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the minutest attention to all the for pis and all the parade of Catholicism , something like sympathy would have been felt , — something like justice would have been done towards the man , who , when Atheism , if we may so speak , was the religion of the
Thuilleries , had dared , undaunted by the danger incurred by dissent from the established unbelief , to proclaim his unalterable attachment to Christianity . We might have reasonably hoped , that
the man whose example , perhaps more than any other , had tended to uphold the faith of his country when it was scoffed at by her philosophers and trampled on by her demagogues , would have been treated with
something less than malignity by a Royal House which professes such zeal for the Restoration of all the outward observances of the Catholic Creed . To insult him—to traduce him , however , has been a stire passport of recommendation to a Bourbon . We should be wasting our
tinie and that of our readers , in attempting the defence of such a character , if that were allowed by general consent to be an axiom which to us appeara incontrovertible , namely , " That that man is entitled to the
veneration of mankind , who has employed a long life in his private and public capacity in the endeavour to benefit his fellow-creatures . " Yet so far is this seeming truism from being sanctioned by common opinion , that
the instances are even numerous in which a life thus devoted has been the object of unmerited and never-tired detraction . We do not , however , recollect a more signal example than the case of M . Gregojre . M . GnSgoire is a Native of Alsace . The early period of his active life was the ministerial duties
employed in of the priesthood , and it was not till he had attained a mature age , that he published the first work which made his name equally known and respected throughout Bi ^ rope . T his was his 4 € Esaai 6 uria R £ g £ n 6 r&tion Physique , Morale 6 t Politique des Jirifs , " which
> vas crowned by the Royal Society of > vas crowned by the Royal Society of Metz , in 1788 , fcnd procured him admission to that learned body . In England , where the Jews have long enjoyed spnuething like protection from the laws , a plea for their toleration woiild not perhaps oppose the prejudices of the many , in the degree that
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would be felt on many parts of the Continent , where this much-injured race are * ' even in the present day" so frequently the sufferers from popular violence . But among our neighbours it was a bold step to take in defence of the natural rights of man , when our
author not only claimed for the Jews an unlimited freedom openly to profess their religion , but maintained the doctrine of their eligibility to the public duties of the citizen . The enlarged views exhibited in this dissertation are .
evidently the same that at a later period directed its eloquent author in his endeavours to obtain for his country , that first of blessings—quo nihil majus , meliusve terru Fuia donavere — the blessing of civil liberty . He traces the causes of the degenerate , character of the sons of Israel to their true source *
the unceasing persecution of bigots , misnamed Christians , and anticipates , with a benevolence which is the spring of all Ids feelings , the happiest change in that character from the general acknowledgment of their natural rights in the Christian world .
M . Gr £ goire was a member of the National Assembly at the beginning of the French Revolution , and was always found in the foremost rank of those whose moderate counsels * if followed , would have secured the Ja&ting freedom of his country . A % this time *
Clarkson , whose name will always be coupled with the grand event of which he was , the prime mover , arrived at Paris , and warnily engaged the " virtuous Abb 6 Ga ^ goire" in the intended motion of the Count de Mirabeau for
the Abolition of the Slave Trade . This , as it was a subject the most congenial to the feelings of this frfend of universal man , ever after most deeply interested his thoughts , and has since
been advocated in his work , ' * I ? e /« Traite et de I E&clavage des Ntftrs et des jB lanes , par tin Ami des Hommes de toutes les Couleurs , " another proof of the dedication of his mind to the
great task of the improvement of his species . Wlieir the reign of Atheism , during which he had rifeked every thing for truth , was succeeded by the te * Establishment of Christianity , this « ealous prelate , in conjunction with his episcopal brethren , added his personal labours to his former example ^ for the purpose of eradicating the evil weeds of infidelity which had taken such deep
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Review . ~ -Life and Character of Abb& Grigoire . 35
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1821, page 35, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2496/page/35/
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