“The position, gentlemen, of this country has for a long series of years been peculiar, anomalous, and unhappy.  Divided as it is, and has been, by the bitter conflict between two opposing creeds and parties, it is not to be wondered at that it should be a melancholy scene of misery, destitution, famine, and crime; and, unhappily, it presents to us the frightful aspect of all these.  The nature, however, of the conflicts between those creeds and parties, inasmuch as it bears upon the case of the prisoner, gentlemen, who now stands for trial and a verdict at your hands, is such as forces me, on that account, to dwell briefly upon it.  In doing so, I will have much, for the sake of our common humanity, to regret and to deplore.  It is a fundamental principle, gentlemen, in our great and glorious Constitution, that the paramount end and object of our laws is to protect the person, the liberty, and the property of the subject.  But there is something, gentlemen, still dearer to us than either liberty, person, or property; something which claims a protection from those laws that stamps them with a nobler and a loftier character, when it is afforded, and weaves them into the hearts and feelings of men of all creeds, when this divine mission of the law is fulfilled.  I allude, gentlemen, to the inalienable right of every man to worship God freely, and according to his own conscience—­without restraint—­without terror—­without oppression, and, gentlemen of the jury, without persecution.  A man, or a whole people, worship God, we will assume, sincerely, according to their notions of what is right, and, I say, gentlemen, that the individual who persecutes that man, or those people, for piously worshipping their Creator, commits blasphemy against the Almighty—­and stains, as it were, the mercy-seat with blood.

“Gentlemen of the jury, let me ask you what has been the state and condition of this unhappy and distracted country?  I have mentioned two opposing creeds, and consequently two opposing parties, and I have also mentioned persecution; but let me also ask you again on which side has the persecution existed?  Look at your Roman Catholic fellow-subjects, and ask yourselves to what terrible outburst of political and religious vengeance have they not been subjected?  But it is said they are not faithful and loyal subjects, and that they detest the laws.  Well, let us consider this—­let us take a cursory view of all that the spirit and operation of the laws have left them to be thankful for—­have brought to bear upon them for the purpose, we must suppose, of securing their attachment and their loyalty.  Let us, gentlemen, calmly and solemnly, and in a Christian temper, take a brief glance at the adventures which the free and glorious spirit of the British Constitution has held out to them, in order to secure their allegiance.  In the first place, their nobles and their gentry have been deprived of their property, and the right of tenure has been denied even to the people.