I consider, that every line I write against all religion and a priesthood, is as much a political act, and tends as much to that same reform of which you boast yourself an advocate, as any thing you can say about Universal Suffrage, or Boroughmongering, or what not. You may as well pledge yourself to see the interest of the National Debt paid to eternity, as to attempt, or to hold out a promise of protecting the trade and corruption of Priestcraft, with a Representative System of Goverument, and as the annihilation of corruption is the order of the day, I feel myself more usefully employed than you are, in battering down the worst part of it, or the foundation of all. I am working effectually, you are only talking and looking on. In all your political moves, can you shew me an instance where you have propagated any thing in the shape of sound and useful principles among the people? I feel assured that you have not, and that the whole of your present and past career will only end in deluding and disgusting them, if you confine yourself to an advocacy of your present professions only. If I rescue the mind of one man, from the power of the priests, 1 accomplish a great object: it is like removing a stone from the wall of corruption, which tends to loosen many others, and to cause their successive removal with more and more ease, until the whole fabric tumbles down together. That I have rescued many persons from their power I know, and in addition to their thanks, I have great satisfaction from the success of my efforts. You may say, that you never saw but one copy of my theological publications in the hands of a Radical Reformer, but I know, and feel well assured, from what I have issued, and continue to issue, you will, on quitting your prison, scarcely find the house of a Radical Reformer without them. Do not be offended when I repeat, that if you wish to continue a leader in the cause in which you now stand high, you must examine those works, and either write them down, or give them your countenance and support. If you wish to be neuter in the matter, you will lose yourself. The question is, are they right or wrong, honest or dishonest, they must be one or the other, and in this, as in all other cases, you will find the best policy to be honesty. So examine and see on which side the honesty lies. No man has condemned a medium or moderation in virtue and reform more forcibly than you have done, and yet you are blind to the situation in which you stand, as but midway in the great cause of Reform. You are now but playing with the branches of the corrupt tree. If you pluck them they will shoot forth

again, unless you take up the roots, stock, and all. I go to the root, and if any man can shew me that I am not at the root, I will go deeper. Be advised, and go deeper, I will always pay you that respect to which age and seniority is entitled in the pursuit of virtue, but unless you can shew me that my pursuit of virtue is a delusion, and that I am in error as to my views, I will compromise nothing. UNION UPON SOUND PRINCIPLES is my motto, supported by PERSEVERANCE. Here I will meet and shake hands with you, and no where else.

For want of advocating some sound principles that can bear examination and be defended, all the past and present clamours about Reform, have sought only to set up a name as a guidance for the approbation of the multitude, and then quarrel with each other upon the score of superiority, and from a jealousy as to who shares the greatest degree of popularity. This has been the groundwork of all our bickerings, therefore I advise you, and every public man, to think less about names, and more about principles, and further, express what principles you think best, and if you dislike mine, give the public some reasons for it, that they too may judge for themselves. Your line of conduct has been a line of expediency, as well as that of those whom you denounce. You never rested upon sound principles: you have always had views beyond what you expressed, and always expressed dislike of those who went further, or not so far as yourself in their expressions. We must have principles avowed, and not expedients and professions, and above all things we must have free discussion upon all subjects, and nothing like dictation.

Your fellow Prisoner,

RICHARD CARLILE.

CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN MR. CARLILE AND THE SOLICITOR TO THE TREASURY.

SIR, Dorchester Gaol, Feb. 11, 1822. As it is my intention to make an immediate settlement as to my fines, I beg leave to enquire, whether the necessary arrangements for that purpose lie within the department of your office, as Solicitor to the Treasury, and for one of the prosecutions, on which a fine has been laid? or. Whether, as I understand the fines are the perquisites of the Sheriffs of the City of London for the time being, my business is with the Secondaries. Your early answer will oblige, Sir, your obedient Servant, R. CARLILE,

George Maule, Esq. Solicitor to the Treasury.

SIR, Lincoln's Inn, Feb. 14, 1822. In answer to your Letter of the 11th inst. informing me that it is your intention to make an immediate settlement of the fines, imposed upon you by His Majesty's Court of King's Bench, and enquiring whether the arrangements for that purpose lie within my department, I have to acquaint you that they do not, and that I conceive the proper officer to whom the fine of £500 ought to be paid, is the Secondary of the City of London, who will afterwards be called upon to account for the saine to the Crown.

With respect to the other fine, I apprehend it may be paid by application to the Court of Exchequer, or if it be more convenient to you, to the Sheriff of the County of Dorset. I am, Sir, your obedient Servant,

Mr. R. Carlile, Dorchester Gaol.

SIR,

GEO. MAULE.

Dorchester Gaol, Feb. 17, 1822.

I HAVE to thank you for the information of your Letter of the 14th instant, as to the proper channels for the payment of my fines; but, there is another point for consideration of equal importance to me, will the payment of the full amount of both fines restore to me the property which was carried off from my premises on December the 23d and 24th, 1819, and of which I have never had any official account that any sale has been made, or what has been done with it? That property is of more value to me than the amount of both my fines. I am informed that every step taken with regard to its removal and detention has been under your instructions, and the same with regard to the seizure just made. Of course I address you as one of the Law Offieers of the Crown, and under the assumption that you are the organ of the Government in this affair. I do not look for a remission of the least part of my sentence. I have ever calculated on a full compliance with it, nor can I imagine that the Government will shew the disposition to double the amount of the fines imposed upon me by the Court of King's Bench, which will be the case if the property taken from me does not account for the fines for which it was seized and taken away, or if, on the payment of the full amount in cash, it be not returned.

The period allotted me for imprisonment is now drawing to a close: I know that my release from confinement cannot take place, unless the fines be settled, and as there is something more to be done, from the seizure of my property, than mere paying the amount of the fines, I shall be obliged if you can, as the Law Officer of the Crown, or as the organ of the Treasury in this affair, give me information whether the property taken from my premises will be restored on the payment of the fines.

It is my wish and intention to settle the matter as speedily as possible. My loss will be grievous enough, from the property having been so long held as a security, and an injury worse than the fines if it should be returned without waste or damage. I make no complaint of the sentence of the Court, nor of any thing else at present. I wish for an immediate fair and honourable settlement of my fines. I am, Sir, your obedient Servant, George Maule, Esq. Solicitor to the Treasury.

SIR,

R. CARLILE.

Lincoln's Inn, Feb. 21, 1822.

I HAVE to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 17th inst. upon the subject of your fines, and with respect to the fine of £1000, beg to acquaint you that I conceive the information which you require must be obtained by application to the Court of Exchequer. With respect to the other fine, I would refer you as before to the Secondary of the City of London.

I am, Sir, your obedient Servant, Mr. R. Carlile, Dorchester Gaol,

GEORGE MAULE.

Printed and Published by R. CARLILE, 55, Fleet Street. All Communications (post paid) are requested to be sent to Dorchester Gaol, until a further Address to some House or Shop be given.-Orders, with remittances, or references for payment, will be punctually attended to. Country Agents will find the most liberal Terms for prompt Payment.

The Republican.

No. 10. Vol. V.] LONDON, FRIDAY, March 8, 1822. [PRICE 6d.

TO THE REPUBLICANS OF THE ISLAND OF GREAT BRITAIN.

Dorchester Gaol, March 4, CITIZENS, Year 3, of the Spanish Revolution. CORRUPT Judges and Common Law are still at work. The Lawyer in London who is known by the appellation of the Common Serjeant, but, at the Common Halls, as Little Jef, or Jefferies, has made himself the advocate and protector of Murray and Sharpe, and has sentenced Holmes, one of my shopmen, to two years imprisonment in Giltspur Street Compter, Holmes was a volunteer, and not in the shop more than three-quarters of a day. He has already suffered imprisonment for selling some publication of Mr. Griffin's, during the Queen's affair, and has proved himself a sound man. The law of banishment would have applied to him, and I rather think it would have been euforced had not the perjured officer, Cooper, sworn to Rhodes as Holmes. I shall not hear the result of the other cases in time to notice them this week, but I rely on the virtue and bravery of the men that they will not disgrace themselves or me, and that they will conduct themselves through their trials in the same spirited manuer as Holmes has done, notwithstanding the infamous sentence passed upon him. shall very soon have occasion to summon a few more brave fellows from the North, and in the face of this sentence I call upon them to forward me their names. We must not be alarmed at imprisonment. Ours is no common cause, and requires no ordinary degree of virtue and courage. I will publish a brief report of all these trials as soon as I can collect them, for the example of others who may follow in the same path of noble doings and noble darings.

Holmes is a married man, and his wife has been brought to bed since his confinement in Newgate. He is a man who has been struggling with adversity for some time past, but

Printed and Published by R. CARLILE, 55, Fleet Street.

bas displayed an unconquerable spirit and good ability under all his disasters. I speak as far as I know of him. He was altogether a stranger to me before December last, but I flatter myself that his former conduct has been unimpeachable in every shape. I have never heard it impeached in any shape. As far as it is in my power to give him and his wife assistance they shall not want, but I have so large and so widely scattered a family that I would earnestly intreat the additional attention and assistance of the Public towards some part of them.

Each of my shopmen and shopwomen ought to be viewed as voluntary antagonists of the Bridge Street and Essex Street Gangs, and I fearlessly say, ought to be supported as such by the Public, and not be considered as agents of mine, in a collective point of view. Each of them has done as much as I have done, that is, their best. They have left nothing undone that they could do.

In the rage of persecution for opinions and attacks upon a corrupt government, we have formed the forlorn hope, and have kept that rage from others, therefore the Public will find an interest in protecting us, to continue to fill that situation. The present Government will never cease to prosecute throughout its decline, nor until its fall, and some one must be foremost: therefore, I feel astonished that the time-serving writers and talkers do not see their own interest in supporting me and those who act with me. If I am to be put down (which shall not be yet, nor easily done) the persecution which now falls upon me will reach the nearest to me, and so on until there be no opposition, and the whole body of people, government, and all, will corrupt and rot together.

The maxim of our enemies is: "Let us stand by each other and not yield an iota of our possession to the demands of the people.' This they act upon, and when assaulted you always find them in phalanx, so if we are to conquer them, we must bring a phalanx against them that shall overpower them, and not leave them to be assaulted by individuals who are almost sure to be destroyed at the first onset.

I shall always feel the conscious pride that I have done my duty in the field of battle. I will go on to do all that I may find power to do, and I think I can answer for the brave few who have gathered round me. The apathy of others shall never lessen our ardour, although that apathy may lessen our powers of action.

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