Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

remain open, he (Mr. Gurney could not tell; but he trusted that the conviction of the present Defendant would be one step made towards the removal of the nuisance. The effrontery with which arrangements were made for continuing the sale of Mr. Carlile's libels would be best shewn to the Jury by an advertisement which appeared in the Republican of the 27th October, 1820. The paragraph was this:

"In consequence of the verdict of Guilty given against Mrs. Carlile for selling Sherwin's Life of Paine, and No. 9, Vol. 1. of the Republican, she is now liable to banishment for serving in the shop, according to our glorious constitution: the business will therefore be managed by Mary-Anne Carlile, the sister of R. Carlile, on the behalf of the infant children, or rather on the behalf of the whole family. In case the house, 55 Fleet-street, should again be exposed to the violence of the legal thieves, the business will be opened as near to the spot as possible immediately, of which due notice will be given. As this kind of business might be said to be renewed every week, at least it depends on the periodical publications, we can begin any where with half an hour's preparation, and laugh at the Vice Society and all the influence they can use against it. If one web be destroyed, a few hours work will spin another, stronger and better than before."

Mr. GURNEY concluded by saying that the Defendant had entered into the trade of libel with her eyes open: to the Society for the Suppression of Vice, her praise only could be distressing her abuse was a donation peculiarly acceptable.

James Rignall said, that he purchased the libel in question, on the 3d of March, 1821, at Carlile's shop in Fleetstreet. On the 7th of March he bought a second copy. The libel was put in, and read as follows:

"OF THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENT. "Archbishop Tillotson says, 'The difference between the style of the Old and New Testament is so very remarkable, that one of the greatest sects in the primitive times, did, upon this very ground, found the heresy of two Gods, the one evil, fierce, and cruel, whom they called the God of the Old Testament; the other was good, kind, and merciful, whom they called the God of the New Testament; so great a difference is there between the representations that are given of God in the books of the Jewish and Christian religion, as to give, at least, some colour and pretence to an imagination of two Gods.' Thus far Tillotson.

"But the case was, that as the church had picked out se

veral passages from the Old Testament, which she most absurdly and falsely calls prophecies of Jesus Christ, (whereas there is no prophecy of any such person, as any one may see by examining the passages, and the cases to which they apply,) she was under the necessity of keeping up the credit of the Old Testament, because if that fell the other would soon follow, and the Christian system of faith would soon be at an end. As a book of morals, there are several parts of the New Testament that are good; but they are no other than what had been preached in the eastern world several hundred years before Christ was born. Confucius, the Chinese philosopher, who lived five hundred years before the time of Christ, says, Acknowledge thy benefits by the return of benefits, but never revenge injuries.

"The clergy of the popish countries were cunning enough to know, that if the Old Testament was made public, the fallacy of the New, with respect to Christ, would be detected, and they prohibited the use of it, and always took it away wherever they found it. The Deists, on the contrary, always encouraged the reading it, that people might see and judge for themselves, that a book so full of contradictions and wickedness could not be the word of God, and that we dishonour God by ascribing it to him.

A TRUE DEIST." Mr. Justice BEST asked if the Defendant had any thing to offer.

The Defendant put in a written defence, and requested that it might be read by the Clerk.

The officer of the court then read as follows:

GENTLEMEN OF THE JURY,

I stand forward to defend myself against the charges of this Indictment, and the hypocritical insinuations of those who have brought it against me, with a feeling of pleasure, - and a strong confidence that there is in you, Gentlemen of the Jury, sufficient liberality, and a sufficient lack of that bigotry which my prosecutors might hope to find in you, to give me a verdict of NOT GUILTY. I feel assured, that if there be but one independent and enlightened mind among you, Gentlemen of the Jury (and I hope and trust there are twelve), you will never send me to two or three years imprisonment for having published this pamphlet ; and further, that you will say by your verdict, that it is a pamphlet of that description, which would make it a disgrace to any government or court of law to suppress. I earnestly entreat you, Gentlemen, to take this pamphlet, which forms the subject of the indictment now before you, and examine

it as a whole, or by chapters, by paragraphs, or by sentences, and say whether there is any thing in it that an honest person might blush to write, to publish and sell, or to read.

Although my indictment sets forth (as a matter of form), that I am a wicked and evil disposed person, I am not backward to put my moral character in competition with any of my secret prosecutors, or any female which might belong to their families; and so anxious am I to have it fairly scrutinized in this case, that I shall consider you, Gentlemen, will not do your duty towards me, unless you examine carefully and particularly every part of the pamphlet which is now laid before you.

There is one thing to which I wish to call your particular attention, Gentlemen, and that is, that the article selected for prosecution was copied from

an

American newspaper. It has been circulated all over the United States of America, and it appears to have done the inhabitants no harm there. The Americans are not alarmed at such a publication, and we do not hear that the Christians on the other side of the Atlantic are afraid to have their religion discussed by such means as the writer of this paragraph has adopted. They have no secret associations of priests and bigots, and interested hypocrites, to raise a clamour against every attempt to examine the religion they profess. Notwithstanding they have no vice-societies, they are not a jot more vicious, or less moral, than the people of this Island. Notwithstanding they cannot boast the possession of a religion of the law, they are not a jot less religious than the people of this country. The seceders from the reigning superstitions are far more proportionately numerous in this country, than in America, where there is no established religion, and where every family or every individual pays what priest or teacher he likes, and as much as he thinks proper-where tithes are are unknown-where, if one sect prevails, in point of numbers, it is entirely from persuasion; and where they, at least, can boast a religion that needs not human law to prop and protect it from examination.

By those frequent appeals to the law in this country, to prop the religion which the law-administerers have found necessary to take under their special protection, it is confessed that it cannot bear scrutiny, and that a blind faith towards it is esssential to its existence.

If a person comes to me and says "I have received a communication from the Deity, but I fear to allow you to

examine its terms and its purport;" shall I not suspect that person to be an impostor even without that examination? Yet this is the case with my prosecutors: they say, the God or Gods whom they adore are omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient; they say that these Gods have deigned to make especial communications; and because I have published a sixpenny pamphlet, one page of which expresses a doubt of the truth of their pretensions, they call upon you, Gentlemen of the Jury, to give me two or three years imprisonment. But I trust, Gentlemen, that you will be more honest that you will not consent to throw me into a dungeon because I have published a pamphlet, which, in a becoming manner, expresses a doubt of the validity of that religion, which is this day sought to be screened from all examination. During the trials of my brother, it was repeatedly and publicly stated by the Lord Chief Justice, in this Court, that it was not illegal to express a doubt of the truth and validity of the Christian religion, provided those doubts were not expressed in a reviling manner-that the law meant not to protect the Christian religion from all examination, but merely from being reviled by those who might doubt or disbelieve its truths. I speak under correction, but I feel assured, that, if these were not the exact words of his lordship, they convey the exact meaning.

Now, Gentlemen of the Jury, I contend, that the three paragraphs which comprise the present Indictment, are written in as respectful a manner as it is possible, when the object is to bring falsehood to the test of truth. If we attempt to prove that any proposition be founded in error, we must first assume that it is erroneous, and proceed by argument to prove it to be so. Throughout the course of this argument, it becomes absolutely necessary, upon all the rules of logic, to keep up the charge of error; and if in the end, the argument and evidence be sufficient to prove the proposition to be erroneous, no language that has been used can justly be termed a reviling, because it is consistent with all the laws of morality, and becomes an imperative duty on every man, to assist in the explosion and annihilation of error and the triumph and establishment of truth. It would be a strange method indeed, in an attempt to bring falsehood to the test of truth, to set out with expressing an admiration for that falsehood, and to put it upon a level with truth. From those observations I mean to infer, that it is impossible for any person who has renounced the Christian religion to make his observations upon that religion, in a more mild and becoming manner, than that which now forms the sub

ject of this Indictment: and if that which the Lord Chief Justice said was law in my brother's case, is to be law in my case, I feel that, even upon this view of the law, I am entitled to a verdict of Not Guilty; and, should your verdict be the contrary, Gentlemen of the Jury, you will be parties in confessing that the Christian religion cannot bear the least examination; and by so doing, you will do more towards reviling and bringing it into contempt, than any pamphlets which I may have sold, or may in future sell.

Now, Gentlemen of the Jury, it is evident, that if the law does not tolerate a denunciation of the Christian religion in direct terms, that toleration is established upon usage in the case of the Jews who inhabit this country. Those persons have their synagogues or places of worship, and it is well known that they hold the historical part of the book called the New Testament in the greatest contempt. There are other sects, such as the Free-thinking Christians, the Unitarian Christians, the Sandemonians, or Beef-eaters, the Swedenborgians, the followers of Johanna Southcote, the Ranters, the Shakers, and a variety of other sects, whom, for humanity's sake, I blush to mention, and you, Gentlemen of the Jury, doubtless, would blush to hear, all calling themselves Christians, and each reviling the Christianity of the other sect, and laying a peculiar claim to Jesus Christ and his Heaven for themselves; yet, all these Christian sects differ as widely from that Christianity which our lawyers call the religion of the law, as do the Jews, or Mahometans, or any other mythologists. From this it would appear, that any species of disgusting and disgraceful nonsense, assuming the title of Christian, might be allowed to revile and bring into contempt the religion of the law; but if any individuals become bold and honest enough to exercise their reason upon it, and bring this religion of the law to a reasonable examination, they are to be incarcerated for years, and reduced to poverty by being mulcted out of all their property, as has been the case with my brother!

The bare existence of such sects in this country, as I have mentioned, upon established usage, is a sufficient justification to any individual, if in his mind he has renounced both Jewish and Christian religion, and every other species of mythology, to publish that renunciation and his reasons for it. It is notorious that Thomas Paine, my brother, and millions of others, both in Europe and America have, after the fullest examination, made a renunciation of the Christian religion, and this forms an important question for your consideration have they, or have they not, a right, a reasona

« AnteriorContinuar »