it is worth while recording the curious, not to say ignominious, ways from which justice to new thought has emerged. in the 5 and 6 victori?, cap. 38, 1842, the trial of eighteen offences were removed from the jurisdiction of justices of the peace in quarter sessions and transferred to the assize court. persons accused were often subject to magisterial intolerance, ignorance and offensiveness.
among the transferred offences were forgery, bigamy, abductions of women. "blasphemy and offences against religion," often of doubtful and delicate interpretation, were two of the subjects taken out of magisterial hands and placed under the decision of better-informed and more responsible judges. "blasphemy" was the general title under which atheism, heresy, and other troubles of the questioning intellect were designated. "composing, printing or publishing blasphemous libels," were included in the list of subjects to be dealt with in higher courts. thus better chances of justice were secured to thinkers and disseminators of forbidden ideas. this new charter of thought, which conceded legal fairness to propagandism, was not the subject of a special statute, but was interpolated in a list, which read like an auctioneer's catalogue, eluded parliamentary prejudice, which might have been fatal, had it been formally submitted to its notice.
in the same manner the affirmation act, which changed the status of the disbeliever in theology from that of an outlaw to that of a citizen, crept into the statute book through a criminal avenue. a bill to admit atheists, agnostics, or other conscientious objectors to the ecclesiastic oath, to make a responsible affirmation instead, was twice or thrice thrown out of the windows of parliament. sir john trelawny used to say mr. gathorne hardy (afterwards lord cranbrook) would rise up, as i have seen him, with a face as furiously red as one of his own blast furnaces at lowmoor, and move its rejection. it was passed at last by the friendly device of g. w. hastings, m.p., the founder of the social science association, in a bill innocently purporting to better "promote the discovery of truth" by enabling persons charged with adultery to give evidence on their own behalf.
then and there a clause was introduced which had no relation to the extension of the right to give evidence, but upon the exemption of an entirely different class of persons from the obligation of making oath. adulterers appear always to be christians, since no case is recorded in which any party in an adultery action professed any scruple at taking the oath. yet the bill set forth that "any person in a civil or criminal proceeding who shall object to make an oath," shall make a declaration instead. when the bill became an act secular affirmation became legalised. thus by a clause treading upon the heels of adultery, the witness having heretical and unecclesiastical convictions was enabled to be honest without peril.
in 1842, as i witnessed at the gloucester assizes, no barrister would defend any one accused of dissent from christianity, but apologised for him and proclaimed his contrition for his sin of thinking for himself. slave thought of the mind, chained to custom, could be defended, but not free thought, which is independent of everything save the truth. by the act of 1869* atheists ceased to be outlaws, and were henceforth enabled to give evidence in their own defence. wide-awake and vigilant as a rule, bigotry was asleep that day. thus by circuitous and furtive paths the right of free thought has made its way to the front of the state.
* 32 & 33 chap. 68, evidence amendment act
