THE REPORTER.
"'TIS PLEASANT, THROUGH THE LOOP-HOLES OF RETREAT, TO PEEP AT SUCH A WORLD-- TO SEE THE STIR OF THE GREAT BABEL, AND NOT FEEL THE CROWD."
[NEW SERIES----VOL. I.]	WASHINGTON, (PA.) MONDAY, AUGUST 6th, 1821.	[NO. 11.

      MR. EDITOR,

      Sir--Being resolved that the present number shall close my series of essays upon the subject of compulsory observance of the institutes of christianity as vindicated by mr. T. the champion in behalf of a forced regard to christian precepts, I consider it necessary briefly to state my reasons for having so resolved. In the first place mr. T. acknowledged in his 5th No.¹ that, not without reason, I claimed victory over all my former opponents. This victory I gained, as he asserts, through their weakness and not by my own strength. Be this as it may, they were vanquished, and all that remains to be determined is with regard to mr. T. and myself. Mr. T. I cheerfully acknowledge was the ablest of my opponents, and I also, for a time, gave him credit for a greater degree of candor and politeness than any of my former antagonists, I was sorry, however, that I was afterwards constrained to alter my opinion of him in this respect. His seeming candor I soon discovered to be mechanical and his politeness artificial. With regard to his talents I was pleased to find them so respectable though no way enviable, hoping that it would render the controversy more interesting, and that the victory of truth would be the more illustrious. Two weeks have now transpired since mr. T. published his last No.² which from its tone and from this circumstance I apprehend he determined to be his last, in reply to what I had previously published. So then mr. T. has evaded the discussion of the following topics to which I challenge him.

      1st. No. 10, "Let mr. T. either admit or formally point out the defects of the following argument. If the following argument is refuted I give up the cause, if not it is established, and will be triumphant. Every man that does not sanctify the first day of the week, is either a professed member of the church or he is not; if he be, the church cannot fine him or commit him to prison, for such is not church discipline. But if he be not a member of the church, the church has no control over him. Nor can the state take control over religious concerns, for such it not its province--consequently, whether the man who profanes the first day, belong to the church, or only to the state, he cannot be punished by man for this offence." Mr. T. in his 7th No.³ admitted the three propositions on which this argument rests, but never attempted the above argument. The 8 items which I stated in my 10th No. he would insinuate I call my primary arguments. Not so, I called them principles or propositions on which my primary arguments rest. The above is one of my primary arguments which mr. T. cautiously evaded. Please see No. 10.

      2d. I challenge mr. T. to prove that the state of Pennsylvania has a divine and civil right to enact and enforce a law requiring of all members of the state the sanctification of one day in seven. On his doing this, I promised to prove that it had the same right to enact and enforce a law, under the same penalty, requiring of all unbaptized persons, submission to the ordinance of baptism, &c." This he never attempted. See "Flint's" review of T's No. 1,⁴ which I adopted in my reply to Timothy as my own sentiments, and requested him to consider it as such.

      3d. The dilemma, between the horns of which, I left mr. T. to work his way, he has not attempted to remove, but quietly reposes in its embrace. 'Tis better mr. T: quietly to rest in it, than to fatigue yourself by hard exertions, and still to be constrained to dwell between its horns. These evasions of mr. T. I consider very decisive with regard to the merits of the controversy.

      4th. In my 6th No. I pointed out the unconstitutionality of the practice of fining "Sabbath breakers," I quoted the 3d section of the 9th article of the good and wholesome constitution of Pennsylvania. This constitution is the supreme law of the land, which I sincerely respect, and even venerate. A clause in the article alluded to, reads as follows: "no man can of right be compelled to attend, erect, or support any place of worship, or to maintain any ministry against his consent; that no human authority can in any case whatever control or interfere with the rights of conscience. And that no preference shall ever be given by law to any religious establishment or modes of worship."⁵ Now, the enforcing by law the observance of the first day is giving a preference to one mode of worship and establishing that mode in preference to Judaism and other modes of worship. The fact then is, the law of '94 is in express terms opposite to both the letter and spirit of the constitution of Pennsylvania. Mr. T. nor one of my opponents, ever attempted to refute, or to reply to my 6th number, nor to the argument above stated.

      5th. In my 2d and 3d numbers, I humbly think that I fully demonstrated that a "moral association" so constituted and formed; so acting, and exhibiting, as that of West-Middletown was naturally necessarily & obviously antichristian. Upon the supposition that the members of it are partly members of the church, and partly not, then such a combination comes under the reprobation of Apostolic Authority. 1 Cor. 5, where christians are prohibited from associating with, unbelievers, drunkards, railers and unholy persons, of any description, in any thing pertaining to christianity. And in the 2d place, upon the supposition that all the members of such a combination are christians; they acting as a moral association acts, come under the severe reprobation of the Apostle Paul, 1 Cor. 5, 12, "What have I (as an Apostle or a Christian) to do to judge them that are without (the church.) Do ye not judge them that are within, but them that are without God judgeth. Moral societies now a days, judge them that are without, as well as those that are within, & bring them to a judgment seat, I blush to name. My reasoning upon this topic which engrosses two numbers mr. T. wisely, for his cause, omitted to notice. I say he evaded it.

      6th. Besides the evasions already noticed, mr. T. was constrained to concede certain points of great importance to the controversy, such as, the persecuting tendency of the law with regard to conscientious dissenters. See my 11th No. That there is no scripture warrant for enforcing the observance of the first day upon any but christians, and that there is no warrant for saying the Sabbath was changed from the 7th to the 1st day of the week, with many things of a similar kind, which he passed over without noticing. See my 12th, 13th and 14th Nos. As the matter now stands; so many primary arguments evaded, others conceded, and many unnoticed, it appears unnecessary to protract the controversy about trifles. When in fact the weighty matters are given up.

      Mr. T. appears disposed in the conclusion of his last number to assign as a reason for his dropping the subject, the two questions I had proposed him in a former number. These, with him, are constuctive slander. This is not quite so candid, as we would have expected. Who was it first asked questions in order to unmask and identify his antagonist? Who was it first introduced personalities? Most assuredly it was mr. Timothy himself. Those two questions I asked him were merely returning the compliment he had confered on me in his 3d No. in which he asks "who is this Candidus," is he so, & is he such, &c. Where then, I ask, was the crime in asking who is this mr. T. is he so and so? Why did mr. T. set so good an example? And if he chose such accidents or properties as he thought best calculated to point out who I was, because they were most notorious. Where, I ask again, was the crime, on my part, of choosing such accidents or properties as were most notorious in mr. T's history, to return the compliment to mr. T.? I think mr. T. will allow that he, who lives in a glass house should never throw stones!--But why was I not provoked at mr. T's two questions, as he appears to be at mine? The only reason I can divine, is that his two questions did not convict my conscience, consequently could not hurt me, but the two I proposed to him seemed to be too pinching and proved irksome.

      Another circumstance, as I am now on circumstantials, which I conceive demonstrates, how much mr. T. wished to draw me aside from the main topics was his insinuations respecting the grammatical precision of my style in writing. The last time he mentioned this, I think was by way of retaliation, for my having charged him with plagiarism, in publishing a grammar on principles not his own--it would have been better to have removed the insinuation by some other process, than to have exculpated himself, by impeaching my style. My style was not defective in any other way, than a hasty draught & typographical inaccuracies rendered unavoidable;--And when mr. T. finds leisure to count out all its inaccuracies, I will pledge my veracity to point out as many inaccuracies in his 9 numbers, as he will find in one dozen of mine. His insinuations on this ground I think denoted something more ungenerous & really meaner than any thing else in his performances. Mr. T. knows, too well, his own defects, I presume, to attempt to particularize instances of these inaccuracies he would fondly talk of. Whenever Mr. T. wishes to display his talents, and acquisitions, let him know, sir, I am ready to meet him on any language or on any grammar, or science he pleases. Eleven years ago, I was present at his examination, I know what he then was, and I am persuaded I have been as industrious since that time as he could be. And let me add, for I know mr. T. will understand my meaning, that I am not afraid of the ghosts of the dead haunting me for their discoveries, ungenerously appropriated, nor do I fear the potent pen, nor valorous tongue of any man. So much in part pay of a just debt to mr. T. from obligations under which he has laid me by the favors above described.

      As to my imprudence in risking my popularity in espousing and vindicating the cause of civil and religious liberty, I have to observe, in the first place, that, I have never shrinked, from what I conceived my duty, from a fear of losing popularity. This assertion is as capable of proof as any assertion with regard to one's own motives can be. I have given the most unequivocal evidence of it for more than 10 years past, I believe that all my acquaintance, whether friends or enemies, will do me so much justice as to say, that I might have sailed smoothly down the popular stream, in the first rank of the favorites of the majority, had I said shibboleth; had I paid court to the popular prejudices, and consulted my interest, rather than my conscience. But as it is rather a delicate subject though necessary on the present occasion, to speak much of one's own motives, I would add that the idol of popularity is the most capricious and fickle deity that mankind ever adored. The same doctrine and practices in all arts, sciences, politics, and religion, are at one time and in one place popular, at another time and in the same place, unpopular. In general there is a woe to the man who attempts to unhinge the popular system. "Galileo was imprisoned and persecuted for asserting that the earth revolved on its axis, and was compelled to renounce a truth of which he was fully convinced, and of which there is no doubt remaining." John Huss and Jerome of Prague were burned for questioning the infallibility of the Pope. Dr. Faust, was about being prosecuted for witchcraft or the "black art," for inventing the art of Printing. Dr. Franklin, it was said by many religious people, ought to have been imprisoned and tried for magic for discharging a canon, by mean of electricity, conveyed to it, through the waters of the Schuylkill. And how many thousands have been butchered for attempting to convince mankind, that kings and priests are the greatest enemies of mankind. I have no doubt from dispositions frequently exhibited, would the law of our country permit, but that I would be prosecuted and perhaps beheaded for asserting that men ought not to be compelled to observe any religious institute, or to be forced to regard that, of which they are not conscientiously convinced. We hope the day is not far distant when religious liberty will be as well understood in Pennsylvania as many other things in civil policy, for which the state is justly celebrated; when the boys of ten years of age will be able to expose the fallacy of such arguments, as have been advanced in favor of coercion in religious affairs.

      Mr. Editor, should mr. T. and yourself be agreed to resume the subject anew, I am agreed, all I ask is the continuation of an equal share in your paper. I am, however satisfied that enough has been said on my part, to convince such as will be convinced, and there are always some in every community that would not be convinced though one rose from the dead, and would tell them, that in the other world they had heard said, by infallible judges, that they were wrong. If mr. T. thinks he can yet do better than he has done, I would suggest to him the propriety of meeting me in a public debate on the items assumed by me, in my numbers. I will assure him that it will afford me great pleasure, to go all the way to the borough of Washington, to meet him in a debate Viva Voce, where we may be both obliged to keep to the point, and contest every inch of ground assumed either by him or myself. I will give him the choice of the place, and the one half of the choice of the time.⁶

      Upon the whole, I would wish to think favorably of mr. T. his error on the topics of dispute are I hope not essentially dangerous to his salvation, I would also wish to forgive him his trespasses against me, in the course of his No's and would wish for a better acquaintance. His getting so angry at the two questions I asked him I could not help. I am pretty certain had he been better acquainted with me than he was, or yet is, he would not have meddled with the controversy. The fact of his becoming so angry at the close of the 9th No. reminded me of an Anecdote of an old German, who frequented the logical disputes in Latin some 2 or 300 years ago, on the continent of Europe--he was asked why he attended these learned disputes, seeing he did not understand the language in which they spoke, he replied his object in attending was merely to know which party conquered; how could he know this, seeing he did not understand their arguments, was the next question. O, said he, I know very well who gets conquered; for he that first gets angry is surely overcome. Please present my compliments to mr. T. as I wish to die in peace with all mankind; and believe me, sir, your obedient, humble servant.

[The Reporter, 6 August 1821, p. 4.]