by the rolling of the vessel, I have wished that our tinmen would make our soup-basins with divisions or compartments, forming small plates, proper for containing soup for one person only. By this disposition, the soup, in an extraordinary roll, would not be thrown out of the plate, and would not fall into the breasts of those who are at table, and scald them. Having entertained you with these things of little importance, permit me now to conclude with some general reflections upon navigation. When navigation is employed only for transporting necessary provisions from one country, where they abound, to another where they are wanting; when by this it prevents famines, which were so frequent and so fatal before it was invented and became so common; we cannot help considering it as one of those arts which contribute most to the happiness of mankind. But when it is employed to transport things of no utility, or articles merely of luxury, it is then uncertain whether the advantages resulting from it are sufficient to counterbalance the misfortunes it occasions by exposing the lives of so many individuals upon the vast ocean. And when it is used to plunder vessels and transport slaves, it is evidently only the dreadful, means of increasing those calamities, which afflict human nature. One is astonished to think on the number of vessels and men, who are daily exposed in going to bring tea from China, coffee from Arabia, and sugar and tobacco from America; all, commodities which our ancestors lived very well without. The sugar trade employs nearly a thousand vessels, and that of tobacco almost the same number. With regard to the utility of tobacco, little can be said; and, with regard to sugar, how much more meritorious would it be to sacrifice the momentary pleasure which we receive from drinking it once or twice a day in our tea, than to encourage the numberless cruelties that are continually exercised in order to procure it us! A celebrated French moralist said, that, when he considered the wars which we foment in Africa to get negroes, the great number who of course perish in these wars; the multitude of those wretches who die in their passage, by disease, bad air, and bad provisions; and, lastly, how many perish by the cruel treatment they meet with in a state of slavery; when he saw a bit of sugar, he could not help imagining it to be covered with spots of human blood. But, had he added to these considerations the wars which we carry on against one another, to take and retake the islands that produce this commodity, he would not have seen the sugar simply spotted with blood, he would have beheld it entirely tinged with it. These wars make the maritime powers of Europe, and the inhabitants of Paris and London pay much dearer for their sugar than those of Vienna, though they are almost three hundred leagues distant from the sea. A pound of sugar, indeed, costs the former not only the price which they give for it, but also what they pay in taxes, necessary to support the fleets and armies, which serve to defend and protect the countries that produce it. TOLERATION IN OLD ENGLAND AND NEW ENGLAND.* SIR, I understand from the public papers, that in the debates on the bill for relieving the Dissenters in the point of subscription to the church articles, sundry reflections were thrown out against that people, importing, "that they themselves are of a persecuting, intollerant spirit; for that, when they had the superiority, they persecuted the church, and still persecute it in America, where they compel its members to pay taxes for maintaining the Presbyterian or Independent worship, and, at the same time, refuse them a toleration in the full exercise of their religion by the administrations of a bishop." If we look back into history for the character of the present sects in Christianity, we shall find few that have not in their turns been persecutors, and complainers of persecution. The primitive Christians thought persecution extremely wrong in the Pagans, but practised it on one another. The first Protestants of the church of England blamed persecution in the Romish church, but practised it against the Puritans. These found it wrong in the bishops, but fell into the same practice themselves, both here and in New England. To account for this we should remember, that the doctrine of toleration was not then known, or had not prevailed in the world. Persecution was, therefore, not so much. * This piece was first printed in The London Packet, June 3d, 1772, and seems to relate to topics of public interest at that time. EDITOR. [The spirited writer of the Two Letters to the Prelates, republished it in an appendix to that pamphlet, without, however, naming Dr. Franklin as the author, but expressing it to be the production of "a gentleman highly respected in the literary world." B. V.] the fault of the sect as of the times. It was not in those days deemed wrong in itself. opinion was only, that those who are in error ought not to persecute the truth; but the possessors of truth were in the right to persecute error, in order to destroy it. Thus every sect, believing itself possessed of all truth, and that every tenet differing from theirs was error, conceived, that, when the power was in their hands, persecution was a duty required of them by that God, whom they supposed to be offended with heresy. By degrees more moderate and more moaest sentiments have taken place in the Christian world; and among Protestants, particularly, all disclaim persecution, none vindicate it, and but few practise it. We should then cease to reproach each other with what was done by our ancestors, but judge of the present character of sects or churches by their present conduct only.. Now, to determine on the justice of this charge against the present Dissenters, particularly those in America, let us consider the following facts. They went from England to establish a new country for themselves, at their own expense, where they might enjoy the free exercise of religion in their own way. When they had purchased the territory of the natives, they granted the lands out in townships, requiring for it neither purchase-money nor quit-rent, but this condition only to be complied with, that the freeholders should for ever support a gospel minister, (meaning probably one of the governing sects,) and a free-school, within the township. Thus what is commonly called Presbyterianism became the established religion of that country. All went on well in this way while the same religious opinions were general, the support of minister and school being raised by a proportionate tax on the lands. But, in process of time some becoming Quakers,* some Baptists, and, of late years, some returning to the church of England (through the laudable endeavours, and a proper application † of their funds, by the Society for Propagating the Gospel), objections were made to the payment of a tax appropriated to the support of a church they disapproved and had forsaken. The civil magistrates, however, continued for a time to collect and apply the tax according to the original laws, which remained in force; and they did it more freely, as thinking it just and equitable, that the holders of lands should pay what was contracted to be paid. when they were granted, as the only consideration for the grant, and what had been considered by all subsequent purchasers as a perpetual incumbrance on the estate, bought therefore at a proportionably cheaper rate; a payment which it was thought no honest man ought to avoid, under the pretence of his having changed his religious persuasion. And this, I suppose, is one of the best grounds of demanding tithes of Dissenters now in England. But the practice being * No person appeared in New England, who professed the opinion of the Quakers, until 1656; that is, about thirty-six years after the first settling of the colony; when Mary Fisher and Ann Austin came from Barbadoes; and, soon after, nine others arrived in the ship Speedwell from London. They were successful in their preaching; and the provincial government, wishing to keep the colony free from them, attempted to send away such as they discovered, and prevent the arrival of others. Securities, fines, banishment, imprisonment, and corporal punishments were instituted for this purpose; but with so little effect, that at last "a law was made for punishing with death, all such as should return into the jurisdiction after banishment. A few were hanged." See History of the British Dominions, 4to. 1773, pp. 118, 120.-B. V. They were to spread the Gospel, and maintain a learned and or thodox clergy, where ministers were wanted or ill provided; administer ing God's word and sacraments, and preventing atheism, infidelity popery, and idolatry. — B. V |