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precepts of religion a mere imposition? What a triumphant defence of all the villains, public and private, that have ever infested society—of all the tyrants civil and ecclesiastical, who have existed from the days of Nimrod down to the present period of the holy alliance!—I ask the author's pardon— of all who have been able to exercise their villainies and their tyranny with perfect impunity.-Those who have not been able, I suppose the author will allow, to have been guilty of a miscalculation of their power; and that they might justly suffer the penalties due for such criminal miscalculation.

It will, I think, readily be perceived, that Mr. Cooper has fallen into this error from a misconception of the position, that utility is the foundation of all obligation, which is true only, if understood of general, and social utility, the general good, and which includes the good of each individual capable of obligation. But he has confined it to the isolated good of the individual actor; an error, to the very verge of which Mr. Paley has sometimes pushed his principles of moral philosophy.

This passage of the author was intended as a defence of the slave holders in the United States; but surely those slave holders will feel themselves under little obligation to him for placing their defence upon a principle, that will equally justify their slaves, and make it a duty, if they think it can be done with impunity, that is, with success, to attempt their own emancipation by force,—and which will, in the same manner, justify each individual slave in the murder of his master.

They have a better-they have a just defence in their situation ; a situation derived to them from their ancestors, and in producing which they had no participation; a situation in which the law of self preservation, a law of necessity, forbids a general emancipation, that must inevitably prove the ruin both of the master and the emancipated slave, and reduce the country to something worse than a mere desert, nor has it been found an easy-if a possible thing to introduce any gradual emancipation, which shall prove safe and effectual.

CHAPTER V.

Of the right of Opinion.

A private opinion, while confined to the breast of an individual, does not belong to the cognizance of human laws, or of human tribunals. It is a matter between the individual and his conscience, and is cognizable only by the Great Searcher of the human heart. It has never been claimed by any human tribunal, except that of the Romish Church. The Pope, the head of that Church, who claims to be God's Vicegerent on earth, claims also the right and power to search the human heart. Accordingly the Court of Inquisition, a tribunal erected by the authority of the Pope, have assumed, as a right which they exercise, an authority to compel, by the most excruciating tortures, any person suspected of secretly entertaining any opinion inserted in their catalogue of heresies, to confess that opinion, and recant the same, upon which, they sometimes dismiss him on penance; sometimes, as a favor, suffer him to perish in their prisons; or, if he obstinately refuse to recant, they condemn him to perish in the flames. But so gross is the absurdity of the claim, that in the present age, and with those for whom I write, to attempt a refutation, would be like an attempt to heighten the splendor of the meridian sun by the feeble light of a candle.

I shall, therefore, assume it as an incontrovertible positionas a first principle—that the right of private opinion, which is, in fact, no other than the right of private judgment, upon any subject presented to the mind, is a sacred right, with which society can, on no pretence, authoritatively interfere, without a violation of the first principles of the law of nature.

But

when a man extends this right, and assumes the liberty of acting upon it, his actions become subject to human control, as they may be injurious to others, injurious to the community. The right of private opinion still remains sacred, while the right of acting upon it is, like all other rights, and for the same reasons, subject to be controlled by political and civil regulations. The right of merely propagating an opinion is a matter of great delicacy and can rarely be subject to civil restraint. The right of acting in this case, as here proposed to be discussed, presents a two-fold division agreeable to the subjects, on which it is exercised. First, religious liberty, or the liberty of a man to act agreeable to his religious opinions; and secondly, the liberty of political opinion. I might have introduced a third division,— The right of moral opinion; but this is nothing more than that natural liberty, of which sufficient has been said in former chapters.

It may appear to some, that little need be said on the subject of religious liberty; but a moment's reflection will convince any one that no subject has occasioned more disputes in the world, or produced a greater variety of conflicting opinions, which have brought the most cruel calamities on mankind. Nor is there, it is believed, a nation in the old world, in which religious liberty is allowed in its full and just extent. Religious liberty has been denominated "Liberty of conscience," and "The rights of conscience" always with a reference to the same subject. It is properly defined to be, "The liberty which a man has of discussing and maintaining his religious opinions and of worshiping God in that way and manner, which he believes in his conscience to be most acceptable to his Maker without being liable on that account to any degradation, penalties, or disqualifications, civil or political. Strictly just as this definition may appear to us in this land of liberty; however consistent with the true spirit of religion and the best interests of mankind, civil and moral, there are nations calling themselves christians, who would deem it a blasphemous heresy, and condemn to the stake any one who dare to maintain it. Many of them tolerate dissenters from the national Church, under various restrictions and disqualifications. Even in England, that boasted land of liberty, dissenters from the

established Church, have on that account, been deprived of many important rights and privileges, both civil and political, or permitted to enjoy them on conditions and compliances inconsistent with any just measure of religious liberty. One is astonished and disgusted on reading in Judge Blackstone's commentaries, the long catalogue of vexations, penalties, disabilities, and degrading disqualifications imposed by numerous laws on the different sects of dissenters, under which they were tolerated in worshiping God according to their consciences. These penalties, disabilities, and disqualifications in a civil and political point of view have been mitigated and even removed since the commentaries were written. But still, while there remains the establishment of the national Church, so regarded by law, the dissenting sects enjoy their religious liberty under the idea of toleration, which is in itself sufficiently degrading. Indeed a national establishment of religion, however necessary it may have been thought in former times to the support of the established government, had its commencement in error, in bigotry, and superstition, which are always exclusive, always intolerant. It is at best, inconsistent with a full and just measure of rational religious liberty.

However demonstrable the existence of the Supreme Being, his extensive attributes, and the duty of all to obey his will, and to serve and worship him, may be to common reason, the mode and manner of that worship which will be most acceptable to him, is not equally demonstrable. This is left to the conscience of every man, upon the best information he is capable of attaining; and was doubtless so left for the moral benefit of mankind. The different sects feeling a deep interest in approving to the world the superior excellence of their particular religious tenets, manner of service, and worship, are set as watchmen on the moral conduct of each other. This situation always, as men, where they are not involved in the ignorance of bigotry, or led astray by the delusive visions of enthusiasm, judge of religious opinions and modes, and the sincerity of those who profess them, by the good effect on their lives and conversation in society, excites a moral emulation among the different sects, beneficial to them and to mankind. Of this we have full proof in the history of the sixteenth century, which includes the

commencement of the great reformation from popery. While the whole christian world was involved in the ignorance and bigotry of that superstition; when the Pope, as the head of the Church, was held to be infallible and the character of the clergy was held too sacred to be submitted to the judgment of the profane laity; when the Pope assumed the power of pardoning past sins, however enormous, for the sums at which he had severally rated to them; of selling dispensations from the most solemn engagements, and indulgences for future crimes, and none dared to hint a censure of these things, the profligacy of the clergy and the universal corruption of manners was such as to render an impartial history of those times almost incredible at this day. The contest that ensued with a powerful hierarchy, excited a spirit of enquiry among the reformers, invigorated their minds, and opened to them the stores of learning which had lain buried for centuries, under the rubbish of a vain philosophy and scholastic jargon. This enabled them to rend the veil of ignorance, under which the world had long been enveloped, and to expose the errors and corruptions of the Church of Rome with an intelligence and force, that threatened the final subversion of the hierarchy. The learners of the reformers could no longer be resisted by ignorance, nor the arguments be opposed by disregarded thunders of the Vatican. The Romish clergy were compelled to become learned in their own defence; and, to prevent a total defection of their followers, they found it necessary to reform their lives, so strongly contrasted with the sober demeanor and strict moral lives of their opponents. Each party noted with severity the conduct of the other. Among the protestant reformers themselves, differences of opinion, modes of worship, and discipline, to which was added a zeal for gaining proselytes, although they sometimes ran into excess, contributed to the same moral end. These are justly to be considered as the first and principal causes of the great improvements, in moral knowledge, in literature, and science, in the European world during the two last centuries.

In these United States religious liberty is secured, and the rights of conscience enjoyed to their full extent. No state establishment of religion, no religious test is permitted by the

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