y going to the magistrate to inform, or to the
spiritual despot to obtain ecclesiastical penalties, but he resorts to
methods, which, if successful, are in effect the most severe pains and
penalties that can restrain freedom of opinion.

What is dearer to a man than _his character_, involving as it does, the
esteem, respect and affection of friends, neighbours and society, with
all the confidence, honour, trust and emolument that flow from general
esteem? How sensitive is every man to any thing that depreciates his
intellectual character! What torture, to be ridiculed or pitied for such
deficiencies! How cruel the suffering, when his moral delinquencies are
held up to public scorn and reprehension! Confiscation, stripes,
chains, and even death itself, are often less dreaded.

It is this method of punishment to which men resort, to deter their
fellow-men from exercising those rights of liberty which they so
tenaciously claim for themselves. Examine now the methods adopted by
almost all who are engaged in the various conflicts of opinion in this
nation, and you will find that there are certain measures which
combatants almost invariably employ.

They either attack the intellectual character of opponents, or they
labour to make them appear narrow-minded, illiberal and bigoted, or they
impeach their honesty and veracity, or they stigmatize their motives as
mean, selfish, ambitious, or in some other respect unworthy and
degrading. Instead of truth, and evidence, and argument, personal
depreciation, sneers, insinuations, or open abuse, are the weapons
employed. This method of resisting freedom of opinions, by pains and
penalties, arises in part from the natural selfishness of man, and in
part from want of clear distinctions as to the rights and duties
involved in freedom of opinion and freedom of speech.

The great fundamental principle that makes this matter clear, is this,
that a broad and invariable distinction should ever be preserved between
the _opinions_ and _practices_ that are discussed, and the _advocates_
of these opinions and practices.

It is a sacred and imperious duty, that rests on every human being, to
exert all his influence in opposing every thing that he believes is
dangerous and wrong, and in sustaining all that he believes is safe and
right. And in doing this, no compromise is to be made, in order to
shield country, party, friends, or even self, from any just censure.
Every man is bound by duty to G