formed or pretended-what ghost appears, who is bewitched at this day in London or Paris, or even in New York or Philadelphia? Priests and the priesthood, and pious frauds, are now confined in their operations and effect nearly to women and children; and the base wretches who enter our families, who work upon the irritable feelings of women and sick persons, who rob them of their property by false hopes, false promises and false fears, and who govern the men by means of the women and children, who always hold the ignorant in their power to stir them up in hatred against the wise, and who are accumulating funds and wealth for their unholy purposes far beyond the suspicion of those who do not examine modern facts these avaricious and unprincipled deceivers will, according to present appearances, ultimately bring on the darkness and superstition of the middle ages. Why does not the legislature of New York and of every other state pass a mortmain act? Because it is not easy to find a more deplorably ignorant and bigoted assembly--a more priestridden set of legislators, than the legislators of New York.

Primus in orbe deos fecit Timor. Ignorance of natural causes begat terror: terror, superstition: superstition, priests and the priesthood; whose interests and unbending efforts are exerted to perpetuate the fear, the ignorance and the superstition that gave them birth. The experience of past times, and the unhesitating conviction of well-informed men at the present day, render every pretended miracle, Christian, Mahometan, and Pagan, utterly incredible; and imperiously demand not only strong testimony, but every precaution to be taken to prevent mistake, in proportion as any asserted fact is of an extraordinary character. All the modes of judicial investigation and precaution that can be applied, ought rigidly to be required in such a case.

19. Hence no historian is worthy of credit, unless, in proportion as we can ascertain his opportunities of personal information as to the facts he relates, his character and standing in society, his freedom from bias, and all the usual sources of mistake, inaccuracy and deception. Where he relies on the testimony of others, in all cases of fact not intrinsically and antecedently credible, he ought faithfully to cite his authority, that we may judge of that authority by the same rules we judge of himself. An author who does not accurately refer to his authorities, is evidence for no fact whatever, and ought to be banished from our libraries.

20. All historic authority is destroyed by manifest anachronisms as to dates, persons, and places, words and phrases. When Moses, the reputed author of the Pentateuch, which he had no means of writing, (Deut. xxxvii. 1 et seq.) among fifty instances of this kind, alludes to the times of the kings of Israel and Judahwhen Ezekiel, in his supposed prophecy, anterior to the captivity, alludes twice to that great man, the prophet Daniel, who was but about twelve years of age when the captivity happened-who

can put faith in such authors, or give a moment's credit to their authenticity?

21. Let A be a narrator of a fact; he tells it to B, who tells it to C, who tells it to D. All these amount to but one witness viz. A. No evidence of a fact is strengthened by such a series and succession of derivative testimony. But if A, B, C and D, each of them testify to the same fact from their own separate observation, without communication with each other, the testimony is strong in proportion to the number of such separate witnesses testifying independently of each other. If they agree in all the general, leading, and important features of the transaction, their testimony is not much vitiated by their disagreement as to minute particulars which will admit of being observed differently. But all the sources of false information apply to each of them, and are to be so applied.

22. In transmitted and hearsay evidence, every fresh hand through which the narration passes increases the chances of mistake, and deprives us of weighing the testimony to such a degree, that veracity and accuracy are annihilated altogether after half a dozen transmissions.

Such are the principal canons that bear upon historical evidence generally. They constitute a set of rules for judging of the value of historical evidence, that are founded on common sense, and every day's practice and experience in judicial proceedings. These are strictly applicable to the subject; for whether a man professes to tell truth by word of mouth, or to write it down for our information, the means of deciding whether it be truth or falsehood that he tells us are the same. It may be said that if such strictness be applied to past history, the value of it will be nearly annihilated; and so it ought to be. I have no belief in any historical fact beyond 500 years anterior to our Christian era, for reasons which an anonymous author of considerable acuteness and research already alluded to has assigned. And of all subsequent history, from Herodotus to the last historian, I believe three fourths worthless. I would ask the reader to peruse Mr. Richardson's preface to his Persian Dictionary, as to the histories of Alexander the Great, and the expedition of Xerxes, or the dis crepancies in French and English accounts of the same historical transactions. History is only of use for the conclusions we can draw from it, applicable to passing and future events. But from dubious facts, what useful conclusions can be drawn? The Augustan age of history has not yet arrived, and will not arrive, till readers are taught how to judge and discriminate, as well as

read.

PHILO VERITAS.

Printed and Published by RICHARD CARLILE, 62, Fleet-street, where all Communications, post paid, or free of expence, are requested to be left.

The Lion.

No. 17. VOL. 4.] LONDON, Friday, Oct. 23, 1829. [PRICE 6d.

THIS is an association of imbecile pretenders to know something about politics. I was present again on Monday evening last, to hear what would be the nature of the much-talked-of address that was to go forth to the country from the association. Not one spark of useful knowledge was there elicited; not a single spirit-stirring sentence uttered; not any thing said that could either stimulate the people assembled to any exertions, or leave them a jot the wiser for so assembling. For any thing that the address contains, the people of England, or the kingdom generally, might as well have been told, in a formal address, that, in the month of October, the sun rises at seven, and sets at five o'clock. All the trash about returning to any state of legislation, that our ancestors enjoyed, indicates nothing but ignorance and imbecility on the part of these addressing reformers, these shallow pretenders, politically to instruct and direct others. So late as the reign of Elizabeth, the Parliament, even the House of Commons, was the disgrace of the country: it was the corrupt tool of the crown for the fleecing of the people. In the reign of James the First, the House of Commons began to assert an independency; and the consequence was, in the ensuing reign, what it must again be in a similar case, a civil war, and a putting down of the Monarchy, the House of Lords, and the Church. When these were restored, the old evils were restored, and from those 'the present evils have been produced. If you will have a monarchy, or such a monarchy, and such a House of Lords, and such a church, you must have such a House of Commons as you now have to work with it. You can have no other; you deserve no other. If you, the pretended radical reformers, cannot see this, you had better keep at home, and sleep, and dream, until you can see it. If you answer that you see it, but do not think it prudent to say it, you had better attend to other business,

Printed and Published by R. Carlile, 62, Fleet Street.
No. 17. Vol. 4.
2 L

until you do think it prudent to say it. For until you say it, you will say nothing; and as reformers, you will do nothing.

I have no objection to the principle of annual parliaments, universal suffrage, and vote by ballot: I do not say that less than this is enough; but what I do say is, that this is not enough, and that it is nothing at all as a reform, in relation to the evils with which the country is afflicted. It is not practicable:-it is not efficient, if it were practicable. It is nothing more than the reform of the whigs, or any other reform that is called moderate. Notwithstanding Mr. Henry Hunt's clamour about the whigs, he has never been any thing more than a whig in political reform. It is an entire delusion for him, or any one else to suppose him more than a whig. They have never advocated any practicable change-he has never advocated any practicable change. They have done no good as political reformers-he has done no good as a political reformer. They propound nothing that can lead to a good or useful change-he propounds nothing that can lead to a good or useful change. His attack upon the whigs is of the same character as the attack of whig upon tory, and tory upon whig. None of them understand, or if they do understand, none of them treat of political principles. Thomas Paine has drawn up a political alphabet for them; but they are either too corrupt to look at it, or too dull to learn it.

I will insert the address, that none of my readers may suppose that I have misrepresented it.

66 ADDRESS OF THE LONDON RADICAL REFORM ASSOCIATION TO THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED KINGDOM.

"Fellow-countrymen-We address you for our common good. We are in common aggrieved; we invite you to think, and when you have thought, to co-operate with us in attaining, by all legal means, the restoration of Universal Suffrage and Annual Parliaments, with the protection of the Vote by Ballot. The accumulating distress which pervades the productive classes of the community should rouse you from your apathy. Before now, the commonwealth of England never experienced such dire afflictions, nor has a more culpable disregard of them ever been displayed by those whose duty it is to seek their alleviation. Our aim is not to make charges against particular administrations, as the promoters of our common distress. Men in office are not immediately responsible to the people, but the Members of the Commons' House of Parliament ought to be immediately responsible-professing, as they do, to derive from us their representative character, to speak our sentiments, and to act for the general welfare.

"The Commons' House of Parliament should be, in reality, the people's house. It should politically show forth the body of

the nation, and be the echo of its sentiments: in fine, it should think and act with the people, otherwise it becomes a self-willed, self-interested, and self-nominated convention, unknown to the Constitution, and destructive of the best interests of the Statewhose security is based on the safety, the happiness, and affections of the people. Who will affirm that such security is now observable in the national affairs? No, fellow-countrymen, society is disjointed; the nation is divided into two castes, whose views, interests, habits, and sympathies, war with each other. One. caste, constituting the great bulk, are unrepresented, pay the taxes, and are dropping into pauperism; the other caste, forming an inconsiderable minority, are almost exclusively represented, receive the taxes, revel in luxury, and hourly augment their income. With almost all the nation's wealth, in the hands of this minority is found almost all its political power; and hence the anomaly in this kingdom, that with the richest and most powerful Aristocracy in the world, it has the poorest and most dependent people; and, with a nation boasting its inheritance of a free Constitution, the least of popular influence in the direction of its civil and political concerns. Here, fellow-countrymen, is the source of all our evils; for, inasmuch as the direction of the Civil and Political State is engrossed by a few wealthy families, who return a majority of Members in the Commons' House of Parliament, our lives, liberties, and properties, are at the disposal of this powerful few, whose wishes and wants are consulted by those to whom they have given place and power; and who are bound to bestow, or to cause to flow among that few,and their dependents, expectants, and nominees, all substantial benefits arising from Church and State. When it is recollected that the immense sum of EIGHTY MILLIONS is annually raised by taxes, charges, or impositions from the people, and becomes, directly or indirectly, the property of, used, or administered by the persons connected with, or appointed, or recommended to offices, by the powerful few; it is easy to understand how that few have become so wealthy and powerful, and the many (who constitute the bulk of the nation) so destitute and powerless.

"Read, fellow-countrymen, what is reported to pass within the doors of Parliament, and mark how every interest ostensibly exists and works there, except the interest of the people:-The landed interest, with its Corn Bill and taxed bread-the commercial interest-the shipping interest-the great East India interestthe West India Planters' interest-and the East India Planters' - interest-the Brewers' interest-the Saintly interest-the Sporting interest-and, though last not least, the Scientific interest, with its bill for dissecting the dead bodies of the poor. All these in a state of mixtion form the political array. The main body being divided into two factions, nicknamed Whig and Tory, apparently opposed to each other in principles and measures; but the only real difference existing between them,