By62 11830d

SPLENDia SINS.

A LETTER

ADDRESSED TO

HIS GRACE
THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON.

BY

LATIMER REDIVIVUS.

LONDON :
J. HATCHARD AND SON, 187, PICCADILLY.

MDCCCXXX.

LONDON
VllINTED BY T. BRETTELL, RUPERT STREET, HAYMARKET.

A LETTER,
Mv Lord,
1 HE exalted position which your Grace occupies in
the scale of society, and the authoritative station
which you have for some time held in the councils of
your country, seem to associate you in a peculiar and
most influential manner with every thing which
relates to the prevailing habits of the great and the
welfare of the community of large. This circum
stance appears to point out your Grace as the most
appropriate channel through which to direct an
appeal to all those persons of elevated rank whose
conduct has a most direct and immediate bearing
upon these objects. To stand upon the pinnacle of
society — to be placed upon a pedestal of personal or
official dignity, an object of almost unavoidable
admiration, homage, and imitation to the surrounding
multitude of various grades — to move in a sphere
which necessarily commands the attendance of a
considerable number of direct adherents, and with a
raoral impetus which extends its influence to the
remotest extremities of the system, these are fearful as
weU as honourable distinctions. They involve re-

sponsibilities, which few among those to whom they
belong appear to form an adequate idea. It is
recorded of a monarch of antiquity, that he em
ployed an individual for the express purpose of
reminding him, amidst the splendour of his achieve
ments, and the intoxications of courtly adulation, that
he was a man. It may not be necessary indeed to
reiterate this salutary memento in the ears of the
princes and nobles of our own land. They seem to
be in no danger of aspiring to the honour of an apo
theosis. They are content, in general, with the rank
of humanity within its narrowest verge ; seldom, it is
to be feared, extending their views beyond the con
fines of a fleeting and momentary existence.
But I have often thought that it would be well if
some one could have access to these persons amidst
the scenes of frivolity and reckless dissipation in
which they deem it their privilege to indulge, and
remind them, in the language of honest and faithful
expostulation, that they are accountable and immor
tal beings. It would assuredly not be amiss if, at the
intervals of retirement from the arena of political
discussion, or the still more tumultuous scenes of
fantastic and unhallowed pleasure, some one was to
call to their recollection, not only the peril of their
own condition, but also the momentous interests of
which they were in many instances the heedless and
unreflecting depositaries. The present habits of the
great mass of persons of exalted rank, and I will
venture to add of the leading members of that admi
nistration of which your Grace is the head, render"

such an office peculiarly necessary. Whether the
existing race of nobility be better or worse than
their ancestors, whether they are more or less dege
nerate than their predecessors, I deem it unimportant
to inquire. I am not one of those who see nothing
but good in the past and little else than evil in the
present. It is enough to justify the appeal which I
propose to make, if offences of the most aggravated
character against the law of God, and pregnant with
most disastrous and fatal consequences to the best
interests of man are continually perpetrated with
bold and undissembled impiety throughout the whole
range of the high places of society. I am not to be
told that these are expressions too vehement and
unmeasured, as applied to the conduct of the aristo
cracy and gentry of the land ; for I am persuaded that
no language can convey an adequate impression of the
enormity of the guilt, and of the malignity of the
effects of such conduct. I am convinced that no
real and substantial change can take place in the
morals of the great body of the people of this
country, until their patterns and examples in the
upper ranks have begun to reform their habits. It is.
impossible that the lower atmosphere should be clear
and salubrious, while the meteors which sport through
its higher regions impregnate it with their noxious
influence. In the course of this address I shaU endeavour to
lay before your Grace the unchristian character as
well as the injurious tendency of some of those habits,
which, from their origination and peculiar prevalence

6
among the great and the illustrious, I have denomi
nated, in the language of an ancient father, " Splendid
Sins." In the prosecution of this object, I totally
disclaim any intention to charge your Grace person
ally with being more deeply implicated in these de
linquencies than others, and though I shall speak in
terms of unequivocal censure of the vices and im
pieties which I undertake to expose, I trust that I
shall use no expression inconsistent with that respect
which is due to your Grace's station and office. I
must also remind your Grace, that in this discussion
I take for granted the truth of the Christian religion,
and assume those actions to be sins which, inde
pendently of national habits, and the maxims of sen
suality, pride, and ambition, the Bible pronounces to
be sins. This, indeed, is a point which must be de
termined at the outset ; for if the Bible be true — if
Christianity be in all its parts a religion, which came
down from heaven to earth — if its authority be clear,
vinequivocal, and distinct, then our estimate of cha
racter and conduct must be entirely founded upon the
acknowledged principles of that scheme ; and it is a
mockery of common sense, as well as an insult to the
majesty of heaven, to set up any other standard of duty
or rule of virtuous conduct.
Assuming, then, Christianity to be true and obli
gatory, and the Bible to be the infallible record of .the
will of the Most High, aUow me, in the first place, to
ask your Grace what we are to think of those open
and undissembled violations of the Sabbath which
have been for years, but at no period more palpably

and offensively than at the present, prevalent among
the higher classes of society in this country. Among
the Splendid Sins with which the great and the noble
appear to exult in decorating their character, and
which may be considered as so many insignia of
triumph over the discomfited powers of morality and
religion, this is doubtless entitled to be regarded as
the palmary trophy. As the reverence of the Chris
tian Sabbath has been proved by all experience to be
the most invariable attendant of practical and influ
ential piety upon every scale of admeasurement, so
its habitual and wanton desecration has demonstrated
with equal certainty the rejection of the authority of
the Supreme. Hence the mode of its observance has
become one of the surest tests of character, one of the
most decisive and unequivocal diagnostics of the state
of the moral constitution — an index, which points
out the degree of temperature to which the mind has
been raised above the zero of utter indifference, and
of the absolute negation of religious principle. The
profanation of this holy day, when viewed in all its
bearings and results, I consider as the most prolific of
aU the sources of national degeneracy and impiety ;
as that reservoir which collects within its bosom
every corrupt element of fashionable dissipation, and
sends them forth in the most copious torrents to
poison and desolate the land. It is the most deadly
bane of society, extending with the same malignant
influence from its highest to its lowest grade. Seldom
does a prince, a peer, or a commoner attain to a dis
astrous notoriety in vice, but the neglect of the duties

8
of the Sabbath occupies a prominent place among
the list of his delinquencies. Rarely does a criminal
ascend the platform to pay the demands of justice by
the sufferance of an ignominious death, but the first
accent of penitent confession, if, indeed, a feeling of
contrition has been awakened in his breast, announces
that his career of sin, which is to end in a death of
infamy, originated in the violation of the Sabbath. If
this be undeniably the case, and if the decent obser
vance of the Sabbath has been sanctioned, guarded,
and enforced by the most rigid and unequivocal pro
visions in the fundamental laws of our country, as
essentially and avowedly Christian in its constitution,
then I appeal to your Grace, as a British statesman,
to cherish and extend, by your influence and example,
a becoming reverence for the Sabbath. I call upon
you as a professing Christian, and as a member of
that Church to which your Grace has frequently
expressed your attachment, to vindicate the con
sistency of your principles by a due regard to this
primary requisition of rehgion and of the Church,
lest the charge of cant and insincerity should rest
upon some other heads than those which the world
has generally dehghted to honour with these epithets.
I am aware, my Lord, of the disadvantage which
attends the question of the Sabbath, arising from the
very nature of the institution, as admitting, of neces
sity, a certain degree of latitude and ambiguity with
respect to the precise extent to which its observance
is to be carried. I know how easy it is to accommo
date our notions lo our inclinations, our duty to our

9

imaginary interest, upon a subject which appears to
concede the slightest measure of discretionary power.
Such a point seems to afford a more than ordinary
facility for the practice of self deception. The
slightest measure of doubt or indeflniteness places
the delinquent in a position which enables him to
dismiss with a sneer every charge of guilt, and to
denounce as fanaticism and extravagance the expres
sion of indignant censure. It is obvious how cheap
and gratuitous it is to turn off the edge of such an
appeal by construing it, upon the score of such an
assuraption, into groundless and unmeaning declama
tion. But, however difficult, and indeed unnecessary
it may be, to mark out the exact limits within which
the observance of the Sabbath ought to be kept,
there can be no difficulty in determining what is suit
able to the spirit and expressed design of that day.
And among the habits which are at most decided
variance with those objects, I must pronounce that of
public and indiscriminate conviviality, and especiaUy
those official and cabinet banquetings which have
lately been so much in vogue. It has been announced,
not many weeks since, through those channels of
information to which, in such a case, it is difficult to
give credit, that three of our most distinguished
ministers of State gave public dinners on a Sunday to
their respective friends and adherents. The most
eminent of those responsible functionaries was said to
be also the Lord Lieutenant of an extensive county.
The same vehicles of communication also stated, that
a large number of the gentry of the county was con
gregated together on that occasion, bringing with them

10
a large retinue of attendants, and leaving, as many
of them must have left, the altar of their God, and
the sober routine of their domestic occupations. Allow
me to ask you, my Lord, what was likely to be — what
indeed must have been — the effect of such an aggrega
tion on such a day ? What must have been the effect
upon the minds of the individuals themselves thus
assembled ? Is it probable that the end of God in
the appointment of a Sabbath was thereby most
effectually secured ? Is it likely that the lessons of
instructions which some of them might have heard
in the morning, would become more deeply impressed
upon their hearts ? May we take it for granted,
for nothing else would justify such a proceeding,
that the tumult and agitation — the polite and
courtly attentions — the commingling elements of
pride and mortification — of self-complacent import
ance and felt insignificance, unavoidably attendant
upon State entertainments, are the best possible means
of soothing and tranquillizing the spirit, whose
emotions of hope and fear, of personal ambition and
patriotic solicitude, have been in a whirl of feverish
activity for eighteen out of every four-and-twenty
hours of the preceding week ? May we assume it
as a point demonstrated by experience and authen
ticated by reason and common sense, that the aggre
gation of a number of individuals within a splendid
hall, for the avowed purpose of convivial enjoyment,
where the eye is dazzled with the glitter of costly
appendages, and the spirits are elated with the
fumes of the most generous productions of the vin
tage, is exactly the kind of occupation which is

11
calculated to disengage the soul from earth, and to
direct its contemplations towards heaven ? If these
questions supply their own answer, with an em
phasis of negation which ought to pour confusion
upon those who capriciously expose themselves to the
charges which they involve, then why is it, my Lord,^
that the ministers of State — the highest functionaries
of a country which calls itself Christian — which
glories in the possession of a reformed Church, and
of Sabbatical services of the purest and most exalted
order of devotion — why is it that the foremost and
most influential public men of such a country ex
hibit the unseemly spectacle of converting the day of
sacred rest, on which they might be feeding upon
the manna of celestial delights, into a carnival of
unholy festivity ? To say nothing of the effects of
such entertainments upon the character and pros
pects of those who immediately partake of them,
why should the feelings of the truly excellent and
good throughout the kingdom be wantonly wounded
and offended by such an authoritative display of in
ordinate levity ? Why should the last feeble barrier
of sound principle in the mind of the doubtful and
hesitating be rudely broken down by an act of
conduct which runs so directly counter to the palpa
ble spirit and design of a divine and positive institu
tion ? Why should the young, the thoughtless, the
avowedly impious and profane, of every rank and
order, be encouraged in the numberless modes of
corrupting association, with the apparent sanction of
those whom they have perhaps the power or ambi
tion to imitate in scarcely anything else? And

12
lastly, why should the numerous train of servants
and dependents, who must be kept in active and
injurious employ during every State entertainment —
why should they, who have immortal spirits as well
as their masters, be deprived of the legitimate rest
and privileges of the Sabbath ? These are questions,
my Lord, which ought not to be lightly dismissed.
They are questions pregnant with eternal conse
quences, and which, therefore, no man, be his rank,
or character, or office what it may, is invested with
the privilege of innocently disregarding.
But, my Lord, from cabinet dinners I feel that I
am called away to one of those nocturnal entertain
ments denominated routs, or by whatever title the
caprice of fashion may choose to designate them, for
which the Sabbath evening appears of late to have
been selected as peculiarly appropriate. Seldom
does a week elapse without some exhibition of this
kind being announced in the public journals, and
rarely does it happen that the array of brilliant
vanity which is mustered on such occasions is not
headed, and, as it were, marshalled by some minis
terial or noble veteran, whose presence is deemed
necessary to raise the assemblage to its proper stand
ing in the lofty sphere of fashion. It may be, that
the wife of some foreign Ambassador, some titled
stranger in our land, has thought it good to give
this specimen of the taste and manners of her coun
try as relates to the observance of the Sabbath. But
with whomsoever this display of frivolity and un
hallowed delight may be announced, it seldom fails
to attract a number of the great and noble among

1,3
our countrymen, which teUs, in melancholy accents,
the awful extent of their degeneracy. From the
splendid mansion, or the magnificent square, which
is, perhaps, the immediate scene of such dissipation,
the noxious influence of the example spreads with
disastrous effect throughout the streets, the courts,
the alleys of the city, and flies upon the wings of the
press, until at last it has reached the remotest ex
tremities of the island.
Pleasure, however, is not the only, though it does
appear to be the chief deity, for the worship of which
the higher classes of our countrymen seem to think
that the Sabbath was appointed. Secular business,
also, in various forms, claims a large measure of their
attention. One of these modifications, in which your
Grace may naturally be supposed to feel a peculiar
interest, I will take the liberty of mentioning. Since
your Grace has been at the head of the present
Government, instances have, I believe, not unfre
quently occurred, in which its members have been
called together on the Sabbath, to consult upon af
fairs of State. Cabinet councils indeed are quite in
character with cabinet dinners. The one is doubt
less a very suitable introduction to the other. I wiU
not affirm that circumstances may not occur which
would imperatively require the immediate deUbera
tion of the guardians of the State. Critical emer
gencies may doubtless spring, which admit of no
legitimate delay. But such conjunctures are rare,
and, in a time of profound peace, there is scarce a
possibility that they should frequently arise. The
inevitable conclusion, therefore, is, that when such

14

conferences do take place, amidst universal tranquil
lity and quietude, it is the result of choice and not of
necessity. When, indeed, the veil is occasionally
removed, and a portion of cabinet machinery is ex
hibited to public view, it is lamentable to perceive
how wantonly the sanctity of the Sabbath is violated,
without a plausible pretext for its desecration. I
call such an employment of the day a desecration,
because I know no difference but what the law hath
made, between the discussions of the Cabinet and
the debates of Parliament itself. As an example of
such a disclosure of the springs of ministerial move
ments, I need only refer your Grace to what I must
denominate the disgraceful political squabble which
attended the dismissal, some time ago, of a distin
guished member of your Grace's cabinet ; when,
without the shadow of a necessity, the Sabbath was
chosen above all other days to conduct the un
seemly correspondence, and the retirement of Majesty
was disturbed by the encroachments of ministerial
rivalry. The last of that particular class of Splendid Sins of
which I now take the liberty of apprizing your
Grace, is the habit of Sunday travelling. There is
in this practice something so peculiarly and diametri
caUy opposed to the origin and expressed design of
the Sabbatical institution, as to suggest the idea that
those who wilfuUy indulge in it had deUberately
formed the plan of contravening, in a manner, the
most unequivocal and direct, the very letter of a
divine injunction. The Sabbath, in its fundamental
ground, in its specific object, and in the very mean-

15
ing of the term, is a day of rest ; but they make it, if
I may be allowed such an incongruity of phrase,
emphatically a day of motion. Thus, an appoint
ment, the morale of which is abundantly manifest,
independently of its positive enactraent, as it affords
a season of necessary quietude and repose to man
and beast, is, by an obliquity of conduct rarely pa
ralleled, made the occasion of a practice the very
reverse. There is something so strangely perverse in
this behaviour, that at the first view we hardly know
how to account for it, except by supposing that it is
intended to be an act of absolute and unqualified
resistance to an expression of the Divine will. On
a closer survey of the case, however, it will not be
found necessary to have recourse to this extreme
atrocity of rebellious purpose. In the existing cir
cumstances of society, as modified by custom and
legislative institutions, there is enough to explain
this moral phenomenon without assuming any other
feeUng towards the beneficent Author of our being
than that of utter indifference to his authority.
Happily the law of the land — a law introduced at a
period in our history when the directors of the
national councils had not yet learnt to regard the
recognition of a sovereign Disposer as a badge of
hypocrisy or a relic of superstition — forbids most of
the more active and public pursuits of business as
well as pleasure. The venerable architects of our
constitution, in embodying the precepts of Christi
anity into the fabric, fortunately did npt derive their
notions of Sabbath occupations from the " Book of
Sports." They seem tq have drawn their maxims of

16

conduct upon this subject from a more ancient
source, and to have raised the standard of duty to a
somewhat closer accordance with its dictates. The
consequence is, that the Sunday to those who do not
feel disposed to employ it in offices of devotion, is
a day of comparative exemption from occupation.
Against such a periodical season of vacancy, how
ever, it was necessary to provide some remedy.
Against the intolerable ennui attendant on a seventh
portion of lingering time, it was indispensable that
some stimulating engagement should be discovered.
The variety and excitement of travelling naturaUy
suggested itself, and the expedient has been found to
answer so well, for the purpose both of pleasure and
of business, as a means of relieving the tedium of
languid hours, and of meeting the calls of distant
occupations, as to have now become a matter of ordi
nary convenience.
My Lord, I am not speaking without authority.
I make no statements which experience and observa
tion do not abundantly justify. We hear too
frequently of journies undertaken from town to
country, and from country to town again, by men of
rank and title ; we read too often of calls of cere
mony and of interviews of State ; we know too weU
the day usually chosen by many who cut the most
prominent figure at our noted rendezvous of pubUc
amusement, for the purpose of congregating at the
scene of sport, to leave any doubt upon our minds as
to the prevalence of this iniquitous practice. I have
more than once heard men of fashion inveighing
against the bigotry and tyranny of our laws in re-

17
quiruig the suspension of public entertainments, and
of some methods of conveyance, during the appointed
day of rest. It is not many weeks since that I
heard a person of this description, just returned
from abroad, and full of admiration for the superior
UberaUty and tolerance of our continental neighbours
in reference to this point, declare that, among other
advantages, traveUing was remarkably convenient as
a means of kiUing Sunday ; and his conscience ap
peared to be quite relieved in having an opportunity
of performing this most acceptable sacrifice. It is
not quite nine months since that I knew of a gentle
man journeying from the metropolis to a distant
borough on a Sunday, for the purpose of offering
himself a candidate for a seat in Parliament, when
his principal, and indeed almost his only available,
claim for such a distinction was the zeal which he
had displayed in behalf of religion and the Protestant
church. These, my Lord, are facts. Upon their mischievous
tendency I forbear to dwell. They are indeed but
obscure and isolated instances. They are but mean
imitations of what is carried on upon a more splendid
scale on the king's highway for fifty-two days every
year. I call for no legal interference against such
practices. They are perhaps beyond the reach of
laws. To meddle coercively with such habits might
be deemed vexatious, without answering any of the
moral ends of obedience. But I call for the more
powerful and efficacious restraint of example from
those who are placed aloft, as brighter luminaries, to

18
reflect their light and impress their force upon the
minor bodies which dance around them : I call for
some consistency in men who have not ceased to
style themselves Christians; for some reverence for
the ordinances of the Church from those who pro
fess to be its supporters and defenders.
The next offence to which I shall take the liberty
of directing your Grace's attention, as pre-eminently
entitled to the designation of " splendid," is that of
DueUing. In that vast barter of profligacy and
crime which takes place in human society, most
vices may be considered as articles of common traffic.
Most of the outrages against morality and religion
prevalent in the upper classes are found to sUde with
a remarkable facility, under a slight modification of
aspect, into the lower ranks of the community. But
in this, the great, the noble, and the honourable,
claim a monopoly. The right to deal in this species
of ware is held by a charter, handed down from the
remotest ages of barbarism, or it must be established
as it were by a fresh patent, drawn out of the herald's
office. Here the privilege of caste is most anxiously
and sedulously maintained. Hired ruffians, indeed,
may lacerate each other's flesh, and break each
other's bones, for the amusement of their superiors,
and be charioted in splendour, amidst the greetings
of assembled thousands, to and from that scene of
basest outrage upon all the decencies of humanity.
But the pleasure of shooting each other deUberately,
and in cold blood, seems to be a luxury exclusively
appropriated to those who glory in the name of
gentlemen.

19
My Lord, I am not trifling with a subject which I
feel to be of the gravest and most painful nature.
But the consummate absurdity of the practice I am
now exposing seems to vie with its atrocity. In
endeavouring to display its wickedness, we are at
the same time insensibly struck with its folly. The
ludicrous becomes imperceptibly associated with the
melancholy, and we are at a loss upon which to fix
the attention. I shall endeavour, however, to dis
miss the former characteristic as much as possible from
my view. I shall take leave, in all seriousness and
sobriety, to put to your Grace the following simple
questions : — If that book which we call the Bible be
not altogether a fable — if that religion which we
profess be any thing else than a system of imposition
— if that soul, that spirit, which resides within us,
and actuates our frame, be any thing beyond a
transient vapour — then is it wise^ is it rational, is it
consistent with the momentous truths and over
whelming realities involved in these suppositions, to
incur the risk of being sent, or of sending another
into eternity, in open defiance of the laws of God and
man, and in defence of an imaginary notion often
more evanid than a shadow, from the field of single
combat ? Is that precisely the scene from which a
man of reflection, even though his character should
fall short, by many degrees, of any thing entitled to
the name of piety, would lightly expose himself or
another to the danger of being summoned before the
tribunal ofthe Supreme? These, my Lord, are not
impertinent, much less are they trifling questions;
The character of pubUc men, we are frequently tpldi

20
is public property ; and if we are to take that
property with aU its evil and its good upon its head,
a little anxiety may at least be pardonable, that the
former may not greatly overbalance in our account.
The extent to which this barbarous and bloody
practice has been carried, and the lives which have
faUen a sacrifice to it in the course of the last fifty
years, among men of rank and influence, in addition
to the levity and recklessness of feeUng which it
produces in the community at large, render the ex
posure of its enormity and preposterous folly a task
peculiarly important. Among statesmen, the names
of Pitt and Tierney, of Castlereagh and Canning,
and those various individuals of Uving celebrity of
whom your Grace knows more than I do, have lent
their lustre to this work of darkness, and surrounded
what might more justly have been considered a sport
of the infernals with a halo of imposing splendour.
And what, my Lord, is the mighty cause which
generally gives rise to these deadly encounters ?
What is the momentous interest, in defence of
which these valiant heroes are so ready to sacrifice
both soul and body, and in comparison of the loss of
which the torments of hell are but as a feather in
the scale ? I am acquainted with the name indeed,
of this mysterious spell ; but beyond the term, I can
find little that is solid or substantial. The stern and
disappointed Roman, on finding himself worsted, ex
claimed with querulous indignation, " Te, virtus, ut
" rem colui, at tu nomen inane es." I fear that the
honour of modern duellists, if brought to the
test of rational analysis, will be found to approach

21
considerably nearer to a nonentity, except as it
is embodied in a name, than the virtue of the
vanquished republican.
Let not your Grace imagine that I undervalue cha
racter, that I consider any risk too great to maintain its
real purity and integrity. In such an effort, no enter
prise is too hazardous — no firmness is too pertinacious
— no sense of what is j ust and right is too keen, and no
determination to pursue it, in spite of all resistance,
is too inflexible and unbending. I honour the man
who holds his life cheap in the dauntless performance
of his duty to his God and to his country. I revere
the moral hero, who can look death in the face when
it encounters him in the path of rectitude, and piety,
and virtue ; who can fearlessly urge on his course,
though a thousand swords were to start out of their
scabbards against him. But I can feel no respect or
veneration for the bravado, who rushes into bloody
conflict in vindication of an airy phantom which he
has been taught to call his honour. And what is
this sublime and superlative endowment — what is
this bright and transcendant exellency, which, like
polished steel, is in danger of being tarnished by the
least breath of obloquy? On surveying it as it is
embodied in the character of those who are most
jealous for its preservation, it wUl be found to exist
in intimate alUance with almost every vice, and in
utter destitution of many of the most valuable virtues.
There is, in fact, no word in the English language so
utterly without meaning, or rather so pregnant with
a meaning the very reverse of what it was intended.
to express, as the term Honour. A man may be

22
guilty of almost any moral delinquency to which his
incUnation may prompt him — ^he may be a blas
phemer, a seducer, a sabbath-breaker, and an op
pressor, and yet be ready to take the field in defence
of his honour. If he be not openly charged with
lying, or some fraudulent purpose, his honour is un
tainted. Surely it is high time that such a pre
posterous misnomer should be rectified. It would be
better indeed that the word should be utterly
abolished, that it should be altogether expunged out
of the vocabulary, than be the occasion of such an
outrageous violation of every principle designative of
what is noble and exceUent in human character.
Better it were that, like other slang of knight-
errantry, it should be flung back into the oblivion of
that era of ignorance and romantic absurdity from
which, by a rare ascendancy of imagination over
common sense, it has floated along the stream of
time, than that it should still continue to exercise its
mischievous and tyrannic sway over the higher
orders of the community, the terror of weak men,
the stalking horse of proud men, and a discharge in
full to unprincipled men, from some of the most im
portant ties of moral obligation.
And what renders this method of terminating dis
putes inexpressibly absurd, is, that the question is
seldom, whether the aUegation which gives rise to
them be actually true or false, but whether any one
shaU be aUowed to impugn the veracity of the sup
posed offender. It is not, in the majority of instances,
an affair of fact, but an affiair of expression. The
grand characteristic of the law of honour appears to

23
be, that it allows aU convenient latitude for actions,
but that no man shall dare to charge another with
any thing disgraceful or mean. It requires the most
laudable construction to be put upon the most ex
ceptionable conduct — the most criminal acts to be
ascribed to the most virtuous motives — the most
polluted streams to be traced to the purest fountain.
He who acknowledges this law, as your Grace well
knows, never condescends to exculpate himself by
reason or argument — to confute a dishonourable
charge by the convincing evidence of facts. The
only logic which he understands is that of powder
and lead ; the only syllogism, that of arranging the
preliminaries of a hostile meeting; the only con
clusion, that of aiming at the termination of life.
If he can dare to encounter such an ordeal, every
rational man must at once admit his innocence,
though the facts of the case stand in precisely the
same position as before. To apply to him an op
probrious epithet, which appears justly designative
of his character, is what no man must presume. But
in the language of a pungent writer of the last
century he may be proved to be such as is implied
in that epithet with all imaginable politeness. In a
late fatal encounter of this nature, the unfortunate
victim felt it necessary to have recourse to this
method of resenting a rash expression, which seemed
to impugn his sincerity, and after he had received his
mortal wound, he requested it might be communi
cated to a pious nobleman, and a zealous prelate,
that he came to this unhappy end because he would

24
not be called a hypocrite. This was indeed a some
what extraordinary species of martyrdom, and it may
be apprehended that such a gratuitous act of self-
devotion will meet with rather a thankless recog
nition on the great day of account. " Inasmuch
" as thou didst it not unto me" will on that day
be the abashing reply to many a clamorous and
forward claimant. And it surely exhibits, in no
ordinary measure, the illusive power which the
principle of duelling is capable of exercising on the
mind, that an individual, apparently not destitute of
some sense of reUgion, could allow himself to think
that, in having carried that principle into fatal effect,
he had performed an act which would entitle him to
the grateful recollections of the most devoted servants
of the Most High. Of this practice, therefore, in all
its modifications, I will only add, that I consider it as
one of the most daring instances of rebelUon against
heaven, and of outrage upon the bland virtues and
the endearing interests of domestic life, which stands
upon record in the annals of human crime. And it
is high time that, in accordance with the enUghtened
spirit of the age and the advanced state of our
civilization, the Legislature should brand it, inde
pendently of its result, with some signal mark of its
displeasure. Until, however, some such measure is
adopted, it seems the paramount duty of those who
occupy the higher conditions of society to repress, by
every legitimate means, the prevalence of a barbarous
notion, which reason pronounces to be absurd — which
the Bible declares, by the clearest impUcation, to be

25
sinful — and experience, in too many instances, has
proved to be so maUgnant in its effects*.
Another class of sins, which may not improperly
faU under the denomination of the " splendid," and
which prevails to a most deplorable extent among the
higher classes of society — ^is that of horse-racing, with
all its accompaniments of evil. Your Grace is aware
that this is not exclusively an offence of the great.
In this scene of cruel and profligate merriment the
rich and the poor meet together. As, however, they
are the noble and the wealthy, who supply the means
of maintaining it, it is obvious that to them mainly
belongs the guilt which it involves, and the de
moralizing influence which it excites.
My Lord, I am no enemy to rational amusement.
Our nature requires, Christianity in its purest form
does not preclude, such habits of manly recreation as
may be decently and moderately pursued. Under
due limitation there may be no material objection to
such rural sports as may be calculated — without har
dening their hearts and corrupting their principles —
to cherish the frank and independent spirit of our
people. If, indeed, the amusements of the turf could
be conducted, according to their probable design,
when instituted by our more simple and ingenuous
forefathers, as a means of improving the breed and
of developing the energies of one of the noblest and
most generous of the lower animals — if they could
be carried on in that spirit of rustic gaiety and high
* Since the above was written, another fatal duel has taken
place in the Sister Island, under circumstances of peculiar aggra
vation.

26
principled integrity, which the imagination finds it
so easy and so delightful to picture but observation
finds it so difficult to realize — if they exhibited a
scene of social intercourse and temperate hospitality,
in which the varied hues of rank and character were
blended together into the serene sunshine of mutual
cordiality and friendship, the question would have
been totally different. But, as the case actually
stands, what is the scene exhibited at the noted ren
dezvous of equestrian contest, but a promiscuous
assemblage, which would afford abundant materials
to be decimated in professed gamblers and undis-
sembling profligates of one class of society, and in
the basest refuse of the sharpers, thieves, and prosti
tutes of another? Any thing laudable that may
have ever existed in the design of this ancient re
creation has, in fact, been completely relinquished.
The very animals employed on these occasions are
trained and disciplined, and degraded into mere in
struments of gambling. If the splendid speculator
in this joint-stock company of adventurers — ^if the
deep player in this game of hazards — if the wholesale
dealer in this market of fraud should be unsuccessful, as
sooner or later generally happens to be the case, the
effect will be manifest in his diminished resources, and
in all those results of wretchedness and trickery, and
deceit, with which unprincipled degradation seldom
fails to be accompanied. If his character and prin
ciples raise him in some degree above these habits, his
natural resource will be to endeavour to throw him
self as a pensioner on the State, and to barter his inde
pendence for the chance of a provision for his family.

27
These, my Lord, are, in too many instances, the
effects of a devotion to this bewitching amusement
in the upper ranks of society. Upon the lower
classes, the debasing influence of such an aggrega
tion of all the elements of moral turpitude is still
more palpable and direct. The atmosphere would
seem to be literaUy tainted with the effluvia. The
contagion not only takes a stronger hold upon those
who were before infected, and becomes more deeply
lodged in their constitution, but also spreads with a
fatal celerity and malignancy among those whose
bosoms had been hitherto comparatively sound and
pure. During the continuance of one of these car
nivals of intemperance the whole neighbourhood is
in a state of morbid and unhealthy commotion.
The whole system of moral and religious obligation
appears to be out of joint. Every power of resist
ance to temptation is enfeebled, and every sinew of
resolution is relaxed; and when the season of riot
and active abomination is past, there is observable
on many parts of the surface of the population a
stagnant coating of depravity, resembUng those
choking deposits of mud and slime which present
themselves on the refluence of a flood. In making
this representation, I am not straining figures or
conjuring up visions of exaggerated demoraUzation ;
but I speak in the language of sobriety and truth
what my own eyes have seen.
From the race-course the transition is natural to the
theatre, to say nothing of the more refined and elegant
fascinations ofthe ball-room. And here again the demon
of impurity and vice reigns with undisputed pre-emi-

28

nence. If there ever was a time in which the stage
was a school of virtue, of which I am by no means
over credulous, it must be confessed that the period
is long since gone by. The theatre, in all its depart
ments, both before and behind the scenes, I will
boldly affirm, is now, with a few rare exceptions, a
panorama of splendid vanity and confessed unblush
ing iniquity, promiscuously and almost indiscrimi
nately huddled together. Will it be maintained that
this statement is groundless and untrue ? Has frip
pery then ceased to be frivolous ? Has blasphemy lost
its claim to be considered as impious ? Is prostitution
no longer a vice ? Has seduction, then, by some new
process of moral chemistry, been transformed into
virtue, and profaneness been sublimated into piety ?
That these are prominent ingredients and accompa
niments of theatrical representations no one who
knows any thing at all of the case needs to be in
formed. If we wanted any specific proof of the
share which the great and noble take in such scenes,
it would be abundantly supplied in those unseemly
matrimonial connections which have frequently re
sulted from them, and which have seldom failed to
inflict degradation and disgrace upon those who
were so inconsiderate as to form them. I will only
say further, on the point of public amusements, that
if they can be placed upon such a footing, and con
ducted in such a manner as to divest them of their
corrupting influence, and to render them conducive
to innocent gratification, then let them by all means
be cherished and encouraged. In their present
state, it is the unequivocal duty of every man who

29
has any real regard for piety and moraUty, and
virtue, to fly from them, as he would escape the
atmosphere of a dungeon.
The last train of Splendid Sins upon which I now
propose to remark, is that of licentiousness, seduction,
and connubial infidelity, which are indeed too exten
sively prevalent among all ranks, but pre-eminently
I fear among the rich and great. Upon these sub
jects your Grace is aware that I cannot enter into
details. Unhappily, the records of our courts of
justice, and the columns of our periodical journals
are too full of such narrations. In those vile panders
for the appetites of the more debased and unprin
cipled portion of the public which are ushered into
existence, and are hawked about with disgusting ob-
trusiveness on the Sabbath-day, such records, seasoned
with a due measure of scandal and exaggeration,
form the chief attractions for the imagination, and
the principal relish for the taste. And it is melan
choly to think how copious and how constant a supply
of materials the wholesale market of iniquity affords,
to be worked up by these retailers into the form of
saleable commodities. Instances have not been
wanting, indeed, of the most nauseous memoirs of
iUicit amours, thrown upon the public probably as
the last resource of jaded and deserted profligacy,
in which persons of quality and rank are said to cut
the most prominent and distinguished figure. It is
true that this class of vices is not confined to the
great. In this, as well as most other delinquencies,
the subordinate ranks of society evince a sufficient
degree of propensity to follow the examples of their

30

superiors. But the larger portion of guilt doubtless
belongs to the latter, inasmuch as their habits are
contagious, and their situation constitutes them na
tural guardians of the morals as well as the secular
interests of those beneath them.
The sin of licentiousness, though surpassed by
none in the baseness of its character and the enormity
of the mischief which it entails, is usually regarded
with a very indulgent eye. It is remarkable, indeed,
with what levity it is generally treated, and what
efforts and contrivances are made by fair names and
extenuating epithets to divest it, in the language of
one of the most exceptionable passages in all the
writings of Burke, of half its inherent grossness. An
intrigue, which has the effect of blasting for ever
the rising hopes of a family — of cutting in sunder the
bonds of domestic tenderness, by which a numerous
circle of beauty and loveliness was held together — of
desolating a husband's bosom, and of alienating a
wife's and a mother's affections ; an effect which it
might seem to require the recklessness of a madman
and the malignity of a demon to undertake, is dis
guised under the soft and specious appellation of an
affair of gallantry, just as an attempt at murder in
cold blood, is called an affair of honour. In the gene
rality of cases it is passed over simply as a matter
of pecuniary compensation, so that the more wealthy
profligate is aUowed, by a sort of tacit recognition,
to carry on his work of depravity and seduction upon
a scale of proportionate splendour. It is only in
those which have been attended with some result
peculiarly disastrousy that the public indignation

31
is awakened against this vice as deserving any
serious reprehension. In other instances, it is
treated rather as a theme of wanton merriment, as
the sport of a prurient fancy, than as an object of
grave condemnation.*
Such, my Lord, appear to me to be the most pro
minent, extensive, and injurious of those delinquen
cies prevalent in that influential and exalted class of
society of which your Grace may justly be consi
dered as one of the most distinguished members. I
might have easily enlarged the list, and swelled the
amount, without overstepping the boundaries of truth.
But I have no desire to be censorious, and the enu
meration here given appears to be quite sufficient to
account for a considerable portion of the national
wretchedness and crime which have been accumu
lating for some years past, without having recourse
to bad harvests, free trade, a change of currency, or
a surplus population ; though I lament the incidental
evils arising from every one of these circumstances.
In bringing my remarks to a conclusion, I need not
repeat the assurance, that I have selected your Grace
as the object of my address, without any intention of
giving your Grace a precedence in the guilt of the
charges here advanced. My business is not with
individuals, except as they form part of an aggregate,
but with a body; not with private character, but
with pubUc acts — acts not of retired domestic life,
which ought always to be a sanctuary into which.
* It is a melancholy proof of the awful and increasing preva
lence of this evil among the upper classes of society, that in the
course of the last five years twenty-one Bills of Divorce have
passed the House of Peers.

32
the eye of rude and wanton curiosity has no right to
pry, but of boundless notoriety — acts which are
daily blazed abroad on the columns of every intelli
gencer throughout the land. I have not flattered
your Grace ; but I trust that my language has been
equally remote from any thing which can be re
garded as personal vituperation. Your Grace is
above being affected by the one or the other. Of
your military talents, though I may not venerate so
highly as some others that species of endowment,
there can be but one opinion. To question them
would be absurd, and to eulogize them insipid ;
and although your Grace's political career may not
be quite so brilhant, yet I trust that it has already
been productive of some substantial good to your
country, and it only requires to be sustained by
a high order of moral principle to raise your Grace
to the same eminence as a statesman to which you
have already attained as a warrior. It would in
deed be a delightful sight to behold your Grace
combining the piety of the Christian with the many
splendid endowments which you are already acknow
ledged to possess. It would be a spectacle worthy
the contemplation of a great and generous people, to
see one of the most distinguished of its heroes and of
the most successful of its statesmen, as he gradually
descended towards the horizon, tinging his track of
glory with the mild lustre of holy principles and
virtuous habits, and, when he sank beneath the verge
of life, affording good ground to hope that it was
only to rise in purer radiance among the stars of a
brighter sphere. FINIS.
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