The Sun.
London, England, 1819-04-17 00:00:00

LETTER 11.

MR. EL/IVOR—In toy last, Letter I endeavoured
to drew how deeply interested Protestant Dissen-
ters art in the Roman Catholic' Question.' I
shell now resume the subject, and treat it as con-
nected ith. the Revolution of 1888.

The Revolution of 1688 may be truly characterised as the
Palladium of Toleration ; it was an sera when despotic Mo-
narchy was compelled to bow to those laws which foreign in-
fluence had prompted it to disregard, and when freedom of
Conscience first began to exist under Legislative protection.
Toleration can scarcely be said to have been understood pre-
s•ions to this period. It is hue, the Protestant Religion had
subsisted in the Empire more than a century antecedent,
but it had subsisted rather in name than in fact; i!s energies
hid been alma at completely paralyzed by the restless and
sidrits of those who still mortally tilted the Re-
f.,' miation ; and who were therefoie obliged to be bound
flown i►y most severe penal Laws, in order to produce arty
desire.. of tranquillity. It may readily be conceived, that
tinder such nittowarti eiletinoitlnces as these, Protestantism
tad no opportimity of evincing its mild and benefice!) t

effects; uphel.las it was liy the severe St ntottes of Charles
and Eli4altetli, it merely hnd an exotic existence ; and it was

reserved for the-Revolution to place it upon a firm AO sure
basis, and to give it :rll opportanity of eviocing itsreal prin-
ciples:. What then were the Laws which the great and wise

men who were concerned in sel t hat glorious event

duetneti it necessary to make, in order to secure the Protes-
tarn Establishment from datr4er and hostile attack ? It is

clear, that at this period, Protestant Dissenters were not
viewed as objects of suspicion ; indeed it would have been
surprizing had tliey been su, since the reign of Charles 11.
had 'sticky') that Protestant Dissent was as odious to' the Ro-
man Catholics as a Protestant Establishment. An Act was
therefore passed (I William and Mary, cap. 19.) for exempt-
ing Protestant Dissenters from the penaltitis-of certain Laws
which had been enacted, in several Reigns subsequent to the
Reformation, upon condition of taking certain Oaths, These
Oaths weie expressive of allegiance tothenewly elected Sore-
teign, arid contained a solemn denial of certain doctrines (lithe
Church • of Rome, and oft he right of the Pope, or any foreign
Prince. to exercise any sAiritnot jorisdif tion within this realm.
Considering the violent oppo.ition which the Roman Catholics
bad evinced to tae Revolution, it is not to be wondered at,
that the newly-received system of toleration was not c,inceded
to than. Accordingly we and, that the srst acts passed after
the Revolution were acts for removing Ronan Catholics from

London and Westminster, and from a certain circuit around,

the cam: fur disarmin; them, and for resting in the two
17niveusities the presentations. of an beneSees bdonging to

lion,*

The Revolution was an event which had for its objtcts both
a religious and a political Establishment. I shall net stop to
diECLUS at thii time of day the• necessity of the former to se-
cure permanency and respect for the latter but shall content
myself with ebdcavouring to prove how intimately the
tordiute question under consideration is connected with that
era, which brought with it liberty and hope, and dispelled
the gloomy vapours of Monkish superstition.

The character of the Revolution was an arduous, a firm,
but a triumphant struggle against a Popish Sovereign, sup-
ported ley Popish advisers and foreign interference. What
says the Bill of Rights ? It sets out with telling us, that
" King James the Second, by the as:dsdance of dicers evil
Counsellors, Judges, and Ministers, employed by him, did en-
deavour to subvert and extirpate the Protestant Religion and
the Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom."—Now, if words can
speak stronger than these to express the intimate connection
which was then supposed to subsist between Protestantism
and English Liberty,l am much deceived. It is observable
that this is the preamble of the Bill, and what is a preamble
but a keg to disclose the Motives which induce the Legisla-
ture to pass any particular measure ? It however has been
contended by those who support the present Claims of the
Roman Catholics, and who yet profess to be entirely guided
by Revolution principles, " that the Bill of Rights does
" not say a word about the Protestant Religion, that the
" thirteen Declarations which it contains as to the Rights of
" the People are equally true whatever is the form of Re-
" •ligioo, whether Protestant, Catholic, or even Mahometan
'' and that, therefore, the Roman Catholic Question is not
" so intimately connected with the Revolution as some have
" supposed." In answer to this, it may surely be urged,
that Protestantism was the grand object of that memorable
period ; it is true, the thirteen Declarations do not in them-
selves contain any 'express mention of the Protestant
ligion, but the Preamiile to them says cat we have seen),
that King.Taines had violated the Constitution in the parti-
eitiars enumerated, " for the purpose of subverting the Pro-
testant Ityligion„ and the Laces and Liberties of the King-
(ane." • And who hauled the thirteen declaratory Clauses?
Does not tbe mil tell us, that they were framed " Gy and
" with the ad, ice of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and
" dicers principal oersons of the Commons, OrING PROTES.
" TANTS ?" It is unfair to quote the Declarations without
the Context, and if that' be taken in, there is an end of the
Question as to the intimate connection of Ole Bill of Rights
with the Protestant Religion. It is indeed impossible to
read this roust in.portant Act without coming to the conclu-
sion, that England is a Protetart government, governed by
a Protestant King, and that the Established Church is to be
protected :lad preserved. How true the declaration of the
Lord Hardwiehe ! " If you sufrer your religious Esta-
blishment to be broken in upon, you nut only.eudanger the
Established Church, but your Civil Liberties!"
The cirenonstances attending the reign of James, and the
interval broils which had existed ever since the Reformation,
had dearly established the position, that an union of Church
send State inust take place, and that any disjunction of the one
from the other, or any controul over the former by a foreign
Power, was fatal to English LiLerty, which, though it dawned
at' Runnymeade, and was fought for at Cressy, Poietiers,
sued Agincourt, was not established upon a basis snfliciently
strong to admit of toleration to conflicting religious opinions,
until 1688: Yes! that was the period which laid the founda-
tion of that " personal, literary, philosophical, and religious
" liberty, which we now enjoy. The times of Alfred and the
" Saxon Monarchs were times of darkness and confusion. lie
" the victorious days of Edward 111. and Henry V. ignorance
" and Popery prevailed, the land was,uncivilized ; and the

" tottattiOtt -people were little betlar I ban alaaas to the fls. V
1' rens 0." Th.- testimony borne to this point by Mr. Hume,
(whese partiality to the house Of Stuarr, and indifference to
allreligionea-are well known), is remarkait ; speaking of the
sera suhsequent to the Revolution, lie says," So long and so
" glorious a period no nation almost can boast of, nor is there
" another is s'ance. in the whole History of Mankind, that so
" many millions of people have, during such a space of time,
" been held together, in a manner so free, so ratior.al, and
" so suitable to the dignity of human nature-j•."
But to return.—We hive already seen that the Bill of:
Rights was formed far the especial protection of the Protest--
ant Religion against all attacks of Popery and arbitrary power.
This provision (as appears from its preamble) became es-
sentially necessary on account of the conduct of King James,
whose object it was to establish the Roman Catholic Reli-
gion, and to destroy those securities with .which the Consti-
tntiou bad guarded the 'Prote,:tatiti Establishment. This was
his deouign when that misguided Monarch imprisoned Bishops,
levied taxes without authority of Parliament, and abolished
test Was; alai these were amongst the acts which occa-
sioned a Revolution that drove a legitimate Monarch
from the Them,. because be violated the compact with
the people by which be held his Crown, and 'endeavour-
ed to subvert that religions establishment which they
teaarded as the 'bulwark of then Liberties. The peat
object of the Revolution was religious, civil, and political
Liberty together; and it was as much one of its principles
that the State should be Protestant, as that the Govern-
ment should be limited. The Constitution had indeed been
undergoing A most serious change ever since the iteroima-
t ion—a eltanae hostile to Popery,.'but favourable to Liberty.
Through litany ta lids, dangers, and impedimenta, this change
had bee:, slawl y making its way, and that week (no :natter
from what motives) which was begun he an .Henry,' was
completed by the people themselves, aided by a beloved So-
vereign. The Establishment founded at this juncture was.,
one raised upon the ruins of Roman Catholic Power ; and
why was it so ? Because Roman Catholic Principles had been
found from experience to be hostile to a free Government.—
Milton, Locke, Temple, and Somers, have recorded this
opinion ; but we need not refer to Opinions of men, however
eminent, on this subject, since the legislative records of that
period satisfactorily prove the point. If this were not so,
' why should the Declaration against Transubstantiation have
been passed in the reign of King Charles the Second ? Was'
not that Declaration required to be signed by every Member
' of the House of Commons, and what could this- be done for
but to peep Roman Catholics cut of Paaliament ? What was
the Oath of Supremacy framed for at the Revolution, but
fur the same pin pose, and why did that oath assert, that
" no Foreign Poker ought to hare any jurisdiction, either
civil or religions, within this realm," except it were to prove,
that a complete resistance to the power of the gtoman See, tt
and an exclusion of Roman Catholics from Pat li:talent, were
necessaia before the Liberties of the People could be esta-
blished upon any firm or permanent basis ? These facts
clearly thew, that the Statutes which were passed at the pc-.
rinds to which we have referred, were Statutes not enacted
for a temporary purpose, lint for the general security of the
Protestant Estahlishment. It was found that Popery Oil the
one hand, and Fanaticism on the other, were alike inimical
to English 'Ft tedom, and the Establishment as then settled
was esteemed the happy meeliom upon which English Freedom
could alone repose for security. Indeedathe Revolution inay
strictly be called the Ac 4 and Deed of the People; it was not
the work of any turbulent or factious Demagogues, who were
at.
prompted to embark its it from au hope that they might rise
into consequence upon the ruins of fallen Majesty: on the
contrary, it was an event brought about entirely through the
imprudence of Majesty itself, by an attempt to abuNsta the
Protestant Religion, " for which such great calamities had
" been sulfured, in order to establish on its ruins a mode of
" faith, which repeated acts of the Legislature had pro-
" scribed, and prescribed, not because it tended to establish
" in England the doctrines of Transubstantiation and Pur-
" gat*, doctrines in themselves of no political moment, hut
" because the unlimited power of 'the Sovereign had been
" made one of its principal tenets.":' These were the real
causes Of the ever-to•be-remembered event which we have
been contemplating ; Roman Catholic principles were the
occasion of it; to guard agaiustßoman Catho!ic interference
was its primary object. The results which proclaimed the'
success of Protestant exertion were great indeed; the, prin-
ciple of imposing Taxes without consent of Parliament was
declared to be illegal ; the dispensing power claimed by the
Crown was abolished; the right of petitioning seas obtained,
aril the Libery of the Press was established. These, there-
, fore, which are now holden op as the grandoiltietaa and prin-
ciples of Whiggism, were attained id consequence of the
ou-
position of a Protestant People to a Popish Novereigit. Is it
not therefore reasonable to suppose; that the RomanaCa-
tholics will remember this.? Will any tune venture to ;arm,
that these objects wouldhave been
,gained, or rather pre-
served, had the restrictive Statutes to which we have alluded
not have passed ? These considerations, however, I shall
defer for another lettera and having, I think, sliewu that the
Revolution of Ina§ encircled a Protestant Throne with a
Protestant Parliament. and Protestant Miniseere, and took
especial care to guard against all foreign Roman Catholic in-
terference and political asceotlancy at home, I shall endea-
your in my next to examine how those who cAli themselves
WHiGs, and profess a sincere adherence to the Revolution of
last, can consistently support the present claim of the
Roman Catholics. 'roues, &c.
Leicester, 14th April, Ma. . BIiPPANXICVS,

s• Vide Dr. Kippi,i's Sermon preached before Ile Revolu-
tion Sr cioy in 1768.
t History of England, W. and M.
De Loline, p. 54. • •

SOMERSETSHIRE COUNTY MEETING ON THE
„CATHOLIC CLAINIiL—We. are desired to state, that
'the Requisition, against which an angry Protest
has-appeared- in the Sherborne Newspaper of last
Monday, was sent to the High Sheriff i 4 the
County Init ten days 'ago, and that it oinfaius
nearly ninety names of the Magistracy, Clergy,
and others, and which were affixed. to it, not
through the medium of an active canvass, as has
been insinuated, but spontaneonsly, and front a
conviction of the great national importance of the
subject, and the propriety of the measure which
it proposed. Neither does the Requisition breathe
the spirit of intemperance, nor is it -in any shape a
remnant of election politics. It merely solicits
the Sheriff, at his own convenience and discre-
tion, to assemble this great county, that they may
have an opportunity of petitioning the. Houses of
Parliament on a vital question to the tititish Con-
stitution. The Requisitioners desire to call, in a
firm but temperate and respectful menner, for the
interference of the Grand Connell of the nation,
and to express their Opinions and feeling S, accord-
ing to one of 11. e dearest rights of the lititish
subject, throng!, the medium of Petition ; be•
lieving, as they do, that the concessions sought
by their Roman Catholic fellow subjects are preg-
nant with mischief desirnetive of our happy Con-
stitution.—(Tutintou, 30th Mora, 1819 )

LI fERATIV

The SSW of VIRGIL. Translated by CtiAttLES STMMos's,
D.D. of Jesus Collegv, Oxford.— ito.

I:4Q
Vella videraur, et in rnedii3 conatibils mgrx
Succidialas,,non Lin; arc vd!et.
We have founittbe-columns which we haiev4e•
(Heated to Irtkom and his last Translator suge-
neraliy acceptable to offr critical Readers,
we regret
.the necessity imposed on its of occa-
sionally suspending them ;•and we lOok forward
with concern to the period whets, from an ex-
haustion ot the mine, we shall no longer be able
to diversify our Paper with this classical material.
In our regular progress through Dr. SYMMONS'S
it:lek, we have now entered on the Notes which
are attached to the Seventh' Book ; and from thN
portion-of the work we lately extracted what ap-
peared to us to he a complete vindication of the
last six hooks of the AugtAtan Epic flow that
charge of inferiority to which they have generally
been exposed. On the present occasion we shall
produce other Notes, which refer likewise to the
defence of the great Roman Poet from some
charges of smaller motnent, and we ate free to
confess that, as the advocate -of his Author, Dr.
SYMMONS seems to us to be, eve' y instance,
entirely successful. We must avow also that, in
this-age of false taste and - of illegitimate poetry,
we regard it as of public utility to exhibit the
kind of poetry which bears-the impress of immor•
!silty, and to illustrate, as minutely as possible,
the conduct of a Poem which has reached us with
the admiration of neatly twenty centuries.—
B. vii, 48. " Now Erato, attend," &c.
" Some critics have advanced that this part of
end
the .rEneis is the commencement
~ of a
,new.second action ; and have adthiced this invoea i‘ut
of the :Muse in evidence of the tt tub of their as-
sertion, But as Nvell might they attentpt to prove,
trout the invocation of the Moses by llomtts.
When he is shout to enumerate the forces ot the
contending armies, that he inteoded to begin 'ail
act ion distinct from.the great aelon ot his Poem
This part or the action its the illueis is evidently
that to.wbieh all that has preceded it, is directly
referable, and to invoke the Muse is customary
with our rust, whenever any events of especial.
importance are to be related by hint. His choice
ot Erato on this occasion, as the, subject of his
invocation, has fancifully been supposed to be
consequence of the love, which is imputed as the
cause of the sanguinary conflicts in the succeed-
jog Books. If, its the beginning of the Fourth
Book, the Poet had invoked this peculiar Mine,,
whose name designates her as the Muse of Love,
1 should have concurred its the opinion of. his
appropriated •design. But the Poets, es' is well
known, frequently invoke any ot the Misses
indifferently, whatever may be their particu-
lar topic ; and lucre, Erato, as 1 reel per-
suaded, is invoked me.rely as the representative
of the sisterhood ot Pat nas,us. _ Love, in-
deed, bas very little concern with the action in the-
last six hooks_of the ZOneis. Without any refer-
ence to the Princess, ./Eneas solicits, for nothing.
more than an es'ahlistment in boily ; and it is
calm ksble that Inc mentions her only once, when
on the contingency ot ltii victoi y over Timms, he
proposes to give her name to the city which be
shall brutal. Site was, as it were, forced on him
by Fate and the G,;(16, for the incorporation of
the two Nations ; and site seems to have engaged
yery little, if any, of his attention. Even with
Tornus, who was the avowed lover, prde
and a sense of invaded rights, rather than love,
appear to have been the inflnencing motives of
his conduct. The Maiden, indeed, herself, as
there can be no question, was attached to Turnns,
and prayed, as is probable, very fervently, with
her Mother,. for the destruction of the alien and
intrusive .2-Eueas. But her inclinations are with-
out effect upon the action. She is the entire pro-
perty of her Father and the State, and she is
more a mute, among the persons of the drama,
than Glycerin's] (for Glyceyitsm does utter a few.
words behind the scene) •in the. Audi hos Of Te-
rence; Lavinia, in short,- has nothing to do in
the piece but to blush, and to,weq,' and to gait
the deciSion.of the vvar.":.•

L. 623. " A stag of beauteous form," &c.
" The death of a tame stag, the favourite of a
Country Girl, has been considered by some Cri-
tics? and, among others,' by the lively Vour-Atc2,
as a cause inadequate to the producNon of a uar.
not it seems to me that these ingenious men have
taken either an imperfet-Or au erroneous view of
the subject. The effective calis'es of the war be-
tween the Latins and the Trojans, were thelti-
vaded interests of Tuirins, warmly csponsed by.
the Queen, and possessing, by her influence:,
,and
by his oern popularity, as a native and an heroics,
Prince, the sympathy .of the Litwin people..The'
death of the-Tame stag is introduced merely as-an
accessary to the principal causes, and for the pur-
pose of exasperating the mind of the rustic Form-
'Winn.; and, surely, nothing could bc—betrer
adapted to the design for wbidt it was introduced„
The stag which was killed belonged tit the fathily
of Tyrrheus, a Mail who, from his ofiice, was of
prime authority among the landholders and pea-
sants yof Latium ; man also of considerable con-
sequence in the state, us we subsequently find his
sous commanding the rear of the Latin army.
The Creature, likewise, was killed (arid this cir-
cumstance meat not be overlooked) by strangers,
intruding. upon their coasts, who would lotoraliY
be the objects of popular animosity awl sospicion.•
In the tray which, in the common course of thing 4„
ensues, Lattan blood is shed, the blood of one of
the sons of Tyrrheus himself, and of a man re-
nowned throughout the country, for the extent of
his possessioos and the amiabienes of his charac-
ter : nay, to el%e greater aggravation to the of-
fence in this last instance, the man is shin as he
is endeavouring to pacify the irritated partiPs, and
to mediate a peace. Surely, then, the death of
the mute stag, with all its dependence of strongly
concatenated events, cannot be regarded us too
trivial to be admitted among the co-operating
causes which hurried the Latins into war. If it
had been assigned as the chief, or even us the sole
cause of the hostilities between the nations, I am
not certain that I could have condemned it for
inadequacy to its effect. Nothing, in tact, is
little, which is naturally anti firmly connected
with an important result. 'Elie whole desci Viol)
of the stag is highly beautiful.''