absolutely must be something to express an abhorrence of Star Chambers, St. Bartholomews, and the principles of non-resistance. And besides the question of policy, should not a work which pretends to be the free and absolutely independent advocate of truth and justice, be anxious to lend a hand against some of the most pernicious evils that ever infested the world? Of what diminutive consequence is the correction of any mere literary errors and faults, compared with a manly resistance of those notions and that spirit which have made prisoners, wanderers, exiles, or martyrs, of the best and wisest of mankind; which have sanctioned the despotism of the vilest governments, and which still are strongly operating in the same way, even in this country?—If the supporters' have no hope of supporting the Eclectic Review without a sacrifice of this free and courageous quality, let them lay down their thankless undertaking, and let some other men be sought to undertake a really bold and free work, which should in its prospectus declare, in so many words, that the Bible is to be held sacred, but nothing else on earth; that all subjects whatever are considered as free for discussion; and all systems, institutions, and practices, as being merely of human authority, are fully open to the exercise of human reason. The 'supporters' may hobble on a while under their weight, but they may depend upon it that without gaining the cordial approbation of Dissenters and independen thinkers, they will sink at last; for as to their Church friends, they will never help them on without some more settled and distinct pledges and proofs of servitude and obsequiousness. "What a stupid thing it was to begin on such a plan! They wisely thought, I suppose, that the whole business of preserving neutrality was confined just to two or three bare questions, and that these could evidently be easily avoided. They could not see that this question of neutrality would necessarily extend to ten thousand things in the course of general reasoning and criticism; that it would interfere in all works of history, of political economy, of biography, of theories of government, of political and ecclesiastical controversy, of missionary designs, of education, of rights of conscience, and of discussion of present parties, measures, and expectations.” Now the spirit of this inglorious compact may exist in the absence of the letter, in a Nonconformist Journal; but its operation will never fail to be ultimately fatal. The times in which men might trim with safety are gone for ever. Ours are days equally of promise and of danger, demanding the spirit of the Prophets and Apostles -a spirit of meek defiance and devout intrepidity! Foster, two years prior to the date of the above letter, said the greater part of the Review fell "under the heavy censure of literary men, as defective in spirit, freedom, and poignancy. I have heard," he says, "" a good many of them talk of the subject; and what they say is, that the Review dares nothing; that its highest ambition seems to be to do no harm; that it takes the style of a Puritan Divine in some instances, where that of Voltaire would be better; that it is too anxious to preserve a quiet impunity under the wings of orthodoxy and loyalty; that it is like a dog that has been whipped, and, therefore, but just ventures to growl, and then runs away." Forty years have passed since these words were originally written: if then they were marked by force and pertinence, as applied to Nonconformist Journalism, by how much more now! Thanking God and taking courage, let the WITNESS and his readers begird themselves afresh for the glorious conflict with ignorance and error, sin and suffering, that they may worthily perform their part towards hastening on the final triumph of truth in the complete deliverance of the human race, and the establishment of Messiah's empire among all nations! JOHN CAMPBELL. |