George Jacob Holyoake

“ Gentlemen, in the pertinacity of my open reply to Maitland, you may find something objectionable, but I happen to be an admirer of that sentiment expressed by the honest 'Vicar of Wakefield'—'In all human institutions a smaller evil is allowed to procure a greater good; as in politics, a province may be given away, to secure a kingdom; in medicine, a limb may be lopt off, to preserve the body. But in religion, the law is written and inflexible, never to do evil.' Then, gentlemen, I ought to be tolerated in the truthfulness of my answer. ”

“ Respect for the law is an intelligent virtue—a sign of fitness for freedom so important that none but an enemy would obscure the duty or weaken the sentiment. If accused, in the matter which led to my Trial, of breaking the law, I might plead that there was no law to break, and therefore I could not break one. What is called the common law relating to blasphemy is a mere caprice, an opinion interpreted by ignorance or sectarian prejudice, and enforced at the call of bigotry—malevolent to the humble while neutral towards the rich. ”

“ I claim merely the right to speak my convictions; to show a man the right path when I think he takes the wrong one.
It is a melancholy maxim in these courts of law, that the greater the truth the greater the libel; and so it would be with me this day could I demonstrate to you that there is no Deity. The more correct I am the severer would be my punishment, because the law regards the belief in a God to be the foundation of obedience among men. ”

“ Will you thus draw attention to a subject you perhaps think had better be forgotten, and create a conviction that it must be a greatly important one, since you erect it into public notice by directing the thunders of the law at young and comparatively inexperienced believer in its principle?
Would you test my opinions by my emotions on the bed of death? Let me assure you, that if men can expect to die in peace who can send their fellow men to a gaol because of honest difference of opinion, I have nothing to fear. ”

“ Gentlemen, which is to be believed, divines and philosophers, or the common law? These persons speak as though they believed Christianity to be true; the common law punishes as though it knew it to be false.
If the state religion be true, my opinion can never overcome it; and by convicting me you publish your consciousness of error in the cause you are placed there to defend as truth. If God be truth you libel him and his power, and publish the omnipotence of error. ”

“ Learned divines, and sage writers on atheism, agree that it is too absurd to need refutation—too barren to satisfy, too monstrous to attract, too fearful to allure, too dumb to speak, and too deathly not to appal its own votaries. It is styled too grave to entertain youth, and too devoid of consolation for the trembling wants of age—too abstract for the comprehension of the ignorant, and too unreasonable to gain the admiration of the intelligent. ”

“ One of my fellow-prisoners was an epileptic man, whose ignorance and irritability, more than any crime, had led to his imprisonment. As I kept a sort of school in our common room, and taught a few things to those about me who were disposed to learn, I had become interested in Upton, a humble and unhappy man, who learned at grammar anxiously. Some nights he would fall out of bed in an epileptic fit, and lie groaning on the stone floor for an hour or more together. It was in vain that we shouted to the turnkeys. They who can hear a man think of escaping, cannot hear when he breaks his neck. ”

“ Hence, in the course I took, I did not think it necessary to calculate consequences; a man's true concern is with his principles, and not with his fate. I pretended to no public virtue, and I laid claim to no praise—I did no more than every man ought to do. That doing so little has been so rewarded by the exertions of many friends for my protection, I must be pleased—but had nothing been done, I trust I should have found pride in penury and satisfaction under neglect, in the reflection that I had discharged my duty and preserved consistency. ”

“ If, as I admit, persecution will put down opinion, what objection's there to its employment when it puts down error? I answer, 'Beware of its use, because it may put down the truth also.' Persecution is not an ordeal. Free discussion is the only test capable of distinguishing and establishing the truth. The proper condemnation of persecution is, that it is an illegitimate opposition which is sure to be discountenanced as men become manly and refined. ”

“ I thought I never should be called upon to stand in this dock, with all its polluting and disgusting associations, to answer for mere matters of speculative opinion. I did think that such persons possessed a sense of the powers of the human mind that would have prevented the interposition of penal judges upon such subjects.
But to Mr. Grantley Berkeley, as foreman of the grand jury who found a true bill against me, I beg to draw your attention. ”

“ I see no more right that a person twenty-one years of age has to elect a member of parliament than he has to be a juryman. I conceive that you may just as well say that every adult male has a right to sit upon a jury to decide the most complicated and difficult questions of property, or that every man has a right to exercise the judicial functions, as the people did in some of the republics of antiquity. ”

“ O waste of money and prayers that should have been employed on Christian men. O infantile fatuity! Do I not reap the whirlwind for my pains? I learned the accents of piety from my mother's lips. She was and still is a religious woman. Whatever may be the dissent I entertain, I have never spoken of her opinions in the language of contempt. I have always left her (as she to her honour has left me) , to enjoy her own opinions. In early youth I was religious. I question whether there is any here who have spent more time than I did as a Sunday school teacher. ”

“ At length one morning the heavy corridor door grated on its harsh hinges, and the morose turnkey—fit messenger of misery—put a letter into my hand. As it had been, as usual, broken open—for there is no feeling, not even that of affection and death, respected in a gaol—Ogden knew its contents, and in justice to him I must say he endeavoured, as well as one whose ability lay in his moroseness could, to speak a word of apology and sympathy. ”

“ I believe you consider Christianity a benefit. I regret that I feel it is not so, and I claim the privilege of saving what is true to me. I have ever been ready to acquire correct notions. I have publicly called upon parties whose duty it was to teach me—and who were well paid for teaching—to assist me in sifting out the truth. But they have chosen the strong arm of the law rather than strong argument. Jean Jacques Rousseau says in his 'Confessions,' 'Enthusiasm for sublime virtue is of little use in society. ”

“ We have recast the practice of controversy: we forbid to ourselves to suspect evil motives, or to impute insincerity to others; the doubtful act we propose to judge by evidence alone, and to put the best construction on the dubious word. Thus we annihilate Antagonism, the eldest foe of Progress, by imposing laws on impulse. Our search in every system is directed after moral truth; and, less exacting than the Christian, we accept it, whether given by Inspiration, confirmed by Miracle, attested by Prophecy, or not. ”

“ The entertaining of opinions is not opposed to law if people keep them to, themselves. If they step out of the way, and seek to propagate them by undermining the institutions of the country, by denying the existence of a God, by robbing others of "the hopes set before them," without offering the flimsiest pretext, it is the duty of all to prevent this. Such is the opinion of those gentlemen who set on foot these proceedings, and no clamour of persecution will prevent them from doing what they believe to be their duty. ”

“ After this, I can only say, that I have greater difficulty than ever in believing that humanity is the associate of piety; and if Christianity has no expounders more attractive than those I have fallen in with, the day of my conversion is still distant.
'It was taught to me that the religion of Jesus cherished kindness, that it promoted our best affections, and reclaimed the erring in love. But how is this accomplished in gaol? The man who goes there must leave his affections, his feelings, and his sensibilities behind him—for in gaol all are blighted, deadened, and destroyed. ”

“ Christianity is but ill-defended by refusing audience or toleration to the objections of unbelievers. But whilst we would have freedom of inquiry restrained by no laws but those of decency, we are entitled to demand, on behalf of a religion which holds forth to mankind assurances of immortality, that its credit be assailed by no other weapons than those of sober discussion and legitimate reasoning.' Our law has adopted that as its rule, and men are not permitted to make use of indecent language in reference to God and the Christian religion, without rendering themselves liable to punishment. ”

“ But I ought to say that during these proceedings the people in the court, of juster feeling than the magistrates, frequently expressed their disapprobation of the speeches made to me.
Mr. Capper's assertion that I was only actuated by a love of notoriety, were just the words to do me injury. The respectable people near, and the intelligent people at a distance, would believe the magistrate and disbelieve the sceptic, who had no friends to rebut the imputation. The vulgar bearing of this brutal old man lingered long in my memory as the most distinct thing of these proceedings. ”

“ Meaning, any man may err in youth. So I erred in being religious in my early days. If I am not religious now, deem me not criminal. Religion never did me a service, how then should I love it? But it assailed my youth with gloomy dogmas, now it assails my liberty. ”

“ The gentleman is never in a hurry, never in a contention. If you annoy him, are rude to him, impose upon him, or menace him, perhaps he quietly indicates his opinion of the impropriety, perhaps his resolution is taken without. He avoids you. His defence is prevention. Renewal of offence, renewal of intercourse, chance of altercation or repetition, is simply impossible. Such was Captain Mason. I watched his manners with pleasure—he governed the gaol like a drawing room, excepting that the desserts were not quite the same. I saw rude men baffled, they could not make out how. ”

“ When the associations of home have twined themselves around the feelings—after long industry and patient frugality have surrounded a man with some comforts unknown to his youth—few have the temper which will part from them and walk into a gaol at the call of duty. I should think this state the death of progress. When, some time ago, insuring my life in the Equity Law Insurance Office, I asked, before I took out my policy, whether it would be forfeited if my death was occasioned by imprisonment or transportation. ”

“ It therefore behoves everyone to set a guard over that liberty, for the loss of which no religion will ever compensate. The conviction should be permanent that Christianity is a fearful thing. But bad men may laud it—mistaken men may contend that there is some good in it—unthinking men may give currency to its terms—and weak men may connive at its delusions, but we ought to regard with different sentiments a system which tramples upon the feelings of humanity and the principles of liberty. Let us then secure the antidote—free expression of opposite opinion. ”