made to depend on the existence of a horde of ruffians, who obeyed without hesitation the call of every gross and irregular appetite. These very legislators of revered antiquity, who are represented as having enacted laws for the protection of Christianity against the infidel licentiousness of the press, some centuries before the press existed, were in the habitual practice of violating without scruple or compunction every precept of the Gospel: and yet the friends of social order, the guardians of the "altar and the throne," have the indecency and folly to assert, that Christianity was made part and parcel of the law of the land by men who used to sleep with the wives of their tenants on the bridal night, and sell their vassals, adscriptos gleba, in the same manner as their beasts of burden!!! The bare mention of such revolting impiety is perfectly frightful, and the indignation of every honest man and sincere Christian is roused, when he considers that the very persons, who arrogate to themselves the exclusive privilege of understanding the Scriptures in an orthodox sense, and affect a monopoly of virtue, do by their acts and practice abundantly show how little confidence they place in that declaration of Scripture which affirms, that the religion of Jesus is seated on a rock, and that the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

If the objections adduced are not sufficient to shew the illegality of Lord Hale's dictum, we still have an argument in reserve, which it is altogether impossible to deny or to evade. It is competent to the legislature to repeal any portion of the common law, by statute or act of Parliament. Now it must be obvious, that whatever ecclesiastical laws existed prior to the reign of Henry the Eighth, they must all have been abrogated and nullified by the Reformation: for the very essence of the new opinions consisted in the right of private judgment in matters of religion, and consequently, all the restraints which existed during the catholic ascendancy, on the freedom of discussion, were impliedly repealed. For it is a maxim of English law, the reasonableness of which is obvious to every man of common sense, that if any privilege is granted to a man, the right of enjoying that privilege cannot be impeded. "For when the law doth give any thing to any one, it giveth impliedly whatever is necessary for enjoying the same. If a man grants me a piece of ground in the middle of his field, he at the same time, tacitly and impliedly gives me a way to come at it."* In the next section, we shall shew at length the impossibility of maintaining, in a pro

* Blackstone, vol. 2, p. 35.

testant country, the justice or expediency of prosecutions for religious opinion.

Before concluding this branch of our subject, we are anxious to exhibit the doctrine of Lord Hale in a point of view, which appears to have escaped observation. The piety of those conservators of public morals, who have lately signalized themselves in the defence of religion, has been satisfied with prosecuting authors and publishers. Against these offenders they have acted with zeal and perseverance; but it is surely to be lamented that the Vice and Constitutional Associations are confined within so limited a sphere of action. It appears to us that the authority of Lord Hale would justify a much more extensive scale of hostilities, and throw the suppressors in contact with opponents more worthy of their notice. It is hoped that those gentry who have displayed so laudable a zeal in fining poor bakers for selling hot rolls on a Sunday, will give to the following suggestions a due share of attention. Let it be assumed that

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Christianity is part and parcel of the law of the land." Now the violation of a law is twofold; direct or implied. The sale of a book, which denies the genuineness and authenticity of the scriptures, is a direct infraction of the law, and the fact of publication constitutes

the overt act A law is violated indirectly or by implication, when any act is omitted which the spirit of the law requires to be observed. The direct offence is against the letter; the implied offence against the spirit. Now the

spirit of christianity is only to be found in the sacred writings. If then a man lives and acts in opposition to the precepts of the Testament, he is guilty of an implied offence, precisely in the same extent as he, who by publishing a book, commits a direct offence. The christianity of the New Testament inculcates universal benevolence, enjoins us to love our neighbours as ourselves, to be patient of injuries, slow to anger, not given to covetousness, to forgive our enemies, and return good for evil. But is this the practical christianity of the present day? Ask the rector, who unites in himself the clerical and secular functions; and on Sunday in the pulpit recommends the practice of those virtues enumerated above, and on Monday, in his magisterial capacity, sends a wretched labourer to prison, and his miserable family to the workhouse, because a wild undomesticated bird has been found in his possession? Ask a

Bishop, if he can see any resemblance between the pomposity and paraphernalia of episcopal grandeur, and the humility and poverty of the fishermen of Galilee? Ask him, if he thinks

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"the religion which is not of this world" requires its teachers to assume the vain-glorious title of " Right Reverend Father in God, by Divine Permission?" and above all, whether it is rational to suppose, from the life and conversations of Christ, that he is pleased with that inequality, which exists among the preachers of his Word? Whether it is consistent for a Bishop to revel in 10,000l. per annum, whilst the curates in his diocese are starving on a guinea a week? Now among the host of idle pluralists, who form so large a section of the Ministers of the Established Church, it would be no difficult matter for the emissaries of the Vice and Constitutional Associations to find sufficient employment for the exertions of Murray and Adolphus. And really, without any superior ingenuity, a qualification we by no means attribute to the Old Bailey practitioner, a strong case might be made out against those, who offend against the spirit of Lord Hale's doctrine. For there is this distinction, and it is important, between the publisher of an infidel work, and the incumbent who neglects his duty. The latter enters into holy orders voluntarily, and it must be presumed, with some purer inducement, than the prospect of temporal advantages. He swears to his belief in the Articles, and tacitly, if not directly, promises to practise all the duties, which Christi