POSTSCRIPT.

THIS Note is, as it bears, a postscript for which the press was actually stopped. It is placed as a frontispiece, because it affords a key-note, apropos struck by Mr Colquhoun himself, which will serve to regulate the reader's accordance with the tone and pitch of that gentleman's moral perceptions. It will moreover be kept in mind when, in the following correspondence, the reader arrives at that stage where an attempt is made by Mr Colquhoun to withdraw attention from his own conduct, by calmly commenting on his correspondent's irritation. This, in its commentaries on the correspondence, is likewise the resource of Mr C.'s sympathizing ally the "Scottish Guardian,” a journal whose assumed title in connection with religion is a burlesque and a byword, and whose abuse has long been placed to the account of praise, by all to whom its real merits are known.

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FROM THE SCOTTISH GUARDIAN OF 14TH AUGUST.

Appendix to the Correspondence between Mr Colquhoun, M.P. and Mr Simpson. -Mr Colquhoun will thank the Editor of the Guardian to insert the enclosed letter, which will usefully illustrate the design and tendency of the friends of Liberal Education. The disguise is here dropped, and the genuine hatred of the party against the Bible breaks out.' It deserves remark, that the union of the Roman Catholic party, and of the Infidel, is on this point, as in so many others, entire. Almost the same language the same charges against the Bible, of indecency, immorality, and of being an unfit book for children, will be found among Roman Catholic writers. Mr C. thinks that he could produce similar charges from the speeches of Roman Catholic Members of Parliament.

This letter will form a useful appendix and comment upon the Correspondence of Mr Simpson and Mr C.

'Killermont, August 11. 1837.'

"Glasgow, 7th August 1837.

"I see that a correspondence of yours with Mr Simpson of Edinburgh is being published in the most part of the newspapers of this city. I do not intend to criticise your or his arguments with regard of using the Bible as a school-book. I will take my stand on higher ground, and ask you sincerely, as a man who pretends to be acquainted with the Bible, whether you really believe the Bible to be the Word of God? If you do, I say at once that you are unworthy of any one's regard. [The reasons are here left out, from want of room, but the anonymous letter thus concludes.] In one word, the Bible is one series of details of falsehoods, frauds, oppressions, rapes, murders, incests, massacres, and so forth-and you, a Member of Parliament, come forward at the present day to inculcate on us the necessity of keeping this obscene and impious book in the hands of our children. Fie, Sir; the clergy themselves do not believe in the jugglery, although they get their living by it-how much more is it necessary that you who are selected for a legislator, should peruse this book, and, by doing so, emancipate yourself from the trammels of custom and superstition, and let those who are desirous keep up a Church which is supported only by ignorance, persecution, fraud and falsehood, and leave men of sense to worship the Deity as becomes men who appreciate the intelligence of the period in which we live.-I remain, Sir, yours, &c. "A WELLWISHER TO LIBERAL EDUCATION.

"J. C. Colquhoun, Esq. M.P. Killermont."

The indefensibly libellous purpose of connecting me with this anonymous letter,all knowledge and approval of which I most peremptorily and scornfully disclaim,-puts into my hands the most unequivocal evidence of that "unscrupulousness" with which I advisedly charge my correspondent and his faction. The "Glasgow Argus," of 17th August, treats the above just and charitable " Appendix” thus:—

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"We reprinted from the Scottish Guardian the conclusion of the correspondence between Messrs Simpson and Colquhoun, without adding one word of comment of our own. Mr Simpson had so irretrievably convicted Killermont as a user of unlawwful weapons, that there was nothing left to say on the subject. To-day we lay before our readers-under the Scottish Guardian's title of 'Appendix to the Correspond ence between Mr Colquhoun, M. P. and Mr Simpson'-the last device' (we think that is the M'Ghee phrase) of Killermont smarting under the rebuke of an injured gentleman. Some person who has seen this correspondence between Messrs Simpson and Colquhoun in the public journals, writes an anonymous letter to Mr Colquhoun, in which he expresses the opinion that the Bible is not the Word of God, and assigns his reasons. Mr Colquhoun immediately transmits this letter to the Scottish Guardian Office, and the management, at his request, print this letter as calculated to usefully illustrate the design and tendency of the friends of liberal education.' Mr Colquhoun adds, This letter will form a useful appendix and comment upon the correspondence of Mr Simpson and Mr C.' The device,' to stir up a prejudice against the friends of liberal education, by publishing a letter from nobody knows whom, expressing sentiments and opinions calculated to hurt the feelings of Christians, is so shallow, that it may be calmly exposed with a smile of contempt. But the ungentlemanly and dishonest attempt to link Mr Simpson's name with this anonymous letter must excite, in every properly constituted mind, feelings of a very different kind. [A passage merely laudatory of me here omitted.]-Yet this man is by implication identified with the anonymous author of a letter, which, waving all consideration of the opinions and sentiments expressed in it, is evidently written for the sole purpose of exciting annoyance and tritation. Mr Colquhoun does not believe he dare not say he believes that Mr Simpson knows any thing of this letter, or approves of one sentiment contained in it. What right, then, has Mr Colquhoun to couple Mr Simpson's name with it? What is his motive for thus coupling them in a journal which he knows to be perused almost exclusively by a class of the community likely to be hurt and terrified by such a letter-likely to jump at the conclusion that Mr Simpson is to blame for it—unlikely to read any publication in which an exposure of this trick will be allowed to appear ?"

My thanks are due to the Editor of the Argus for the above manly and spontaneous expression of indignation; to which I have nothing to add of my own.

J. S.

PREFATORY ADDRESS.

In publishing the following pages, I trust I shall be believed when I say, that I am not actuated by vindictive feelings towards an individual, or even by self-vindicative motives. I will not deny that I have been personally injured, and, it is possible, may have suffered a temporary loss of good name, with those to whom I am unknown, by the grievous misrepresentations to which, not only my parliamentary evidence, but my character, were subjected on the election platforms of Rutherglen and PortGlasgow; but I do not feel that either to avenge or justify myself would have been reason sufficient for the appeal I now make. I have a more important object. It is to make the country aware of the true character of that tyrannical sectarianism, which assuming, as it has lately done, the combinations and tactics of a political party, is known by the watchword of "religion in danger,”—as if religion required its guardianship,—and by the practice of branding with the mark of irreligion and infidelity, all who presume to question its sway.

As it is from that faction, and from it alone, that, in and out of Parliament, a liberal plan of national education will meet with obstruction,— and by such a plan is meant, one which shall respect the rights of conscience equally in the humblest and proudest religious sects in the land, as opposed to one which will reject all education not blended with its own religious doctrines, rites, discipline, and economy,-it is fortunate that, so early, one of its leading champions, now prominently representing its opinions and objects in Parliament, one, in short, of a class, for as an individual he should have been left unnoticed, has put himself forward, and furnished a specimen of the mode, manner, and spirit of its opposition such as, it is hoped, will reduce to moral helplessness the future efforts of himself and his friends to delay the only just, as well as efficient system of national education, which an enlightened and impartial legislature can offer to the country. It is of great importance that "the Kilmarnock election" shall meet him at the very threshold of Parliament; and that he and all who adhere to him shall be reminded of IT, when they employ their position there to oppose such a system.

As it was Mr Colquhoun's obvious resource to withdraw attention from the only point which gave rise to the following correspondence, by introducing a totally different discussion, the reader is requested to keep that point steadily in view,—namely, DID MR COLQUHOUN, or did he not, IN HIS SPEECHES TO HIS ELECTORS, QUOTE AS PART OF MY EVIDENCE, PASSAGES WHICH ARE NOT THERE Tto be found?

I beg to avail myself of this preface to make a few general observations important to the following controversy. At the Reformation, freedom of religious opinion, in that well-known formula, the right of private judgment in the interpretation of the Holy Scriptures, was asserted and vindicated. This freedom it is the height of inconsistency as well intolerance for any Protestant at once to assume and question; and all measures, or opposition to measures, in which that inconsistency and intolerance appear, must necessarily be unjust. This right of conscientious interpretation has been so freely acted upon by Protestant Christians, as to have produced nearly eighty different and distinct denominations. These sects, or sections--for some of the more high-minded repudiate the term sect when applied to themselves are distinguished by various kinds and degrees of difference, doctrinal, ritual, disciplinal, and economical; but one character of these differences is universal, they divide the religious world into a corresponding number of distinct communities. Now, any cause of difference sufficient to produce this segregation, is sufficient to dispose the adherents of each denomination to object to their children being placed under the religious tuition of a teacher who, belonging to another denomination, will naturally inculcate the doctrines, rites, discipline, or economy, or all four, of his own sect. It matters not how slight the point of difference may be. The objecting parent must be allowed to be the sole judge of its importance to himself. To interfere with his conscience or his feelings here, in the arrangements we shall make for him, and which he would not make for himself, is undeniable intolerance and persecution.

In the system of popular education which will, it is thought, be in due time provided by the Nation, it is the first duty of the Legislature, who shall determine the machinery, at least, of that education, to keep steadily in their view that their power does not extend to a control over religious opinions; and that the laws which they make ought to touch these with the most delicate, and, above all, with the most impartial hand.

If there exist a sect endowed by the State-improperly held a dominant sect, for there is no legal religious domination,-the consciences of the adherents of that sect are in nowise entitled to more consideration, to more delicacy of treatment, to partial legislation or privilege, than the adherents of any other sect however obscure.

Now it is partial and unjust legislation so far to disregard the religious opinions of any sect in the country, as to adopt a machinery for national education which shall shew the slightest favour to any other sect whatsoever. This injustice would be done by such a machinery as would give secular and religious instruction in the same school, and by the same teacher. This one only teacher must belong to one only sect, and will, or may, which is the same thing, inculcate the doctrines, rites, discipline, and economy of that sect. This is injustice to all the other sects or denominations who have right to send their children to the school,

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It is usual for those, who have been accustomed to dictate in religious matters, to answer that the sect may be so small, or the difference so slight, or the individuals so indifferent, as not to call for great delicacy; it is enough, they add, that there be a reasonable concurrence in essentials. The existence of sects is an answer to this unfeeling, one-sided, and secretly proselytising, compromise. To every sect the cause of difference ought, by the Legislature, to be presumed important; and to force conscience in one individual is as unjust as to force it in a million. Here assuredly," major et minor non variant speciem."

There are two ways to meet this difficulty-either, first, to provide, at the national expense, a school for every sect, in each of which secular education shall be given with the religious of that sect. This may safely be pronounced impracticable; for it could not be realized without providing schools in such numbers, that neither funds nor teachers could be obtained for them: Or, secondly, so to arrange, that the secular or ordinary education shall be taught at a different time, or in some way separately, from the religious. No conscience is violated, no persecution is offered, by providing one secular school for all sects. Natural truth, in its various branches, is, or ought to be, taught there; and the Christian, the Jew, the Mussulman, and the Pagan, may all join in the same study.

Religious education will also be given; and the question is, How? I answer, by a different teacher from the secular. Does this mean, it will be asked, that there shall be one secular and only one religious teacher? This would only be varying the form of the injustice, because one religious teacher must be of one sect, and it would only be to increase the evil to give him the tuition of all the other sects, even without the mixture of secular teaching. It follows that one religious teacher, whether the same person with the secular, or a different, is an arrangement quite out of the question. If so, What is to be done? Shall there be two appointed religious teachers. This does not mend the matter, for there may be five, ten, twenty sects in the school, or, which is the same thing in the parish, for the school must not be closed against any sect. At once it is obvious, that there cannot be appointed religious teachers as part of the school establishment. Justice would give to every sect an equal right to appointment; and therefore, as they cannot all be appointed, it is unjust to appoint any of them. The same argument applies to endowment. This, it is said, is endowing secular education, and leaving religious to chance, or to take care of itself. The answer is, that, even were this true, which it is not, there is no help for it; any other course would present the alternative of injustice, or impracticability.

You

Now, the common sense view is plain, you must endow the secular teacher; for, besides that he is only one, he is yet to be created. need not endow the religious teachers, for they are many, and they already exist. Besides the two Established churches of the Empire, with a multitude of labourers in the vineyard, the numerous Dissenting denomina