352 PROCEEDINGS of the POLITICAL CLUB, &c. Aug However, Sir, to explain and en- methods might be found for guarding force the intention of that act, it against this danger, befide that of will be very easy, by a fhort bill, dividing the fovereign power; for to add a claufe for providing, that that it is by this bill to be divided, in cafe the next heir to the crown cannot by any fineffe be difputed: be under age, or otherwife not ca- Whilft minifters, or if you pleafe, pable to act, the parliament fo af. A the administration, which confifts of fembled fhall neither be prorogued the minifters, can be removed at nor diffolved by any perfon in the pleasure, they are but the fervants king's name, until after they have of the crown; but the moment you appointed a regency to govern in make them irremoveable, and nothe king's name during that inca- thing to be done without their conpacity. And this, in my opinion, fent, you give them a share of the Sir, is the only general law we can B fovereign power, you make them make, in order to provide for all future partners with the fovereign, or the minorities; for to talk of fettling a perfon who reprefents the fovereign; form of regency, or method of go- and as they have the greatest fhare, vernment, either by law or precedent, they will probably foon become that is to fuit all future ininorities, masters. is a vain undertaking: Every future regency muft be, as all paft re- C gencies have been, in fome fhape or other, different from the former; and this is fo evident, that I am apt to fufpect the defign's being made ufe of only as a pretence for doing what ought not to be done; for without any compliment to the mi- D nifters who advised this bill, or to those who had the framing of it, I believe, they have more penetration than to imagine, that they are making a precedent, or can make a precedent, fit to be followed by all future generations. But, Sir, it is faid, the regent is to have in every thing a negative voice, and the fole difpofal of all pofts and places not excepted in the bill. As to her negative voice, I fhall presently fhew, I have fome reafon to doubt of it; but fuppofe it to be fo, in many cafes fomething must be done, or confufion muft enfue; and if she will not act as directed by the council of regency, fhe cannot act at all, confequently confusion must enfue. Sir, ministers are answerable for concurring with the king in their feveral departments, E if what is done be wrong; but they are not answerable for not concur F What may be the reafon, Sir, for thus precipitating a regency fcheme, before the event happens, I do not know; but this I am fure of, they have chosen the very worst form of a regency, when all circumftances directed them to chufe the beft. What I call the best, Sir, is that which comes nearest to our eftablished form of government, and confequently must be a fole regent with fovereign power. This, I hall grant, might be dangerous, if the perfon to be appointed regent were G the prefumptive heir of the crown, or of such high rank as might encourage him to form projects for placing himself upon the throne ; but many ring, let the measure be never fo right and neceffary, because the king can remove them: Since then you are to make the regent's ministers irremoveable, I think, you should make them anfwerable for refusing to concur.. Whereas, for any thing in this bill, they may refufe their concurrence to the most neceffary measure, or grant it only upon their own conditions. I could fuppofe a cafe where the regent must act or the and her children be undone, and yet where if the does act with the concurrenee, and upon the conditions prefcribed her by the council of regency, the and her children muft 1751. PROCEEDINGS of the POLITICAL CLUB, &c. 353 A be equally undone : Suppose an in- Then as to her fole difpofal of So much, Sir, for the power of the regent: And now as to the power of the council of regency, it is E said, they can never meet as a coune of regency but when called by the regent, nor take any thing under their confideration but what is proposed by her. As to their meeting, Sir, it would feem to me by their having a chief or head affign. F ed them, that they can meet as often as he pleafes: The bill fays, they shall meet when her royal high nefs fhall please to direct; but there are no words to prevent their meeting without her direction, nor are there any words impowering her to put an end to their meeting; fo that, when once they are met, they may fit as long as they please, adjourn from day to day, and fo continue their Auguft, 1751. feffion from the beginning to the end of the regency. And as to what they are to take into their confideration, I can find nothing in the aft for reftraining them from confidering upon whatever matters they please, or for confining them to thofe matters only that are laid before them by the regent: Nay, I do not find, that he has a right to be prefent at their deliberations; and by the claufe for declaring what number shall be a quorum, they feem to be impowered to act, as well as deliberate, without her concurrence or confent ; for the bill fays, that any five of the faid council, being fo affembled, shall be fufficient to act as fuch council of regency, and all aƐs to be done by a major part of the council so assembled, fhall be deemed to be acts of the council of regency; which words to me feem to fhew,, that the regent is not in every thing to have a negative voice. We know, Sir, how apt all courts and councils are to ingrofs more pow. er than what was at firft defigned for them; and tho' this council be called in the bill, a council to affift her royal highness in the adminiftration of government, I am afraid, it will be found to be a council to direct her royal highness in the administration of government; for if I were confined not to do any thing of importance, without the confent of two or three of my fervants, I fhould from that moment look upon them, not as my fervants, but my mafters; becaufe, in order to obtain their confent in matters of importance, it would be neceffary for me to ask their confent in the mereft trifles; therefore if this bill fhould país into a law, as it now ftands, and we should fall under the misfortune of his majefty's death, during the nonage of his fucceffor, the princefs regent, fo far as I can fee, has nothing to do, but to fubmit herfelf entirely to be governed by him, who may happen to get the lead in the council of regen G ey i 354 Abstract of the Afiatick TOLERANT. Aug. her children (if any fhould happen, An Account of a Book, intitled, The Afiatick Tolerant. A Treatife for the Ufe of Zeokinizul, King of the Kofirans, furnamed the Beloved. AWork tranflated from the Arabick of the Traveller Beckrinoll. By M. de ***, Paris. cy; and what may be the confequence of this, God only knows; but whatever it may be, I am fure, I have at prefent as much reafon to recommend the ftory of Richard III. to the perufal of thofe who are now fo needleЛly fond of a council A of regency, as they have to recommend that story to me; and I fhall farther recommend to them the story of Edward VI. and the terrible confequences that befel this nation by the untimely death of that hopeful young prince, and the ambition of B him who was at the head of that council of regency. Happy had it been for that prince, happy had it been for the nation, if his father, Henry VIII. had, notwithstanding the complaifance of his parliament, left the appointment of a regency to Click. the next parliament that fhould af femble after his death; but as he had got from the parliament a power to appoint a regency by his last will, the intrigues of the cabinet prevailed, and produced that bydra, which brought fo many misfortunes upon D this kingdom, and would have been the occafion of the utter extirpation of the proteftant religion, if queen Elizabeth had not been preferved by a miraculous fort of providence. E If this bill fhould pafs, Sir, in the form it is at prefent, we fhall all have reafon to pray, that it may not be attended with any fuch fatal confequences; for if it fhould, I am fure, neither the religion nor virtue of the present times can intitle us to hope for any relief from Providence; but by the wifdom of this F houfe, I hope the bill will either be rejected, or fo amended as to give that gracious princefs, who is named in it, not only the name but the power of a regent; for as the bill now ftands, I muft look upon it rather as an infult than a compliment G to her royal highnefs, and, in my opinion, a cruel infult too, becaufe it is making her anfwerable for all the misfortunes that may happen to 1 excufe errors, but not cruelties. Taken from a foreign Journal, 1750. not HIS little thy the spention of the pub It were to be wifhed, for the honour of those who make profeffion of christianity, that there never had been any occafion to examine the queftion, which the author treats of in it. But the fpirit of intolerance is fo little banished from amongst them, that there is a neceffity, from time to time, to fhew the incompatibility of it with the principles of good fenfe, the fpirit of the gospel, and found policy. This is the defign which the Anonymous has propofed to himself, in making ufe of the ftrongeft reafonings that have been advanced in favour of tolera. tion, by Mr. Bayle, in his philofophical commentary; Mr. Locke, in fome of his letters and other works; and Mr. Noodt, in his difcourfes upon the power of the fovereigns, and liberty of confcience. He has fet forth their principles in few words, has explained them with great clearness, and has expreffed them with force. The author calls himfelf a Roman Catholick, and declares, that he had 'undertaken his work purely out of compaflion to the reformed of France. "It is not their cause I plead, fays he, in the conclufion of his book, it is the cause of truth. I 17513 Of the PREFACE and DEDICATION. have no relation with them. I had "Emort, if thou complainest that this is betraying thee, make thyfelf enemies that I may hate." C To fay fomething ftill more pre- B cife of the pretended or real author of this work, we shall observe, that he takes the name of Bekrinoll, that is to fay, Crebillon; that he calls himfelf of Paris, an enemy to tyranny, full of zeal for the fervice of his country and for the glory of his prince; that his pretended tranflator gives him the teftimony of being equally diftinguished by the qualities of the mind and heart, of which he knows and avoids the errors; and that he would have had the courage to present it to Zeokinizul †, if cou- D rage alone had been fufficient. This difguifed name, in which is found that of Crebillon, and this allufion to one of his works, fufficiently fhew that he is the author of this book, or that they have a mind to put it to his account. Be it as it E will, it cannot but do honour to him who has wrote it, fince the principles of it are conformable to humanity, and to the fpirit of chriftianity. Under an ingenious fiction, like that of M. Fontinelle in his Princefs Eenegu, and that of Dr. Swift in his Tale of the Tub, is reprefented to us, in the preface, the manner in which Rome has aggrandized itfelf, and made of perfecution and intolerance the firm fupport of its throne: It fpeaks particularly of the ravages which it has caufed in France, and fhews that the edict of Nantz had brought a fure remedy to all the 355 mischiefs, that a difference of religion had occafioned in that kingdom. From thence it paffes to the means, which cardinal Richelieu used to: enervate the force of it, and to the manner in which Lewis XIV. fuppreffed it. It comes at laft to what was done on this account under the ministry of cardinal du Bois, and to what has been feen fince the last war. This fpirit of intolerance, which feems to revive, makes this book neceffary. It is dedicated to the king of France, and we are affured that it has been read by his minifters. The epiftle dedicatory breathes a noble boldness. We cannot help tranfcribing fome pieces of it.' "Great by your conquefts, fays he to that prince, the question is at prefent, Sire, to increase the fplen-' dor of your glory by opening your eyes upon the miferies of your fubjects. There are three millions of them, who have groaned in oppreffion for above 60 years. All their crime confifts in remaining inviola. bly attached to the fentiments of the moft illuftrious of your ancestors, the great Kraten-Hueri §; fentiments` which they prefer, I know not by what blindness, to thofe which that prince embraced afterwards out of neceffity. It is true, for I must not difguife any thing, that they are accused of violating the laws; but it is no less than what all the fenfible men among us grant, that they cannot obferve them without infringing thofe of a greater king than you, Sire, of a king by whom you reign,' of the immortal Riftkefufi. Heir to the throne of Kraten-Hueri, can you fuffer, Sire, that in contempt of his facred promise they should perfecute those, to whom your majesty owes your crown?-It does not belong to me, Sire, to give you lefG fons, but it belongs ftill lefs to a monarch of the Kofirans to make unhappy men. Your great grandfafather ceased to be great, when he Y y z began § Henry IV. Jefus Chrift. Languedoc. † Rome. ↑ Lewis XV. 356 Toleration necessary, and a Chriftian Duty. A Aug. fion of Lewis XIV. to the throne of Lewis XIII, no more than of what he fays of Lewis XV. and his great grandfather Lewis XIV *. The Roman church and the clergy of that communion are not more fpared. After he has faid, that if the fpirit of charity was the principle of perfecution, it would punish vices, he adds; Is it not indeed infinitely more criminal to carry into another's bed the pleasures which they retrench from that to which they are united B by oaths taken before the altars, than to fay, that Emor has not a right to depopulate kingdoms and infenfibly to annihilate itself by making men and even women eunuchs? Is it not infinitely more criminal to dishonour human nature by exceffes of fenfuaClity, than to believe that Emor is not a magician, fkilful enough to operate with four words contradictory prodigies? Is it not infinitely more crimi nal to deceive men, either by the infraction of treaties, or by fubtle tricks, than to fay with experience, D that Emor and its conclave are fubject to be mistaken even involuntarily? In the body of the work, the author demonftrates, that toleration is a chriftian duty, because it is the characteriflick mark of a good chriftian, because intolerance is exprefly contrary to the law of nature; becaufe it has dreadful confequen. ces; and because its principles are contradictory, and rejected by the moft able lawyers. He fhews, next, that civil toleration is neceffary in good policy, because princes have no right of inspection over confciences; because the intolerants are the greatest enemies to the fociety; and because their maxims tend to arm all men, one against another. Finally, he fhews, that the edict of Nantz was irrevocable, and that in justice, equity, and found policy, it ought to be reftored. This is, in To perpetuate the empire of vices, brief, the purport of this book; and to destroy that of opinions, what fubwe fhould here conclude our extract, verfion of order! Why do we let (fays our Journalist) were there not that reproach fubfift, which the infifome particular paffages, upon which dels continually throw out against us, it will not be useless to stop a little. E that our life deftroys our fentiments? We obferve, first, that it were to May it not be, as Ebba de Larsvil + be wished, that the author had been faid, because the Derviffest, who more cautious in his expreffions. It are the principal favourers of intole is difficult to make ourselves liked rance, find themselves infinitely more by persons, to whom we tell hard proper to multiply mankind and truths; but we make them our ene- vice, than to multiply errors ?"mies, when we exprefs them in F And lower, " Dervifles, Fadirs §, too ftrong terms. Self-love at fuch Ebba's, Kueves**, Klarnadis +t? time plays its game; they are tempt- -Is it for the good of the Kanvilied to look on all this as the effect of ans that you have obtained fo mapaffion and a fpirit of party; and ny thundering decrees? Alas! if you the beft reasonings are without efhave fo much zeal for the falvation fect. We cannot therefore approve of others, why have you not fome of the infinuations of the Anonymous G for yourselves? Why do you fcanagainft the legitimacy of the fuccef- dalize us by your worldlinefs? Why Here the Journalist quotes some very fewers passages from the book, which we shall not medille with, any more than with some others towards the end of this abstract. + Abbé de Villars. + Pries. § Farbers. H Abbots. • Bifbops. tt Cardinali. 11 Calvinifi |