The Sun.
London, England, 1849-11-02 00:00:00

FRIDAY EVENING NOVEYIBER 2 ►£349

TO THE MEMBERS OF THE BIR-
MINGHAM- TOTVN- COUATCIL.
Gentlemen,—You have taken an honourable lead
in resisting the imposture, by which it was attempted
to limit your freedom of commercial intercourse to
four days in the week, on pretences based on the
falsification of documents and the abuse of the trust
confided in the religious servants of the public.
The case is not a new one ; and it might by possi-
bility have been repeated under the old form. Sup-
pose then the statement made to you by bishops and
presbyters had been, that the New Testament declares
the Pope to possess the power of deposing kings,
and measures must in consequence take place, deeply
affecting your interests in various ways.
I put the case thus, that there may be no semblance
of seeking quarrel with the followers of an ancient
church, some of whom are probably among the
esteemed members of your body.
Suppose then the question had been put to you as
thus,—" Are you. Christians, or infidels ? Do ycu
or do you not believe, that, the Pope has the power
to depose kings ?"
Would you have consented to shuffle about under
this charge of being infidels, by which the assailant
always means dogs; or would you have answered by
saying, " Luckily two can play at that game. The
New Testament is not a rare hook chained in our
churches, but there is none among us but has it
in his hand. It is as easy to know whether the fraud
is with us or you, as to settle a suspected account.
Bring us the bond, and let us see who is right. If
you have called us names with a view to blink what
you knew to be a false account, a penal colony would
be the proper place to send you."
Pass over the ignorant, who bawl as they are told
to do; but fasten on some who are responsible for
their acts. And ask them whether they do not per-
fectly know, and whether they are in any manner
prepared to deny, that the Apostle from whom the
Christian church universal takes nearly the whole of
the details of its duties and its avoidances, includes
the sabbatical observances of the Jews in the most
sweeping terms among what he has directed to be
resisted. Put the question in its simplicity, or if you
go further, ask why they do not desire you to be cir-
cumcised, seeing that the liberation from that burthen
depends upon similar words, in the same places, from
the same authority. And then watch how your
antagonists will wriggle and glose, to try to twist a
set falsehood into truth, and what specimens you will
have of that faculty of perverting plain words, which
has made the name of theologian at a discount
from Milton's day to ours.
May I assume that every one of you is aware of
the following facts :
That the Great Apostle, the Apostle of the Gen-
tiles, as he is sometimes called, in laying down rules
for his Christian converts, prohibits in distinct words
the keeping of the Jewish sabbaths of all kinds (See
Coloss. ii. 16).
That to maintain that the Apostles substituted the
First day of the week for the Seventh, is as totally
and disgracefully false as it would be to say they sub-
stituted the cutting off a joint of the little finger for
circumcision. They authorised meetings for public
worship on the First day, and collections for chari-
table purposes, and they called it the Lord's, or
Christ's day, in commemoration of the resurrection.
But all the rest is forgery.
That the Protestant Reformers included the attempt
to transfer the restrictions of the Jewish Seventh day
to the First day of the week, among the grievances
they complained of (See the Confession of Augsburg).
That the Church of England in her Catechism and
Articles ignores the Fourth Commandment; thereby
declaring it to belong to the " Ceremonies, Rites, and
Civil precepts, which do not bind Christian men," and
not to the " Commandments which are called oral."
Of which if any wants to be convinced, let him
revert to his youthful memories, and repeat the
various answers consequent upon the question," What
dost thou chiefly learn from these Commandments ?"
That the Dissenting sects without exception, ac-
knowledge the authority of the Apostles to direct
what shall and shall not be kept of the Jewish
law ; though they have not the virtue to speak the
truth, under the temptation of getting power over the
bodies and souls of men, by preserving what they
think too good to be parted with at the Apostles'
bidding.
The tyranny you have so manfully opposed, has its
branches everywhere. A principal object in view,
when it is convenient to acknowledge it, is to cut off
your working classes from those opportunities of
mental improvement, which the day of relaxation from
toil which custom gives and Christianity does not
oppose, would place within their reach. Does any
man believe that kindness was meant to the working
classes ? The next step would have been to shut
them up like slaves on the priests' Jewish prison-day.
And another evil of scarcely less importance, is the
mischief attendant on setting up a false scale of mo-
rality, and thus tempting men by the commission of
imaginary sins. The man executed in Scotland the
other day for a complication of crime it is not agree.
able to allude to, was of course made to say he began
with sabbatle breaking. In a Catholic country he
would have said he began with absence from con-
fession, and eating meat in Lent ; and in a Moham-
medan ono, with not keeping the fast of Ramazsn.
Set up any test and standard of morality, and you
are responsible for leading men to the gallows, it' it
is a false one.
Lastly, you would have had other political and
commercial tyrannies in rapid course. If you had
given way without resistance on this point, you would
next have had a demand for a tax upon post letters,
and another upon the exchange of your 'Birmingham
goods fur foreign produce. You see what you Lim e
escaped for the present. 'Whether the ignorant, and
those who are of small skill in the ways of fraud,
stand by you in future or not, the recollection of what
you have done will be cherished by your country, and
unless the country is to retrograde, will look better
daily in the eyes of a growing posterity.
ONE WllO BELIEVES SABBATICAL OBSERV-
ANCE PROHIBITED TO CHRISTIANS.
P.S. Since the above was in type, accounts have
been received of the Public Meeting at Birmingham.
Mr. Weston made a slight verbal error, as reported
in the Morning Herald. Instead of saying "As a
Christian people we ,have no command to keep the
seventh day of the week," he should have said " As a
Christian people we are commanded not to keep a
seventh day of the week." There will be no good
done, till we have the courage to stand on the whole
truth like our fathers.
The first words uttered on the part of the requisi-
tionists, were to the effect that every person regarding
the law of God must concur in the object of the
requisition (Report of J. Taylor, Esq., in the Marn•
ing Post). And when Alderman Weston proceeds
to raise the question whether it is according to the
law of God or not, he is stopped by a Reverend, who
tells him that entry on the theclogical part of the
question has been prohibited.
Bishop Bonner dared not have so committed him-
self. He would never have called a meeting to
determine whether the Pope was authorised in the
New Testament to burn heretics, and then have
declared the question prohibited whether there was
such an authority or not. You see where the shoe
pinches. The adversary knows the assertion that it
is according to the Christian law, to be a falsehood ;
and therefore he prohibits the question whether it is
according to the Christian law. Mark them that do
thus ; and never trust them with either soul or body.
If you do, you will be back to Church and King
mobs before you know of it.
What simpletons must he your working men, if
they allow themselves to be led by the nose through
the falsification of a printed document. Is there no
man who has got a New Testament and can read, and
can read it to his neighbours ? I wonder whether
they would resist if they were told they must be
circumcised. And yet almost the same passage which
releases us from circumcision, releases us from the
Jewish observation of sabbaths. But their teachers
have a different interest.

mutely raising, his arms horizontally upwards, or in like
manner slowly dig ressing the ti, he should communicate
to them his d-sire hat the sped might be increased or
diminished."

The next quotation, relating two anoodo`es of the
spectators pre., nt cn th, occAsion oF the floati,ig of
the tubular bridge will to pe:uicd with some amuse-
ment :

' Dear me!' said an old gentleman, as the tube when

it first swung across the Straits was in perspective seen
approaching the platform on which he sat, and which
was immediately in front of the awful chasm between
Britannia and Anglesey Towers, 6 they have surely
been and made it too short ; they must put a bit ou !'
As soon, however, as, veering round, it approached him
broadside foremost, he si hispered, I'm quite sure its
too long; they'll have to cut a piece off!'
" A lady said to her companion, ' Mr. Stephenson
appeared dreadfully excited during the passage! Didn't
you observe how he kept continually stretching out his
arms, raising them up and then sinking them down in
this way?' (suiting her words to the actions by which
the speed of the voyage had calmly been regulated.)
• But no wonder he was so agitated!' "
Altogether, both i❑ regard to the amount of
valuable information condensed into the contribution,
and in reference to the agreeable stale of its compo-
sition, the paper on the last miracle of engineering
science may vie with the popular article by the same
writer, since republished under the title of " Stokers
and Pokers." 'We heartily congratulate Mr.
William Fairhairn upon the castigation received by
him from this brilliant writer, a castigation which he
(Mr. Pairbairn) has richly merited. The content 3
will eminently repay perusal.