fufpicion and infult to the unthinking vulgar. Perfuaded that we have not merited thofe abfürd and malicious imputations by which ignorance and bigotry have always attempted to excufe illegal violence, we boldly appeal for our juftification to our general conduct, whenever, on great national emergencies we have been drawn forth to action. We cannot point out any other criterion of our principles as a body, than the uniform tenor of our public conduct. We know that on fuch occafions we shall be found ever to have fhewn the most affectionate and invariable attachment to the conftitution of this kingdom, as fettled on the princi. ples of the glorious Revolution, on which alone depends the title of the prefent auguft family to the British throne; and on this fair and open ground we challenge any clafs of our enemies to a comparifon. But although we have no wifh to conceal our fentiments; yet maintaining, as we fhall never cease to do, the equal right of every citizen to all the common benefits of fociety, we apprehend that to call on us to purchase protection, fafety, or even the good opinion of our fellow-fubjects, by any avowal which the law does not require of all, or by any filence which it does not univerfally enjoin, is an affumption of fuperiority, which liberal minds will difclaim, and to which, confcious of no inferiority but in numbers, of no guilt but the love of liberty and our country, we see not the fmalleft reafon to fubmit. We trust that our countrymen will at length difcover that it is not our fault if fome degree of difcontent be ever the effect of oppreffion. We fhall not relinquish the attempt ceedings falls with accumulated weight on the authors and the perpetrators of fuch mischief; nor can we avoid obferving in the circumftances of this tranfaction evident fymptoms either of fome grofs defect in our general fyftem of police, or of the moft fupine and culpable negligence in thofe whofe immediate duty it was to have protected the places of public worship, as well as the lives and property of their fellow-citizens; and we truft that the executive government, which exerted fo much laudable activity to reprefs the diforders on the first notice, will proceed more fully to vindicate its own dignity and the national honour, by ferioufly enquiring how it came to pafs that they were permitted to rife unchecked to fuch a height of destructive fury. Whatever may be the event, we defire to affure you of our warmeft affection, of our fteadieft fupport. Although in this inftance the storm has fallen on you alone, we all feel ourselves to have been equally within the aim of the fpirit which directed it; nor fhall we ever attempt to elude fimilar violence by meanly abandoning the common caule, or deferting our brethren in the hour of diftrefs. Our adverfaries betray little acquaintance with the character and principles of the men whom they prefume to infult and vilify, if they imagine that the fpirit of the Diffenters is to be fubdued and broken by the means which have been employed at Birmingham. Such meafures can only tend to cement more clofely our bond of union, and to invigorate our efforts to procure the repeal of thofe invidious and injurious laws, by which we are held forth as the proper objects of London Constitutional Whigs, Independent and Friends of the People, GEO. PULLER, Chairman. we named, we the to convince them that civil diftinctions, founded on religious differences, are the real fources of the difturbances which have fo frequently arifen from contending fects in the fame community; and we flatter ourselves that Britain, which formerly took the lead in religious toleration, will not be the laft nation in the world to acknowledge the juft claims of religious liberty; but that the day will arrive much fooner than thofe imagine, who reflect not on the prefent afpect and tendencies of human affairs, when the good fenfe of our country will admit us to that equal rank for which we contend, and when all thall cordially concur to efface the stain which the late outrages have fixed on our national character. "Signed by the unanimous order of the meeting, EDWARD JEFFRIES, Chairman." King's Head, Poultry, London, Feb. 1. Addrefs from the London Correfpending Society, and Four other Societies in England, to the National Convention. ADDRESS TO THE FRENCH NATIONAL CONVENTION. From the following Societies of Britons united in one common Cauje; namely the obtaining a fair, equal, and impartial Reprefentation in Parliament: Manchester Constitutional Society, THO. WALKER, Pref. SAM. JACKSON, Sec. Manchester Reformation Society, JOHN STACEY, Seć. Norwich Revolution Society, THO. GOFF, Pref. JOHN COZENS, Seo. AUTHORIZED by our united London Correfponding Society, for them as well as for ourselves, thus addrefs you: FRENCHMEN, While foreign robbers are ravaging your territories under the fpecious pretext of justice, cruelty and devaftation lead on their van, while perfidy with treachery bring up their rear; yet mercy and friendfhip are impudently held forth to the world as the fole motives of their incurfions; the oppreffed part of mankind, forgetting for a while their own fufferings, feel only for yours, and with an anxious eye watch the ultimate event, fervently fupplicating the Supreme Ruler of the universe to be favourable to your caufe, fo intimately blended with their own. Frowned upon by an oppreffive fyftem of controul, whofe gradual but continued encroachments have deprived this nation of nearly all its boafted liberty, and brought us almoft to that abject ftate of flavery from which you have fo glorioufly emerged, a few thoufands of Britifh citizens, indignant, manfully ftep forth to refcue their country from the opprobrium brought upon in power: they conceive it to be it by the fupine conduct of those the duty of Britons to countenance, and to affift to the utmost of their power, the champions, of human happinefs, and to fwear to a nation proceeding on the plan which you have adopted, an inviolable friendfhip. Sacred from this day be that that friendship between us and for your fuccefs, eager as we are to behold freedom triumphant, and man everywhere reftored to the enjoyment of his juft rights, a fenfe of our duty as orderly citizens forbids our flying in arms to your af fiftance. Our government has pledged the national faith to remain neutral! In a struggle of liberty a gainst defpotifm, Britons remain neutral. O fhame! But, we have entrusted our king with discretionary powers. -we therefore must obey. Our hands are bound, but our hearts are free, and they are with you. Let German defpots act as they pleafe, we fhall rejoice at their fall; compaffionating, however, their enflaved fubjects, we hope this tyranny of their mafters will prove the means of reinftating, in the full poffeffion of their rights and liberties, millions of our fellow-creatures. With unconcern, therefore, we might view the Elector of Hanover join his troops to traitors and robbers: but the king of Great Britain will do well to remember that this country is not Hanover:-fhould he forget this diftinction, we will not. While you enjoy the envied glory of being the unaided defenders of freedom, we fondly anticipate in idea the numerous bleflings which mankind will enjoy, if you fucceed, as we ardently with. The triplealliance, not of crowns, but of the people of America, France, and Britain, will give freedom to Europe, and peace to the world! Dear friends, you combat for the advantage of the human race! How well purchafed will be, though at the expence of much blood, the glorious, the unprecedented privilege of saying "Mankind is free! Tyrants and tyranny are no more! may vengeance to the uttermoft overtake the man who fhall hereafter attempt to cause a rupture! Though we appear comparative ly fo few at prefent, be affured, Frenchmen, that our number increases daily. It is true that the ftern uplifted arm of authority at prefent keeps back the timid-that bufily circulated impoftures hourly miflead the credulous and that court-intimacy with avowed French traitors has fome effect on the unwary, and on the ambitious. But with certainty we can inform you, friends and freemen, that information makes a rapid progrefs among us: curiofity has taken poffeffion of the public mind; and the conjoint reign of ignorance and defpotifm paffes away. Men now afk each other, what is freedom? what are our rights? - Frenchmen, you are already free, and Britons are preparing to become fo! Cafting far from us the criminal prejudices artfully inculcated by evilminded men and wily courtiers, we, inftead of natural enemies, at length discover in Frenchmen our fellow-citizens of the world, and our brethren by the fame Heavenly Father, who created us for the purpose of loving, and mutually affifting each other; but not to hate, and to be ever ready to cut each others throats at the command of weak or ambitious kings, and corrupt minifters. Seeking our real enemies, we find them in our bofoms. We feel ourselves inwardly torn by and ever the vicAims of a reftlefs all-confuming arif tocracy, hitherto the bane of every nation under the fun :-wifely have you acted in expelling it from France. Warm as are our wifhes E4 Peace Peace reigns on the earth! and this is the work of Frenchmen !"-The defire of having the concurrence of different country focieties to this Addrefs, has occafioned a month's delay in prefenting it. Succefs unparalleled has now attended your arms. We congratulate you thereon; that fuccefs has removed our anxiety, but it has no otherwife influenced our fentiments in your behalf. Remember, Frenchmen, that although this teftimony of friendship only now reaches your affembly, it bears date the 27th of September 1792. (Signed by order) MAURICE MARGAROT, Prefident. THOMAS HARDY, Secretary. The Prefident's Answer. ENGLISHMEN, and fellow-citizens of the world, The national convention has heard with lively fenfibility the glorious and generous wifh of the English citizens, who cordially unite with us in our labours. The fentiments of 5,000 Britons, devoted openly to the caule of mankind, exift, without doubt, in the hearts of all the freemen in England. Let them not ftill confider their neutrality as a reproach while they are fpectators of the grand ftruggle for liberty against defpotifm; their refpect for a conftitution which they have learnt to judge in filence, is no longer that antiquated fuperftition which promifed to government impunity for its faults; it is rather the effect of a prudent and political gravity, which knowing how to temper its force, feems to command the government to obferve thet very neutrality, and to warn it to be as juft, or at least as prudent, as the nation. Believe, generous Englishmen, that by following that fyftem, you do not the lefs concur with us in the work of univerfal liberty. Let us advance fome fteps further in that career in which you were our precurfors; and let us enjoy by anticipation, and with a common hope, that epoch (doubtlefs not far diftant) when the interefts of Europe and of mankind fhall invite the two nations to ftretch out the hand of fraternity! Addrefs from the Revolution Society in London, to the National Convention; dated 5th of November.—Read in the Sitting of 1ft of December, 1792. FR RENCH Citizens! The Society inftituted to perpetuate the remembrance of the revolution of Great Britain, offers you this addrefs with the fincereft refpect. At the fuggeftion of one of our members, the late Dr. Price, whose lofs we regret, we have already congratulated you on your firft fucceffes in the common caufe of liberty; and we cannot be filent at a period fo fruitful in events. Even if the enemies who invaded France ftill ravaged your towns, we would not keep back this addrefs; in the hope that a nation which fights not for itself alone, but for the whole human race, would, in the end, prove victorious. The tyrants who threatened you have retired with difgrace; and the friends of liberty, in all countries, fhare the joy of your triumph. Above all, we rejoice in the late revolution of the 10th of August, fo neceflary to fe cure Addrefs of the Society for Conftitutional cure to you the advantages which SERVANTS of a Sovereign people, and Benefactors of mankind! We rejoice that your revolution has arrived at that point of perfection which will permit us to address you by this title: it is the only one that can accord with the character of true legiflators. Every fucceffive epoch in your affairs, has added fomething to the triumphs of liberty; and the glorious victory of the 10th of Auguft has finally prepared the way for a conftitution, which we truft you will establish on the bafis of reafon and nature. Confidering the mass of delufion accumulated on mankind to obfcure their understandings, you cannot be aftonished at the oppofition you have met with, both from tyrants and from flaves. The inftrument used against you by each of these claffes is the fame; for in the genealogy of human miferies ignorance is at once the parent of oppreffion, and the child of fubmiffion. The events of every day are proving that your caufe is cherished by the people in all your continental vicinity; that a majority of each of thofe nations are your real friends, whofe governments have tutored them into apparent foes; and that they only wait to be delivered by your arms from the dreaded neceffity of fighting against them. The condition of Englishmen is lefs to be deplored; here the hand of oppreffion has not yet ventured completely to ravish the pen from us, nor openly to From point the fword at you. bofoms burning with ardour in your caufe, we tender you our warmest withes for the full extent of its proIt is indeed a grefs and fuccess. facred caufe; we cherifh it as the pledge J. TOWERS, Chairman. |