names some of whom have been subcribers to all the money which you have received, others only to the present subscription, you will see by this list that our cause is getting ground in this part of the world. I conclude your friend and well-wisher in Liberty's cause.

JOSHUA KERSHAW.

As the sums subscribed by the old subscribers are not set forth, with their names, we merely give the names and sums of the new subscribers.

DEAR CITIZEN, Deptford, Nov. 20, 1822. INCLOSED is an account of the mites of a few friends at Deptford, towards liquidating the cruel and oppressive fines imposed on you. I have given the amount to your shopman in Union Street. You will be so good as notice the receipt of them in "The Republican," it would have been more, but several of your friends of this place had attended the meeting at Cateaton Street, and did there subscribe. Times are really so bad with the industrious classes here, few can spare much, but, at the same time, I am happy to say, those who have here given, gave it with the greatest pleasure; we are all proud to see your friends increase, but at the same time are sorry to see you still incarcerated for want of your fines being paid. However, looking at the vast magnitude of the object at which you aim

(emancipation of mind as well as body) I cease to wonder so few are found to avow and support their sentiments.

Wishing you, your Wife and Sis:er, all possible peace and comfort, I subscribe myself your admirer,

SEVERAL friends have complained to me of the manner iu which I noticed the Reverend Mr. Smith of Penzance. They say he is a man of very mild and gentlemanly manners, and a decided enemy to persecution for matters of opinion. I am also told that he is a regular reader of my publications and a preacher against the persecutions that have fallen upon myself and family.

But the question is, did he make such speeches at Hull, as were reported in "The Hull Advertiser"? If he did not, let him publicly say so. If he did I have proved him a liar, and being proved a liar who wanders about to deceive, constitutes him a vagabond. These are the only two epithets I applied to him, and on the fullest consideration, and after different accounts of the man, I not only am not disposed to retract what I wrote, but I have discovered a full justification of the matter. One friend has said that I did not treat the man and the subject philosophically. I know nothing of philosophy that is distinct from a detection and exposure of error and falsehood, and a plain and bold promulgation of truths. A liar is the proper name for the man who wilfully states what he knows to be false. A vagabond is the proper name of a man who wanders from place to place to deceive those who will listen to him, and who makes a trade and a living of deception, having no fixed residence, and no honest or useful employment. Such a character is the Reverend Mr. Smith of Penzance, and from the heads of a sermon that has been sent me, which he preached in (I believe) Silver Street Chapel, London, I think the man a detestable hypocrite.

R. CARLILE.

ISRAEL VINDICATED.

(Continued from Page 799.)

In England, and in Holland, where numerous bodies of Jews are settled, in consequence of more religious liberty being granted there than in the other European states, few criminals of our nation are to be found. "Scarcely (says the author of the Letters of Certain Jews) can one instance be given of a Portuguese Jew executed at Amsterdam, or the Hague, during two centuries." Can as much be said of the Christians in any country of the world? Even in the United States, where the criminal code is less sanguinary than it is in any other nation, do we not see persons frequently put to death for the most atrocious crimes; yet these men are not Jews, but professing to be Christians. Let the comparison be drawn in reference to any other country, and the result will be found equally honourable to our nation.

With regard to the people of Massachusetts, I perceive that they have decided on calling a convention, for the purpose of re-modelling their constitution, and it is not doubted, that the religious test will be there done away with. Some of the antiquated leading men in the state, among whom is a Judge Parker, have proclaimed hostility against this salutary modification; but as it appears from the public journals, that liberal and tolerant principles generally prevail in this part of the union, the efforts of these men to counteract the introduction of a judicious policy, which is dictated by the present advanced state of knowledge, must prove entirely abortive.

I confess, dear Isaacs, that I have hitherto been much deceived as to the boasted liberty of conscience enjoyed in this country. When I contemplated the language of the general constitution, which distinctly states, that every citizen is to be held eligible to fill public offices, without regard to his religious opinions, I had no idea that a principle, which all the states had recognised collectively as a leading bond of their union, could have been so easily invaded by particular states. Of what avail is it for congregated tribes to pledge themselves, in solemu convocation, to maintain the principles of universal toleration, when they assume to themselves, on this convocation being dissolved, the right to violate this sacred boud of union? They may attempt to shelter them.

selves under some pretence relative to the independence of the states taken separately, and the right they have by the general constitution, to enact their own laws. But if, in enacting these laws, they run counter to first principles, and, under the subterfuge of adhering to the letter, innovate upon the spirit of the original contract, they as effectually withhold their assent to the general constitution as if they had openly declared against it. First principles are invariable in all circumstances and in all situations. They admit of no qualification; and whenever it is attempted, by sophistry or the cant of hypocrisy, to weaken or disguise their obvious meaning, we may then safely conclude, that interest and prejudice are predominant; that mankind are hurried along by these inordinate feelings, instead of being guided by the torch of reason and of truth.

Nothing seems more obvious than the abuse of the word toleration:-this word ought, in fact, to be expunged from the vocabulary of nations. The right to think belongs to no one exclusively. It is the property of all. He that atten:pts to deprive me of that right, or to limit its exercise, meditates a controul of my actions. If it is once admitted, that I ought to submit my opinions to the regulations of others, there would be only one step farther to a total surrender of every civil right. He that pretends he has a right to tolerate opinions, must yield that right to others, or deny the natural equality of man. If all should insist that the power belongs to them, peace and concord would be banished from the earth, and war perpetuated, not to establish an uniformity, but an ascendancy of contradictory and opposing systems.

Had Jehovah intended to establish uniformity of opinion, it would have been impossible for mankind to differ. In all countries, and in all ages, the ideas of man have been as varied as their countenances-an evident proof that they never can be made to think alike. He, therefore, that attempts to regulate, or tolerate the opinion of others, sets himself in opposition to the Deity. A Jew has as good a right to tolerate a Catholic or Protestant as either of these sects has to tolerate a Jew. Both are equal in the eyes of God, and both have an equal claim to the protection of the laws.

It is only in despotic governments that these incontrovertible principles have not been adopted. It has been tyrants only, that have attempted to withhold from man the free exercise of his thinking faculties. The right of giving, clearly implies the power of withholding. If any man tells me that he will tolerate my opinions, this implies that he claims the

power of restraining them. Hence the origin of persecution, which is only the offspring or child of toleration.

Farewell, dear Isaacs; may you be blessed with a patient and forgiving spirit.

NATHAN JOSEPH.

LETTER XXX.

Same subject continued-Jews not immoral.

DEAR ISAACS,

FOR what purpose is it that indignities are heaped upon our nation by the Nazarenes? Do they think that the mind is to be convinced by compulsion, or by denying us our civil rights? Are they ignorant that the heart of man can never be brought to relish truth, if it is not presented in engaging colours? Is it by the scourge, or by offers of suitable rewards, that the pupil is prevailed on to listen to the precepts of his teacher? Although it were true, that the Nazarenes are in the right, the violent and tyrannical manner by which many of them announce their principles, and the contempt with which they treat the children of Abraham is calculated to prevent the reception of these principles, and to excite au unconquerable prejudice against a religion which aims at sovereign power, and seeks to convince by force rather than by reason.

Why should I despise another because he has not been educated as I bave been? I think he is in error; he thinks the same of me. If we both err, it is unfair to attribute to obstinacy what has arisen entirely from our having had different teachers, and having read different books. When the high priest of Tamerlane urged him to reduce all the nations he bad conquered, to one religion, that prince replied—“ No, I will not; for how do I know, but the same God, who hath delighted himself so much with the variety which we see every where in nature, may not also delight himself as much in variety of worship?"

During those ancient periods in which the principle of compulsory tests was acted upon by sovereigns, we find only a history of schisms, heresies, and futile contests; of men, pretending to be saints, cutting each other's throats for opinions which they could not understand, and of princes fostering, sometimes on one side and sometimes on another, those bloody struggles, which intolerance excited among their sub