Cap of Liberty. A London › Weekly Political Publication. No. 14, Vol. 1.1 Wednesday, December 8th, 1819. [PRICE 2d. If Humanity shows to the God of this World, NUS TIO C. PHILLIPS. SMITHFIELD PUBLIC MEETING, LEIAN ON- Wednesday, December 8, 1819, at twelve o'clock precisely, HENRY HUNT, Esq. in the Chair. We whose names are hereunto subscribed, resident Householders paying Taxes within the City of London, do bereby appoint a Public Meeting, to be held in Smithfield, on Wednesday next, to take into consideration the propriety of presenting a Petition to his Royal Highness the Prince Regent, not to give the Royal Assent to those Bills which afe now pending in the Two Houses of Parliament; which STATUTES placed the House of Brunswick upon the Throne of these Realmis. Here follows the names of twenty-eight respectable Householders.] 4. We think it an imperious duty no every independent pubHeation, to inform its readers of every Meeting to be held, for the purpose of advocating the Rights and Immunities of the People. This day there will be two Meetings, hoth of which we hope will be numerously attended; one in Smithfield as stated above, the other in Covent Garden: we can not avoid expressing our decided opinion, that these Meef- ? ings are now too late for the intended objects; they should have been held sooner, and should have been held simul. taneously all over the Kingdom; and those Bills never would have passed. Although the motives of those Re- 1 formers who not only discountenanced, but actually prévented those Meetings, may have been well meant; still ean we scarcely repress the bitterness of our feelings, when we reflect that the subjugation of pur Country is the consequence T. DAVISON, Printer and Publisher, 10, Duke Strect, Smithfield. of the torch of discord, which their fears or their imbecility flung amongst the Reformers throughout the Country. There is but one method in the power of remedying the evil of which they have been the authors, and that is by candidly confessing their error, and thus doing justice to those who did all that lay within their power to effect the overthrow of the present Ministerial junto of "respectables," who abuse us as graceless Radicals, for having been defrauded of the immense treasures upon which these august senators found their reputability. The exertions of every Reformer should now be more than ever unceasing; the more we lose, the more we have to regain; and the heart that flinches from terror of the faction who are draining our very vitals, deserves not the glorious appellation of A PATRIOT. The appellation which gave dignity and grandeur to the names of BRUTUS and of CASSIUS, in the earlier ages, and in the later times to HAMPDEN, RUSSEL, and SYDNEY in England to WALLACE in Scotland-to FITZGERALD, Emmett, and O'CONNOR in Ireland-to CARNOT in France and to WASHINGTON in America. In the worst times of their country's freedom, when the wreck of Liberty paved the way for the sceptre of the despot, when terror and despair darkened the hemisphere of national independence, when every thing which was valuable to a freeman bowed beneath the sword, or shrunk intimidated from the clanking chains and desolate gloominess of a dungeon, those aspiring spirits boldly braved the vengeance of the storm and triumphed over despotism, by the enthusiasm which their conduct infused in thousands of their respective countrymen; they have even in their misfortunes triumphed over fate itself by a glorious end. The brave never die-the spirit which actuated their frames while living, circulates the palpitating stream of thousands; of millions in the cause of freedom, when their bodies are in the course of nature, returned to their mother earth; yes, until the cause in which they perished, finally triumphed over the tyrauny they warred with. We must therefore, while yet we may, meet throughout the NATION and consult for the recovery of our rights. let all animosities be buried in oblivion. Our party would carry their system of Reform farther than another, but that is no reason that they should separate into distinct bodies. We have even been perhaps more inveterate in our declarations against the Whigs than against the Tories-and why? not because they would not come into our terms of Reformation-no, certainly not, what then? because we believe them to be hypocrites, we believe that they are not very sincere in the Reformation which they themselves profess. We believe the only Re-: form they desire is to get themselves in and the Tories out of office. "What means the term of WHIG, Papa, "I long to know its story; "But all in vain I ask Mamma, "She knows not WHIG from TORY." The Tories are open and undisguised enemies of the people-the Whigs are Tories who profess themselves friendly to the rights of the people for the purpose of sharing amongst them the loaves and fishes, which the people are obliged to supply, to satiate their voracity in a ratio by no means.com patible with the desperately deplorable state of their individual resources. We are happy to find that the Seditious Meetings Bill has not passed the House of Commons. as a permanent Act of Parliament. Lord Castlereagh was deterred from executing his threats completely against the Liberties of the People. The Cheap Publications have again interfered with his Lordship's plans of turning this Country into a Military Despotisin: they have frightened him into enacting it only as a temporary measure; we owe it to his fears, rather than to the gentleness and pliability of his disposition, that the period of its enforcement is limited to five years. We have therefore nothing for which to thank his Lordship, and it would be hypocritical and mean, to pretend that he was deserving of any thing but the execrations of the virtuous, the humane, and the patriotic. We can hardly curb our expressions of abhorrence for this, in our opinion demon niacal character. We know much of him, and we greatly fear that he will compel us to know more of him ere he dies. At present we view him as a scourge to these kingdoms, for! their wilful blindness in warring with the liberties of Franer, when she flung from her throne the Despot and his minions, whom European Tyrants vainly endeavoured to save and to support. Nothing, however, could arrest the progress of independence in France at that period, nor can it, we are confident, be checked in England now, even though ten thousand Traitors such as Čh should bribe their armed Janizaries, to support them in levelling the rights and properties of the People. Properties, did we say? alas!" the People have now no properties to be levelled, they are flecced of every thing they possessed, and are still compelled to surrender one half of their earnings by the sweat of their brow, to support these ravenous locusts in a style of Asiatic pomp, luxury, and profusion. Such a state of things can never last; it is a moral impossibility, that a whole people will submit tamely, and in quiet to be starved to death; the People may be patient, but to carry patience to too great an extent, becomes cowardly and degenerate. It has in our opinion already reached its elimax, the ne.plus ultra of virtue; to carry it further or to bear with greater restrictions, longer than it can be helped, is servile and subservient slavery of intellect as well as body a slavery which we hope can never justly be attributed to Englishmen. CHARACTER OF THE WHIGS AND TORIES AT· FULL LENGTH. LONG tirades against Sedition and Blasphemy, is now the order of the day in the House of Commons. Radical Re-“ form and Deism are alike obnoxious to the Whigs and Tories; indeed the former are more virulent and liberal of their invectives than the latter, and frequently descends to the greatest abuse of individuals, who must on reading their speeches, look down on them with the most: sovereign contempt for their prejudices, or pity for the imbecility of mind, which is even acting as a curb to their reason in its efforts to surmount them. It is strange, that men who in other respects might pass for rational, should in a theolo gical discussion become far more cowardly and imbecile than even children! The latter will enquire the meaning of that, which is above their comprehension; the former seek not whether it has or has not a meaning. One of these sort of gentry, indulged himself on Thursday night, in a most virulent strain of abuse, against that meritorious though persecuted individual, Richard Carlile. Mr. Lyttelton in the course of his speech, in support of the Seditious Meeting's Bill, gave utterance to the following extraordinary sentences. Then as to the question of whether the present laws, duly, impartially, and vigorously administered, would suffice to meet and contend with the eyil? He thought not. He never knew a period so pregnant with portentous matter as the present; he thought that additional steps were necessary to check sedition and rebelJion. The old law was strong against treason, but the exe- cution of that law was extremely difficult. The subject was.. protected against arbitrary oppression; he was fenced round with bulwarks that were almost impregnable, God forbid it should be otherwise: it was a wise and just, it was a salutary, beneficial and necessary protection: but who should deny that the spirit of these writings, which were disseminated throughout the land, was not in the spirit of treason? Could any gentleman doubt it, after the papers that had been read by his honourable friend? and if the law of treason could not be brought to bear upon the writings, should they not enact such laws as would meet them? After the trial and acquittal of Hone, he did not think it very likely that a Jury of Middlesex would convict for blasphemy. The defence set up was, that the libel was blasphemous as well as seditious, and that the prosecutor was influenced by corrupt motives, and that the defence prevailed. Affairs however had since that period, taken a different turn, and Juries had the other day, by the conviction of that execrable and vulgar wretch Carlile, convinced the country that blasphemy was not to be so palliated." Perhaps in the whole annals of Parliament, a more foolish and inconsistent speech could not be adduced. This longheaded gentleman, first tells us that although the old laws against Treason are strong, still it is extremely difficult to put them into execution, because the subject is protected against unjust and arbitrary oppression, and is fenced round. with bulwarks that are almost impregnable; that is in other words, the law of treason is strong, but Juries wo'nt allow the Ministry to put it in force against the innocent. So far then is something like a tangible, like an intelligible argument;, we can understand Mr. Lyttelton, but lo and behold, he turns round with an exclamation of "God forbid it should be otherwise." But this is not all, he wheels about again, and after invoking the name of the Deity in favour of the lives of Englishmen, be most pathetically beseeches the House, that as the law of treason cannot be brought to bear upon them, they will in their wisdom and goodness, enact a law that will have the desired effect, that is, to hang, trans4 port, or behead, all those who may be hereafter guilty of the heinous crime of telling Truth. t * He next alludes to the trial of Mr. Houe, and totally misrepresents the grounds on which the Jury acquitted that gentleman. As to his abuse of that gentleman, it is in * We should be inclined to think Mr. Lyttleton held Republican principles, he so seldom dignifies any individual with the title of MR." |