Volume IV Part 11 (2/2)
Beware or ye be woe, Know your frende fro your foe, Haue ynough, and say hoe: And do wel and better, & flee sinne, _And seeke peace and holde you therin,_
& so biddeth Iohn Trewman & all his fellowes.”
The reader has perceived, from the last lines of this curious state-paper, how well the National a.s.sembly has copied its union of the profession of universal peace with the practice of murder and confusion, and the blast of the trumpet of sedition in all nations. He will in the following const.i.tutional paper observe how well, in their enigmatical style, like the a.s.sembly and their abettors, the old philosophers proscribe all hereditary distinction, and bestow it only on virtue and wisdom, according to their estimation of both. Yet these people are supposed never to have heard of ”the rights of man”!
JACK MYLNER.
”Jakke Mylner asket help to turne his mylne aright.
”He hath grounden smal smal, The Kings sone of heven he schal pay for alle.
Loke thy mylne go a rygt, with the fours sayles, and the post stande in steadfastnesse.
”With rygt and with mygt, With skyl and with wylle, Lat mygt helpe rygt, And skyl go before wille, And rygt before mygt: Than goth oure mylne aryght.
And if mygt go before ryght, And wylle before skylle; Than is oure mylne mys a dygt.”
JACK CARTER understood perfectly the doctrine of looking to the _end_, with an indifference to the _means_, and the probability of much good arising from great evil.
”Jakke Carter pryes yowe alle that ye make a G.o.de _ende_ of that ye hane begunnen, and doth wele and ay bettur and bettur: for at the even men heryth the day. _For if the ende be wele, than is alle wele._ Lat Peres the Plowman my brother duelle at home and dygt us corne, and I will go with yowe and helpe that y may to dygte youre mete and youre drynke, that ye none fayle: lokke that Hobbe robbyoure be wele chastysed for lesyng of youre grace: for ye have gret nede to take G.o.d with yowe in alle yours dedes. For nowe is tyme to be war.”
[24] See the wise remark on this subject in the Defence of Rights of Man, circulated by the societies.
[25] The primary a.s.semblies.
A
LETTER
TO
A PEER OF IRELAND
ON THE
PENAL LAWS AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS,
PREVIOUS TO
THE LATE REPEAL OF A PART THEREOF IN THE SESSION OF THE IRISH PARLIAMENT, HELD A.D. 1782.
CHARLES STREET, LONDON, Feb. 21, 1782
My Lord,--I am obliged to your Lords.h.i.+p for your communication of the heads of Mr. Gardiner's bill. I had received it, in an earlier stage of its progress, from Mr. Braughall; and I am still in that gentleman's debt, as I have not made him the proper return for the favor he has done me. Business, to which I was more immediately called, and in which my sentiments had the weight of one vote, occupied me every moment since I received his letter. This first morning which I can call my own I give with great cheerfulness to the subject on which your Lords.h.i.+p has done me the honor of desiring my opinion.
I have read the heads of the bill, with the amendments. Your Lords.h.i.+p is too well acquainted with men, and with affairs, to imagine that any true judgment can be formed on the value of a great measure of policy from the perusal of a piece of paper. At present I am much in the dark with regard to the state of the country which the intended law is to be applied to. It is not easy for me to determine whether or no it was wise (for the sake of expunging the black letter of laws which, menacing as they were in the language, were every day fading into disuse) solemnly to reaffirm the principles and to reenact the provisions of a code of statutes by which you are totally excluded from THE PRIVILEGES OF THE COMMONWEALTH, from the highest to the lowest, from the most material of the civil professions, from the army, and even from education, where alone education is to be had.[26]
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