Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1856-05-29

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says the Hon. John p Kennedy, "was
con,pelled by the Charter to respect the
rights of members of the Church of Eng
land-he could not, then, but respect the
rights of all other christians maryland
(adds he) was the land of the sanctuary, all
christians were invited within it's borders,
and that there they found written covenant
| &. e. the Charter) of security against all
encl lchments on their rights of conscience
by the Lord Proprietary and his govern
ment." The truth is ''the original settle
ment partook in no degree of the illusions
of romantic adventure which it is SO
|eloquently invested by Mr. Davis and 9TH
ers. ''Nor did it owe its conception (says
Mr.. Kennedy either to religious persecu-
ton, or to that desire which is supposed to
have influenced other Colonies to form So
clety dedicated to the promotion of parti-
cular worship. There is no evidence that
Calvert's ardor in these undertakings was
stimulated by any motive having reference
to particular religious opinions. We are,
on the contrary, bound to presume that his
purpose was in part the advancement of his
own reputation, the increase of the wealth
of his family, and as the Maryland Charter
expresses it, "a laudable and p;ous zeal for
extending the Christian religion, and also
the territories of our (the British) empire"
But whatever honor is due to the concep-
ton and authorship of this charter of reii-
glons freedom, it may not be nationally
doubted Or gainsayed that it owes it's form
and principles more to the peculiar circum-
stances of the time, than to the purely gene
rous, disinterested and uutrammeled sug-
gestion of any religionist or individual As
to Calvert he could hardly ask less, Or ex-
pect, or by possibility procure more. And
Charles, though a jealous and uncompro-
missing "Anglo-Catholic," Gas Mr. Davis
very properly expresses it, could hardly
deny less favour Gin distant Colony at least)
to the co-reGgionists of his beloved Roman
Catholic wife-while the dominant and
growing power Of Puritanism in his realm
would and did compel him, at the same time,
to respect the rights Of the multitude of Pro-
testant sects. In any event the Charter was
all 1t IS by Protestant monarchs act and
~M. And if it be asked why Charles was
less liberal to the liege men of his more i'm
mediate realm than to the subjects of the
Proprietary government [ answer, that
if liberation for all religious opinions, was
not complete i'll England it was at least en-
joyed to greater extent there than under
any otherreligious establishment in the civil
lied world. That Charles the First (consi-
dering his ecclesiastical principles) was quite
as likely, to say the least, as the Proprieta-
ry, to desire its more perfect and general
exercise and if not actuated by the love of
liberation at all-he could not but know,
that, at that particular epoch of our common
history, nothing could tempt so many to try
the dangerous and raging main-or would
eonduce more rapidly and certainly to swell
the population of the Colony into prosper
Gus and profitable dependency and princi-
pality-as the proclamation of the most I'M
limited indulgence in the matter of consci-
entious scruple and religious opinion
These things being so, it is difficult to
perceive what wonderful merit belongs to
my Lord Baltimore in the premises and
not so easy to join with clean hands and
pure heart, )" in the fashionable cant of a GER
tain class Of orators and popular-favour seek
ers-about Lord Baltimore, as ''the first
legislator who proclaimed the sacred rights
of conscience, and established for the gov
eminent of his Colony the principle, not
merely of liberation, but perfect religious
freedom and equality among all sects of
Christians. wide late Buchanan speech
in city of Baltimore.) Stubborn history and
invincible truth, the meanwhile, constran-
ing the contradictory admission that this re-
ligious freedom was ''secured by the Char
ter to the people, whether his Lordship
would or ot)-and that cit was the most
liberal charter which had ever been granted
by sovereign to his SUBJECTS"
The proclamation of full and complete to-
leration Gin the early Colonial Charter for
every Christian denomination and opinion,
we have limited with reason we think would
naturally constitute the strongest magma
BILE incentive to men of the old world, of
every faith, to flock to the Proprietary es-
Enlistment in Maryland-as refuge from
the storms and conflicts of religious contro-
versy, and from comparative insecurity a
broad-and therefore it is not to be wonder
ed at, that not few Protestants should
have swelled even the first company of ''pil-
grims" who came over in ''The Ark" and
'The Dove'-(apparently with no other
than Jesuit priests for their ministers at
this halcyon hour, and to this religious Ely
SUM in the beautiful county of St. Mary's.
Nor ought we to be surprised that the Pro
testant element, continued in greater or less
proportion to swell in, until, Gin not many
years after the settlement it was confess
eddy dominant, both in respect of political
power and numerical strength and superb
GRITTY. ''Not long (says Mr.. Davis, D. Isl,
after the passage Of the act relating to re
ligion,' the Protestants, it is admitted, out
grew their Roman Catholic brethren; : and
in 1859, succeeded very easily in their at