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REVIEW. cc Still pleased to praise, yet not afraid to blame." — Pope.
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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.
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AfcT . l . ~—TAe Spirit of Despotism . 8 vo . pp . 94 . jffone . 1821 . fTHHIS pamphlet deserves to be dis-JL tinguished from the mass of ephemeral political publications . It is a re-publication of a volume , printed twenty-five years ago , and from some
cause or other suppressed . The author , yet living , is not generally known . It appears , from a letter in our present Number , ( pp . 164 , 165 , ) that our correspondent ( p . 108 ) was mistaken in supposing him to be Mr . Law . Whoever he be , he is entitled
to a distinguished place both amongst fine writers and Christian politicians . There is a glowing eloquence , the eloquence not of words but of sentiments , in every page . The author is deeply imbued with a sense of religion , and tor ought that appears he may be reckoned ainongst the enlightened and liberal members of the Church of
[ England . His example shews with how much more effect the cause of liberty and humanity may be pleaded from the New Teatauaettt than from the loose ground of abstract reason . Our unknown writer vindicates with
signal ability the right of the people to education . The vulgar , he says , will be liberalized , by bein ^ taught . Their taste will improve with their understanding ; and they will see the beauty of order while they are convinced of its utility . They will consider laws , not aa chains and fetters , but as helmets and shields for their
protection " . But what say the despots ? Like < the tyrannical son of Philip , when he reprimanded Aristotle for publishing hie discoveries , they whisper to their myrmidons , ' Let us diffuse darkness round the land . Let the people be kept in a brutal
state . Let their conduct ^ when assembled , be riotous and irrational as ignorance and our spies can make if , that they may be brought into discredit , and deemed unfit for the management of their own aflfoirs . Let power be rendered dangerous h * their hands , that it may continue unmolested in our own . Let them not taste the fruit of the tree of knowledge , lest they become as we are -
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and learn to know good and evil . *"—Pp . 14 , 15 . Being about to quote a striking passage froin the writings of Dr . Price , the author digresses to pro * nounce a panegyric upon him , led , he says , by an honest indignation against the vilest of calumnies against the best of men :
** On the mention of his name , I must pay a trifling tribute to his memory , which is the more necessary , as his character has been scandalously aspersed by those who are ever busy m discrediting the people and their friends , and who , pretending a love of goodness and
religion , blacken wjth their foulest calumny those who are singularly remarkable for both , for no other reason than that , under the influence of goodness and religion , such persons espouse the cause of freedom , and prefer the happiness of
millions to the pomp and pride of a few aspirants at unlimited dominion . Meek , gentle and humane ; acute , eloquent , and profoundly skilled in politics and philosophy ; take him for all and all , the qualities of his heart , with the abilities of his head , and you may rank Price
among the first ornaments of his age . Let his enemies produce from all their boasted despots and despotical Satraps , any < o « e x > £ his contemporaries whom , in the manoer of Pltttarch , they may place
by his aide » s a parallel . Posterity will < d *> hl * n the justice of which the proud hate robbed him , and snatch him from the calumniators , to place him in the temple of personal honour , high among the benefactors to the human race . "—P .
23 . In Section x . ( for the work is divided into sections , with a full title to each , ) the consequences are traced of holding human life cheap . It is maintained with the philosopher of antiquity , that homo res esi sacra , that every ^ huraan creature is consecrated to God , and
therefore inviolable by his fellow-man without profanation . All the gold of Ophnr , aft the gems of Golconda , cannot buy a single life , nor pay for its loss . But VDk despotic countries , and in all countries , opinions that depreciate man as man tend to despotism , the dignity of human nature is treated
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Review. Cc Still Pleased To Praise, Yet Not Afraid To Blame." — Pope.
REVIEW . cc Still pleased to praise , yet not afraid to blame . " — Pope .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), March 2, 1821, page 166, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2498/page/38/
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