Mr. URBAN,

W

Doctors Commons, July 20. HEN you did me the favour of inferting the fhort notice which appeared in your latNumber, I was not without hope, that, by inducing

*** a private explanation

from Mr. Le Mefurier, it might have faved me fome pain in the public performance of a promile, already perhaps too long delayed from fimilar motives. It has, however, produced no more effect thau the former intimation of the fame kind, which Dr. Milner gave at my request. I muft, therefore, proceed as I can, to difcharge what I confider as a facred debt of juftice. Never, Sir, have I thought it worth while to anfwer any mif-fiatement of my Speeches in Parliament, or any comment founded on fuch mil-ftatement, by which I alone could be injured. I have fuffered not a little in that way; but it was my own affair: I have not the faine right to leave the character of another unprotected, where my name has been made the vehicle of an unjuft impu

tation.

With the charitable view, as he profeffes, of clearing me from having any concern in a fraud, Mr. Le Melurier has advanced, on my alledged authority, a moft ferious charge against the whole body of Roman Catholicks *. He flates, as from me, not only "that I difavow the report of my Speech," which his antagonit Dr. Milner had quoted; and that it is not as I fpoke it; but that the Romanijis have twisted my arguments to answer their own purpofes. And this" (he takes occation to obferve, Mr. Urban) "will give your readers a pretty clear idea of what is the impartiality of thes boated Report of the Debates on the Catholic Quetion." My Reverend Friend then

Gent. Mag. for January, 1807, p. 33.

goes on, through the rest of his Letter, to be fometimes very fevere, and fometimes very smart (I suppose I muft, in civility, fo call it), upon "the fabrica tor of the Report," "the impartial Re porter's talents at garbling," and "the fabricated Report, to which Dr. Milner has given currency by his figua ture." In a fubfequent Letter, the fame. charge is "repeated, and pofitively afferted" again, though in terms rather guarded and equivocal; and, in a late pamphlet, this ready Polemick renews the original attack, referring to "the garbled account of Dr. Laurence's Speech, which the Roman Catholicks have publifhed in their impartial ac count of the Debates, and which Dr. Milner has adopted." Thus, in every fhape of controverfy, in the fugitive mifcellany of a Magazine, and in his more formal publication (though, perhaps, Mr. Urban, not likely to circulate fo widely, or to live fo long, as your pages) he perfifis in a fweeping accufation of falfification and forgery against the whole Catholic Body in ge neral, and Dr. Milner in particular; and I am the witnefs whom he calls, over and over again, to prove his cale,

In this exhibition of me, as a fort of deluded accomplice turning King's evidence, my friend, I doubt not, believed that he was doing me honour. He wifhed, probably in tenderness, to reprefent me as lefs criminal than I might be fuppofed, in my wicked endeavours to prote From political degradation and oppreffion, three millions of my fellow-fujets, from whom I mot con cientionfly differ in religious opinion. In the true pint of Chrifian benevolence be haliened to draw out of the mod, where I was floundering, "a mon of us fize and eminence," as he truly and icevorfly de crines me; for your readers, Mr. Urban, mufi know, toa I was born to be one *The Sequel, &c. &c. pp. 61 and 62. of

ever, I'm afraid, that, in spite of 1. Ius pious effor, I muft even fick where I am fince, in relating the converfation to which he alludes, I fhall be obliged to own, that although I certainly declared the Report of Riv Speech not to contam what. I fpoke (and what report does?; although I did then difavow, as both before and fince I have difavowed to many, the arguments as they there, find ajeribed" to me; yet I never hit d, or meant to hint at any cute but that of serial err r; and moft indisputably not at any wilf and diffoneti perverfion. I muti who confefs, in regard to the paf. Lage of the Report mare immediately in quellion, that, not remembering the words of it, I did moft diftinctly exprefs my general concurrence in the fubliance of Dr. Milner's doctrines concerning Oaths. I fhall now, S'r, lay before your readers all that actually paffed between Mr. Le Mefurier and myself.

I was in laf November, during the heat of a contefied election for the Univerfity of Oxford, that Mr. Le Me furier hattening from the place of polling, and I hurrying towards it, accidentally met. He stopped me with, You are the very man that I parti cularly wanted to fee.” On my anfwering that I was always glad to fee him, and enquiring what now was his particular Lufine's with me: he informed me, that he was referred to me in his controverly with Dr. Milner. I very fincerely told him, that I knew nothing about his controverfy, and had not even heard of it. "Tell me, then," fand he, "do you own the Report of your Speech on the Catholic Petition. published by Cothell and Martin? Is it correct?" Certainly not," aufwered I; "it is very defective, perplexed, and confufed. Where the main topic of an argument is to be traced, the peculiar turn of it is completely lot as ut be commonly more or less expected, and was much more likely to happen, on a fubject to extenfive, and involving a difcuffion of fo many of our conftitutional laws fince the Reforma ion, and fo much of ecclefiatical h fiory from a more remote period; efpecially, too, where the memories that preferved it were fure to give it a tincture from the opinions which would be there neceffarily

64

mingled with whatever was received;

plied by thole who had let it elcape from their own flock of reafoning on the f me fubjects." Whether I illuftrated this by any infiance, I am not fure; bu, had Lice Lecte! the words, the paflage in quefton would have afforded me one very much to the purpofe. My friend then sked me, whether I agreed with Dr. Milner in las doetrines concerning Ouths, as affected by views of prudence and expediency : and I told him, that I decidedly did, according to my undertanding of Dr. Milner's u'e of the terms. Confider, too," added I, that, to prevent mifapprehenfion, he gives an example in the cafe of a promile to return a fword; and, though you may find fault with the expreffion, you ought rot to push the meaning of any man beyond that which is fairly analogous to his own clear explanation," Well," continued he, but do you held that a promite or oath may be broken, if it obtires any good evidently greater ?" to that effect. "Yes," I replied, "as I onderftand it. Put the fecond cafe of the promise to return the word, if the demand is made, when it is necellary for you to difend the life of your Sovereign, or of any innocent perfon." No;" interrupted Mr. Le Melurier, "that cafe is not applied to that doctrine by Dr. Milner." This I admited; but comended myself, that it

44

would apply. He then, in kind compaflion to my ignorance, I prefume, informed me, I meant the rule, that a lefler evil is to be incurred in preference to a greater. I acquainted him, that I knew the rule was fome times fo expreffed, and candidly allowed that it was better fo to exprefs it, because it was fo lefs liable to mifconftruétion; ftill I thought, that, at bottom, the meaning would be found to be the fame. He laughed; afferted the difference with much feeming triumph, when I put an end to the converfation by faving, that I should be happy to meet him on the fubject when we had leifure, but that was not the place for fuch a difcuffion. I had then in my mind an imperfect recol"lection of a paflage in Ariftotle's Nicomachean Ethicks, which fays, that a leffer evil, in comparison of a greater, is reckoned as a pofitive good and this is made the foundation of Mr. Le Meurer's reading of the rule by B.thopT ylor, who, by the bye, quotes

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