THE Attorney General, in that part of his address which arose from a letter, supposed to have been written to him from France, exhibited signs of strong sensibility and emotion. I do not, I am sure, charge him with acting a part to seduce you; on the contrary, I am persuaded from my own feelings, and from my acquain­tance with my friend from our childhood upwards, that he expressed himself as he felt. But, gentlemen, if he felt those painful embarrassments, think what mine must be: he can only feel for the august character whom he represents in this place, as a subject for his sovereign, too far removed by custom, and by law, from the inter­courses which generate affections, to produce any other sentiments than those that flow from a relation common to us all. But it will be remembered, that I stand in the same relation ^* towards another Great Person, more deeply implicated by this supposed letter; who, not restrained from the cultivation of personal attachment by those qualifications which must always secure them, has exalted my duty of a subject to a Prince, into a warm and honest affection between man and man. Thus circumstanced, [Page 8] I certainly should have been glad to have had an earlier opportunity of knowing correctly the contents of this let­ter, and whether (which I positively deny) it proceeded from the defendant. Coming thus suddenly upon us, I see but too plainly the impression it has made upon you who are to try the cause, and I feel its weight upon myself, who am to conduct it; but this shall neither detach me from my duty, nor added to all the other difficulties that thicken around me, enervate me, (if I can help it) in the discharge of it.

Gentlemen, if the Attorney General is well founded in the commentaries he has made to you upon this book which he prosecutes; if he is warranted by the law of England, in repressing its circulation, through these realms, from the illegal and dangerous matters contained in it; if that suppression be, as he avows it, and as in common sense it must be, the sole object of the prosecution, the public has great reason to lament that this letter should have been at all brought into the service of the cause: it is no part of the charge upon the record; it had no existence for months after the work was composed and published; it was not even written, if written at all, till after he had been at Dover, in a manner insultingly expelled from the country by the influence of government, and had become the subject of another country. It cannot, therefore, by any fair inference, even decypher the mind of the author when he composed his work; still less can it affect the construction of the language in which the work itself is written. The introduction of this letter at all is, therefore, not only a departure from the charge, but a sort of derelic­tion of the object of the prosecution, which is to con­demn the book: for if the condemnation of the author is to be obtained, not by the work itself, but by collateral mat­ter not even existing when it was written, nor known to its various publishers throughout the kingdom, how can a verdict upon such grounds condemn the work, or cri­minate other publishers, strangers to the collateral man­ner on which the conviction may be obtained? I main­tain, therefore, that upon every principle of found policy, as it affects the interest of the crown, and upon every rule of justice, as it affects the author of the Rights of Man, the letter should be wholly dismissed from your consideration.

[Page 9]Gentlemen, the Attorney General has thought it neces­sary to inform you, that a rumour had been spread, and had reached his ears, that he only carried on the prosecu­tion as a public prosecutor, but without the concurrence of his own private judgment; and therefore to add the just weight of his own character to his public duty, and to re­pel what he thinks a calumny, he tells you that he should have deserved to have been driven from society, if he had not arraigned the work and the author before you.

Here too we stand in situations very different. I have no doubt of the existence of such a rumour, and of its ha­ving reached his ears, because he says so; but for the narrow circle in which any rumour, personally implicating my learned friend's character, has extended, I might ap­peal to the multitudes who surround us, and ask, which of all them, except the few connected in office with the crown, ever heard of its existence. But with regard to myself, every man who hears me at this moment, nay, the whole People of England, have been witnesses to the ca­lumnious clamour, that by every art, has been raised and kept up against me: In every place, where business or plea­sure collect the public together, day after day my name and character have been the topics of injurious reflection. And for what?—only for not having shrunk from the dis­charge of a duty which no personal advantage recommend­ed, and which a thousand difficulties repelled. But, gen­tlemen, I have no complaint to make, either against the printers of these libels, nor even against their authors; the greater part of them, hurried perhaps away by honest prejudices, may have believed they were serving their country by rendering me the object of its suspicion and contempt; and if there have been amongst them others who have mixed in it from personal malice and unkind­ness, I thank God I it can forgive them also.—Little in­deed did they know me, who thought that such proceed­ings would influence my conduct: I will forever, at all hazards, assert the dignity, independence, and integrity of the ENGLISH BAR; without which, impartial justice, the most valuable part of the English constitution can have no existence. For, from the moment that any advocate can be permitted to say that he will or will not stand be­tween the crown and a subject arraigned in the court where [Page 10] he daily sits to practise, from that moment the liberties of England are at an end. If the advocate refuses to defend from what he may think of the charge or of the defence, he assumes the character of the judge; nay, he assumes it before the hour of judgment; and, in proportion to his rank and reputation, puts the heavy influence of, perhaps, a mistaken opinion into the scale against the accused, in whose favor the benevolent principle of English law makes all presumptions, and, which commands the very Judge to be his counsel.

Gentlemen, it is now my duty to address myself regu­larly, and without digression to the defence. And the first thing which presents itself in the discussion of a judi­cial subject, and indeed of every other, is to state distinctly and with precision, what the question is, and (where pre­judice and misrepresentation have been exerted,) to distin­guish it accurately from what it is not. The question then is NOT whether the constitution of our fathers, under which we live—under which I present myself before you, and under which alone you have any jurisdiction to hear me,—be or be not preferable to the constitution of Ame­rica or France, or any other human constitution. For upon what principal can a court, constituted by the authority of any government, and administering a positive system of law under it, pronounce a decision against the constitution which creates its authority; or the rule of action which its jurisdiction is to enforce? The common sense of the most uninformed person must revolt at such an absurd supposition.

I have no difficulty, therefore, in admitting, that if by accident some or all of you were alienated in opinion and affectation from the forms and principles of the English government, and were impressed with the value of that unmixed representative constitution which this work re­commends and inculcates, you could not, on that account, acquit the defendant. Nay, to speak out plainly, I freely admit, that even if you were avowed enemies to monar­chy, and devoted to republicanism, you would be never­theless bound by your oaths, as a jury sworn to administer English justice, to convict the author of the Rights of Man, if it were brought home to your consciences, that he had exceeded those widely extended bounds which the [Page 11] ancient wisdom and liberal policy of the English consti­tution have allotted to the range of a free press. I freely concede to this, because you have no jurisdiction to judge either the author or the work, by any rule but by the En­glish law, which is the source of your authority. But having made this large concession, it follows, by a conse­quence so inevitable as to be invulnerable to all argument or artifice, that if, on the other hand, you should be im­pressed (which I know you to be) not only with a dutiful regard, but with an enthusiasm, for the whole form and substance of your own government; and though you should think that this work, in its circulation amongst classes of men unequal to political researches, may tend to alienate opinion, still you cannot, upon these grounds, without a similar breach of duty, convict the defendant of a libel, unless he has clearly stepped beyond that extended range of communication which the same ancient wisdom and liberal policy of the British constitution has allotted for the liber­ty of the press.

Gentlemen, I admit, with the Attorney-General, that in every case where a court has to estimate the quality of a writing, the mind and intention of the writer must be taken into account the bona, or male sides, as lawyers ex­press it, must be examined: for a writing may undoubt­edly proceed from a motive, and be directed to a purpose, not to be decyphered by the mere construction of the thing written. But wherever a writing is arraigned as seditious or slanderous, not upon its ordinary construction in lan­guage, nor from the necessary consequences of its publica­tion, under any circumstances and at all times, but that the criminality springs from some extrinsic matter, not visible upon the page itself, nor universally operative, but capable only of being connected with it by evidence, so as to demonstrate the effect of the publication, and the design of the publisher; such a writing, not libellous PER SE, cannot be arraigned as the author's work is arraigned upon the record before the court. I maintain without the ha­zard of contradiction, that the law of England positively requires, for the security of the subject, that every charge of a libel complicated with extrinsic facts and circumstan­ces, dehors the writing, must appear literally upon the re­cord, that the defendant may know what crime he is cal­led [Page 12] upon to answer, and how to stand upon his defence. What crime is it that the defendant comes to answer for to-day? What is the notice that I, who am his counsel, have from this parchment of the crime alledged against him? I come to defend his having written this book. The record states nothing else; the charge of sedition in the introduction is notoriously paper and pack-thread, and the innuendoes cannot enlarge the sense, or natural construction of the text. The record does not state any one extrinsic fact or circumstance, to render the work cri­minal, at one time more than another; it states no peculi­arity of time, season, or intention, not proveable from the writing itself, which is the naked charge upon record. There is nothing therefore which, upon any principle of English law, gives you any jurisdiction beyond the con­struction of the work itself; and you cannot be justified in finding it criminal because published at this time, unless it would have been a criminal publication under any circum­stances, or at any other time.

The law of England then, both in its forms and sub­stance, being the only rule by which the author or the work can be justified or condemned, and the charge upon the record being the naked charge of a libel, the cause resolves itself into a question of the deepest importance to us all, the nature and extent of the liberty of the English Press.

But before I enter upon it, I wish to fulfil a duty to the defendant, which, if I do not deceive myself, is at this moment peculiarly necessary to his impartial trial. If an advocate entertains sentiments injurious to the defence he is engaged in, he is not only justified but bound in duty to conceal them; so, on the other hand, if his own gen­uine sentiments, or any thing connected with his charac­ter or situation, can add strength to his professional assist­ance, he is bound to throw them into the scale: in ad­dressing myself, therefore, to gentlemen not only zealous for the honor of English government, but visibly indignant at any attack upon its principles, and who would, perhaps, be impatient of arguments from a suspected quarter, I give my client the benefit of declaring, that I am, and ever have been attached to the genuine principles of the British go­vernment;—and that, however the court or you may reject [Page 13] the application, I defend him upon principles not only consistent with its permanence and security, but, without the establishment of which, it never could have had an existence.

The proposition which I mean to maintain as the ba­sis of the liberty of the press, and without which it is an empty sound, is this:

That every man, not intending to mislead and to con­found, but seeking to enlighten others with what his [...] reason and conscience, however [...], dictate to him as truth, may address himself to the universal reason of a whole nation, either upon the subject of governments in general, or upon that of our own particular country: that he may analyze the principles of its constitution, point out its errors and defects, examine and publish its corruptions, warn his fellow-citizens against their ruinous consequences, and exert his whole faculties in pointing out the most ad­vantageous changes in establishments which he considers to be radically defective, or sliding from their object by abuse. All this, every subject of this country has a right to do, if he contemplates only what he thinks its happiness, and but seeks to change the public mind by the conviction which flows from reasonings dictated by conscience.

If, indeed, he writes what he does not think; If con­templating the misery of others, he wickedly condemns what his own understanding approves; or, even admitting his real disgust against the government or its corruptions, if he calumniates living magistrates, or holds out to indi­viduals, that they have a right to run before the public mind in their conduct; that they may oppose by contuma­cy or force, what private reason only disapproves; that they may disobey the law, because their judgment con­demns it; or resist the public will, because they honestly wish to change it: he is then a criminal upon every prin­cipal of rational policy, as well as upon the immemorial precedents of English justice; because such a person seeks to disunite individuals from their duty to the whole, and excites to overt acts of misconduct in a part of the com­munity, instead of endeavoring to change, by the impulse of reason, that universal assent which, in this and in every country, constitutes the law for all.

I have therefore no difficulty in admitting that, if, upon [Page 14] an attentive perusal of this work, it shall be found that the defendant has promulgated any doctrines which tend to withdraw individuals from their subjection to the law by which the whole nation consents to be governed; nay, if the direct contrary shall not be found to be studiously in­culcated—if his book shall be found to have warranted or excited that unfortunate criminal who appeared here yes­terday to endeavor to relieve himself from imprisonment, by the destruction of a prison, while the law of imprison­ment remained, or dictated to him the language of defiance which ran through his whole defence—if, throughout the whole work, there shall be found any syllable or letter, which strikes at the security of property, or which hints that any thing less than the whole nation can constitute the law, or that the law, be it what it may, is not the inexo­rable rule of action for every individual, I willingly yield him up to the justice of the court.

Gentlemen, I say, in the name of Thomas Paine, and in his words as author of the Rights of Man, as written in the very volume that is charged with seeking the de­struction of property.

‘The end of all political associations is, the preserva­tion of the rights of man, which rights are liberty, property, and security; that the nation is the source of all sovereignty derived from it: the right of property be­ing secured and inviolable, no one ought to be deprived of it, except in cases of evident public necessity, legally ascertained, and on condition of a previous just indem­nity.’

These are undoubtedly the rights of man—the rights for which all governments are established—and the only rights [...]. Paine contends for; but which he thinks (no matter whether right or wrong,) are better to be secured by a republican constitution than by the forms of the En­glish government. He instructs me to admit that; when government is once constituted, no individuals, without rebellion, can withdraw their obedience from it—that all attempts to excite then to it, are highly criminal, for the most obvious reasons of policy and justice—that nothing short of the will of whole people can change or affect the rule by which a nation is to be governed—and that no private opinion, however honestly inimical to the forms or [Page 15] substance of the law, can justify resistance to its authority, while it remains in force. The author of the Rights of Man not only admits the truth of all this doctrine, but he consents to be convicted, and I also consent for him, unless his work shall be found studiously and painfully to incul­cate these great principles of government which it is char­ged to have been written to destroy. Let me not, there­fore, be suspected to be contending, that it is lawful to write a book pointing out defects in the English govern­ment, and exciting individuals to destroy its sanctions, and to refuse obedience. But, on the other hand, I do contend, that it is lawful to address the English nation on these mo­mentous subjects, for had it not been for this unalienable right, (thanks be to God and our fathers for establishing it,) how should we have had this constitution which we so loudly boast of? If, in the march of the human mind, no man could have gone before the establishments of the time he lived in, how could our establishment, by reiterated changes, have become what it is? If no man could have awakened the public mind to errors and abuses in our go­vernment, how could it have passed on from stage to stage, through reformation and revolution, so as to have arrived from barbarism to such a pitch of happiness and perfection that the Attorney General considers it as profanation to touch it any further, or to look for any future amendment.

In this manner power has reasoned in every age; go­vernment, in its own estimation, has been at all times a sys­tem of perfection; but a free press has examined and de­tected its errors, and the people have happily reformed them: this freedom has alone made our government what it is, and alone can preserve it; and therefore, under the banners of that freedom, to-day I stand up to defend Tho­mas Paine. But how, alas! shall this task be accomplished? How may I expect from you what human nature has not made man for the performance of? How am I to address your reasons, or ask them to pause, amidst the torrent of prejudice which has hurried away the public mind on the subject you are to judge?

Was any Englishman ever so brought as a criminal be­fore an English court of justice? If I were to ask you, gentlemen of the jury, what is the choicest fruit that grows upon the tree of English liberty, you would answer, security [Page 16] under the law. If I were to ask the whole people of En­gland, the return they looked for at the hands of govern­ment, for the burthens under which they bend to support it, I should still be answered, security under the law; or, in other words, an impartial administration of justice. So sacred, therefore, has the freedom of trial been ever held in England; so anxiously does justice guard against every possible bias in her path, that if the public mind has been lo­cally agitated upon any subject in judgment, the form is either changed, or the trial postponed. The circulation of any paper that brings, or which can be supposed to bring, prejudice, or even well-founded knowledge, within the reach of a British tribunal, on the spur of an occasion, is not only highly criminal, but defeats itself, by leading to put off the trial which its object was to pervert. On this principle, his Lordship will permit me to remind him, that on the trial of the Dean of St. Asaph for a libel, or rather when he was brought to trial, the circulation of books by a society favorable to his defence, was held by the no­ble Lord, as Chief Justice of Chester, to be a reason for not trying the cause; although they contained no matter re­lative to the Dean, nor to the object of his trial; being only extracts from ancient authors of high reputation, on the general rights of juries to consider the innocence as well as the guilt of the accused; yet still, as the recollecti­on of these rights was pressed forward with a view to af­fect the proceedings, to guard the principle, the proceedings were postponed.

Is the defendant then to be the only exception to these admirable provisions? Is the English law to judge him, script of the armour with which its universal justice encir­cles all others? Shall we, in the very act of judging him for detracting from the English government, furnish him with ample matter for just reprobation, instead of detracti­on? Has not his cause been prejudged through a thousand channels? Has not the work before you been daily pub­licly reviled, and his person held up to derision and re­proach? Has not the public mind been excited, by crying down the very phrase and idea of the Rights of Man? Nay, have not associations of gentlemen, I speak it with regret, because I am persuaded, from what I know of some of them, that they, amongst them at least, thought they were [Page 17] serving the public; yet have they not, in utter contempt and ignorance of that constitution of which they declare themselves to be the guardians, published the grossest at­tacks upon the defendant? Have they not, even while the cause has been standing here in the paper for immediate trial, published a direct protest against the very work now before you, advertising in the same paper, though under the general description of seditious papers, a reward on the conviction of any person who should dare to sell the book itself, to which their own publication was an answer?

The Attorney General has spoken of a forced circulation of this work; but how have these prejudging papers been circulated? We all know how: they have been thrown into our carriages in every street; they have met us at every turnpike; and they lie in the areas of all our houses. To complete the triumph of prejudice, that high tribunal, of which I have the honor to be a member, (my learned friends know what I say to be true) has been drawn into this vortex of slander; and some of its members, for I do not speak of the house itself, have thrown the weight of their stations into the same scale.

By all means I maintain that this cause has been pre­judged.

It may be said, that I have made no motion to put off the trial for these causes, and that courts of themselves take no cognizance of what passes elsewhere, without facts laid before them. Gentlemen, I know that I should have had equal justice from that quarter, if I had brought myself within the rule. But when should I have been better in the present aspect of things? And therefore I only remind you of all these hardships, that you may recol­lect that your judgment is to proceed upon that alone which meets you here, upon the evidence in the cause, and not upon suggestions destructive of every principle of jus­tice.

Having disposed of these foreign prejudices, I hope you will as little regard some arguments that have been offered to you in court. The letter which has been so repeatedly pressed upon you, ought to dismiss even from your recollection; I have already put it out of the ques­tion, as having been written long subsequent to the book, and as being a libel on the King, which no part of the [Page 18] information charges, and which may hereafter be prose­cuted as a distinct offence. I consider that letter besides, and indeed have always heard it treated, as a forgery, contrived to injure the merits of the cause, and to embarrass me personally in its defence.—I have a right so to con­sider it, because it is unsupported by any thing similar at an earlier period. The defendant's whole deportment, previous to the publication, has been wholly unexceptiona­ble: he properly desired to be given up as the author of the book, if any inquiry should take place concerning it; and he is not affected in evidence, directly or indirectly, with any illegal or suspicious conduct; not even with having uttered an indiscreet or taunting expression, nor with any one matter or thing, inconsistent with the duty of the best subject in England. His opinions indeed were adverse to our system; but I maintain that opinion is free, and that conduct alone is amenable to the law.

You are next desired to judge of the author's mind and intention, by the modes and extent of the circulation of his work. The first part of the Rights of Man, Mr. Attorney General tells you, he did not prosecute, al­though it was in circulation through the country for a year and a half together, because it seems it circulated on­ly amongst what he styles the judicious part of the pub­lic, who possessed in their capacities and experience an antidote to the poison; but that with regard to the se­cond part now before you, its circulation had been forced into every corner of society; had been printed and re­printed for cheapness even upon whited brown paper, and had crept into the very nurseries of children, as a wrapper for their sweetmeats.

In answer to this statement, which after all stands only upon Mr. Attorney General's own assertion, unsupported by any kind of proof, (no witness having proved the author's personal interference with the sale,) I still main­tain, that if he had the most anxiously promoted it, the question would remain exactly the same: the question would still be, Whether at the time when Paine composed his work, and promoted the most extensive purchase of it, he believed or disbelieved what he had written, and whether he contemplated the happiness or misery of the English nation, to which it is addressed; and whichever [Page 19] of these intentions may be evidenced to your judgments upon reading the book itself? I confess I am utterly at a loss to comprehend how a writer can be supposed to mean something different from what he has written, by an anxiety (common I believe to all authors,) that his work should be generally read.

Remember, I am not asking your opinions of the doctrines themselves, you have given them already pret­ty visibly since I began to address you; but I shall ap­peal not only to you, but to those who, without our leave, will hereafter judge without appeal, of all that we are doing to day; Whether, upon the matter which I hasten to lay before you, you can refuse in justice to pronounce, that, from his education—form the accidents and habits of his life—from the time and occasion of the publication—from the circumstances attending it—and from every line and letter of the work itself, and all his other writings, before and even since, his conscience and understanding (no matter whether erroneously or not) were deeply and solemly impressed with the matter con­tained in his book, —that he addressed it to the reason of the nation at large, and not to the passions of individuals, and that in the issue of its influence, he contemplated only what appeared to him (though it may not to us,) to be interest and happiness of England, and of the whole human race? In drawing the one or the other of these conclusions, the book stands first in order, and it shall now speak for itself.

Gentlemen, the whole of it is evidence before you; the particular parts arraigned have only been read by my consent, upon the presumption that, on retiring from the court, you would carefully compare them with the con­text, and all the parts with the whole viewed together. You cannot indeed do justice without it. The most com­mon letter, even in the ordinary course of business, cannot be read in a cause to prove an obligation for twenty shil­lings, without the whole being read, that the writer's meaning may be seen without deception. But in a crimi­nal charge of only four pages and a half, out of a work containing nearly two hundred, you cannot, with even the appearance of common justice, pronounce a judgment with­out the most deliberate and cautious comparison. I observe [Page 20] that the noble and learned judge confirms me in this obser­vation. But if any given part of a work be legally expla­natory of every other part of it, the preface, a fortiori, is the most material; because the preface is the author's own key to his writing: it is there that he takes the reader by the hand, and introduces him to his subject: it is there that the spirit and intention of the whole is laid before him by way of prologue. A preface is meant by the author as a clue to ignorant or careless readers: the author says by it, to every man who chooses to begin where he ought, Look at my plan—attend to my distinctions—mark the purpose and limitations of the matter I lay before you.

Let then the calumniators of Thomas Paine now attend to his preface, where, to leave no excuse for ignorance or misrepresentation, he expresses himself thus:

Gentleman, you must undoubtedly wish to deal with every man who comes before you in judgment, as you would be dealt by yourselves; and surely you will not lay it down to-day as a law to be binding hereafter even upon yourselves, that if you should publish any opinion concerning the existing abuses in your country's govern­ment, and point out to the whole public the means of amendment, you are to be acquitted or convicted as any twelve men may happen to agree with you in your opinions. Yet this is precisely what you are asked to do to another: it is precisely the case before you. Mr. Paine expressly says, I obey a law until it is repealed; obedience is not only my principle, but my practice, since my disobedience of a law from thinking it bad, might apply to justify a­nother man in the disobedience of a good one; and thus individuals would give the role for themselves, and not society for all.

Gentlemen, you will presently see that the same prin­ciple pervades the rest of the work; and I am the more anxious to call your attention to it, however repetition may tire you, because it unfolds the whole principles of my argument; for, if you find a sentence in the whole book that invests any individual, or any number of in­viduals, or any community short of the whole nation, with a power of changing any part of the law or consti­tution, I abandon the cause—YES, I freely abandon it, because I will not affront the majesty of a court of justice by maintaining propositions which, even upon the sur­face of them are false. Mr. Paine, page 162—168, goes on thus:

Gentlemen, these are the sentiments of the author of the Rights of Man; and, whatever his opinions may be of the defects in our government, it never can change our sentiments concerning it, if our sentiments are just; and a writing can never be seditious in the sense of the English law, which states that the government leans on the universal will for its support.

Gentlemen, this universal will is the best and securest title which his Majesty and his family have to the throne of these kingdoms; and in proportion to the wisdom of our institutions, the title must in common sense become the stronger: so little idea, indeed, have I of any other, that in my place in parliament, not a week ago, I consider­ed [Page 23] it as the best way of expressing my attachment to the constitution, as established at the Revolution, to declare, (I believe in the presence of the heir-apparent of the crown, for whom I have greatest personal zeal) that his Majesty reigned in England by choice and consent, as the magis­trate of the English people; not indeed a consent and choice by personal election, like a king of Poland, the worst of all possible constitution; but by the election of a family for great national objects, in defiance of that he­reditary right, which only becomes tyranny, in the sense of Mr. Paine, when it claims to inherit a nation, instead of governing by their consent, and continuing for its be­nefit.

Gentlemen, this sentiment has the advantage of Mr. Burke's high authority, who says with great truth, in a letter to his constituents, ‘Too little dependence cannot be had at this time of day on names and prejudices: the eyes of mankind are opened: and communities must be held together by a visible and solid interest.’ I be­lieve, Gentlemen of the Jury, that the Prince of Wales will always render this title dear to the people. The At­torney General can only tell you what he believes of him; I can tell you what I know, and what I am bound to de­clare, since this Prince may be traduced and calumniated in every part of the kingdom, without its coming often in question, till brought in to load a defence with matter collateral to the charge. I therefore assert what the At­torney General can only hope, that, whenever that Prince shall come to the throne of this country (which I hope, but by the course of nature will never happen,) be will make the constitution of Great-Britain the foundation of all his conduct.

Having now, Gentlemen, established the author's ge­neral intention by his own introduction, which is the best and fairest exposition, let us next look at the occasion which gave it birth.

The Attorney General, throughout the whole course of his address to you (I knew it would be so) has avoided the most distant notice or hint of any circumstance having led to the appearance of the author in the political world, af­ter a silence of so many years; he has not even pronounced or even glanced at the name of Mr. Burke, but has left [Page 24] you to take it for granted that the defendant volunteered this delicate and momentous subject; and that, without being led to it by the provocation of political controversy, he had seized a favorable moment to stigmatize, from mere malice, and against his own confirmed opinions, the Con­stitution of this Country.

Gentleman, my learned friend knows too well my respect and value for him to suppose that I am charging him with a wilful suppression; I know him to be incapable of it; he knew it would come from me. He will permit me how­ever, to lament that it should have been left for me, at this late period of the cause, to inform you, that, not only the work before you, but the First Part, of which it is a natu­ral continuation, were written avowedly, and upon the face of them. IN ANSWER TO MR. BURKE. They were writ­ten besides under circumstances which I shall hereafter ex­plain, and in the course of which explanation I am have occasion to cite a few passages from the works of that cele­brated person. And I shall speak of him with the highest respect: for, with whatever contempt he may delight to look down upon my humble talents, however he may dis­parage the principles which direct my public conduct, he shall never force me to forget the regard which this country owes to him for the writings which he has left upon record for the illumination of our most distant posterity. After the gratitude which we owe to God for the divine gifts of reason and understanding, our next thanks are due to those from the fountain of whose enlightened minds they are fed and fructified. But pleading, as I do, the cause of free­dom of opinions, I shall not give offence by remarking that this great author has been thought to have changed some of his; and, if Thomas Paine had not though so, I should not now be addressing you, because the book which is my subject would never have been written. Who is right and who is wrong, in the contention of doctrines, I have repeatedly disclaimed to be the question; I can only say that Mr. Paine may be right throughout, but Mr. Burke cannot—Mr. Paine has been uniform in his opini­ons, but Mr. Burke has not—Mr. Burke can only be right in part; but should Mr. Paine be even mistaken in the whole, still I am not removed from the principle of his defence. My defence has nothing to do with either the [Page 25] concealment or rectitude of his doctrines. I admit Mr. Paine to be a republican: you shall soon see [...] one—I do not seek to shade or qualify his [...] constitution; I put my [...] doubtedly means to declare it to be defective in it [...] and contaminated with abuses, which, in his [...] will one day or other bring on the ruin of us all; it is [...] vain to mince the matter; this is the scope of his work. But still, if it contains no attack upon the King's Majesty, nor upon any other living magistrate; if it excites to no resistance to magistracy, but, on the contrary, if it even in­culcates, as it does, obedience to government, then, what­ever may be its defects, the question continues as before, and ever must remain an unmixed question of the liberty of the press. I therefore considered it as no breach of profes­sional duty, nor injurious to the cause I am defending, to express my own admiration of the real principles of our constitution; a constitution which I hope never to see give way to any other; a constitution which has been productive of various benefits, and which will produce many more here­after, if we have wisdom enough to pluck up those weeds that grow in the richest soils, and amongst the brightest flowers. I agree with the merchants of London, that the English government is equal to the reformation of its own abuses; and, as an inhabitant of the city, I would have signed their Declaration, if I had known, of my own know­ledge, the facts recited in its preamble. But abuses the English constitution unquestionably has, which call loudly for reformation, the existence of which has been the theme of our greatest statesmen, which have too plainly formed the principles of the defendant, and created the very con­juncture which produced his book.

Gentlemen, we all but too well remember the calamitous situation in which our country stood but a few years ago; a situation which no man can look back upon, without horror, nor feel himself safe from relapsing into again, while the causes remain which produce it. The event I allude to, you must know to be the American war, and the still existing causes of it, the corruptions of this govern­ment. In those days it was not thought virtue by the pa­triots of England to conceal their existence from the peo­ple; [Page 26] but then, as now, authority condemned them as disaffected subjects, and defeated the ends they sought by their promulgation.

Hear the opinion of Sir George Saville; not his specu­lative opinion concerning the structure of our government in the abstract, but his opinion of the settled abuses which prevailed in his own time, and which continue at this mo­ment. But first let me remind you who Sir George Saville was—I fear we shall hardly look upon his like again— How shall I describe him to you?—In my own words I cannot. I was lately commended by Mr. Burke in the House of Commons, for strengthening my own language by an appeal to Dr. Johnson. Were the honorable gentle­man present at this moment, he would no doubt doubly applaud my choice in resorting to his own works for the description of Sir George Saville.

‘His fortune is among the largest; a fortune, which, wholly unincumbered as it is, without one single charge from luxury, vanity, or excess, sinks under the benevo­lence of its dispenser. This private benevolence, ex­panding itself into patriotism, renders his whole being the estate of the public, in which he has not reserved a peculium for himself of profit, diversion, or relaxation. During the session, the first in, and the last out of the House of Commons; he passes from the senate to the camp; and, seldom seeing the seat of his ancestors, he is always in Parliament to serve his country, or, in the field to defend it.’

It is impossible to ascribe to such a character any prin­ciple but patriotism, when he expressed himself as follows:

Such were the words of that great good man, lost with those of many others of his time and his fame, as far as power could hurt it, put in the shade along with them. The consequences we have all seen and felt: America, from an obedient affectionate colony, became an independ­ent nation; and two millions of people, nursed in the [Page 28] very lap or our monarchy, became the willing subjects of a republican constitution.

Gentlemen, in that great and calamitous conflict, Mr. Burke and Mr. Paine fought in the same field of reason together, but with very different successes. Mr. Burke spoke to a parliament in England, such as Sir George Sa­ville describes it, that had no ears but for sounds that flat­tered its corruptions. Mr. Paine, on the other hand, spoke TO A PEOPLE; reasoned with them, that they were bound by no subjection to any sovereignty further than their own benefits connected them; and by these powerful arguments prepared the minds of the American people for that GLO­RIOUS, JUST, and HAPPY revolution.

Gentlemen, I have a right to distinguish it by that ap­pellation, because I aver that at this moment there is as sa­cred a regard to property, as inviolable a security to all the rights of individuals, lower taxes, fewer grievances, less to deplore, and more to admire, in the constitution of Ameri­ca, than that of any other country under heaven. I wish indeed to except our own, but I cannot even do that, till it shall be purged of those abuses, which, though they obscure and deform the surface, have not as yet (thank God) de­stroyed the vital parts.

[...], because out of a people consisting of near three millions, he alone did not remain attached in opinion to monarchy. Remember, that all the blood which was shed in America, and to which he was for years a melancholy and indignant witness, was shed by the authority of the crown of Great-Britain, under the influence of its parliament, such as Sir George Saville has described it, and such as Mr. Burke himself will be called upon by and by, in more glowing colours to paint it. How then can it be wondered at, that Mr. Paine should return to this country in his heart a repub­lican? Was he not equally republican when he wrote Com­mon Sense? yet that volume has been sold without restraint or prosecution in every shop in England ever since, and which nevertheless (I appeal to the book, which I have in court, and which is in every body's hands) contains every one principle of government, and every abuse in the British constitution, which is to be found in the Rights of Man. Yet Mr. Burke himself saw no reasons to be alarmed at its [Page 29] publication, nor to cry down its contents, even when Ame­rica, which was swayed by it, was in arms against the crown of Great-Britain. You shall hear his opinion of it, in his letter to the sheriffs of Bristol, pages 33 and 34.

‘The court gazette accomplished what the abetters of independence had attempted in vain. When that disin­genuous compilation, and strange medley of railing and flattery was adduced, as a proof of the united sentiments of the people of Great-Britain, there was a great change throughout all America. The tide of popular affection which had still set towards the parent country, began immediately to turn, and to flow with great rapidity in a contrary course. Far from concealing these wild de­clarations of enmity, the author of the celebrated pamph­let which prepared the minds of the people for independ­ence, insists largely on the multitude and the spirit of these addresses; and draws an argument from them, which (if the fact were as he supposes) must be irresistible. For I never knew a writer on the theory of government so partial to authority, as not to allow that the hostile mind of the rulers to their people, did fully justify a change of government; nor can any reason whatever be given, why one people should voluntarily yield any degree of pre-eminence to another, but on a supposition of great affection and benevolence towards them. Un­fortunately your rulers, trusting to other things, took no notice of this great principle of connection.’

But there is a time, it seems, for all things.

Gentlemen, the consequences of this mighty revolution are too notorious to require illustration. No audience would sit to hear (what every body has seen and felt,) the independence of America notoriously produced, not by remote and circuitous effect, but directly and palpably, the revolutions which now agitate Europe, and which portend such new changes over the face of the earth. Let govern­ors take warning. The revolution in France was the con­sequence of her incurably corrupt and profligate govern­ment. God forbid that I should be thought to lean, by this declaration, upon her unfortunate monarch, bending, perhaps at this moment, under afflictions which my heart sinks within me to think of; but, when I speak with de­testation of the former politicks of the French court, I fasten [Page 30] as little of them upon that fallen and unhappy prince, as I impute to our gracious sovereign the corruptions of our own government. I desire, indeed, in the distinctest man­ner, to be understood that I mean to speak of his Majesty, not only with that obedience and duty which I owe to him as a subject, but with that justice which I think is due to him from all men who examine his conduct either in pub­lic or private life.

Gentlemen, Mr. Paine happened to be in England when the French revolution took place, and notwithstanding what he must be supposed and allowed from his history to have felt upon such a subject, he remained wholly silent and inactive. The people of this country too appeared to be indifferent spectators of the animating scene. They saw, without visible emotion, despotism destroyed, and the King of France, by his own consent, become the first magistrate of a free people. Certainly, at least, it produced none of those effects which are so deprecated by government at present; nor, most probably, ever would, if it had not oc­curred to the celebrated person, whose name I must so often mention, voluntarily to provoke the subject; a sub­ject which, if dangerous to be discussed, he should not have led to the discussion: for, surely, it is not to be endu­red, that any private man is to publish a creed for a whole nation; to tell us that we are not to think for ourselves—to impose his own fetters upon the human mind—to dog­matise at discretion—and that no man shall sit down to an­swer him without being guilty of a libel. I assert, that if it be a libel to mistake our constitution—to support it by means that tend to destroy it—and to chuse the most dan­gerous season for the interference, Mr. Burke is that libel­ler; but not therefore the object of a criminal prosecution: for, whilst I am defending the motives of one man, I have neither right nor disposition to criminate the motives of another. All I contend for, is a fact that cannot be contro­verted, viz. that this officious interference was the origin of Mr. Paine's book. I put my cause upon its being the origin of it—the avowed origin—as will abundantly ap­pear from the introduction and preface to both parts, and throughout the whole body of the work; nay, from the very work of Mr. Burke himself, to which both of them are answers.

[Page 31]Gentlemen, for the history of that celebrated work, I appeal to itself.

When the French revolution had arrived at some of its early stages, a few, and but a few, persons (not to be named when compared with the nation) took a visible interest in these mighty events; an interest well worthy of Englishmen. They saw a pernicious system of government, which had led to cruel desolating wars, and had been for ages the scourge of Great Britain, giving way to a system which seemed to promise harmony and peace amongst the nations. They saw this with virtuous and peaceable satisfaction: and a reverend divine ^*, eminent for his eloquence, recol­lecting that the issues of life are in the hands of God, saw no profaneness in mixing the subject with public thanks-giving; reminding the people of this country of their own glorious deliverance in former ages. It happened, also, that a society of gentlemen, France being then a neutral nation, and her own monarch swearing almost daily upon her altars to maintain the new constitution, thought they infringed no law by sending a general congratulation. Their numbers, indeed, were very inconsiderable; so much so, that Mr. Burke, with more truth than wisdom, begins his volume with a sarcasm upon their insignificance.

‘Until very lately he had never heard of such a club. It certainly never occupied a moment of his thoughts; nor, he believed, those of any person out of their own set.’

Why then make their proceedings the subject of alarm throughout England? There had been no prosecution a­gainst them, nor any charge founded upon suspicion of disaffection against any of their body. But Mr. Burke thought it was reserved for his eloquence to whip these curs of faction to their kennels. How he has succeeded, I ap­peal to all that has happened since the introduction of his schism in the British empire, by giving to the king, whose title was questioned by no man, a title which it is his Ma­jesty's most solemn interest to disclaim.

After having, in his first work, lashed Dr. Price in a strain of eloquent irony for considering the monarchy to be elective, which he could not but know Dr. Price, in the [Page 32] literal sense of election, neither did or could possibly consi­der it, Mr. Burke published a second treatise; in which, after reprinting many passages from Mr. Paine's former work, he ridicules and denies the supposed right of the people to change their governments, in the following words:

"The French revolution," say they, (speaking of the English societies,) ‘was the act of the majority of the people; and if the majority of any other people, the people of England, for instance, wish to make the same change, they have the same right; just the same un­doubtedly; that is, none at all.’

And then, after speaking of the subserviency of will to duty, (in which I agree with him,) he, in a substantive sentence, maintains the same doctrine; thus:

‘The constitution of a country being once settled upon some compact, tacit or expressed, there is no power existing of force to alter it, without, the breach of the covenant, or the consent of all the parties.—Such is the nature of a contract.’

So that if reason, or even revelation itself, were now to demonstrate to us, that our constitution was mischie­vous in its effects; that, to use Mr. Attorney General's expression, we had been insane for the many centuries we have supported it; yet that still, if the king had not forfeited his title to the crown, nor the lords their privile­ges, the universal voice of the whole people of England could not build up a new government upon a legitimate basis.

Gentlemen, not to argue for the present against such a proposition, and supposing it could, beyond all contro­versy, be maintained; for heaven's sake, let wisdom never utter it! Let policy and prudence forever conceal it! If you seek the stability of the English government, rather put the book of Mr. Paine, which calls it bad into ev­ery hand in the kingdom, than doctrines which bid human nature rebel even against that which is the best. Say to the people of England, Look at your constitution, there it lies before you—the work of your pious fathers, handed down as a sacred deposit from generation to genera­tion, the result of wisdom and virtue, and its parts cement­ed together with kindred blood. There are indeed a few spots upon its surface; but the same principle which reared [Page 33] the structure, will brush them all away: yon may keep it, or you may destroy it. To such an address what would be the answer? A chorus of the nation— Yes we will pre­serve it. But say to the same nation, even of the very same constitution, It is yours, such as it is, for better or for worse; it is strapped upon your backs, to carry it as beasts of burthen, and you have no jurisdiction to cast it off. Let this be your position, and you instantly raise up (I ap­peal to every man's consciousness of his own nature) a spirit of uneasiness and discontent. Yet it is the contro­versy alone, which this useless and mischievous proposition stirred up, that has pointed most of the passages arraigned before you, which it will be presently my duty to explain.

But let the prudence of the argument be what it may, the argument itself is untenable.

His Majesty undoubtedly was not elected to the throne. No man can be supposed in the teeth of fact, to have con­tended it; but did not the people of England elect King William, and break the hereditary succession? And does not his Majesty's title grow out of that election? It is one of the charges against the defendant, his having denied the par­liament which called the Prince of Orange to the throne to have been a legal convention of the whole people: and [...] very foundation of that charge, that it was such a legal convention, and that it was intended to be so? And if it was so, did not the people then confer the crown upon King William without any regard to hereditary right? Did they not cut off the Prince of Wales, who stood directly in the line of succession, and who had incurred no personal for­feiture? Did they not give their deliverer an estate in the crown totally new and unprecedented in the law or history of the country?—And, lastly, might they not, by the same authority, have given the royal inheritance to the family of a stranger? Mr. Justice Blackstone, in his Commenta­ries, in terms, asserts that they might; and ascribes their choice of King William, and the subsequent limitations of the crown not to want of jurisdiction, but to their true o­rigin, to prudence and discretion in not disturbing a valuable institution further than public safety and necessity dictated.

The English government stands then on this public con­sent, the true root of all governments. And I agree with Mr. Burke, that, while it is well administered, it is not in [Page 34] the power of factions or libels to disturb it; though, when ministers are in fault, they are sure to set down all disturb­ances to these causes. This it most justly and eloquently exemplified in the Thoughts on the Cause of the present Discontents, pages 5 and 6.

He says true: never were serious disturbances excited by such means!

But to return to the argument. Let us now see how the rights of the people stand upon authority, and whether this great source of government is not maintained by persons on whom my friend will find it hard to fasten the character of libellers.

I shall begin with the most modern author on the subject of government—a gentleman, whose work lies spread out before me, as it often does for my delight and instruction in my leisure hours. I have also, by the favor of a friend [Page 35] who sits near me in court, the honor of his personal ac­quaintance. He is a man, perhaps more than any other, devoted to the real constitution of the country, as will be found throughout his valuable work; and he is a person besides, of great learning, which enabled him to infuse much useful knowledge into my learned friend who introdu­ced me to him ^*. I speak of Mr. Paley, Archdeacon of Car­lisle, and of his work, intitled, The Principles of Political and Moral Philosophy, in which he investigates the first principles of all governments—a discussion not thought dangerous till lately: and I hope we shall soon get rid of this ridiculous panic.

Mr. Paley professes to think of governments what the Christian religion was thought of by its first teachers:— If it be of God it will stand; and he puts the duties of obedience to them upon free will and moral duty. Af­ter dissenting from Mr. Locke as to the origin of govern­ments in compact, he says,

He then proceeds in a manner rather inconsistent with the principles entertained by my learned friend in his open­ing to you:—

‘No usage, law, or authority whatever, is so binding that it need or ought to be continued, when it may be changed with advantage to the community. The fami­ly of the Prince—the order of succession—the preroga­tive of the crown—the form and parts of the legislature—together with the respective powers, office, duration, and mutual dependency of the several parts; are all on­ly so many laws, mutable, like other laws, whenever expediency requires, cither by the ordinary act of the legislature, or, if the occasion deserve it, BY THE IN­TERPOSITION OF THE PEOPLE.’

No man can say that Mr. Paley intended to diffuse dis­content by this declaration. He must therefore be taken to think with me, that freedom and affection, and the sense of advantages, are the best and the only supports of govern­ment. On the same principle, he then goes on to say,— ‘These points are wont to be approached with a kind of awe; they are represented to the mind as principles of the constitution, settled by our ancestors, and being set­tled, to be no more committed to innovation or debate; as foundations never to be stirred; as the terms and con­ditions of the social compact, to which every citizen of the state has engaged his fidelity, by virtue of a promise which he cannot now recall. Such reasons have no place in our system.’

[Page 37]Such are the sentiments of this excellent author, and there is no part of Mr. Paine's work, from the one end of it to the other, that advances any other proposition.

But the Attorney-General will say, these are the grave speculative opinions of a friend to the English Govern­ment whereas Mr. Paine is its professed enemy; what then? the principle is, that every man, while he obeys the Laws, is to think for himself, and to conduct himself as he thinks. The very ends of society exact this licence, and the policy of the law, in its provisions for its security, has tacitly sanctioned it. The real fact is, that writings against a free and well proportioned government, need not be guarded against by laws. They cannot often exist, and never with effect. The just and awful principles of so­ciety, are rarely brought forward, but when they are in­sulted and denied, or abused in practice: Mr. Locke's Essay on Government, we owe to Sir Robert Filmer, as we owe Mr. Paine's to Mr. Burke; and indeed, between the arguments of Filmer and Burke, I see no essential dif­ference; since it is not worth disputing, whether a King exists by Divine right, or indissoluble Human compact, if he exists whether we will or no: If his existence be with­out our consent, and to continue without benefit, it matters not a farthing, whether his title be from God or from Man.

That his title is from man, and from every generation of man, without regard to the determination of former ones, hear from Mr. Locke, "All men" say they, (i. e. Filmer and his adherents,) ‘ are born under government, and therefore they cannot be at liberty to begin a new one. Every one is born a subject to his father or his prince, and is therefore under the perpetual tie of subjec­tion and allegiance, It is plain, mankind never owned nor considered any such natural subjection that they were born in, to one or to the other, that tied them, without their own consents, to a subjection to them and their heirs.’

‘It is true, that whatever engagements or premises any one has made for himself, he is under the obligation of them, but cannot, by any compact whatsoever, bind his children or posterity: for his son, when a men, be­ing altogether as free as the father, any act of the father [Page 38] can no more give away the liberty of the son, than it can of any body else.’

So much for Mr. Locke's opinion of the rights of man­kind. Let us now examine his ideas of the supposed dan­ger of trusting them with them.

‘Perhaps it will be said, that the people being igno­rant, and always discontented, to lay the foundation of government in the unsteady opinion and uncertain hu­mor of the people, is to expose it to certain ruin: and no government will be able long to subsist, if the people may set up a new legislature, whenever they take offence at the old one. To this, I answer quite the contrary: people are not so easily got out of their old forms, as some are apt to suggest: they are hardly to be prevailed with to amend the acknowledged faults in the frame they have been accustomed to; and if there be any ori­ginal defects, or adventitious ones introduced by time, or corruption, it is not an easy thing to be changed, even when all the world sees there is an opportunity for it. This slowness and aversion in the people to quit their old constitutions, has in the many revolutions which have been seen in this kingdom, in this and former ages, still kept us to, or, after some interval of fruitless at­tempts, still brought us back again to our old legisla­tive of king, lords and commons: and whatever provo­cations have made the crown be taken from some of our princes heads, they never carried the people so far as to place it in another one.’

Gentlemen, I wish I had strength to go on with all that is material, but I have read enough, not only to maintain the true principles of government, but to put to shame the narrow system of distrusting the people.

It may be said, that Mr. Locke went great lengths in his positions, to beat down the contrary doctrine of divine right, which was then endangering the new establishment. But that cannot be objected to David Hume, who main­tains the same doctrine; speaking of the Magna Charta in his history, vol ii. Page 88, he says, ‘It must be con­fessed, that the former articles of the great charter, con­tain such mitigations and explanations of the foedal law, as are reasonable and equitable; and that the latter in­volve all the chief outlines of a legal governments, and [Page 39] provide for the equal distribution of justice and free en­joyment of property; the great object for which politi­cal society was founded by men, which the people have a perpetual and unalienable right to recal; and which no time, nor precedent, nor statute, nor positive institu­tion, ought to deter them from keeping ever uppermost in their thoughts and attention.’

These authorities are sufficient to rest on, yet I cannot omit Mr. Burke himself, who is, if possible, still more dis­tinct on the subject. Speaking, not of the ancient people of England, but of colonies planted almost within our me­mories, he says, ‘If there be one fact in the world per­fectly clear, it is this; 'that the disposition of the peo­ple of America is wholly averse to any other than a free government,' and this is indication enough to any ho­nest statesmen, how he ought to adapt whatever power he finds in his hands to their case. If any ask me what a free government is, I answer, That it is what the peo­ple think so; and that they, and not I, are the natural, lawful, and competent judges of this matter. If they practically allow me a greater degree of authority over them than is consistent with any correct ideas of perfect freedom, I ought to thank them for so great a trust, and not to endeavor to prove from thence, that they have reasoned amiss, and that having gone so far, by analogy, they must hereafter have no enjoyment but by my pleasure.’

Gentlemen, I am sorry to feel my time considerably consumed before I am arrived at what I conceive to be the material subject of your consideration. For all that I have been stating now is only to shew, that there is not that novelty in the opinions of the defendant, that should lead you to think that he does not bona fide entertain them, much less when connected with the history of his life, which I therefore brought in review before you. But still the great question remains unargued. Had he a right to promulgate these opinions? Gentlemen, if he entertained them, I shall argue that he had; and although my arguments upon the Liberty of the Press may not to-day be honored with your or the court's approbation, I shall retire not at all disheartened, consoling myself with the reflection, that a season may arrive for their reception. The most essential [Page 40] freedoms of mankind have been but slowly and gradually received, and so very late, indeed do some of them come to maturity, that notwithstanding the Attorney General tells you that the very question I am now agitating is most peculi­arly for your consideration, as a Jury, under our ancient constitution, yet I must remind both you and him, that your jurisdiction to consider and deal with it at all in judg­ment, is but a year old. When, before that late period, I ventured to maintain this very right of a Jury over the question of libel under the same ancient constitution; (I do not mean before my Lord, for the matter was gone to rest in the courts, at least long before he came to sit where he does.) But when, before a noble and reverend Magis­trate of the most exalted understanding, and of the most uncorrupted integrity, to give effect to it. ^* I had occa­sion to maintain it, he treated me, not with disregard in­deed, for of that his nature was incapable, but he put me aside with indulgence, as you do a child while it is lisping its prattle out of season; and if this cause had been tried then, instead of now, the defendant must have been instant­ly convicted on the proof of the publication, whatever you might have thought of his case; yet I have lived to see it resolved, by an almost unanimous vote of the whole Parliament of England, that I had along been in the right. If this be not an awful lesson of caution concerning opini­ons, where are such lessons to be read?

Gentlemen, I have insisted, at great length, upon the origin of government being in the consent of the people, and detailed the authorities which you have heard upon the subject, because, I consider it to be not only a sup­port, but, indeed, the only foundation of the Liberty of the Press. If Mr. Burke be right, in his principles of go­vernment, I admit that the Press, in my sense of its free­dom, ought not to be free, nor free in any sense at all; and that all addresses to the people upon the subject of go­vernment, and all speculations of amendment, of what kind or nature soever, are illegal and criminal: for, if the peo­ple have, without possible recal, delegated all their au­thorities, they have no jurisdiction to act, and therefore none to think, upon such subjects, and it is a libel to ar­raign Government or any of its acts, before those that [Page 41] have no jurisdiction to correct them. But on the other hand, as it is a settled rule in the law of England, that the subject may always address a competent jurisdiction on ev­ery matter within it, no legal argument can shake the free­dom of the press in my sense of it, I am supported in my doctrines concerning the great unalienable rights of the people, to change or to reform their governments.

Gentlemen, it is because the Liberty of the Press resolves itself into this great issue, that it has been in every time and country, the last liberty which subjects have been able to wrest from power.—Other liberties are held under governments, but the liberty of opinion keeps governments themselves in due subjection to their duties. This has pro­duced the martyrdom of truth in every age, and the world has only purged itself from ignorance with the innocent blood of those who have enlightened it.

Gentlemen, my strength and time are wasted, and I can only make this melancholy history pass like a shadow before you.

I shall begin with the grand type and example.

The universal God of nature,—the Saviour of mankind, the Fountain of all light, who came to pluck the world from eternal darkness, expired upon a cross the scoff of infidel scorn; and his blessed Apostles followed him in the train of martyrs. When he came in the flesh, he might have come like the Mahometan prophet, as a powerful sovereign, and propagated that religion with an unconquerable sword, which even now, after the lapse of ages, is but slowly moving under the influence of reason, over the face of the earth: But such a process would have been inconsistent with his mission, which was to confound the pride, and to establish the universal rights of men; he came therefore in that lowly state which is represented in the Gospel, and preach­ed his consolations to the poor.

When the foundation of this religion was discovered to be invulnerable and immortal, we find political power taking the church into partnership; thus began the cor­ruptions both of religion and civil power, and, hand in hand together, what havoc have they not made in the world; ruling by ignorance and the persecution of truth; but this very persecution only hastened the revival of let­ters and liberty, which was to destroy the one and raise up [Page 42] the other. Nay, you will find, that in the exact propor­tion that knowledge and learning have been beat down and fettered, they have destroyed the governments that bound them. The court of Star-Chamber, the first restric­tion of the press of England, was erected, previous to all the great changes in the constitution. From that moment no man could legally write without an imprimatur from the state; but truth and freedom found their way with greater force through secret channels, and the unhappy Charles, unwarned by a free-press, was brought to an ig­nominious death.

When men can freely communicate their thoughts and their sufferings, real, or imaginary, their passions spend themselves in air, like gun-powder scattered upon the sur­face; but pent up by terrors, they work unseen, like sub­terraneous fire, burst forth in earthquake, and destroy eve­ry thing in their course. Let reason be opposed to reason, and argument to argument, and every good Government will be safe.

The usurper, Cromwell, pursued the same system of re­straint in support of his Government, and the end of it speedily followed.

At the restoration of Charles the Second, the Star-Cham­ber Ordnance of 1637, was worked up into an Act of Par­liament, and was followed up during that reign, and the short one that followed it, by the most sanguinary prose­cutions; but what fact in history is more notorious, than that this blind and contemptible policy prepared and has­tened on the Revolution. At that great aera these cob­webs were all brushed away: The freedom of the Press was regenerated, and the country, ruled by its affections, has since enjoyed a century of tranquility and glory.— Thus I have maintained, by English history, that in pro­portion as the press has bean free, English government has been secure.

Gentlemen, I will now support the same important truth by every great authorities. Upon a subject of this kind resort cannot be had to law cases. The ancient law of England knew nothing of such libels; they began, and should have ended, with the Star-Chamber. What wri­tings are slanderous of individuals, must be looked for where these prosecutions are recorded; but upon general [Page 43] subjects we must go to general writers. If, indeed, I were to refer to obscure authors, I might be answered, that my very authorities were libels, instead of justifications or ex­amples; but this cannot be said with effect of great men, whose works are classics in our language, taught in our schools, and printed under the eye of government.

Gentlemen, I shall begin with the poet Milton, a great authority in all learning.—It may be said, indeed, he was a republican, but that would only prove that republicanism is not incompatible with virtue; it may be said too, that the work which I cite was written against previous licen­sing, which is not contended for to-day. But, in my opi­nion, if every work is to be adjudged a libel, which is ad­verse to the wishes of government, or to the opinions of those who may try it, the revival of a licencer would be a security to the public: For, if I present my book to a magistrate appointed by law, if he rejects it, I have only to forbear from the publication, and in the forbearance I am safe; and he too is answerable to law for the abuse of his authority. But, upon the argument of to-day, a man must print at his peril, without any guide to the principles of judgment, upon which his work may be afterwards prose­cuted and condemned. Milton's argument therefore ap­plies, and was meant to apply, to every interruption to writing, which, while they oppress the individual, endan­ger the state.

He then adverts to his visit to the famous Galileo, whom he found and visited in the inquisition, ‘for not thinking in astronomy with the Franciscan and Dominican Monks.’ And what event ought more deeply to inte­rest and affect us. The very laws of nature were to bend under the rod of a licenser; this illustrious astronomer end­ed his life within the bars of a prison, because, in seeing the [Page 45] phases of Venus thro' his newly-invented telescope, he pronounced, that she shone with borrowed light, and from the Sun as the centre of the universe. This was the migh­ty crime, the placing the sun in the centre: that sun which now inhabits it upon the foundation of mathematical truth, which enables us to traverse the pathless ocean, and to carry our line and rule amongst other worlds: which but for Ga­lileo we had never known, perhaps even to the recesses of an infinite and immortal God.

Milton then, in his most eloquent address to the Parlia­ment, puts the liberty of the press on its true and most ho­norable foundation; ‘Believe it, Lords and Commons, they who counsel ye to such a suppressing of books, do as good as bid you suppress yourselves; and I will soon shew how.’

‘If it be desired to know the immediate cause of all this free writing and free speaking, there cannot be assigned a truer than your own mild, and free and humane government; it is the liberty, Lords and Commons, which your own valorous and happy counsels have pur­chased us; liberty which is the nurse of all great wits: this is that which hath rarified and enlightened our spi­rits like the influence of heaven; this is that which hath enfranchised, enlarged, and lifted up our apprehensions, degrees above themselves. Ye cannot make us now less capable, less knowing, less eagerly pursuing the truth, unless ye first make yourselves, that made us so, less the lovers, less the founders of our true liberty. We can grow ignorant again, brutish, formal, and slavish, as ye found us; but you then must first become that which ye cannot be, oppressive, arbitrary, and tyrannous, as they were from whom ye have freed us. That our hearts are now more capacious, our thoughts now more erected to the search and expectation of greatest and ex­actest things, is the issue of your own virtue propagated in us. Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely, according to conscience above all liberties.’

Gentlemen, I will now refer you to another author, whose opinion you may think more in point, as having li­ved in our own times, and as holding the highest monar­chical principles of government. I speak of Mr. Hume, who, nevertheless, considers, that this liberty of the press [Page 46] extends not only to abstract speculation, but to keep the public on their gourd against all the acts of their govern­ment.

After shewing the advantages of a monarchy to public freedom, provided it is duty controlled and watched by the popular part of the constitution, he says, ‘These prin­ciples account for the great liberty of the press in these kingdoms, beyond what is indulged in any other govern­ment. It is apprehended, that arbitrary power would steal in upon us, were we not careful to prevent its pro­gress, and were there not an easy method of conveying the alarm from one end of the kingdom to the other. The spirit of the people must frequently be roused, in or­der to curb the ambition of the court; and the dread of rousing this spirit must be employed to prevent that ambition. Nothing is so effectual to this purpose as the liberty of the press, by which all the learning, wit, and genius of the nation, may be employed on the side of freedom, and every one be animated to its defence. AS LONG, THEREFORE, AS THE REPUBLICAN PART OF OUR GOVERNMENT CAN MAINTAIN ITSELF A­GAINST THE MONARCHICAL, IT WILL NATURAL­LY BE CAREFUL TO KEEP THE PRESS OPEN, AS OF IMPORTANCE TO ITS OWN PRESERVATION.’

There is another authority co-temporary with the last, a splendid speaker in the upper House of Parliament, and who held during most of his time, high offices under the King; I speak of the Earl of Chesterfield, who thos express­ed himself in the House of Lords:— ‘One of the greatest blessings, my Lords, we enjoy, is Liberty; but every good in this life has its alloy of evil—Licentiousness is the alloy of Liberty, it is—.’

Doctor Johnson claims to pluck that feather from Lord Chesterfield's wing; he speak, I believe, of the eye of the political body.

Gentlemen, I have heard it said, that Lord Chesterfield borrowed that which I was just about to state, and which his Lordship has anticipated.

That very speech which did Lord Ches­terfield so much honor, is supposed to have been written by Doctor Johnson.

Gentlemen, I believe it was so, and I [Page 47] am much obliged to his Lordship for giving me a far higher authority for my doctrine. For though Lord Chesterfield was a man of great ingenuity and wit, he was undoubtedly far inferior in learning and in monarchical opinion, to the celebrated writer to whom my Lord has now delivered the work by his authority. Doctor John­son then says, ‘One of the greatest blessings we enjoy, one of the greatest blessings a people, my Lords, can en­joy, is Liberty; but every good in this life has its alloy of evil: Licentiousness is the alloy of Liberty: It is an ebullition, an excrescence; it is a speck upon the eye of the political body, which I can never touch but with a gentle, with a trembling hand, lest I destroy the body, lest I injure the eye upon which it is apt to appear.’

‘There is such a connection between licentiousness and liberty, that it is not easy to correct the one without dangerously wounding the other; it is extremely hard to distinguish the true limit between them; like a changeable silk, we can easily see there are two different colours, but we cannot easily discover where the one ends, or where the other begins.’

I confess, I cannot help agreeing with this learned au­thor. The danger of touching the press is the difficulty of marking its limits. My learned friend, who has just gone out of court, has drawn no line, and unfolded no principle. He has not told us, if this book is condemned, what book may be written. If I may not write against the existence of a monarchy, and recommend a republic, may I write against any part of the Government? May I say that we should be better without a House of Lords, or a House of Commons, or a Court of Chancery, or any other given part of our establishment? Or if, as has been hinted, a work may be­come libellous for stating even legal matter with sarcastic phrase, the difficulty becomes the greater, and the liberty of the press more impossible to define.

The same author pursuing the subject and speaking of the fall of Roman liberty, says, ‘But this sort of liberty came soon after to be called licentiousness; for we are told that Augustus, after having established his empire, restored order in Rome by restraining licentiousness. God forbid we should in this country have order resto­red [Page 48] or licentiousness restrained, at so dear a rate as the People of Rome paid for it to Augustus.’

Gentlemen, this subject was still more lately put in the justest and the most forcible light by a noble person high in the Magistracy; and whose mind is not at all tuned to the introduction of disorder by improper popular ex­cesses; I mean Lord Loughborough, Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas. I believe I can answer the cor­rectness of my note, which I shall follow up with the opinion of another member of the Lord's House of Par­liament; the present Earl Stanhope; or rather, I shall take Lord Stanhope first, as his Lordship introduces the subject by adverting to this argument of Lord Loughbo­rough's. "If," says his Lordship, ‘our boasted liberty of the press, were to consist only in the liberty to write in praise of the Constitution, this is a liberty enjoyed under many arbitrary governments. I suppose it would not be deemed quite an unpardonable offence, even by the Empress of Russia, if any man were to take into his head to write a panegyric upon the Russian form of Government. Such a liberty as that might therefore properly be termed the Russian. Liberty of the Press. But, the English Liberty of the Press is of a very differ­ent description: for, by the law of England, it is not [Page 49] prohibited to publish speculative works upon the Con­stitution, whether they contain praise or censure.—’

[Lord Stanhope's defence of the Libel Bill.]

You see therefore, as far as the general principles go, I am supported by the opinion of Lord Stanhope, for otherwise the noble Lord has written a libel himself, by exciting other people to write whatever they may think, be it good or evil, of the constitution of the country. As to the other high authority, Lord Loughborough, I will read what applies to this subject—"Every man," said Lord Loughborough, ‘may publish at his discretion his opinions concerning forms and systems of Government.’

‘If they be wise and enlightening, the world will gain by them; if they be weak and absurd, they will be laughed at and forgotten; and, if they be bona fide, they cannot be criminal, however erroneous. On the other hand, the purpose and the direction may give a different turn to writings whose common construction is harmless or even meritorious. Suppose men, assembled in disturbance of the peace, to pull down mills or turn-pikes, or to do any other mischief, and that a mischiev­ous person should disperse among them an excitation to the planned mischief known to both writer and reader, To your tents, O Israel; that publication would be criminal. But how criminal? Not as a libel, not as an abstract writing, but as an act; and the act being the crime, it must be stated as a fact extrinsic on the record: for, otherwise, a Court of Error could have no jurisdic­tion but over the natural construction of the writing; nor would the defendant have any notice of such matter at the trial, without a charge on the record. To give the Jury cognizance of any matter beyond the constructi­on of the writing, the averment should be in the case as I have instanced, that certain persons were, as I have de­scribed, assembled; and that the publisher, intending to execute these persons so assembled, wrote so and so. Here the crime is complete, and consists in an overt act of wickedness evidenced by a writing.’

In answer to all these authorities, the Attorney-General may say, that, if Mr. Paine had written his observations with the views of those high persons and under other cir­cumstances, [Page 50] he would be protected and acquitted: to which I can only answer, that no facts or circumstances attending his work, are either charged or proved; that you have no jurisdiction whatever but over the natural construction of the work before you, and that I am therefore brought without a flaw in the deduction to the passages which are the particular subject of complaint.

Gentlemen, I am not unmindful how long I have already trespassed upon your patience; and, recollecting the nature of the human mind, and how much, for a thousand reasons, I have to struggle against at this moment, I shall not be disconcerted if any of you should appear anxious to retire from the pain of hearing me farther. It has been said, that my vanity has forwarded my zeal in this cause; but I might appeal even to the authors of those paragraphs, whe­ther a situation ever existed which vanity would have been fonder to fly from—the task of speaking against every known prepossession; with every countenance, as it were, planted and lifted up against me. But I stand at this bar to give to a criminal arraigned before it, the defence which the law of the country entitles him to. If any of my ar­guments be indecent, or unfit for the Court to hear, the noble judge presides to interrupt them: If all, or any of them, are capable of an answer, they will be answered: Or, if they be so unfounded in your own minds, who are to judge of them as not to call for refutation, your verdict in a moment will overthrow all that has been said—We shall then have all discharged our duties—It is your's to judge, but mine only to address your judgments.

When my Lord and I were Counsel for Lord George Gordon in 1781, it was not considered by that Jury, nor im­puted to us by any body, that we were contending for the privileges of over-awing the House of Commons, or re­commending the conflagration of this city: I am doing the same duty now, which MY LORD AND I then did in concert together; and, whatever may become of the cause, I expect to be heard: conscious that no just obloquy can be, or will (in the end) be cast upon me for having done my duty in the manner I have endeavoured to perform it.

Gentlemen, I come now to observe on the passages selec­ted by the information; and with regard to the first, I shall dispose of it in a moment.

[Page 51] ‘All Hereditary government is in its nature tyranny. An hereditable crown, or an hereditable throne, or by what other fanciful name such things may be called, have no other significant explanation than that mankind are hereditable property. To inherit a government is to inherit the people, as if they were flocks and herds.’

And is it to be endured, says the Attorney General, that the people of this country are to be told that they are driven like oxen or sheep? Certainly not. I am of opinion that a more dangerous doctrine cannot be instilled into the peo­ple of England. But who instills such a doctrine? I deny it is instilled by Paine. For when he mantains that heredit­ary monarchy inherits a people like flocks and herds, it is clear from the context (which is kept out of view,) that he is combating the proposition in Mr. Burke's book, which asserts, that the hereditary monarchy of England is fastened upon the people of England by indissoluble compact. Mr. Paine, on the contrary, asserts the King of England to be the magistrate of the people, existing by their consent, which is utterly incompatible with their being driven like herds. His argument, therefore, is this, and it retorts on his ad­versary: he says, such a King as you represent the King of England to be, inheriting the people by virtue of con­quest, or of some compact, which, having once existed, cannot be dissolved while the original terms of it are kept, is an inheritance like flocks and herds. But I deny that to be the King of England's title, he is the magistrate of the people, and that title I respect. It is to your own imagi­nary King of England therefore, and not to his Majesty, that your unfounded inuendos apply. It is the monarchs of Russia and Prussia, and all governments fastened upon unwilling subjects by hereditary indefeasible titles that are stigmatised by Paine as inheriting the people like flocks. The sentence, therefore, must either be taken in the pure abstract, and then it is not only merely speculative, but the application of it to our own government fails altogether, or it must be taken connected with the matter which consti­tutes the application, and then it is Mr. Burke's King of England, and not his Majesty, whose title is denied.

I pass therefore to the next passage, which appears to be an extraordinary selection. It is taken at a leap from page 21 to page 47, and breaks in at the words, "This Con­vention." [Page 52] The sentence selected stands thus, ‘This con­vention met at Philadelphia, in May 1787, of which General Washington was elected president. He was not at that time conected with any of the state governments, or with Congress. He delivered up his commission when the war ended, and since then had lived a private citizen.’

This sentence standing by itself, may appear to be a mere sarcasm on King William, upon those who affected the Revolution; and upon the revolution itself, without any reasoning or deduction: But when the context and se­quel are looked at and compared, it will appear to be a seri­ous historical comparison between the Revolution effected in England in 1688, and the late one in America when she established her independence; and no man can doubt that his judgment on that comparison was sincere. But where is the libel on the constitution? For whether King William was brought over here by the sincerest and justest motives of the whole people of England, each man acting for himself, or through the motives and agencies imputed by the defendant, it signifies not one farthing at this time of day to the establishment itself. Blackstone warns us not to fix our obedience or affection to the government on the motives of our ancestors, or the rectitude of their reason­ings, but to be satisfied that it is established. This is safe reasoning, and for my own part, I should not be differently affected to the constitution of my country, which my own understanding approved, whether angels or daemons had gi­ven it birth.

Do any of you love the reformation the less because Henry the Eighth was the author of it? Or because lust and poverty and not religion, were his motives. He had squandered the treasures of his father, and he preferred [Page 53] Anne Bullen to his Queen; these were the causes which produced it. What then! does that affect the purity of our reformed religion, undermine its establishment, or shake the King's title as prince of the country, to the ex­clusion of those who held by the religion it had abolished? Will the Attorney General affirm, that I could be convict­ed of a libel for a whole volume of asperity against Henry the Eighth, merely because he effected the reformation; and if not, why against King William, who effected the Revolution? Where is the line to be drawn? Is one, two, or three centuries to be the statute of limitation? But do not our own historians detail this very cabal of courtiers, from the records of our own country? If you will turn to Hume's history, volume the eighth, page 188, &c. &c. you will find that he states at great length, the whole detail of intrigues which paved the way for the Revolution, and the interested coalition of parties which gave it effect.

But what of all this, concerning the motives of parties, which is recorded by Hume. The question is, What is the thing brought about,—Not HOW it was brought about. If it stands, as Blackstone argues it, upon the consent of our ancestors, followed up by our own, no individual can with­draw his obedience. If he dislikes the establishment, let him seek elsewhere for another; I am not contending for uncontrolled conduct, but for freedom of opinion.

With regard to what has been stated of the Edwards and Henrys, and the other princes under which the author can only discover "restrictions on power, but nothing of a con­stitution:" surely my friend is not in earnest when he se­lects that as a libel.

Paine insists that there was no constitution under these prin­ces, and that English liberty was obtained from usurped power by the struggles of the people. SO SAY I. And I think it for the honor and advantage of the country that it should be known.

Was these any freedom after the original establishment of the Normans by conquest? Was not the MAGNA CHAR­TA wrested from John by open force of arms at Runny-mead? Was it not again re-enacted whilst menacing arms were in the hands of the people? Were not its stipulations broken through, and two-and-forty times re-enacted by [Page 54] Parliament, upon the firm demand of the people in the fol­lowing reigns? I protest it fills me with astonishment to hear these truths brought in question.

I was formerly called upon under the discipline of a col­lege to mantain them, and was rewarded for being thought to have successfully maintained that our present constitution was by no means a remnant of Saxon liberty, nor any other institution of liberty, but the pure consequence of the op­pression of the Norman tenures, which spreading the spirit of freedom from one end of the kingdom to another, ena­bled our brave fathers, inch by inch, not to re-conquer, but for the first time to obtain those privileges which are the unalienable inheritance of all mankind.

But why do we speak of the Edwards and Henrys when Hume himself expressly says, notwithstanding all we have heard to day of the antiquity of our constitution, that our monarchy was nearly absolute till the middle of last cen­tury. I have his book in court, and will read it to you. It is his essay on the Liberty of the Press, vol. I, page 15.

‘All absolute Governments, and such in a great mea­sure was England, till the middle of last century. notwithstanding the numerous panegyrics on ANCIENT English Liberty, must very much depend on the admini­stration.’

This is Hume's opinion; the conclusion of a grave his­torian from all that he finds recorded as the materials for history: and shall it be said that Mr. Paine is to be punish­ed for writing to-day what was before written by another, who is now a distinguished classic in the language? All the verdicts in the world will not make that palateable to an impartial public, or to posterity.

The next passage arraigned is this: p. 56. ‘The attenti­on of the government of England, (for I rather chase to call it by this name, than the English government) appears since its political connection with Germany, to have been so completely engrossed and absorbed by foreign affairs, and the means of raising taxes, that it seems to exist for no other purposes. Domestic concerns are neglected; and with respect to regular law, there is scarcely such a thing.’

That the government of this country has, in consequence of its connection with the continent, and the continental [Page 55] wars which it has occasioned, been continually loaded with grievous taxes no man can dispute; and I appeal to your justice, whether this subject has not been, for years toge­ther, the constant topic of unreproved declamation and grum­bling?

As to what he says with regard to there hardly being such a thing as regular law, he speaks in the abstract of the complexity of our system; but does not arraign the ad­ministration of justice in its practice. But with regard to criticism and strictures on the general system, it has been echoed over and over again by various authors; and even from the pulpits of our country, that the law of the land is mainly defective, devoid of regularity and precision, and overloaded with a variety of expensive and unnecessary forms. I have a Sermon in Court written during the Ame­rican war, by a person of great eloquence and piety, part of which I will read to you on this subject, in which he looks forward to an exemption from the intolerable griev­ances of our old legal system in the infant establishment of the New World.

‘It may be in the purposes of Providence, on you west­ern shores, to raise the bulwark of a purer reformation than ever Britain patronised; to found a less burthen­some, more auspicious, stable, and incorruptible govern­ment than ever Britain has enjoyed; and to establish there a system of law more just and simple in its princi­ples, less intricate, dubious and dilatory in its proceed­ings, more mild and equitable in its sanctions, more easy and more certain in its execution; wherein no man can err through ignorance of what concerns him, or want justice through poverty or weakness, or escape it by legal artifice, or civil privileges, or interposing power; wherein the rule of conduct shall not be hidden or dis­guised in the language of principles and customs that died with the barbarism which gave them birth; where­in hasty formulas shall not dissipate the reverence that is due to the tribunals and transactions of justice: where­in obsolete prescripts shall not pervert, nor entangle, nor impede the administration of it, nor in any instance ex­pose it to derision or disregard; wherein misrepresen­tation shall have no share in deciding upon right and truth; and under which no man shall grow greatly the [Page 56] wages of chicanery, or thrive by the quarrels that are ruinous to his employers.’

This is ten times stronger than Mr. Paine; but who ever thought of prosecuting Mr. Cappe?

In various other instances you will find defects in our jurisprudence pointed out and lamented, and not seldom by persons called upon by their situations to deliver the law in the seat of magistracy: therefore the author's gene­ral observation does not appear to be that species of attack upon the magistracy of the country, as to fall within the description of a libel.

With respect to the two Houses of Parliament, I believe I shall be able to shew you that the very person who intro­duced this controversy, and who certainly is considered by those who now administer the government, as a man usefully devoted to maintain the constitution of the country in the present crisis, has himself made remarks upon these assem­blies; that upon comparison you will think more severe than those which are the subject of the Attorney General's animadversion. The passage in Mr. Paine runs thus:

The conclusion of the sentence, and which was meant by Paine as evidence of the previous assertion, the Attor­ney General has omitted in the information, and in his speech, it is this: ‘In the debate on engaging in the Russian and Turkish war, the majority in the House of Peers in favor of it was upwards of ninety, when in the [Page 57] other House, which is more than double its numbers, the majority was sixty-three.’

The terms, however, in which Mr. Bruke speaks of the House of Lords, are still more expressive. ‘It is some­thing more than a century ago, since we voted the House of Lords useless. They have now voted themselves so, and the whole hope of reformation’ (speaking of the House of Commons) "is cast upon us." This sentiment, Mr. Burke not only expressed in his place in parliament, where no man can call him to an account; but it has been since, repeatedly printed amongst his other valuable works. And his opinion of BOTH THE HOUSES OF PARLIA­MENT, which I am about to read to you, was originally published as a pamphlet, and applied to the settled habi­tual abuses of these high assemblies. Remember I do not use them as argumenta ad hominem, or ad individiam against the author, for if I did, it could be no defence of Mr. Paine. But I use them as high authority, the work ^* having been the just foundation of substantial and lasting reputation. Would to God that any part of it were capa­ble of being denied or doubted.

Mr. Burke therefore, in page 66, speaking of the same court party, says:

‘Parliament was indeed the great object of all these po­litics, the end at which they aimed, as well as the IN­STRUMENT by which they were to operate.’

And pursuing the subject in p. 70, proceeds as follows:

Mr. Burke, in page 100, observes with great truth, that the mischiefs he complained of, did not at all arise from the monarchy, but from the parliament, and that it was the duty of the people to look to it. He says, ‘The distem­pers of monarchy were the great subjects of apprehension and redress, in the last century; in this, the distempers of parliament.’

Not the distempers of parliament in this year or the last, but in this century, i. e. its settled habitual distemper. ‘It is not in parliament alone that the remedy for parlia­mentary disorders can be completed; and hardly indeed can it begin there. Until a confidence in government is re-established, the people ought to be excited to a more strict and detailed attention to the conduct of their representatives. Standards for judging more systemati­cally upon their their conduct ought to be settled in the meetings of counties and corporations, and frequent and correct lists of the voters in all important questions ought to be procured.’

‘By such means something may be done, since it may appear who those are, that by an indiscriminate support of all administrations, have totally banished all integrity and confidence out of public proceedings; have con­founded the best men with the worst; and weakened and dissolved, instead of strengthening and compacting the general frame of government.’

I wish it was possible to read the whole of this most im­portant volume—but the consequences of these truths con­tained in it were all eloquently summed up by the author in his speech upon the reform of the houshold.

‘But what I confess was uppermost with me, what I bent the whole course of my mind to, was the reduction of that corrupt influence which is itself the perennial spring of all prodigality and disorder; which loads us more than millions of debt; which takes away vigor [Page 60] from our arms; wisdom from our councils; and every shadow of authority and credit from the most venerable parts of our constitution.’

The same important truths were held out to the whole public, upon a still later occasion, by the person now at the head of his Majesty's councils; and so high (as it appears) in the confidence of the nation. He, not in the abstract like the author before you, but upon the spur of the occasi­on, and in the teeth of what had been just declared in the House of Commons, came to, and acted upon resolutions which are contained in this book. ^* Resolutions pointed to the purification of a parliament, dangerously corrupted into the very state described by Mr. Paine. Remember here too, that I impute no censure to Mr. Pitt. It was the most brilliant passage in his life, and I should have thought his life a better one, if he had continued uniform in the support of opinions, which it is said he has not changed, and which certainly have had nothing to change them. But at all events, I have a right to make use of the authority of his splendid talents and situation, not merely to protect the defendant, but the public, and to resist the precedent. That what one man may do in England with approbation and glory, shall conduct another man to a pillory or a prison.

It was the abuses pointed out by the man before you, that led that Right Hon. Gentleman to associate with many others of high rank, under the banners of the Duke of Rich­mond, whose name stands at the head of the list; and to pass various public resolutions, concerning the absolute ne­cessity of purifying the House of Commons; and we col­lect the plan from a preamble entered in the book, ‘Whereas the life, liberty and property of every man is or may be affected by the law of the land in which he lives, and every man is bound to pay obedience to the same.’

These with many others, were published, not as ab­stract, speculative writings, but within a few days af­ter the House of Commons had declared that no such rights existed, and that no alteration was necessary in the representation. It was then that they met at the Thatched House, and published their opinions and resolu­tions to the country at large.—Were any of them prosecu­ted for these proceedings? Certainly not, (for they were [Page 62] legal proceedings.) But I desire you as men of honor and truth, to compare all this with Mr. Paine's expression of the Minister's touching Parliament with his opiate wand, and let equal justice be done—that is all I ask—let all be pun­ished or none—do not let Mr. Paine be held out to the contempt of the public upon the score of his observations on parliament, while others are enjoying all the sweets which attend a supposed attachment to their country, who have said the same things, and reduced their opinions to practice.

But now every man is to be cried down for such opini­ons. I observed that my learned friend significantly raised his voice in naming Mr. Horne Tooke, as if to connect him with Paine, or Paine with him. This is exactly the same course of justice; for after all he said nothing of Mr. Tooke. What could he have said, but that he was a sub­scriber with the great names, I have read in these proceed­ings which they have thought fit to desert.

Gentlemen, let others hold their opinions, and change them at their pleasure; I shall ever maintain it to be the dearest privilege of the people of Great Britian to watch over every thing that affects their good government, either in the system, or in the practice; and that for this purpose the press must be free. It has always been so, and much evil has been corrected by it.—If government finds itself annoyed by it, let it examine its own conduct, and it will find the cause,—let it amend it, and it will find the remedy.

Gentlemen, I am no friend to sarcasms in the discussion of grave subjects, but you must take writers according to the view of the mind at the moment; Mr. Burke as of­ten as any body indulges in it;—hear his reason in his speech on reform, for not taking away the salaries from Lords who attend upon the British Court. "You would," "said he," have the court deserted by all the nobility of "the kingdom.

‘Sir, the most serious mischiefs would follow from such a desertion. Kings are naturally lovers of low compa­ny; they are so elevated above all the rest of mankind, that they must look upon all their subjects as on a level: they are rather apt to hate than to love their nobility, on account of the occasional resistance to their will, which will be made by their virtue, their petulance, or their pride. It must indeed be admitted, that many of the nobility [Page 63] are as perfectly willing to act the part of flatterers, tale-bearers, parasites, pimps, and buffoons, as any of the low­est and vilest of mankind can possibly be. But they are not properly qualified for this object of their ambition. The want of a regular education, and early habits, with some lurking remains of their dignity, will never per­mit them to become a match for an Italian eunuch, a mountebank, a fidler, a player, or any regular practiti­oner of that tribe. The Roman emperors, almost from the beginning, threw themselves into such hands; and the mischief increased every day, till its decline, and its final ruin. It is, therefore, of very great importance (provided the thing is not overdone,) to contrive such an establishment as must, almost whether a prince will or not, bring into daily and hourly offices about his person, a great number of his first nobility; and it is rather an useful prejudice that gives them a pride in such a servi­tude though they are not much the better for a court, a court will be much the better for them. I have, there­fore, not attempted to reform any of the offices of honor about the King's person.’

What is this but saying, that a king is an animal so in­curably addicted to low company, as generally to bring on by it the ruin of nations; but nevertheless, he is to be kept as a necessary evil, and his propensities bridled by surrounding him with a parcel of miscreants still worse if possible, but better than those he would chuse for himself. This therefore, if taken by itself, would be a most abomi­nable and libellous sarcasm on kings and nobility: but look at the whole speech, and you observe a great system of regulation: and no man, I believe, ever doubted Mr. Burke's attachment to monarchy. To judge, therefore, of any part of a writing, the whole must be read.

With the same view I mean to read to you the beginning of Harrington's Oceana: but it is impossible to name this well known author without exposing to just contempt and ridicule the ignorant or profligate misrepresentations which are vomited forth upon the public, to bear down every man as desperately wicked, who in any age or country has coun­tenanced a republic, for the mean purpose of prejudging this trial.

[Page 64][Mr. Erskine took up a book, but laid it down again without reading from it, saying something to the gentle­man who sat near him, in a low voice, which I did not hear.]

Is this the way to support the English constitution? Are these the means by which Englishmen are to be taught to cherish it? I say, if the man upon trial were stained with blood instead of ink,—if he were covered over with crimes which human nature would start at the naming of, the means employed against him would not be the less disgraceful.

For this notable purpose then, Harrington, not above a week ago, was handed out to us as a low, obscure wretch, involved in the murder of the monarch, and the destruc­tion of the monarchy, and as addressing his despicable works at the shrine of an usurper. Yet this very Har­rington, this low blackguard, was descended (you may see his pedigree at the Herald's office for six pence,) from eight Dukes, three Marquisses, seventy Earls, twenty-seven Vis­counts, and thirty-six Barons, sixteen of whom were Knights of the Garter; a descent which I think would save a man from disgrace in any of the circles of Germany. But what was he besides?—A blood-stained ruffian! Oh brutal igno­rance of the history of the country! He was the most af­fectionate servant of Charles the first, from whom he never concealed his opinions; for it is observed by Wood, that the King greatly affected his company; but when they hap­pened to talk of a commonwealth, he would scarcely en­dure it.—"I know not," says Toland, ‘which most to commend; the King for trusting an honest man, though a republican; or Harrington for owning his principles while he served a king.’

But did his opinions affect his conduct?—Let history again answer.—He preserved his fidelity to his unhappy Prince to the very last, after all his fawning courtiers had left him to his enraged subjects. He staid with him while a prisoner in the Isle of Wight: came up by stealth to follow the fortunes of his Monarch and master; even hid himself in the boot of the coach when he was conveyed to Windsor; and ending as he began, fell into his arms and fainted on the scaffold.

[Page 65]After Charles's death, the Oceana was written, and, as if it were written from justice and affection to his memory: for it breathes the same noble and spirited regard, and as­serts that it was not Charles that brought on the destruc­tion of the monarchy, but the feeble and ill-constituted na­ture of monarchy itself.

But the book was a flattery to Cromwell.—Once more and finally, let history decide.

It was seized by the Usurper as a libel, and the way it was recovered is remarkable. I mention it to show, that Cromwell was a wise man in himself, and knew on what governments must stand for their support.

Harrington waited on his daughter to beg for his book, and on entering her apartment, snatched up her child and ran away. On her following him with surprise and terror, he turned to her and said, ‘I know what you feel as a mo­ther, feel then for me; your father has got my child:’ meaning the Oceana. The Oceana was afterwards restored on her petition; Cromwell answering with the sagacity of a sound politician, ‘Let him have his book; if my go­vernment is made to stand, it has nothing to fear from paper shot.’—He said true.—No good government will ever be battered by paper shot. Montesquieu says, that, ‘In a free nation, it matters not whether individuals reason well or ill; it is sufficient that they do reason. Truth arises from the collision, and from hence springs liberty, which is a security from the effect of reasoning.’ The Attorney General read extracts from Mr. Adams's answer to this book. Let others do like Mr. Adams: I am not insisting on the infallibility of Mr. Paine's doc­trines: If they are erroneous, let them be answered, and truth will spring from the collision.

A disposition in a nation to this species of controversy, is no proof of sedition or degeneracy, but quite the re­verse, as is mentioned by Milton, (I omitted to cite the passage with the others,) who in speaking of this subject, rises into that inexpressibly sublime stile of writing, wholly peculiar to himself. He was indeed no plagiary from any thing human: he looked up for light and expression, as he himself wonderfully describes it, by devout prayer to that Great Being who is the source of all utterance and know­ledge; [Page 66] and who sendeth out his seraphim with the hallow­ed fire of his altars to touch and purify the lips of whom he pleases.—"When the chearfulness of the people," says this mighty poet, ‘is so sprightly up, as that it has not only wherewith to guard well its own freedom and safety, but to spare, and to bestow upon the solidest and sublimest points of controversy and new invention, it betokens us not degenerated nor drooping to a fatal de­cay, but casting off the old and wrinkled skin of corrup­tion to outlive these pangs, and wax young again, en­tering the glorious ways of truth and prosperous virtue, destined to become great and honorable in these latter ages. Methinks I see, in my mind, a noble and puis­sant nation rousing herself, like a strong man, after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks: methinks I see her as an eagle muing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazzled eyes at the full mid-day beam; purging and unscaling her long-abused sight at the fountain itself of heavenly radiance; while the whole noise of timorous and flocking birds, with those also that love the twilight, flutter about, amazed at what she means, and in their envious gabble, would prognosticate a year of sects and schisms.’

Gentlemen, what Milton only saw in his mighty ima­gination, I see in fact; what he expected, but which never came to pass, I see now fulfilling: methinks I see this no­ble and puissant nation, not degenerated and drooping to a fatal decay, but casting off the wrinkled skin of corruption to put on again the vigor of her youth.

And it is, because others as well as myself, see this that we have all this uproar. France and its constitution are the mere pretences. It is, because Britons begin to re­collect the inheritance of their own constitution, left them by their ancestors: It is because they are awakened to the corruptions which have fallen upon its most valuable parts, that forsooth the nation is in danger of being destroyed by a single pamphlet.

Gentlemen, I have marked the course of this alarm: It began with the renovation of those exertions for the pub­lic, which the authors of the alarm had themselves origi­nated and deserted; and they become louder and louder when they saw these principles avowed and supported by [Page 67] my admirable and excellent friend Mr. Fox; the most em­inently honest and enlightened statesman that history brings us acquainted with: a man whom to name is to honor, but whom, in attempting adequately to describe, I must sly to Mr. Burke, my constant refuge when eloquence is necessary: a man, who, to relieve the sufferings of the most distant nation, ‘put to the hazard his ease, his secu­rity; his interest, his power, even his darling popularity for the benefit of a people whom he had never seen.’ How much more then for the inhabitants of his native coun­try: yet this is the man who has been censured and disa­vowed in the manner we have lately seen.

Gentlemen, I have but a few more words to trouble you with: I take my leave of you with declaring, that all this freedom which I have been endeavoring to assert, is no more than the freedom which belongs to our own inbred constitution: I have not asked you to acquit Mr. Paine upon any new lights, or upon any principle but the law, which you are sworn to administer: My great object has been to inculcate, that wisdom and policy, which are the parents of the law of Great Britain, forbid this jealous eye over her subjects; and that, on the contrary, they cry aloud in the language of the poet, employed by Lord Chatham on the memorable subject of America, unfortunately with­out effect:

Engage them by their affections, convince their reason, and they will be loyal from the only principle that can make loyalty sincere, vigorous, or rational, a conviction that it is their truest interest, and that their form of govern­ment is for their common good. Constraint is the natural parent of resistance, and a pregnant proof, that reason is not on the side of those who use it. You must all remember, Gentlemen, Lucian's pleasant story; Jupiter and a coun­tryman were walking together, conversing with great free­dom and familiarity upon the subject of heaven and earth. The countryman listened with attention and acquiescence, [Page 68] while Jupiter strove only to convince him; but happening to hint a doubt, Jupiter turned hastily round and threaten­ed him with his thunder.—"Ah! ha!" says the countryman, ‘now Jupiter, I know that you are wrong; you're al­ways wrong when you appeal to your thunder.’

This is the case with me—I can reason with the people of England, but I cannot fight against the thunder of au­thority.

Gentlemen, this is my defence for free opinions. With regard to myself, I am, and ever have been, obedient and affectionate to the law: to that rule of action, as long as I exist, I shall ever give my voice and my conduct; but I shall ever do as I have done to-day, maintain the dignity of my high profession, and perform, as I understand them, all its important duties.

[Mr. Attorney General arose immediately to reply to Mr. Erskine, when Mr. Campbell (the foreman of the Jury) said,—my Lord, I am authorised by the Jury here, to inform the Attorney General, that a reply is not necessa­ry for them, unless the Attorney General wishes to make it, or your Lordship.—Mr. Attorney General sat down, and the Jury gave in their verdict,— Guilty.]