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THE DISARMAMENT OF SECT . " Civil and religious liberty , " has been tbe war CTV of the now-dying agitation in the mouths even of those whose purpose was to crush the liberty of « n « sect but if the strong in mind be true to themselves , they will be able to snatch a fuller instalment of genuine liberty than the agitators ever thought of . Already have our anticipations ; been of the first battle shock has
fulfilled - the dust blown away , and as the darkness clears off , men becin to know sides ; and many now learn that thev have been fighting against then- own cause , But they need not lay aside their arms without securing a genuine victory for freedom ; and let those in authority who called forth the agitation take the consequences if constituted authority gets rather mauled in the fight .
Already there are signs of the inevitable reaction . The Dissenters are beginning to discern the false position into which they have been betrayed . Lord Johr * Russell and other trusted leaders for Liberal affairs , descrying troublesome questions in the
distance , and seeing the opportunity for a hunt in another direction , raised the cry of " Cardinal , " as you would that of " mad dog . " The appeal struck so forcibly , not on the positive religious conviction of the Dissenters , but on their old traditional dislikes , that they rushed out pell mell ; and in that mood they , the Dissenters , blinded by old dislikes , were actually inveigled into a national demonstration for the spiritual " supremacy of the Crown " ! The whole body of Dissenters in England have been tricked . _ _' .
Such is the effect of yielding to theological passion . A moment ' s pause , a flash of reflection has disclosed to them their ridiculous situation ; but the difficulty is to know how to draw back from it without repassing through the Slough of Ridicule ; how to retract from the great charge of arms in favour of established Protestantism , without making a countermarch in favour of dis-established
Romanism . There is another difficulty : having joined in the wild intoxication of the eve , in the orgies of orthodoxy , how can they suddenly become reasonable on the morrow without seeming " inconsistent "—the Englishman ' s favourite dread ; how be rational now , without confessing the past madness ? It is the embarrassing difficulty which ao often prevents the reform of the conscientious drunkard ; he is ashamed of the sobriety which
unsays bravado , and denounces his own vice . Both these difficulties gave pause to the Protestant Dissenting Deputies at their annual meeting on the 3 rd instant . In the first place , they hesitated to support unknown legislative measures that might trench on the rights of Dissent quite as much as the Papal aggression had done—much more , we should say , since Crown and Parliament can do
something in England , which the Pope and Cardinals cannot . In the second place , with a reviving sense of propriety , they hesitated to call the Church of Rome " an apostate Church ; " vituperation being a spiritual licentiousness fitter for the orgies of the eve than the sobriety of the morrow . The meeting adjourned to ponder these matters ; and whatever the result might be , the pause indicate * the awakening of a better spirit .
So , likewise , the resolution in the Leeds Town Council , to petition Parliament against . " interference with the rights and liberties of the Roman Catholics of Ireland . " The mover of this resolution distinctly recognized the right of the Roman Catholics " to attempt to convert the people of this country to Popery , as being equal to the right the Wesleyan Methodists had to convert them to Methodism , or the Unitarians to Unitarianism "; and ho denounced the intolerant and persecuting character of the Anti-Catholic movement . It is true
that this resolution was moved by Joseph Barker , a true man of the People , whose eloquence has earned a personal following which few public men can display ; but it is equally true that his resolution met with hearty concurrence , and was adopted by the Town Council . Alderman Luccock protested against the enmity which had been excited , not only against the Pope , but against our Roman Catholic fellow-subjects ; another good
nign of returning decency . Others are awakening to truths . The clergy of " the provinces of Armagh and Dublin , " in the " United Church of England and Ireland , " find that they have been left out in the movement of the clergy of the provinces of Canterbury and York against the " common adversary "; and politely , but anxiously , they have called upon the Archbishop of Canterbury for an explanation . Primate Sumner admits that he ought to have spoken in the name of
"the United Church of England and Ireland /* though it might cause him " to' have indited an inharmonious sentence . " He promises that " we shall be ready to act with your Grace and the other Irish Prelates as an united body "; but this promise is accompanied by an ominous qualificationit is limited to " all cases where codperation is desirable or practicable . " Primate Sumner will not say to the Irish Established Church , " we stand or fall together . " The meaning of this reserve is made intelligible by the Times . Lord St . Germans had foreseen the difficulty which now presents itself to the Government through the
Archbishop of Canterbury , and he had pointed out , that if Government were to adopt Anti-Catholic measures in deference to the Protestants in England , such measures would be claimed with equal right by the Protestants in Ireland , where an Anti-Catholic policy would be incompatible with peace , order , or the safe conduct of public affairs . The Times cuts this knot by declaring that , though the English Protestants must be gratified , the Irish Protestants may be left to themselves ; the Protestants of Ireland , therefore , understand that the Government casts them off , while the Catholics will understand the sole motive which arrests the
persecution of themselves—fear ; for the malignant spirit is already shown against their brethren in England . The Irish Members are alive to this danger ; but English Members had better be alive too , if they have any value for " civil and religious liberty . " That is not all : the Tractarians in the Church of England may already perceive , in the Archidiaconal visit to the church of the Reverend Bryan King , following up the attempt to drive out the
Reverend William Bennett , that preliminaries are taken towards the chastisement of themselves . With the Tractarians , we class numbers of conscientious men , who entertain views on symbolical observances perhaps more accordant with the true spirit of religion , than the cut and dry formalities of the Low Church , which present devotion half ashamed of itself . Such men will have to defend themselves against officially decreed religion .
A wide-spread panic has been artfully created against the " papal aggression , " and while all eyes have been turned towards Rome , which really can do nothing whatever in this country , a real inroad has been made upon " civil and religious liberty : " while fears have been excited against Pope Pius the Ninth , Pope John Russell has effected a manoeuvre which is to fortify the Established Church of England at the expense of injury or embarrassment to almost every other sect in the country . In the name of " civil and religious liberty , " the Roman
Catholics—who cannot levy taxes , who cannot fine men for staying away from church , who do not appoint the Sovereign , or appropriate millions sterling yearly in patronage—are to be coerced and restrictea in the internal arrangements of their own sect ; while the sect which can do all these things has cajoled all the other ecclesiastical bodies to help it in strengthening its own position . Pope Pius the Ninth is a shadow , powerless to hurt any one of us ; Pope John Russell is a dominant , costly , and yexatioqs reality . In the sects severally led by these two Popes , we see a striking
similarity and a striking difference : in both , there is the claim to absolute " truth , " in both the animus of domineering ; but in this country , there is something which makes one sect work on the side of that " civil and religious liberty" which it is utterly powerless to restrain , while the other , the sect of Pope John Russell—of Pope Innocent the Ninety-ninth—undermines liberty to strengthen its own dominion . What is that difference ? It is the possession of secular power . From the actual state of affairs we learn anew the lesson , that the
sole condition necessary to make perfect religious freedom for all sects , quite safe to political freedom is , to debar every sect from the possession of secular power : deprive it of that , and it can do no harm .
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OOOD TKACHEUB WANTKI ) . A ookhbspondbnt of tho Inquirer—the organ of Unitarianism , nays , " I am astonished to sec an advertisement appearing week by week in your paper , evidently unanswered , offering a probable salary of £ 75 a-year for a school-mistress to a day-school , in connection with one of our chapels . " Ills Inference in that good female teachers for the best day-schools connected with Unitarian chapels are exceedingly scarce , and ho thinks that this is a very important and promising sphere for " intelligent and strong-minded young women . " It appears to ua a still more wide and promising sphere of exertion will
aoon be opened up for " intelligent and strong-minded " young men , by the sudden demand for thoroughlyeducated teachers which will inevitably follow the establishment of a national system of education . Were the nation perfectly prepared in every other respect for carrying a legislative measure for that purpose into immediate effect , the scheme would be robbed of more than half its value , simply from the want of a sufficient number of good teachers .
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SOCIAL REFORM . EPISTOLJE OBSCXTROBITM VIRORI / M . No . XXX Who can Create a People ' s Party ? To Thornton Hunt . Jan . 8 , 1851 . My dear Thornton , —In common with others I have read with interest and admiration the series of letters on " Social Reform" which have been reciprocated between you and your friends in the Leader . In distinctness and boldness they have exceeded anything which has fallen under my notice before , nor do I think that newspaper literature affords any parallel to their merit and courage . The working classes , so far as I am acquainted with them , appreciate so unusual a contribution to their instruction . But how are the measures therein urged , so opportunely and with so much judiciousness , to be realized ? Does any machinery exist for such a purpose ? This question has not been asked . Will you permit me to offer you some impressions on the subject ?
There is no one to whom I could address these enquiries so consonantly as to yourself . No public man with whom I am acquainted unites so much boldness with a statesmanly advocacy of the people ' s interests . Surely no one who has lived so much amid political routine has preserved so free a spirit . There seems to be nothing that you fear in the way of generous recognition , or courageous enunciation
of popular principle . The Leader , written ( as a journal intended to be a power for the people must be ) at that elevation , calculated to attract and move those who govern , is necessarily somewhat above the language of the populace ; but owing to you and Lewes the Leader has that which commands their sympathies ; it has audacity , that genial audacity so rare in English journalism , an earnest of success as it is a presentiment of influence .
The very difficulty , I had almost written impossibility , of speaking usefully for the People , and so as to be intelligible to them at the same time , constitutes one of the impediments in the way of creating a Party among them . One who has studied them long , and whom we both esteem , once said to me , " ifou cannot serve the People in the language of the People "—a saying not to be soon forgotten . It reveals a gulf between the service of the People and their appreciation of that service , for they are only to be interested in that
advocacy which is the echo of their language , which enforces their prejudices and intensifies the utterance of their passions , as charlatans know full well . In all this I seek not to present discouragement . Still serve them I would say—patiently and hopefully—but do not expect that large numbers of them will speedily or heartily cooperate in that emancipation , which they but partially understand , and which can follow but slowly after the performance of the ungracious task of their instruction . You will not think ill of this plainness
of speech , as none know better that to overcome difficulties we must first survey , measure , and admit them . Then , first , I ask what can be done with our British populace , that portion who have been accustomed to think on political matters ?—who have been inspired but never trained—whose sole political capital is wild energy and indefinite hope . Read their fitness in their character . They reason with
an impetuosity that never waits on coherence , and act with a rashness that does not comprehend opportunity—opportunity , that magic word in diplomacy , and without which no political dictionary is complete . Before such a party ( if formed ) can be directed , it has to be trained . Time will not do it —unless money help time ; and the temper of our patriots is a far more difficult clement to control than to win time or command money .
We hear much of the propriety of the People helping themselves . When did they do it ? Let the question be anHwered by reference ? to an embryo society . " The National Charter and Social Union" has been projected to afford a new centre where those may gather who have been repulsed by the incapacity of old associations or disappointed by the narrowness and tameness of new ones . But how is this last union to be organized ?
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Jan . U , 1851-3 «*• & «« & ««? 3 y
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 11, 1851, page 37, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1865/page/13/
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