I claim no Praise from it; that belongs to another; but neither can I regard those who shall think, that which I have done merits Censure.
Being disinterested, I may expect Credit; but there is yet a Reason why I shall speak less freely. 'Tis an unfortunate Circumstance, that with the Innocence of this Person, there is connected the Crime of another; if not the intentional, at least the effectual Crime: The Evidence that absolves the one accuses the other; and it is one of those Incidents, under which Humanity is wounded by the Means, while it glories in the End.
It will be found, however romantic, or however absurd, such Conduct may appear to many, that I have acted in this only on the Principle of real Honesty and public Utility; and as I have acted, I would wish to see others also act. But while I shall plead yet farther in the Cause of a Person who is innocent, whom I have not seen, nor do know that I ever shall see; and in whose Favour, I do avow in the Face of Almighty God, no Application whatsoever has been made to me; it will give me Pain to reflect that in every Argument I am wounding another; concerning whom I know nothing of Certainty, more than appears from this Evidence; nor can judge how far what so appears to be her Guilt, may admit of Palliation.
I know how improper, nay, how dishonest, it is in many Cases to prepossess the Public against those whom their Country has not yet found guilty of any Crime: No History can produce a greater Instance of it than is before us in the present Story; and I shall think the Obligation sacred that restrains my Hand upon every other Occasion: But here the Life of a Person, certainly innocent, is concern'd on the one Part; and not so much as the Life, even should the worst be proved, and the Laws put in their fullest Execution, of one, as certainly a Cause of the greatest Distress, and almost of Death to that Innocent, on the other. As this is the Case in the present Enquiry, the Particularity of the Circumstance may dispense with what would be faulty on a different Occasion.
I must the more think the doing of this necessary, and therefore justifiable, as mean Sophistry, and the Parade of Argument, have been employed on the other Side; and the Attempt of vindicating the Accuser, though but a secondary Consideration, has, with some Persons, altho' I hope with none of Consequence, prevailed against that Proof of Innocence on the Part of the Accused, which alone can
prevent the Execution of a Sentence procured by a confess'd Perjury.
I had read the Pamphlet in which these are us'd, as a Justification only of the Conduct of a Man, against whom I have no Resentment; and, as such, I could not desire to invalidate any thing that it contained: But though I had no Wish against its Success on that Account, I cannot see it aiming to overthrow that Justice and Compassion, which were growing up in the Minds of all Men, with Respect to the Object whom I had proposed to them as so worthy of those Emotions, without treating it with that Severity, and condemning it to that Ignominy which it deserves; without detecting its Misrepresentations, refuting its imagined Arguments, and pointing out to those, who have not already seen it, where they are to smile upon its Puerility.
If it be possible that I should by this Piece of Justice make that Man more my Enemy, than he is at present; I tell him, no Part of this is written with that immediate Design: But I shall also add, that the Importance of the Cause will compensate all that his pointless Arms can return upon the Occasion; and that, if I shall become conscious, I have been instrumental, tho'