On this page
-
Text (1)
-
Untitled Article
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.
-
-
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
sumed authority , absolved his people from their allegiance to the papal see , and threatened to inflict death upon any of his subjects who should refuse to him the oath of supremacy , or affirm the authority of the Holy Father . The spiritual tyranny of Henry was more burdensome than even that of the Pope , but what he had done nourished those principles of the reformation
which had already taken root , chiefly through the efforts of the celebrated Wickliffe , and they grew and multiplied notwithstanding the checks which they received ; and , together with them , grew also the principles of civil liberty , until one Stuart lost his head in endeavouring to make himself absolute master of the property of the people , and another Stuart , for his attempt to re-enact Popery and despotism , was forced to abdicate his throne , and to submit to see his crown transferred from his own brow to those of
his daughter and her husband William . This revolution , by the provisions of its act of settlement , seated the present royal family , the House of Brunswick , upon the throne , after the decease of Queen Anne , and they are now the hereditary but constitutional sovereigns of the nation , owing and owning as much obedience to the laws as those whom they govern , and claiming their homage and submission , not by divine right , but as the chosen guardians of their liberties , and the administrators of their laws .
Under the reign of the House of Brunswick , some signal advances have been made towards a full acknowledgment of the principle for which we are contending , that every man has a right to as much of his natural liberty as is consistent with the public good ; that the business of a government is not to try how much a people can and will bear ^ but to teach and enforce the endurance of so much individual restraint , as shall preserve the freedom
of the community : in the words of our first proposition , " to teach men the true enjoyment of their liberties . " As in England , so in other countries , where now heavy-handed despotisms seek to crush every discussion of popular rights , and to repress every attempt towards their attainment , the great and important truth must gradually be learned , be fully established , and be acted upon under the
influence of a spirit diametrically opposite to that which now reigns in those who practise and those who abet oppression . The purposes of God are ripening , and the vain designs of those who seek to perpetuate their wrongs shall disperse as the mists of night , at the approach of the glorious morning . The principle of mutual restraint for mutual good is the true Protestant principle , —that which enables sects , differing in opinion and practice , to live peaceably together , that which should unite them all in opposing restraints which are not required .
The principle of mutual restraint is a principle of the gospel , and on it are founded all those precepts which have regard to social intercourse . It is on a modification of this principle also that personal righteousness must be built , for he only can be said to approach towards perfect righteousness , whose virtues and graces are so balanced as to harmonize with each other , and render a man exemplary in all the relations of life .
Some portion of restraint for the full enjoyment of liberty , is , then , the law of humanity * which , when it is clearly seen , and universally acknowledged , shall give the largest possible sum of happiness to the whole race of man . in . v *
Untitled Article
604 On the Proper Use of Government .
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1830, page 604, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2588/page/20/
-