92 ON THE CAUSES OF THE PRESENT DISCONTENTS. disorders with which it has been stained with the deepest regret, but they still hope that they will in the result be more than compensated by the grandeur of its principles and the beneficence of its effects. Instead of wishing for a similar event in England, they are intent on reform chiefly to avoid that necessity. Under every form of government they know how to recognise the divine aspect of freedom, and without it can be satisfied with none. The evils of anarchy and of despotism are two extremes which they equally dread; and between which no middle path can be found but that of effectual reform. To avert the calamities that await us on either side, the streams of corruption must be drained off, the independence of parliament restored, the ambition of aristocracy repressed, and the majesty of the people lift itself up. It is possible to retreat from the brink of a precipice, but wo to that nation which sleeps upon it! *The execution of the king was certainly a most cruel and unjustifiable transaction, alike repugnant to law, order, and humanity. Without being conducive to any views of policy whatever, it seems to have been merely a gratification of the most detestable passions. The treatment of the beautiful and unfortunate queen and of the royal family is barbarous and unmanly in the extreme. When we look at their sufferings, humanity weeps, and pity forgets their crimes. REVIEW OF THE APOLOGY FOR THE FREEDOM OF THE PRESS, PUBLISHED IN THE CHRISTIAN GUARDIAN: AND MR. HALL'S REPLY. [PUBLISHED IN 1822.] REVIEW OF MR. HALL'S FREEDOM OF THE PRESS. Extracted from the Christian Guardian for Jan. 1822. "THE political principles of the Bible are simple, distinct, and plain. The sacred writers enter into no niceties, draw no lines of exact demarkation, meet no involved cases of civil casuistry; but, speaking of mankind generally as alike depraved and unruly, and of governments as the creations of God's providence, they inculcate, without qualification, reservation, or restriction, the obvious and indispensable duties of submission, honour, and obedience. "It has been, however, very much the fashion of late to get rid of thèse unpleasant and degrading' injunctions by pleading the change of time and circumstances, and the difference between the laws and system of government under which we are privileged to live and those of the apostolic days. Now, as to the general duty of obedience, it is obvious that it must apply rather more than less strongly to those who live under a paternal government than to those who live under a tyrannical one. At the same time we are ready to allow, that the system of freedom which, in this country, gives to the people a share in the legislature and an influence over the government, renders the submission due from them less implicit and uninquiring, at the same time that it increases the obligation to its cheerful payment. "But although it be conceded that under a constitution which renders the people a party to their own government, it is lawful and proper for laymen to interest themselves intimately in political concerns, and even to a certain extent to participate in political contests, there is one body of men whom we could ever wish to see taking no other part in these matters than as moderators, instructers, and peacemakers. "The ministers of the gospel must, in the discharge of their duty,—they must, if they will declare the whole counsel of God,' sometimes touch upon those passages of Scripture which inculcate the duties of subjects. While St. Paul, in the days of Nero himself, was led by the Holy Spirit to write, Submit to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake;' and to pronounce, without hesitation, 'He that resisteth the power,' tyrannical as it was in the extreme, 'resisteth the ordinance of God; and while similar passages abound in the inspired volume, it cannot be thought consistent with the character of preacher of the gospel to maintain an absolute silence on these topics. But there is one rule which, in our opinion, ministers would do well to follow, and that is, to go no further than the Bible will carry them. The war of parties and factions, the continual struggle of political leaders, the various questions of constitutional casuistry, are subjects which lie beyond this boundary, and with which they would do well not to embroil themselves. The servant of the Lord is exhorted not to strive,' but to cut off occasion * In order that the propriety of Mr. Hall's reply may be fairly estimated, it has been thought right to reprint the original article that called it forth.-ED. from them which desire occasion:' and, assuredly, he will find that the bare discharge of his plain duty in these things will expose him to sufficient obloquy and reproach. "Entertaining this view of the subject, it is with sorrow that we observe the republication, under his own immediate sanction, of Mr. Hall's 'Apology for the Freedom of the Press.' This work was first given to the world about thirty years ago, and has been long since forgotten, or remembered only as one of the sins of its author's youth. Since its disappearance Mr. H. has so much better employed his time and his great talents, that he may now be considered as standing in the very first rank among the non-conformists of the present day. And is it not a lamentable thing to see such a man stepping forward, in the ripeness of his years and at the height of his well-earned reputation, to obtrude himself on the public in the degraded character of a violent party-scribe :-and yet, in what other light can we consider the man who, in so uncalled-for and gratuitous a manner, and at so comparatively peaceful a period, sends into the world, with the sanction of his name, and of his latest corrections, a new edition of such a pamphlet as this? "He indeed states, as an excuse for the republication, that the term of copyright being expired, it was no longer in his power to prevent the reprinting of this work. The law, however, is not so; the power of perpetuating its oblivion lay still in his hands. But had he even been correct on this point, where was the necessity for his being an active agent in this reappearance ? "To characterize the tract before us appropriately we need only observe, that the principal topics discussed by this minister of the gospel' are, the right of public discussion, the propriety of political associations, parliamentary reform, the rights of men, the character of dissenters, the present discontents. The work is extremely personal, and great bitterness is shown towards the late Bishop Horsley, Mr. Burke, and Mr. Pitt. We shall not imitate Mr. Hall's example by entering into a discussion on the subject of Mr. Pitt's political character; but we should have hoped that the reflection of his undoubted integrity and of that perfect devotion to his country which led him to sacrifice even life itself, in its service, might have spared him, at the distance of sixteen years from his death, a new volley of bitter reproach from one whose vocation is the gospel of peace.' "As to the character of Bishop Horsley, it is now placed far beyond the reach of his adversaries; and the Christian world will know how to appreciate invectives against such a man from one who is at the same time the eulogist of Priestley and Price, the Socinians, and of Mary Wolstonecraft, the female libertine and Deist. "Looking, then, upon this work as one of which a critical analysis would be ill placed in the pages of the Christian Guardian, we shall conclude with a specimen or two of the political creed of Mr. Hall, and of the manner in which he supports it. "He is, then, as far as professed doctrine can make him, plainly and clearly a radical reformer. He pleads for annual parliaments,' for universal suffrage, for the unfettered publication of every kind of blasphemy, for the exclusion of the relatives of noblemen from the House of Commons, for the overthrow of all ecclesiastical establishments, and for 'the sovereignty of the people.' In what part of the sacred volume he has discovered the least sanction for any one of these notions we are at a loss to imagine. "In fact, the whole pamphlet is an argument in favour of the supremacy and infallibility of the people, and of the necessity of paying the most implicit obedience to the least expression of their will. Now, could these notions have been carried into practice at the time they were written (soon after the Birmingham riots), and could a legislature have been formed upon Mr. H.'s universal suffrage plan, the necessary and inevitable consequence would have been, that as the feeling of the multitude ran violently against all the friends of the French revolution, Mr. H. and most of his fellow-labourers and admirers would have been silenced, banished, or hanged. So much for the effects which might be expected to follow Mr. Hall's plan. And as for the principles upon which that plan is founded, we find him broadly stating in the latter end of this work, with admirable consistency, that 'calumny and reproach are usually the lot of distinguished virtue,' and that the unpopularity of a cause is rather a presumption of its excellence. Now, if the fact |