XXIII. 1790, And as to the contrast which Mr. Burke had ex- BOOK hibited, respecting the mode in which the two revolutions in England and France were conducted, it must be remembered, that the situation of the two kingdoms was totally different. In France, a free constitution was to be created: in England, it wanted only to be secured. If the fabric of government in England suffered less alteration, it was because it required less alteration. If a general destruction of the antient constitution had taken place in France, it was because the whole system was radically hostile to liberty, and that every part of it breathed the direful spirit of despotism." Mr. Sheridan, with still less reserve and attention to personal respect, reprobated the political sentiments which had been that night advanced by Mr. Burke. "The people of France, (said Mr. Sheridan) it is true, have committed acts of barbarity and bloodshed which have justly excited indignation and abhorrence. That detestation and abhorrence however are still more justly due to the government of France prior to the revolution, tyranny and oppression of which had deprived the people of the rights of men and of citizens, and driven them to that degree of desperation which could alone have incited those unexampled acts of cruelty and revenge which had been practised in the first agitation and violence of the effort to regain their freedom. Could it be expected, that the XXIII. 1790. BOOK men in their situation should be capable of acting with the same moderation and the same attention to humanity and sensibility as characterised freemen? Were the mad outrages of a mob an adequate ground for branding the National Assembly with the stigma of being a bloody, ferocious, and tyrannical democracy? It was a libel on that illustrious body thus to describe them. A better constitution than that which actually existed it is allowed that France had a right to expect. From whom were they to receive it? From the bounty of the monarch at the head of his courtiers? or from the patriotism of marshal Broglio at the head of the army? From the faint and feeble cries emitted from the dark dungeons of the Bastille? or from the influence and energy of that spirit which had laid the Bastille in ashes? The people, unhappily misguided as they doubtless were in particular instances, had however acted rightly in their great object. They had placed the supreme authority in those hands by whom alone it could be justly exercised, and had reduced their sovereign to the rank which properly belongs to kings-that of administrator of the laws established by the free consent of the community." The house appeared, during a long and most interesting discussion, greatly agitated by this shock and conflict of opinions. But Mr. Pitt preserved a cautious and politic silence as to the merits of the revolution which XXIII. 1790. had taken place; venturing nevertheless to pro- BOOK nounce that the present convulsions in France must sooner or later terminate in general harmony and regular order, and lavishly applauding Mr. Burke, for the zealous and seasonable attachment he had displayed to the principles of the British consti tution. The spirit by which the court was now actuated still more evidently appeared in their conduct relative to the dissenters, who had signalized themselves by the exuberance of their joy at the late events in France. Since the favorable decision of the late session relative to the repeal of the Test Laws, they had not ceased their efforts by every means in their power to increase the number of their friends in the house of commons. Provincial meetings were convened by them in every part of the kingdom; and resolutions, framed in terms for the most part harsh and revolting, passed, expressive of their sentiments of the injustice and oppression under which they suffered. And in contemplation of the approaching general election, they had even the gross indiscretion, in many of their public votes, to recommend a marked preference in favor of those who had shewn themselves the friends and advocates of equal and universal liberty. In the stead Mr. Fox's of Mr. Beaufoy, a friend and partisan of the mi-a nister, Mr. Fox was now solicited to move the house a third time for the repeal of the acts in motion for repeal of the test: BOOK question; to which he gave a ready and generous XXIII. assent. By appearing to consider the repeal of the 1790. Test Laws as a matter of great magnitude and importance, the nation at large, which had originally regarded the question with indifference, were led to believe it to be a matter of high and serious import. Counter-meetings of the friends of the church were called, in which the repeal of the Test was deprecated as fatal to its security. The clergy revived with incredible success the obsolete and senseless clamor, that the CHURCH was in DANger. All possible encouragement was given to these artifices of faction and efforts of bigotry by the court; so that when the period arrived at which the destined motion was to be made, the dissenters were astonished to find the government, the church, and the nation, combined in passionate opposition to a claim which to them appeared founded on the clearest principles of reason, policy, and justice. On the 2d of March, Mr. Fox brought forward his motion of repeal, which, unmindful of its present extreme unpopularity, and fixing his attention only on the essential and immutable rectitude of the measure, he supported with a wonderful display of ability. He said, "that it was to him a matter of triumph, that the very people who had imputed to him designs hostile to liberty and subversive of the constitution had requested him to plead their cause on that day. This was at once XXIII. 1790. a refutation and reparation of the WRONG they BOOK had done him." He said, "he was himself a member of the established church, and thought an establishment, if not necessary, at least useful and advisable: and should any attempts be made to invade the just rights of the church, she should find him as ready to stand forward the champion of those rights, as he was this day to plead those of the dissenters; and he hoped the time would come when the church would see his conduct in its true light, and acquit him of any design upon her splendor, influence, or greatness. Persecution (said Mr. Fox) is a bond of union. Remove the barriers which separate the dissenters from the community of citizens, and in their collective capacity they would be no longer known. Men unite to resist oppression; but cease to oppress, and the union is dissolved. Continue it, and you render the union still more compact and firm; till resistance, at first perhaps weak, gradually becomes formidable, and finally successful. And experience shews, that, when oppression has been carried to certain lengths, men think that the only way to destroy the oppression is to destroy the oppressor. Such is the tendency and such the termination of this wretched system of policy. For any government to extend its jurisdiction over the opinions of in ́dividuals (said this magnanimous statesman) is at once absurd and tyrannical. It is absurd, for opi |