Wesley Corpus

Knock them on the head, to be sure. And who can doubt, but they have an unalienable power so to do, seeing “Government was instituted for the people's sake, and theirs is the only real omnipotence.” (Page 16.) 36. And, lest your meaning should not yet be plain enough, you conclude this article thus: “These reflections should be constantly present to every mind in this country. There is nothing that requires to be more watched than power; there is nothing that ought to be opposed with a more determined resolution than its encroachments. The people of this king dom were once warmed with such sentiments as these.” Exactly such, in the glorious days of Watt the Tyler, and of Oliver Cromwell. “Often have they fought and bled in the cause of liberty; but that time seems to be going.” Glory be to God, it is not going, but gone. O may it never return ? “The fair inheritance of liberty, left us by our ancestors, we are not unwilling to resign.” We are totally unwilling to resign either our civil or religious liberty; and both of these we enjoy in a far greater measure than ever our ancestors did. Nay, they did not enjoy either one or the other, from the time of William the Conqueror till the Revolution. “Should any events arise,” (and you give very broad intimations that they have arisen already,) “which should render the same opposition necessary that took place in the time of King Charles the First,”--the same opposition which made the land a field of blood, set every man’s sword against his brother, overturned the whole constitution, and cut off, first, the flower of the nation, and then the King himself,-“I am afraid all that is valuable to us would be lost : The terror of the standing army would deaden all zeal,” for these noble exploits, “and produce a general servitude.” (Page 18.) 37. What a natural tendency has all this, to instil into the good people of England the most determined rancour and bitterness against their Governors, against the King and Parliament! And what a natural tendency has all that follows to instil the same both into the English and the Americans !