
1797] 
while he plumes himfelf upon thinking 
with the wife, does not condetcend to 
{peak with the vulgar, and hereby to 
fupport and countenance error ?” 
Such, in their full force and extent, 
are the arguments which may be con- 
|. ceived to be urged by the advocates for 
the difcree: propagation of error: and it 
muft be confeffed, that they carry with 
them a degree of plaufibility which may 
eafily gain them credit, efpecially with 
perfons who happen to lie within the at- 
' traction of other adventitious motives to 
the exercife of difcretion. It may, how- 
ever, be doubted, whether they will 
ftand the teft of an unprejudiced and 
difinterefted examination. 
~ Without entering into the general 
queftion concerning the foundation of 
morals, and even admitting utility to be 
the meafure of virtue, it may be con- 
fidently afked, whether an invariable ad- 
herence to moral truth, or veracity, be 
not, at leaft, as likely to be ufeful to 
mankind, as the violation of this law of 
morality in the wilful propagation of 
etror>?> Whether the love of truth be 
Woven into the original fabric of the 
human mind. or whether it be the refult 
of a feries of unavoidable affociations, it 
, cannot -be doubted that it is natural to 
man. No good man ever violates it 
without reluctance.) Few merchants take 
a cuftom-houfe oath, which they know 
to be not ftri¢tly true, without withing 
that they might be excufed. - A clergy- 
man, who fubfcribes the Phirty-nine Ar- 
ticles with a fecret confcioufnefs that 
they do not perfeétly coincide with his 
‘fentiments, muft feel an uneafy preffure 
as he enters the narrow door, and, not- © 
Withftanding the ufefulnefs of the edifice 
to which he is admitted, mutt with the ’ 
‘paflage into'it enlarged. Thefe are right 
and laudable feelings; and it is by no 
means certain, that mankind have ever 
been benefited by counteracting them. 
“If the certain knowledge of abftraét 
_truth be a difficult ‘attainment, it is no 
lefs difficult todetermine, with certainty, 
what will be, on the whole, ufeful. The 
general good is a vaft objet, and com- 
prehends an-endlefs variety of compli- 
cated relations and circumftances, in 
which the mind is in as much danger of 
being loft, as in the labyrinth of a fpe- 
culative truth. Becaufe the whole field 
of knowledge does-not lie open to the 
human underftanding, it is not to be in- 
ferred that man is incapable of poffeff- 
ing himfelf of fuficient knowledge to 
feeure his happineis, without calling in 
4 - - * 
The Duque No. XI. | 109 
the aid of error: nor ought the miftakes 
and errers into which men fall before 
they acquire the perfect ufe of their rea- 
fon, or while they neglect to exercife it, 
to be urged as an argument for the de- 
liberate and fyftematic propagation of 
error among beings to whum reafon is 
given for the very purpofe of correcting 
error. 
It 1s admitted, that the exclufive pa- 
tronage of any particular fyfiem of opi- 
nions, under the notion of fupporting 
the caufe of ‘truth, is an exercife of civil 
power which always has been, and al- 
ways muft be, injurious to fociety : but 
it is alfo afferted, on the other hand, 
that any interference of magiftracy for 
the purpofe of encouraging and fupport- 
ing a fyftem which the magiftrates them- 
felves believe to be founded in error, in 
expeétation that it will furnifh ufeful 
inftruments of ¢controul, is, at leaft, 
equally injurious. Ifthe magiftrate af- 
fords equal proteétion and encourage- 
ment to inftruciors of al] claffes, he per- 
mits, it is true, the diffemination of falfe 
principles, but he does not, in reality, 
patronize and propagate error ; for no- 
thing fo certainly promotes the dilcovery 
and propagation of truth, as the unlimit- 
ed freedom of difcuffion. Whatever is’ 
for the public good, it is the bufinefs <f 
the magiftrate to encourage; but expe- 
rience has proved, that the public good 
is not promoted either by the .patronage 
of any fpecific fyftem of fuppofed truth, 
or the propagation of error: it muft, 
therefore, be his duty to leave truth and 
error a.clear field of conteft, with no 
other interference than may be neceflary 
to bringtogether fkilful combatants, and 
to fecure them fair play. 
It cannot be proved, in a fingle in- 
ftance, that any interference, either of 
the -magiftrate, or the priefthood, in 
favour of error, has ever been praduc- | 
tive of good. The ingenious devices, 
for example, of the Indian Brahmins, to 
amufe the people with {plendid fictions, 
what effets have they produced for 
which the people have reafon to thank 
them? They have eftablifhed the moft 
debafing fyftem of fervility ; they have 
confounded moral obligation with child- 
ifn fuperftition; they have created an 
unnatural feparation between man and 
man, by dividing fociety into diftinét 
cafts, productive, on the one part, of in- 
folent tyranny, on the other, of abject 
and wretched flavery. Similar confe- 
quences, though perhaps in an inferior 
degree, have followed from fimilar fyt- 
Pa : tems 

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