general officers always exifting: these are appointed occafionally, when an invasion or infurrection happens, and their commiffion determines with the occafion. The governor is head of the military as well as of the civil power. The law requires every militia man to provide himself with the arms ufual in the regular fervice. But this injunction has always been indifferently complied with, and the arms they had have been fo frequently called for to arm the regulars, that in the lower parts of the country they are entirely difarmed. In the middle country a fourth or fifth part of them may have fuch firelocks as they had provided to deftroy the noxious animals which infeft their farms; and on the western fide of the Blue Ridge they are generally armed with rifles.

The interfection of Virginia, by fo many navigable rivers, renders it almoft incapable of defence: as the land will not support a great number of people, a force cannot foon be collected to repel a fudden invafion. If the militia bear the fame proportion to the number of inhabitants now, as in 1782, they amount to more than fixty-eight thousand.

RELIGION AND CHARACTER.

The first settlers in this country were emigrants from England, of the English church, juft at a point of time when it was flushed with complete victory over the religious of all other perfuafions, Poffeffed, as they became, of the powers of making, administering, and executing the laws, they fhewed equal intolerance in this country with their Presbyterian brethren, who had emigrated to the northern government; the poor Quakers were flying from perfecution in England. They caft their eyes on these new countries as asylums of civil and religious freedom: but they found them free only for the reigning fect. Several acts of the Virginia affembly of 1659, 1662, and 1693, had made it penal in parents to refufe to have their children baptized, and prohibited the unlawful affembling of Quakers; had made it penal for any master of a veffel to bring a Quaker into the State, and had ordered thofe already here, and fuch as fhould come thereafter, to be imprifoned till they fhould abjure the country; had provided a milder punishment for their first and fecond return, but death for their third; had inhibited all perfons from fuffering their meetings in or near their houses, entertaining them individually, or difpofing of books which fupported their tenets. If no capital execution took place there, as did in New-England, it was not owing to VOL. III. mode

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moderation of the church, or fpirit of the legislature, as may be in. ferred from the law itfelf; but to historical circumstances which have not been handed down to us. The Anglicans retained full poffeffion of the country about a century. Other opinions began then to creep in, and the great care of the government to fupport their own church, having begotten an equal degree of indolence in its clergy, two thirds of the people had become Diffenters at the commencement of the late revolution. The laws, indeed, were ftill oppreffive on them, but the fpirit of the one party had fubfided into moderation, and the other had risen to a degree of determination which commanded refpe&t.

The prefent ftate of the laws on the fubject of religion is as follows: the Convention of May 1776, in their declaration of rights, declared it to be a truth, and a natural right, that the exercife of religion fhould be free; but when they proceeded to form on that declaration the ordinance of government, inftead of taking up every principle declared in the Bill of Rights, and guarding it by legislative sanction, they paffed over that which afferted their religious rights, leaving them as they found them. The fame Convention, however, when they met as a part of the General Affembly, in October, 1776, repealed all acts of Parliament which had rendered criminal the maintaining any opinion in matters of religion, the forbearing to repair to church, and the exercifing any mode of worship; and fufpended the laws giving falaries to the clergy, which fufpenfion was made perpetual in October, 1779. Statutory oppreffions in religion being thus wiped away, the Virginians remained under thofe only imposed by the common law, or by their own act of Affembly, till 1785, at which time all restraints and civil incapacities on account of religion were done away. At the common law, herefy was a capital offence, punishable by burning. Its definition was left to the ecclefiaftical judges before whom the conviction was, till the ftatute of the 1ft Eliz. c. 1. circumfcribed it, by declaring, that nothing should be deemed herefy, but what had been fo determined by authority of the canonical fcriptures, or by one of the four first general councils, or by fome other council having for the grounds of their declaration the exprefs and plain words of the fcriptures. Herefy, thus circumfcribed, being an offence at the common law, their act of Affembly of October, 1777, c. 17. gives cognizance of it to the general court, by declaring, that "the jurifdiction of that court shall be general in all matters at the common law." The execution is by the writ De hæretica comburendo. By their own act

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of Affembly of 1705, c. 30, if a perfon brought up in the Chriftian religion denied the being of a God, or the Trinity, or afferted there are more Gods than one, or denied the Christian religion to be true, or the Scriptures to be of divine authority, he is punishable on the first offence by incapacity to hold any office or employment ecclefiaftical, civil or military; on the fecond, by difability to fue, to take any gift or legacy, to be guardian, executor, or administrator, and by three years imprifoment without bail, A father's right to the cuftody of his own children being founded in law on his right of guardianship, this being taken away, they may of course be severed from him, and put, by the authority of a court, into more orthodox hands. This is a fummary view of that religious flavery, under which a people were for fome time willing to remain, who had lavished their lives and fortunes in the establishment of their civil free doin; the evil is now, however, done away, and by an act of Affembly paffed in 1785, the Virginians were put in poffeffion of the complete enjoyment of religious liberty. The error will, ere long, be finally eradicated, that the operations of the mind, as well as the acts of the body, are subject to the coercion of the laws. Rulers can have authority over fuch natural rights only, as have been fubmitted to them, The rights of conscience were never submitted, for man could not lawfully fubmit them; he is answer able for them to God. The legitimate powers of government extend to fuch acts only as are injurious to others; but it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god; it neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. If it be faid, his testimony in a court of justice cannot be relied on, reject it then, and be the ftigma on him. Conftraint may make him worfe, by making him a hypocrite, but it will never make him a better man. It may fix him obftinately in his errors, but will not cure them. Reafon and free inquiry are the only effectual agents against error. Give a loose to them, they will fupport the true religion, by bringing every falfe one to their tribunal, to the teft of their investigation. They are the natural enemies of error, and of error only, Had not the Roman government permitted free inquiry, Chriftianity could never have been introduced. Had not free inquiry been indulged, at the æra of reformation, the corruptions of Chriftianity could not have been purged away. If it be restrained now, the present corruptions will be protected, and new ones encouraged. Was the government to prescribe to us our medicine and diet, our bodies would be in such keeping as as our fouls are now, Thus in France the emetic was once forbidden

as a medicine, and the potatoe as an article of food. Government is Juft as infallible too, when it fixes fyftems in phyfics. Galileo was fent to the inquifition for affirming that the earth was a fphere: the government had declared it to be as flat as a trencher, and Galileo was obliged to abjure his error. This error, however, at length prevailed, the earth became a globe, and Defcartes declared it was whirled round its axis by a vortex. The government in which he lived was wife enough to fee that this was no queftion of civil jurifdic- diction, or we fhould all have been involved by authority in vortices. In fact, the vortices have been exploded, and the Newtonian principle of gravitation is now more firmly established, on the bafis of reafon, than it would be were the government to ftep in, and to make it an article of neceffary faith. Reafon and experiment have been indulged, and error has fled before them. It is error alone which needs the fupport of government; truth can ftand by itself. Subject opinion to coercion, whom will you make your inquifitors? Fallible men; men governed by bad paffions, by private as well as public reafons. And why fubject it to coercion? To produce uniformity. But is uniformity of opinion defirable? No more than of face and ftature. Introduce the bed of Procruftes then, and as there is danger that the large men may beat the fmall, make us all of a fize, by Topping the former and stretching the latter. Difference of opinion is, perhaps, advantageous in religion. The feveral fects perform the of fice of a cenfor morum over each other. But is uniformity attainable ? Millions of innocent men, women and children, fince the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one step towards it. What has been the effect of coercion? To make one half the world fools, and the other half bypocrites, for the purpose of supporting roguery and error all over the earth. Let us reflect that this globe is inhabited by a thousand millions of people; that thefe profefs probably a thoufand different systems of religion; that ours is but one of that thousand; that if there be but one right, and ours that one, we should wish to fee the nine hundred and ninety-nine wandering fects gathered into the fold of truth. But against fuch a majority we cannot effect this by force. Reason and perfuafion are the only practicable inftruments. To make way for thefe, free inquiry muft be indulged; and how can we with others to indulge it while we refuse it ourselves? But every state, says an inquifitor, has established some religion. We reply, no two have ef tablished the fame. Is this a proof of the infallibility of establishments? Many of the States, particularly Pennsylvania and New-York, have long fubfifted without any establishment at all.

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The experiment was new and doubtful, when they made it; it has answered beyond conception; they flourish infinitely. Religion is well fupported; of various kinds, indeed, but all fufficient to preferve peace and order; or if a fect arises, whose tenets would fub. vert morals, good fenfe has fair play, and reasons and laughs it out of doors, without fuffering the State to be troubled with it. They do not hang fo many malefactors as in England; they are not more disturbed with religious diffenfions; on the contrary, their morality is pure and their harmony is unparalleled; this can be ascribed to nothing but their unbounded tolerance, because there is no other circumitance in which they differ from every nation on earth, France excepted. They have made the happy difcovery, that the way to filence religious disputes, is to take no notice of them.

The prefent denominations of Chriftians in Virginia are Presbyte rians, who are the most numerous, and inhabit the western parts of the State; Epifcopalians, who are the most ancient fettlers, and occupy the eastern and first settled parts of the State. Intermingled with these are great numbers of Baptifts and Methodists.

Virginia prides itself in being "The Ancient Dominion." It has produced fome of the most diftinguished and influential men that have been active in effecting the two late grand and important revolutions in America. Her political and military character will rank among the first in the page of history; but it is to be observed, that this character has been obtained for the Virginians by a few eminent men; who have taken the lead in all their public tranfactions, and who, ia short, govern Virginia; for the great body of the people do not concern themselves with politics; so that their government, though nominally republican, is, in fact, oligarchical or aristocratical.

The Virginians who are rich, are in general fenfible, polite, and hofpitable, and of an independent fpirit. The poor are ignorant and abject, but all are of an inquifitive turn. A confiderable proportion of the people are much addicted to gaming, drinking, swearing, horfe-racing, cock-fighting, and most kinds of diffipation. There is a much greater disparity between the rich and the poor, in Virginia, than in any of the northern States. The native inhabitants are too generally unacquainted with bufinefs, owing to their pride, and falfe notions of greatnefs. Before the revolution they confidered it as beneath a gentleman to attend to mercantile concerns, and devo ted their time principally to amufement. By thefe means the Scotch people