Oldalképek
PDF
ePub

the Greek nor the Armenian, nor, fince heats are fubfided, the Roman system of religion, we prefer the Proteftant; not because we think it has less of the Christian religion in it, but because, in our judgment, it has more. We are protestants, not from indifference but from zeal.

We know, and it is our pride to know, that man is by his constitution a religious animal; that atheism is against, not only our reason but our instincts; and that it cannot prevail long. But if, in the moment of riot, and in a drunken delirium from the hot spirit drawn out of the alembick of hell, which in France is now fo furiously boil. ing, we should uncover our nakedness by throw. ing off that Christian religion which has hitherto been our boast and comfort, and one great fource of civilization amongst us, and among many other nations, we are apprehenfive (being well aware that the mind will not endure a void) that some uncouth, pernicious, and degrading fuperstition, might take place of it.

For that reason, before we take from our establishment the natural human means of estimation, and give it up to contempt, as you have done, and in doing it have incurred the penalties you well deserve to fuffer, we defire that fome other may be presented to us in the place of it. We shall then form our judgment.

On these ideas, instead of quarrelling with establishments, as some do, who have made a philosophy and a religion of their hoftility to such institutions, we cleave closely to them. We are resolved to keep an established church, an established

K 4

established monarchy, an established aristocracy, and an established democracy, each in the degree it exifts, and in no greater. I shall shew you presently how much of each of these we poffefs.

It has been the misfortune (not as these gentlemen think it, the glory) of this age, that every thing is to be discussed, as if the constitution of our country were to be always a fubject rather of altercation than enjoyment. For this reason, as well as for the fatisfaction of those among you (if any fuch you have among you) who may wish to profit of examples, I venture to trouble you with a few thoughts upon each of these establishments. I do not think they were unwise in antient Rome, who, when they wished to new-model their laws, sent commiffioners to examine the best constituted republics within their reach.

First, I beg leave to speak of our church establishment, which is the first of our prejudices, not a prejudice destitute of reason, but involving in it profound and extensive wisdom. I speak of it first. It is first, and last, and midft in our minds. For, taking ground on that religious system, of which we are now in possession, we continue to act on the early received, and uniformly continued fenfe of mankind. That sense not only, like a wife architect, hath built up the august fabric of states, but like a provident proprietor, to preserve the structure from prophanation and ruin, as a facred temple, purged from all the impurities of fraud, and violence, and injustice, and tyranny, hath folemnly and for ever confecrated the commonwealth, and all that officiate in it. This confecration is made, that all who adminifter

nister in the government of men, in which they stand in the person of God himself, should have high and worthy notions of their function and deftination; that their hope should be full of immortality; that they should not look to the paltry pelf of the moment, nor to the temporary and tranfient praise of the vulgar, but to a folid, permanent exiftence, in the permanent part of their nature, and to a permanent fame and glory, in the example they leave as a rich inheritance to the world.

Such fublime principles ought to be infused into persons of exalted situations; and religious establishments provided, that may continually revive and enforce them. Every fort of moral, every fort of civil, every fort of politic inftitution, aiding the rational and natural ties that connect the human understanding and affections to the divine, are not more than necessary, in order to build up that wonderful structure, Man; whose prerogative it is, to be in a great degree a creature of his own making; and who when made as he ought to be made, is destined to hold no trivial place in the creation. But whenever man is put over men, as the better nature ought ever to preside, in that case more particularly, he should as nearly as possible be approximated to his perfection.

The confecration of the state, by a state religious establishment, is necessary also to operate with an wholesome awe upon free citizens; because, in order to secure their freedom, they must enjoy some determinate portion of power.

To them

them therefore a religion connected with the state, and with their duty towards it, becomes even more necessary than in such societies, where the people by the terms of their fubjection are confined to private fentiments, and the management of their own family concerns. All persons poffeffing any portion of power ought to be strongly and awefully impressed with an idea that they act in truft; and that they are to account for their conduct in that trust to the one great master, author and founder of fociety.

This principle ought even to be more strongly impressed upon the minds of those who com pose the collective sovereignty than upon those of single princes. Without instruments, these princes can do nothing. Whoever uses instruments, in finding helps, finds also impedi ments. Their power is therefore by no means compleat; nor are they safe in extreme abufe. Such perfons, however elevated by flattery, arrogance, and felf-opinion, must be sensible that, whether covered or not by positive law, in some way or other they are accountable even here for the abuse of their truft. If they are not cut off by a rebellion of their people, they may be strangled by the very Janissaries kept for their security against all other rebellion. Thus we have seen the king of France fold by his foldiers for an encrease of pay. But where popular authority is abfolute and unrestrained, the people have an infinitely greater, because a far better founded confidence in their own power. They are themselves, in a great meafure, fure, their own instruments. They are nearer to their objects. Besides, they are lefs under responsibility to one of the greatest controlling powers on earth, the sense of fame and estimamation. The share of infamy that is likely to fall to the lot of each individual in public acts, is small indeed; the operation of opinion being in the inverse ratio to the number of those who abuse power. Their own approbation of their own acts has to them the appearance of a public judgment in their favour. A perfect democracy is therefore the most shameless thing in the world. As it is the most shameless, it is also the most fearless. No man apprehends in his person he can be made subject to punishment. Certainly the people at large never ought: for as all punishments are for example towards the conservation of the people at large, the people at large can never become the subject of punishment by any human hand*. It is therefore of infinite importance that they should not be fuffered to imagine that their will, any more than that of kings, is the standard of right and wrong. They ought to be perfuaded that they are full as little entitled, and far less qualified, with safety to themselves, to use any arbitrary power whatsoever; that therefore they are not, under a false shew of liberty, but, in truth, to exercise an unnatural inverted domination, tyrannically to exact, from those who officiate in the state, not an entire devotion to their interest, which is their right,

• Quicquid multis peccatur inultum.

but

« ElőzőTovább »