336 Lord Erskine's Character of Mr. Fox, as an Orator and Statesman. every topic of irritation, of rejecting a narrow system of policy regarding her, [America] and of opening our parental arms to renew the feelings of confidence and affection, which "common names and kindred blood" might yet restore and perpetuate. England has declared by her Ministers in Parliament, that she claims no rights, but those which are common to all nations. Such rights cannot be doubtful, since what they are, the universal voice of nations must pronounce; and, in cases where their exercise may become harsh and inconvenient, HE will approve himself the best statesman and the truest friend of both countries, who shall devise the best means of putting at an endless distance every cause of strife. Another conspicuous subject of Mr. Fox's eloquence, was the portentous phenomenon of the French Revolution; and on this mighty question of national interest, which, from its new and extraordinary nature, could not but produce strong differences of opinion between the best private friends, and amongst the most honest and enlightened statesmen, it was my wish and my design to have been altogether silent, more especially as we are at this moment, I fear, in the very midst of the storm, and as I was besides, most anxious to avoid even the appearance of a wish to revive political controversy. In raising this humble, but affectionate monument to his memory, I felt that I ought not only to guard it from being defaced, but should invite it to be surrounded by honest and enlightened men of all parties and opinious; at the same time, when I came to consider how very important a part it formed of his public character, I found it indispensable to touch, though slightly and generally, upon this difficult, delicate and complicated subject. I shall, therefore, very shortly advert to his opinions, but without any argument in their support-they are already, indeed, matter of history; and as they cannot at all govern our present duties, under circumstances so very different, I shall leave them "without impatience, to the vicissitudes of opinion, and the impartiality of a future generation." It was the constant theme, then, of Mr. Fox, as will appear over and over again throughout these volumes, that the true policy of this country regarding France at that period, independently of not interfering with the internal government of any nation, was to leave her to the good or evil of her own revolution.-He thought, whilst her desperate and distracted factions were balancing, and almost daily destroying one another, that whatever they might declare or publish, or however, in the frenzy of the mo ment, they might denounce the governments of surrounding nations, they had no power to enforce their threats; and that so far from there being any danger of France, so circumstanced, overpowering her neighbours by conquest, she was likely herself to sink in the storm she had raised. He was convinced, that if the states of Europe had acted upon this opinion, contenting themselves with taking security by prudent councils against the contagion of disorganizing principles so much apprehended, husbanding their finances, and standing upon their guard against invasion by great military establishments, instead of invading France, she could not, upon any human calculation, have so suddenly extended her dominion over so many mighty nations. I purposely avoid all design of considering or questioning her aggressions at that period, or of disputing the justification of war against her, if it was prudent in that manner to wage it. To enter upon this would be raising the very spirit of controversy which I have disclaimed. I am only recording Mr. Fox's sentiments, and shall therefore content myself with the fact, that the Duke of Brunswick published his fatal manifesto, and invaded France. At that period, and under those circumstances, Mr. Fox, in his letter to his coustituents, ridiculed the idea of her conquest, and he was justified by the event.-By this ill-timed assault upon her territory, accompanied by the disgusting threat of utterly exterminating the principles and authors of the revolution, contending factions were annihilated by a common danger to all; the citizens of Paris who had been cutting one another's throats in the streets without knowing wherefore, knew then, to a man, that they must unite for their existence as a people; and the world exhibits no parallel to the exertions of France: she dug into the mansions of the dead for the fabric of her powder, and forged the irons which surrounded her churches and public edifices into weapons of war: the spirit which inspired her was not merely the spirit of freedom, always undaunted however misdirected, but was inflamed and elevated by terror and despair, when caught in the moment of disorganization by the numerous armies which surrounded her, proscribed as she was by the whole European world. It did not, in my opinion, require Mr. Fox's sagacity to predict the result of this unequal contest.The nations of Europe at that period, whatever they might have had to fear, had then actually suffered nothing from the French revolution; so that whilst on the one hand, the French armies, however undisciplined, were in fact a people in arms, the invading force was only brought up to the charge by the cold and lifeless principle of military discipline, without a national object, and by subjects rather disgusted with their own governments, than with the changes they had only heard of in France. Well, therefore, might Mr. Fox on that occasion, when the conquest of France was anticipated, exclaim against the feeble pencil of Cervantes-from the very course then pursued to conquer her, he conceived, she became invulnerable; because having no means left of existence as a nation, but by forming her population into a vast camp, and depending for her security upon military skill and exertion, she was not at all likely to be the victim of any combination amongst the old governments of Europe, jealous of one another, and not excited by a counteracting motive, of an equally projectile force. When her government was thus established, no matter whether for good or for evil, and war had arisen from resisting it in its commencement, Mr. Fox still more strongly reprobated as a monstrous proposition, that she was incapable in the pure abstract of maintaining the usual relations of peace and amity. He admitted, of course, most distinctly, that Great Britain and all other powers were well justified in looking to their own securities, but he thought they should come at once to the decision of the securities they required, and not have acted upon a declaration so vague and so unexampled. To this policy, which he condemned as erroneous, Mr. Fox imputed the disasters which followed in his timeFrance, being thus put under the bann of an undefined proscription, a looser rein was undoubtedly given by it to her impetuous and dangerous course; and in faithfully recording Mr. Fox's principles and opinions, it is impossible to refrain from saying, that for a season at least there was too much colour for her invasion of other nations. What other security had she for her own independence? Since not only no terms were offered to her, but she was even denied the privilege of offering any herself. * It is impossible to close this review of Mr. Fox's parliamentary exertions, without adverting to the object of his very last motion in the House of Commons; an object for which he had laboured with many eminent men of all political parties and opinions, for nearly twenty years-its accomplishment which followed but a few months afterwards, would have raised our country, even if she had no other illustration, to stand unrivalled amongst nations, and to look up to God Himself to pronounce-" Well done thou good and faithful servant"--the ABOLITION of the Slave TRADE leaves every other triumph of humanity and justice almost out of sight behind it, and well entitled Mr. Fox to declare, "that if, during the forty years he had sat in parliament, he had been so fortunate as to accomplish that object, and THAT ONLY, he should think he had done ENOUGH, and could retire from public life with the conscious satisfaction that he had done his duty." One short sentence more belongs imperiously to this subject — the name of WILBERFORCE cannot be separated from it-it is of the utmost importance to mankind perpetually to remember, that immortal honour and reputation are the sure rewards of those by whose virtuous, patient, unconquerable perseverence, the blessed cause of universal freedom has been advanced, and the lingering progression of the world urged on in its slow and mysterious course. Being now brought to the conclusion of my letter, and ruuning it over 338 Dr. Morell, on the Connexion between Truth and Morality. (too hastily I fear) before I could venture to comply with your request that it should be published, I cannot but look back as to the happiest and most honourable circumstance of my life, that I thought and acted with Mr. Fox, through so considerable a part of his time, and that now, in my retirement from the world, (for so I have considered it since my professional course has been closed for ever), I have had the opportunity of thus publicly expressing my veneration for his memory. When I followed him to the grave, I was unable from sorrow to support with decent firmness the high place which my station at that period assigned me in the mournful procession, and even now, when thus engaged in the review of his splendid and illustrious career, I cannot but feel the most affectionate and painful regret-seeking a kind of consolation with his numerous friends, from his being in a manner still living in the Representative of his Family. To Mr. J. Wright, MISCELLANEOUS COMMUNICATIONS. burgh Review, I saw with surprise, that in one of them (for Jan. 1803), it is unequivocally maintained, that the interests of truth and virtue may be at variance betwixt themselves; that there are truths of which the prevailing conviction would tend directly to the depravation of manners; and consequently that there are errors of opinion from which morality derives necessary support. If this be fact, the friend of truth may be the enemy of his kind, and the philosopher may push his inquiries to the worst possible issue, when they are pursued with the greatest possible success;-if, indeed, the discovery of truth is to be any longer considered as a successful termination of philosophical research. Under the article "Elements of the Philosophy of Mind," &c. by Thomas Belsham, the "actual existence" of philosophical necessity is admitted, and the truth of the doctrine of materialism is de nied, but the diffusion both of the false doctrine and of the true is reprobated, as in every view unfavourable to morality. With the philosophical speculations the present inquiry is not immediately connected. The con mined is simply this; - that truth must be favourable to virtue. The almost universal assent which this principle has received, is accounted for in that article by a reference to the professional habits and views "of the first teachers of morals in our schools, and of the greater number of their successors." In other words, the maxim has been allowed because our. first moralists were theologians. It cannot be denied that many sins lie at the door of theological teachers; some have been convicted of pious frauds, for which they are entitled to the commendation of this reviewer; others have perverted truth, and a great part have done it infinite disservice by their unskilful or illiberal defence. But it is now alleged against them, for the first time, that they have done wrong by giving universality to the persuasion that truth must be favourable to virtue. Men still retain so much of barbarous prejudice, and are still so ignorant of their own interests, that they will readily forgive the the ologians this wrong, and could almost forgive them every other wrong for the sake of this one, were it proved against them. If the maxim, however, was first "a religious maxim," it was so not as “a part of the optimism in which it was combined," but as a deduction from that revelation which taught our "first teachers of morals," as they supposed, that truth is an attribute of the Divinity. Of the theological argument, however, resting on revelation, the writer has said nothing, though speaking of Christian theologians; but by a dexterous manœuvre of controversy has considered them in the more convenient character of optimists, who maintained that whatever is must be beneficial, because it exists under the government of a Being who wills happiness, and happiness only. The reason of this view of the theological moralist is manifest: if truth must be beneficial on the principles of optimism, so must error also, because error has been, and still is, and therefore makes a part of that scheme of things which tends to the production of good. Hence it is concluded that there is nothing "in the abstract consideration of truth and Deity," which justifies the admission of the maxim in debate. If the maxim was to be tried at all as a theological one, it ought to have been met fairly on the grounds of natural and revealed religion, and shewn to have no foundation in either, instead of being thus dexterously evaded by a diversion into the system of optimism. The question as a theological question would then stand thus: may it be inferred from any thing we know of the divine Being, that truth must be favourable to virtue? It is not a sufficient answer to this question to say," that the employment of falshood for the production of good, cannot be more unworthy of the Divine Being, than the acknowledged employment of rapine and murder for the same purpose." If the crimes of men are made subservient to the ends of the divine government, they are not the less crimes on that account; and if falsehood, or the wilful propagation of error, be made subservient to the same ends, it is not, therefore, exonerated of the charge of immorality. It is not in this way that any question respecting human conduct can be tried at the bar of the human understanding. If such reasoning were allowed to be applied to such questions, the distinction of vice and virtue must quickly disappear, and every action will be proved to be morally right, because it makes a part of the universal plan. Every practical maxim must be tried either by an appeal to the authority of revelation, or to experience. As the former has not been made in the present instance, the latter only demands our attention. Is the principle, "that truth, or the diffusion of truth (for it is a question of practice), must be favourable to morality, justified by actual experience? A question of so wide a range is not solved by saying, that the courtesies of life, forming "the chief happiness of civilized manners, proceed either from actual falsehood or from the suppression of truth;" and therefore that happiness, far from being promoted by the indiscriminate diffusion of truth" is increased by the general adoption of a system of concerted and limited deceit." To this reasoning it might be replied, that deceit which is concerted and limited by a whole community, loses its nature. It may be an abuse of terms, but in that community it is no longer deceit; for what is concerted is understood. But even admitting that it retains all the nature of deceit, before the solution can be considered as complete, the good arising from the system of falsehood must be weighed against the mischief that must result from the general_admission of the practical principle, that the partial suppression of ascertained truth conduces to human happiness, and is therefore a moral duty. It must also be compared with the good that must ensue from a system of universal sincerity. To say that such a system is impracticable, does not prove that the practice would be productive of less happiness than the system of falsehood. Perfect virtue is unattainable; but few moralists are inclined to dispute its connexion with the greatest possible happiness. Medicine is good, but health is better; and dissimulation may have its use, but it is not so useful as virtue, which could supersede it. The argument, then, of the advocate of falsehood may be thus stated:-because, through a 840 Dr. Morell, on the Connexion between Truth and Morality. deficiency of virtue in man, deceit is of use by breaking off the rough edges of human intercourse, therefore the maxim that truth should be diffused promiscuously and without reserve, cannot be acted upon without injury to the interest of virtue. To bring the principle to a just test, it is not enough to take a single acknowledged truth and imagine it to be put in circulation, insulated and broken off from the great chain of truths of which it makes but a single link. Such mutilated and partial evidence is not admitted in any court whose proceedings are guided by equity: no more can it be permitted to the adversary of truth to suppose any single error detached from the clan of errors with which it must be accompanied, and to demand, whether the prevalence of such an erroneous belief would not be productive of much benefit to mankind? Yet such is the mode of trial adopted by this moralist; "if," says he," it were a superstition of every mind, that the murderer, immediately on the perpetration of his guilt, must himself expire by sympathy, a new motive would be added to the side of virtue." Again, "if superstition could exist and be modified at the will of an enlightened legislator, so as to be deprived of its terrors to the innocent and turned wholly against the guilty, we know no principle of our nature on which it would be so much for the interest of mankind to operate." What is this but saying, if strong poisons could be administered so as to act solely on the disease, and not at all upon the constitution of the patient, what a salutary application might be made of them by a skilful physician! It will hardly, however, be admitted for no better reason than a supposition of what is so impracticable, that a good plain nutritive diet is not of greater benefit to man than all the mineral and vegetable poisons in the world. The same is the relation which truth has always been supposed to bear to error; and which, as long as politicians and, we may now add, philosophers, shall allow her the privilege of speech (for the right is denied), will still be acknowledged by men of unsophisticated minds. The conclusion drawn by the writer from such premises is," that we may assume as established and undeniable, that there is nothing in the nature o truth which makes it necessarily good; that in the greater number of instances truth is beneficial, but that of the whole number of truths and falsehoods, a certain number are productive of good and others of evil." This is to separate what is in its nature inseparable. No truth, certainly no truth of any practical value, stands alone. It is sufficient praise, that in its natural and necessary connexion it forms a part of what is, as a whole, beneficial to mankind and favourable to moral virtue; and that it does so, is reason enough for throwing it into the general stock which forms the proper riches of intellectual man. Local and temporary mischief may result from the disclosure and belief of certain facts and opinions, which have, notwithstanding, the warrant of truth. This, however, is not their proper, for it is not their ultimate operation. That is to be deduced from their effects, when acting in union with other truths to which they are naturally allied, and extending their influence, together with them, through a long duration, and over a great diversity of condition. What will be the issue of such an experiment, cannot be doubted even by the present eulogist of error, since he confesses that, in the greater number of instances, truth is beneficial; and since truth is not a rope of sand that may be picked and sorted grain by grain, of which one is to be rejected and another preserved, but is, indeed, of a texture more stubborn and cohesive than any physical product, let us be content to take the incidental and lesser evil together with the certain, perpetual and preponderating good, and let it still be acknowledged as the chief of philosophical and moral maxims, that truth is the minister of utility, and that her voice, even when it might be thought most discordant, still harmonizes with the morality and happiness of man. When we are told " that innumerable cases may be imagined in which errors of belief would be of moral advantage," imagination is substituted for experience; and it would be difficult to frame a proposition which might not be established in a similar way. To such a declaration, for it is no argument, nor part of an argument, it is sufficient to oppose asser |