n? A bill of
rights is wanting, and all those things which are usually secured under
it--

1. The _rights of conscience_ are swept away. The Confession of Faith, the
Prayer-Book, the Manual and Pilgrim's Progress are to go. The psalms of
Watts, I am told, are the only thing of the kind that is to have any
quarter at all.

2. The _liberty of the press_--that is gone at the first stroke. Not so
much as an advertisement for a stray horse, or a runaway negro, can be put
in any of the gazettes.

3. The _trial by jury_--that is knocked in the head, and all that worthy
class of men, the lawyers, who live by haranguing and bending the juries,
are demolished.

I would submit it to any candid man, if in this constitution there is the
least provision for the privilege of shaving the beard? or is there any
mode laid down to take the measure of a pair of breeches? Whence is it
then, that men of learning seem so much to approve, while the ignorant are
against it? The cause is perfectly apparent, viz., that reason is an
erring guide, while instinct, which is the governing principle of the
untaught, is certain. Put a pig in a poke, carry it half a day's journey
through woods and by-ways, let it out, and it will run home without
deviation. Could Dr. Franklin do this? What reason have we then to suppose
that his judgment, or that of Washington, could be equal to that of Mr.
Smilie(55) in state affairs?

Were it not on this principle that we are able to account for it, it might
be thought strange that old Livingston,(56) of the Jersies, could be so
hoodwinked as to give his sanction to such a diabolical scheme of tyranny
amongst men--a constitution which may well be called hell-born. For if all
the devils in Pandemonium had been employed about it, they could not have
made a worse.

Neil MacLaughlin, a neighbor of mine, who has been talking with Mr.
Findley, says that under this constitution all weavers are to be put to
death. What have these innocent manufacturers done that they should be
proscribed?

Let other states think what they will of it, there is one reason why every
Pennsylvanian should execrate this imposition upon mankind. It will make
his state most probably the seat of government, and bring all the
officers, and cause a great part of the revenue to be expended here. This
must make the people rich, enable them to pay their debts, and corrupt
their morals. Any citizen, therefore, on the Delaware and Susquehannah
water