southern, or of Presbyterians in the northern parts of the island. If, Sir, you have any regard to common justice, and the most obvious maxims of it, exert yourself to remedy this crying abuse; and be assured that you will not be able to find out any other remedy that shall be effectual to quell the present disturbances in that country.

If this conduct was proper with respect to Ireland, why was not the same thing attempted in Scotland; and why is it not carried into execution in Canada, Nova Scotia, or wherever you have power to enforce it? As to justice, or mercy, it is evident that they were not considered in the

case.

But, Sir, I look with satisfaction to a future and a better state of things, in which the religion of Christ will be as much detached from all connexion with civil power as it was in its best days, before the time of Constantine; since which time it has always been kept in chains, and made subservient to the most unworthy purposes. It will then be supported, not by the compulsory payment of tithes, or any compulsion at all, but by the voluntary attachment of its friends, who will understand and value it.

With respect to the bishoprics, deaneries, prebends, and other appendages of the hierarchy, which you represented as essential to the good estate of the kingdom, I shall tell you a true story, and leave the application to yourself. A farm in this country was famous for producing cheese of the finest flavour; but the meadows had, for ages, been full of anthills. These the proprietor wished to have removed, but the farmer remonstrated, maintaining that the peculiar excellence of his cheese depended upon them; and he said that he must quit his farm if they were disturbed. The proprietor, however, persisted in his purpose, and in consequence of this the tenant did leave the farm, and another came in his place; and he found the cheese more in quantity than it had produced before, and equal in quality.

Much, Sit, very much, is to be done in this country; and in due time there will not be wanting men who will have the head, the heart, and the firmness of nerve to do it.

I would not, however, be understood to be an advocate for any violent changes. Any thing of this kind would counteract and defeat all my purposes. Every desirable step in the whole progress will be effected by the operation of reason alone, aided by free inquiry; and on no consideration would I have any thing done by the governing powers, but with the hearty concurrence, and at the requisition of

the people. All I ask of you, as one of our governors, is to lay no undue bias on the minds of men. Put them into a situation to judge freely, and have that confidence in truth, as to believe that it will be able to recommend and enforce itself. This is my only ground of confidence with respect to every thing for which I contend; but this has not been the case with the advocates of the Church of England.

Such, Sir, is the state, and such the maxims, of that ecclesiastical establishment, which, as you have been taught, is so intimately connected with the civil constitution of this country; and to preserve which you have thought your Test and Corporation Acts to be so absolutely necessary. But on the same principles, and from the same apprehensions of remote danger to the state, which make these provisions necessary, you ought to provide other securities. One of your friends in the House proposed that the Dissenters should be excluded from the House of Commons; and considering the ideas that some persons have of the dangerous and insinuating nature of our principles, and the alarm which the bishops have taken at them, (and which may be expected to increase rather than diminish,) I should not be surprised if other persons, equally zealous for the church, should propose the prohibition of our preaching and publishing; and perhaps some still more zealous may propose in earnest that short way with the Dissenters, which Defoe did in irony, as a proper sacrifice to the safety of the church

and state.

But other statesmen, not instructed by bishops, may make a juster estimate of the services which the Church of England has actually rendered to the state, and examine the principles of the alliance that has subsisted between them; and they may then, perhaps, not think it worth the while to secure it at so great an expense. Considering the progress of knowledge in general, and of good sense in matters of religion in particular, they may think it prudent first to reform the abuses in the church; and in time they may find that it will be the wish of the country, and necessary for the peace of it, to abandon the ecclesiastical establishment altogether.

Thus, Sir, you are in possession of the free sentiments of a citizen of this free country,* those of a man who has no interest but in the reputation and flourishing state of it; who

• It is hardly necessary to inform my readers, that this letter was written without the concurrence of the body of Dissenters, or of the Committee who conducted the late application to Parliament. They are not answerable for my mistakes, or for my imprudence. (P.)

has honestly endeavoured to do every thing in his power to add to its reputation, without seeking its emoluments; who wants nothing that you, Sir, as the prime minister of his country, can give him; and who has done nothing for which he apprehends he has any thing to fear. Let what he has freely proposed be impartially considered.

I am one of that body of Dissenters who have always thought themselves happy to find any opportunity of shewing their approbation of the measures of their sovereign, and particularly of that in consequence of which you, Sir, were appointed to your present situation; and though the experience of ages has taught us that there is little ground. of dependence on the gratitude of statesmen, or of courts, we had some expectations from a youth uncorrupted by vice, and not hackneyed in the ways of the world, and we are still unwilling to think that we are wholly disappointed.

We understood that when you were first applied to on the business that was lately agitated, you did not appear to think unfavourably of it. The strong disapprobation which you expressed of the measure must, therefore, have arisen afterwards. But what you advanced on the subject has by no means satisfied us that it arose from mature consideration, or from any better views of the thing. We must, therefore, in a great measure, withdraw the confidence which we had placed in your liberality, or your discernment. But we are not without hopes that your mind may still be open to conviction, and that, on a future occasion, you will be the more zealous to do us justice, on account of your having been the principal means of denying it to us at present. At the most, we can but retire to the situation we have so long occupied, and to which we have been so much accustomed, as to be pretty well reconciled to it, which is that of deserving favours which we have not obtained, and of being frowned upon, and discountenanced by a government to which we have ever shewn the most zealous attachment; at the same time, that it takes into its bosom that part of the community which was ever noted for its disloyalty. But we consider our condition not as that of humiliation, but of pride; and we may some time, perhaps, have an opportunity of shewing our magnanimity, by overcoming evil with good.

The aid of the Dissenters has more than once been wanted to secure the civil liberties of this country, and even to befriend the ecclesiastical establishment of it, and it may be wanted again. Our ancestors were principally instrumental

both in the restoration of the Stuarts, and in the settlement of the crown on the present reigning family; and future princes may look for assistance where their predecessors have never failed to find it.

Neither our numbers, our property, nor our dispositions, are such as to give you any thing to fear from our resentment, if we should retain any. But though we are few, we trust that we are respected by the sounder and the more liberal part of the community; and, therefore, that such public measures as are known to be adopted by us, will be generally esteemed to be those which are favourable to public liberty, and have the concurrence of the friends of it, whether they rank with us as Dissenters from the establishment or not. In this respect, Mr. Fox did us ample justice; but we hope no more than justice.

Permit us, Sir, to think thus favourably of ourselves, as a source of consolation under our present defeat, and as an encouragement to resume our application for the redress of our grievances on a future occasion; when, I doubt not, it will be understood that our cause is that of justice, and of reasonable liberty, and that it will have the hearty support of all those who wish to be considered as the true friends of liberty, in the House of Commons, and out of it.

I cannot conclude this address without observing, that from you, Sir, we were led to expect a reform in the state of representation in this country, and other measures of public utility; and sorry I am to say, that it yet remains to be seen whether you are a real friend to such measures, and choose to have your name enrolled among the very few truly honest and upright statesmen, or will be content to have it lost in the great mass of those who have had no views but to their own interest or ambition, who have lived in the practice of all the arts of deceit, and who, beginning with imposing upon their country, have at length never failed to involve themselves in that ignominy and disgrace which they have been the means of bringing upon others. I am, Sir,

Your very humble servant,

London, March 31, 1787.*

J. PRIESTLEY.

Those who may wish to have farther information concerning the Dissenters than they will find in this Letter, I would refer to a Pamphlet I published some time ago, entitled, A VIEW of the PRINCIPLES and CONDUCT of the PROTESTANT DISSENTERS, with respect to the Civil and Ecclesiastical Constitution of Eugland. On the Subject of ECCLESIASTICAL ESTABLISHMENTS, and the Principles of CIVIL and RELIGIOUS LIBERTY, I would refer my Readers to my ESSAY ON GOVERNMENT. (P.)

FAMILIAR LETTERS,

ADDRESSED TO

THE INHABITANTS OF BIRMINGHAM,

IN

Refutation of several Charges,

ADVANCED

AGAINST THE DISSENTERS AND UNITARIANS,

BY THE REV. MR. MADAN.

ALSO,

LETTERS TO THE REV. EDWARD BURN,

IN ANSWER TO HIS

On the Infallibility of the Apostolic Testimony

CONCERNING

THE PERSON OF CHRIST.

The Second Edition, with some Additions and Corrections.

To speak evil of no man, to be no brawlers, but gentle, shewing all meekness

unto all men.

TITUS iii. 2.

Ne sævi, Mague sacerdos.

MR. MADAN'S Text.

VIRGIL.

[Birmingham, 1790.]