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    another . The laws of fashion , the laws of honour , the laws of the realm , differ in their origin ,

    enactments ' * sanctions , arid the subjects on which they attach ; but of each of these the force and binding efficacy depends on the dcc ! ared will and p

    violation . In like manner , morals and politics , although from their relation , as a whole to its part , much more nearly allied than what have been just mentioned , differ considerably . The subjects of the moral code are individual

    men , and chiefly those in a private station . . The subjects of the political are independent nations and communities , acting by their proper organs , sovereign princes ^ &c . Each ot these last ,

    personally and individually , may , if he pleases , suffer his political character and rights to be absorbed and lest in what he judges to be his moral duties ; but he must take the temporal consequences . On the other 'hand , ( and it is

    beyond all comparison oi numbers the more common case , ) he may sacrifice moral duty to political rights : of this , too , he must take the consequences , which are not temporal . In morals , the legislator and the judge is

    Almighty God . In politics ,- the legislation and jurisdiction are , indeed , appointed by him , but , for purposes , no doubt , infinitely wise and benevolent , although to us inscrutable , entrusted to

    human beings , and , on that account , liable to the error , imperfection , and depravity of the depositaries . What is right in politics is often in morals the reverse :. From his office , as governor of Judea , Pi-Ute had unquestionably * the right

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    Of Rig ht considered as \ foiinded on Power . 5 S 7

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    to condemn to death the innocent Jesus : that he was morally wrong , and felt himself to be so .

    is evident irom all that he did and said . In every state the magistrate , supposing him both to make and to execute the laws , has a political right to take cogniz-^ ance of religious practices and

    opinions , when known and pro-, mulgated . Private opinion he has no ri-sht to . controul , and for this obvious reason , that he has no power to do so . Whether he be morally justifiable , in thus interfering with the religion of his

    subjects , is a very different question with which this discussion has . no concern , 7 . On the whole it is evident , that in society man has different kinds of rights ; personal ,

    domestic , civil , municipal , and political ; all relative to the several institutions in which they origi ^ - natc , " and all dependent for their effect and utility on the power of those institutions to enforce them * When the power ceases , the rio ; ht

    is at an cna . A familiar example will illustrate this . Jura silent inter anna . In cases where the civil authority is insufficient to compel obedience , military force takes away civil rights , and substitutes its own in their place .

    8 . 11 , after the manner of the Amphictyorns of ancient Greece , or according to the later project of the benevolent . Abbe de St . Pierre , the civilized nations of Europe , or of the world , were to

    establish a central diet or chamber of" deputies , to whom all disputes between sovereigns and i ndependent states , as wo 11 as between rulers and their subjects , might be referredi anil were to arm this chamber wifh the united

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1808, page 587, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2398/page/11/