when you have
secured the possession of power, imitate the bad example of
those who killed your founder, violate men's liberties, rob
them of all that is perhaps dearest to them, and brand them
with a stigma of public infamy by a verdict from the jury-box!
Surely gentlemen, it is impossible that you can do that! Who
are we? Three poor men. Are we wicked? No, there is no proof
of the charge. Our honor and honesty are unimpeached. It is
not for us to play the Pharisee and say that we are better than
other men. We only say that we are no worse. What have we
done to be classed with thieves and felons, dragged from our
homes and submitted to the indignities of a life so loathsome
and hideous, that it is even revolting to the spirits of the men
who have to exercise authority within the precincts of the gaol?
You know we have done nothing to merit such a punishment.
Gentlemen, you ought to return a verdict of Not Guilty against
us, because the prosecution have not given you sufficient
evidence as to the fact; because whatever legal bigotry is
gained from the decisions of judges in the past must be treated
as obsolete, as the London magistrate treated the law of
Maintenance; because we have done nothing, as the indictment
states, against the peace; because our proceedings have led
to no tumult in the streets, no interference with the liberty
of any man, his person or property; because no evidence has
been tendered to you of any malice in our case; because there
is no wicked motive in anything we have done; because the
founder of your own creed was murdered on a very similar charge
to that of which we stand accused now; and, lastly, because
you should in this third quarter of the nineteenth century
assert once and for ever the great principle of the absolute
freedom of each man, unless he trench on the equal freedom of
others. I ask you to assert the great principle of the liberty
of the press, liberty of the platform, liberty of thought and
liberty of speech; I ask you to prevent such prosecutions as
are hinted at in the _Times_ this morning; I ask you not to
allow sects once more to be hurling anathemas against each other,
and flying to the magistrates to settle questions which should
be settled by intellectual and moral suasion; I ask