battlement, in
any single pinnacle.

But the honorable gentleman has mentioned, indeed, principles which
astonish me rather more than ever. The honorable gentleman thinks that
the Dissenters enjoy a large share of liberty under a connivance; and he
thinks that the establishing toleration by law is an attack upon
Christianity.

The first of these is a contradiction in terms. Liberty under a
connivance! Connivance is a relaxation from slavery, not a definition of
liberty. What is connivance, but a state under which all slaves live? If
I was to describe slavery, I would say, with those who _hate_ it, it is
living under will, not under law; if as it is stated by its advocates, I
would say, that, like earthquakes, like thunder, or other wars the
elements make upon mankind, it happens rarely, it occasionally comes now
and then upon people, who, upon ordinary occasions, enjoy the same legal
government of liberty. Take it under the description of those who would
soften those features, the state of slavery and connivance is the same
thing. If the liberty enjoyed be a liberty not of toleration, but of
connivance, the only question is, whether establishing such by law is an
attack upon Christianity. Toleration an attack upon Christianity! What,
then! are we come to this pass, to suppose that nothing can support
Christianity but the principles of persecution? Is that, then, the idea
of establishment? Is it, then, the idea of Christianity itself, that it
ought to have establishments, that it ought to have laws against
Dissenters, but the breach of which laws is to be connived at? What a
picture of toleration! what a picture of laws, of establishments! what a
picture of religious and civil liberty! I am persuaded the honorable
gentleman, does not see it in this light. But these very terms become
the strongest reasons for my support of the bill: for I am persuaded
that toleration, so far from being an attack upon Christianity, becomes
the best and surest support that possibly can be given, to it. The
Christian religion itself arose without establishment,--it arose even
without toleration; and whilst its own principles were not tolerated, it
conquered all the powers of darkness, it conquered all the powers of the
world. The moment it began to depart from these principles, it converted
the establishment into tyranny; it subverted its foundations from that
very hour. Zealous as I am for the principle of an establishment, so
just an abh