun . The King of France was then living at Paris , apparently
in great popularity , and in strict harmony with the National Assembly . At Birmingham ^ however , where one of these meetings was held , the populace rose with tbe utmost violence , and after burning the Dissenting chapels , they proceeded to Dr . Pries-tlev ' shouse ,
though he had not been present at the meeting . He was with some difficulty prevailed upon , to fly , for trusting in his own innocence and good-will to others , he thought it incredible that others should wish to injure him ; but his family refusing to escnpe without
him , he consented to accompany them . Thus his life was saved , but his house and his invaluable manuscripts ; library and philosophical apparatus , were destroyed by the mob . The following four days , the town of Birmingham and the country for several miles round ,
appeared to be entirely under the dominion of the rioters , who demolished all the houses of the principal Dissenters , and rendered it necessary for all such to save their lives by flight . These violen-ces , which were worse than any thing which had then taken place in the course of the French
Revolution , were passed over almost with impunity—one peruon only , and he one of the very meanest that was concerned in them , being punished , and the ministers , instead of reprobating them as they deserved , when Parliament met , attempt ed to excuse them , and to divert toe public attention from them ; thus
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shewing , th * t their dislike of the riotors and law less proceedings in France , arose not so much from the wickedness and violence of those proceedings , as from their being directed against kings and nobles , and that they had no objection to equal violence being employed
in this country against the Dissenters and the friends of liberty ; while , to use the language of one of their most eloquent writers , in relation to those horrid excesses , which after the time oft he Birmingham riots disgraced the course of the French Revolution , the Dissenters and the true friends of
liberty felt sentiments of abhorrence too strong to be expressed in language for the popular violences and murders , or attempts at murder , on both sides the channel . - These riots at Birmingham form the third instance in the course
of the last century , of popular violence excited by the High-church party , while no instance can be adduced of the Dissenters having attempted to in- > stigate the populace to any such deeds . Similar riots to those in Birmingham were excited in many of the principal
towns of the kingdom , but in none did they rise to so great an excess . Mr . Pitt having , in his speech against the repeal of the Test JLaw , avowed in the most unequivocal terms , the right of the Dissenters to a full and complete toleration ; Mr . Fox , in the year 1 702 *
brought forward a motion for the repeal of the Penal Statutes , which still hung over the Unitarians , but Mr . Pitt opposed the motion on the ground , that those laws were fallen into disuse , to which it was a fair reply , that laws which were too cruel to be carried
into execution , were a disgrace to the Statute-Book and ought to be repealed . The motion , however , wns lost by a large majority , ami here terminated for the present all attempts to enlarge the toleration of Dissenters .
In tii § year 1793 , Mr . Winterbotham , an Independent minister at Plymouth , was tried for sedition , found guilty and imprisoned for four years , on the evidence solely of three infamous women , two of whom had been already
convicted of perjury , and not one of whom , there was every reason to believe , had been present at the chapel on the day when they swore he h , ad used seditious expressions , while there was every possible evidence to , qtovq that be had never used such exprea *
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Brief History of the Dissenters from the Revolution . 459
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1817, page 459, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2467/page/11/
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