TEST-ACT. 



is deemed a proper punifliment for fome of the greateft 

 crimes :— Aaions, and not opinions, political or religious, are 

 the proper objeAs of human authority and cognizance :— No 

 man, who does not forfeit tliat capacity of ferving his fovercign 

 and country, which is his natural right, as well as the honour 

 and emoluments that may happen to be conneaed with it, 

 by overt-ads, ought to be deprived of them ; and difabili- 

 ties that are not thus incurred are unjuil penalties, implying 

 both difgrace and privation :— Punilhmeiit, without the pre- 

 vious proof of guilt, cannot be denied to be an injury ; 

 and injuries infliSed on account of rehgion arc undoubtedly 

 perfecutions : — The ends of civil fociety can never juftify 

 any abridgment of natural rights that is not cffential to 

 thefe ends : — The inftitutions of religion, and the ordinances 

 of civil government, are diftinft in their origin and 

 their objeds, in the fanAions that enforce them, and the 

 mode in which they are adminiftered : — The inftitution 

 of the Lord's fupper, being wholly of a rehgious nature, 

 and appointed merely as a memorial of his death, is 

 improperly applied to the fecular ends of civil fociety ; 

 and if it be fo applied, it is not only an improper, but in 

 many cafes an infufficient, teft of the principles and cha- 

 rafter of thofe to whom it is adminiftered. Such are 

 fome of the leading principles, which have been the fubjefts 

 of difcuffion in the debates that have occurred, both among 

 writers and among our legidators, in confidering the expe- 

 diency of repealing the teft laws. The cafe of the Catho- 

 Lcs and of the Proteftant diffenters has been repeatedly argued 

 in both houfes of parhament, and may probably again be- 

 come the fubjeft of pubhc difcuffion. Many (indeed moft) 

 of the fame arguments apply to both defcriptions of per- 

 fons ; but we (hall chiefly reftridt ourfelves to the pleas of 

 the diffenters. They have urged, that being well-affefted 

 to his majefty and the eftabhlhed government, and ready to 

 take the oaths required by law, and to give the fulleft proof 

 of their loyalty, they think their fcruple to receive the 

 facrament after the manner of the church of England, or 

 after the manner of any church, as a qualification for an 

 office, ought not to render them incapable of holding public 

 employments, civil or military : they alfo allege, that the 

 occafional receiving of the Lord's fupper as a qualification 

 for a place, cannot, in the nature of things, imply that thofe 

 who thus receive it, mean to declare their full and entire 

 approbation of the whole conftitution and frame of the efta- 

 blifhed church ; fome men may be compelled by their necef- 

 fities, or under the allurement of fecular advantages, to do 

 what they would not do, if they were left to their free 

 choice. Others, perhaps, may comply with the facra- 

 mental teft who are not even Chriftians, and who therefore 

 cannot be fuppofed to wifti well to Chriftianity itfelf, or to 

 any national eftablifhment of it whatfoever. Hence they 

 are led to think, that fuch a teft can be no real or effeftual 

 fecurity to the church of England. Conceiving that they 

 have a right, as men, to think for themfelves in matters of re- 

 ligion, and that this right is prefcribed and fanftioned by the 

 Author of Chriftianity ; and that they have a right, as ctti- 

 zau, to a common chance with their fellow-fubjefts for 

 offices of civil and military truft, if their fovereign or fel- 

 low-citizens ftiould tliink them worthy of confidence ; they 

 cannot be of opinion that any of the ends or objefts of civil 

 fociety require that thefe rights (hould be fupcrfeded, and that 

 they (hould be excluded from the fervice of the ftate. Their 

 advocates plead on their behalf, that the continuance of thofe 

 afts which invade their rights is fo far from being neceffary 

 to the well-being of the ftate, or to the eftabhfliment of the 

 national church, that they are actually pernicious both to 

 the ftate and church, and ought to be repealed. Their in- 



utility is (liewn by referring to the higher truft of legiljativc 

 authority, to which the dilTenters are admitted without hefi- 

 tation or referve, and without fubmitting to any fuch teft. 

 An excifeman furely, it is faid, does not fuilain a more im- 

 portant office, neither is it neceffary that he fhould make a 

 profeffion of his Chriftian faith more than a member of the 

 houfe of commons or the houfe of peers. The principles of 

 the diffenters, their attachment to the cor-ftitution, and their 

 zeal in fupport of it, have been fufficiently manifefted in a 

 variety of inftances, from the Revolution to the prefent day ; 

 and yet can it be afferted, that their exclufion from the 

 fervice of the public is neceffary or beneficial to the ftate J 

 Can it be faid that the contiKUance of the difabilities to which 

 their profeffion fubjefts them, is neceffary for the fafety or 

 honour of the church ? The eftabli(hment of a church re- 

 quires a legal provifion for its minifters ; but it does not re- 

 quire for its laity an exclufive right to civil and militai-y 

 trufts. The eftablifhment of the church of England coa- 

 fifts in her tithes, her prebendaries, her canonries, her arch- 

 deaconries, her deaneries, and her biftioprics. Thefe confti- 

 tuted her eftablifhment before the Corporation and Teft afts 

 had any exiftence : and they will equally conftitute her 

 eftablifhment if thefe afts (liould be repealed. In Scotland 

 they have had no fuch afts ; and yet Scotland has an efta- 

 blilhed church. In Ireland thefe ads have been repealed ; 

 and yet the eftablinied church of Ireland remains. In Hol- 

 land, Ruffia, Pruffia, Germany, &c. they have no fuch afts. 

 As to the intimate and beneficial connection between church 

 and ftate, on which fome have grounded the fuppofed pro- 

 priety and neceffity of thefe laws, it would be fnfficient to 

 refer to the authority of archdeacon Palcy, who has ftated 

 what ought to be the fingle end of church eftablifhments. 

 (See Religion.) LTpon an appeal to hiftory, it has been 

 argued that the civil government maintained itfelf in former 

 times, when unccnneded with the church ; and the dif- 

 turbances which terminated in the ruin of both church and 

 ftate, are faid to have originated in the intolerant fpirit and 

 arbitrai'y proceedings of iome ecclefiaftics, who had them- 

 felves exercifed powers, and had inftigated their unhappy 

 fovereign to aftions and claims at leaft as contrary to, and 

 fubverfive of, the true fpirit of the conftitution, as any of 

 thofe violences of the times immediately fucceeding, which 

 have been fo juftly reprobated. In this connedion, we may 

 refer to the fpeech of an able advocate for the repeal of the 

 difabHng ftatutes : who maintains that no human govern- 

 ment has a right to inquire into men's private opinions, to 

 prefume that it knows them, or to ad on that prefumption. 

 Men fhould be tried by their adions, not by their opinions. 

 This, if true with refped to political, was more peculiarly 

 fo with regard to religious opinions. In the pofition, faid 

 Mr. Fox, that the adions of men, and not their opinions, 

 were the proper objeds of legiflation, he was fupported by 

 the general tenor of the laws of the land. Hiliory, how- 

 ever, afforded one glaring exception in the cafe of the Roman 

 Catholics. The Roman Catholics, or rather the Papifts, as 

 they were then properly denominated, had been fuppofed 

 by our anceftors to entertain opinions that might lead to 

 mifchief in the ftate. But it was not their rehgious opinions 

 that were feared. Their acknowledging a foreign autho- 

 rity paramount to that of the legiflature ; their acknowledg- 

 ing a title to the crown fuperior to that conferred by the 

 voice of the people ; their pohtical opinions, which they 

 were fuppofed to attach to their religious creed, were 

 dreaded, and juftly dreaded, as inimical to the conftitution. 

 Laws therefore were enaded to guard againft the pernicious 

 tendency of their pohtical, not of their religious, opinions ; 

 and the principle thus adopted, if not founded on juftice, 



was 



