love of freedom, his unconquerable hostility to all religious domination under whatever name or character, his aversion to bigotry and narrowness, his adherence to the simple truths of the Gospel; these give a charm and a value to his writings, by which none can fail to be instructed and improved. Whoever would look for pleasure or benefit from the productions of a writer with traits like these, will find his labour well rewarded in perusing the works of Robbert Robinson.

ON

UNIFORMITY IN RELIGION.

FROM THE ARCANA.

LEGISLATION is doubtless a sacred thing; it is a divine imitation of the government of mankind, and is deservedly assigned to the first in birth, property, and skill; but, the history of all nations will prove, that in parliaments, as in paradise, the serpent has found a way to corrupt and deprave. Ignorance or interest, negligence or pride, have too often prevailed over the generous principles which ought to influence these gods of mankind; and one age has been driven to repeal the laws of a former; so that perhaps legislation would furnish a large history of the extravagancies of the human mind, among which an Act of Uniformity would appear one of the greatest. Britons boast of their laws, and in general with great reason; but some of them blush for their country when they read a law entitled an Act of Uniformity.

It would be foreign from the present purpose to inquire the origin of this law; it may be more proper

to show that religious uniformity is an impossibility, and that a law of this kind can neither be argued from the light of nature, nor from the holy Scriptures. The idea of uniformity is neither the idea of a philosopher, nor of a christian. The fabricature of this law therefore by men who had a just right to both these titles, implies a moment's absence.

Sound policy requires a legislature to preserve its dignity; but the dignity of a legislature is never more prostituted than when impracticable edicts are issued. The dignity of legislation depends more on enforcing, than on inventing a law; the latter may be done by a pedant in his study, but the first must have power, property, magistracy, penalty, in a word, authority to support it; and this energy is its dignity. Where a tax is levied which the people cannot pay; where a kind of obedience is required which the people cannot yield; the legislators are forced to dispense with the obedience required. And what follows? the people despise a folly which could not foresee, a narrowness of capacity which could not comprehend, a timidity which dares not, or a weakness which cannot enforce its decrees. Did not all Europe deride the absurdity of those magistrates, who, in the reign of Mary, cited to their commissioners, Fagius and Bucer, who were both dead and buried, to appear and give an account of their faith? and, as if that was not quite ridiculous enough, caused their bones to be dug up out of their graves and burnt for non-appearance!

Aut nunquam tentes, aut perfice, is an excellent motto, and nowhere more rationally applied than in the matter of law-making. Had this been attended to, (but who that attends to the transactions of the year 1559, can wonder that it was not?) an act of uniformity could never have been passed. The impossibility of enforcing it might have been foreseen; nor ought it to be wondered at if five years after, "her Majesty was informed, that some received the communion kneeling, others standing, others sitting. Some baptized in a font, some in a bason; some signed with the sign of the cross, others not." In vain the queen attempted to enforce the act by penalties; in vain have succeeding princes endeavoured to enforce it; in vain were the formidable forces of oaths, subscriptions, fines, and prisons brought into the field; cruelty and lenity, madness and moderation, the gentleness of the eighteenth, and the rage of the seventeenth century have been employed in vain; the act stands disobeyed and unrepealed to this day.

Make religion what you will; let it be speculation, let it be practice; make it faith, make it fancy; let it be reason, let it be passion; let it be what you will; uniformity in it is not to be expected. Philosophy is a stranger to it, and christianity disowns it.

A philosopher holds that the system of the universe is perfect; that the duty and glory of man is to follow, not force nature; that moral philosophy is nothing but a harmony of the world of spirit with the

world of matter; that all the fine descriptions of virtue are nothing but essays on this conformity; thus he proves that moral evil is the production of natural evil, moral good the production of natural good. A philosopher would say to a legislator, as the poet to a man of taste:

To build, to plant, whatever you intend,
To rear the column, or the arch to bend,
To swell the terrace, or to sink the grot,
In all, let NATURE never be forgot.

Give a philosopher a farm, and enjoin him to cultivate it en philosophe, he will study the soil, the situation, the seasons, and so on; and, having comprehended what his farm is capable of, he will improve it accordingly. In the same manner he directs his garden, and every plant in it, never expecting to gather grapes of thorns, nor figs of thistles. What would he, yea, what would the unphilosophized farmers say of an act for the uniformity of husbandry? An act of uniformity, say the honest rustics, what's that? What's that! Why, you must grow nothing but wheat. How! say they, some of our lands are too light, they will produce none; we can grow rye there indeed; we have some even not worth ploughing for rye; however they will serve for a sheep-walk, or at worst for a rabbit-warren. Thus NATURE teaches men to reason and thus they reason right.

Go a step farther. Make this philosopher a tutor, and commit to his tuition a company of youths; he