On this page

• Text (2)

  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.

  • 

    Untitled Article

  • 

    Untitled Article

• 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

    ind that all civil power , right and Jommion , is bouaded and confined to the only care of promoting these things ; and that it neither can , nor ought , in any manner to be extended to the care of souls . "

    It would be highly gratifying to pursue this subject , as the " Letters concerning Toleration / ' would sttpply ample materials * Yet it may be more immediately useful ,

    especially to the younger part of your readers , if you allow me to occupy a few of your pages in attempting to deduce , from the aera of the Reformation , the condition

    of the people in this country , as to the exercise of the rights of conscience ; or rather to describe some remarkable violations . of those rights . From that summary statement , which alone I can venture to propose , it will , I am persuaded , appear , that Mr . Locke expressed himself with his usual accuracy , when he said that our Government has not only been partial in matters of religion , but those also who have suffered under that partiality , and have , therefore , endeavoured , by their writings , to vindicate their own rights and liberties , have for the

    most part done it upon narrow princi ples , suited only to the interests of their own sects . " Should you accept this letter , as introductor y to a rapid Sketch of English Protestant Persecution , I may be encouraged to pursue the sub ject . R . G . S .

    Untitled Article

    Toleration in Danger . *'

    Sir , I observe , with much concern , that Mr . Belsham , inhis" Letter jo Lord Sidmouth , " recently pub-J'shed , endeavours to throw con -

    Untitled Article

    tempt on the late proceedings of the Dissenters , which , whether right or wrong , cannot with any propriety be pronounced ., by friends or foes , contemptible . He puts into the mouths of the

    Dissenters the cry of < Toleration in Danger , " which he classes with the cry of <* The Church is in Danger , " of lC Great is Diana of the Ephesians , * ' and of u No Popery , '' and seems to consider that cry equally unreasonable and mischievous as these . Now this

    view of the matter is unfair by Mr , Belsham ' s own shewing , for in one part of his letter he allows that Lord Sidmouth ' s Bill contained such clauses , as if enacted by

    the Legislature , would have harrassed and oppressed the Dissenters and entailed disgrace upon their author : his argument in hehalf of his Lordship , if I rightly understand it , is that he would

    have altered his measure in favour of the Dissenters if they had waited with more patience and wisdom ; but how were they to It now that he would thus act ? how could they judge of the noble Viscount ' s design but by his Bill ? how could they conclude that he spoke the

    language of intolerance , but meant an extension of religious liberty ? If the Bill were originally bad , the opposition to it was good ; for the Toleration was really in danger , and was rescued from its perils by the petitioners .

    But I mean to confine myself to the cry of the Cl Toleration in Danger / ' which I hope to be able to shew was wholly unlike the disgraceful cries with which it is here associated , and ought not to have been classed with them . All popular cries are not necessarily foolish * The cry of the

    Untitled Article

    " Toleration in Danger . " 53 . 7

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1811, page 527, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2420/page/15/