Wesley Corpus

48. See an argument of a different kind: “The laws and religion of France were established in Canada, on purpose to bring up thence an army of French Papists.” (Page 94.) What proof have you, what tittle or shadow of proof, for this strange assertion, that the laws and religion which they had before in Canada were established on purpose to bring an army thence? It is manifest to every impartial man, that this was done for a nobler purpose. Every nation, you allow, has a natural liberty to enjoy their own laws, and their own religions: So have the French in Canada; and we have no right to deprive them of this liberty. Our Parliament never desired, never intended, to deprive them of this; (so far were they from any intention of depriving their own countrymen of it!) and on purpose to deliver them from any apprehension of so grievous an evil, they generously and nobly gave them a legal security, that it should not be taken from them. And is this (one of the best things our Parliament ever did) improved into an accusation against them? “But our laws and religion are better than theirs.” Unquestionably they are; but this gives us no right to impose the one or the other, even on a conquered nation. What if we had conquered France, ought we not still to have allowed them their own laws and religion? Yea, if the Russians had conquered Constantinople, or the whole Ottoman empire, ought they not to have allowed to all they conquered, both their own religion and their own laws; nay, and to have given them, not a precarious toleration, but a legal security for both? 49. “But the wild Indians, and their own slaves, have been instigated to attack them.” I doubt the fact. What proof is there of this, either with regard to the Indians or the Negroes? “And attempts have been made to gain the assistance of a large body of Russians.” Another hearty assertion, which many will swallow, without ever asking for proof: In truth, had any such attempts been made, they would not have proved ineffectual. Very small pay will induce a body of Russians to go wherever they hope for good plunder. It might just as well have been said, “Attempts were made to procure a large body of Tartars.” 50.