ARGUMENT. GENTLEMEN : I APPEAR before you to advocate the claims of Benedict Fenwick and others, as set forth in their petition referred to you. The persons chiefly interested in this petition are the nuns composing the Ursuline Community, late living upon Mount Benedict in Charlestown. Benedick Fenwick's name stands upon the petition as a mere trustee of the property that was destroyed there. He has no legal interest in the result, except as trustee, although he feels a deep personal interest in its fate, springing from his connexion with that institution, as its religious pastor. There are also upon the petition, the names of several of the parents, whose children were under the charge of the community, when it was destroyed, their effects were also destroyed. In addressing you upon this petition, however, I shall consider it as that of the Ursuline Community alone,—the claims of all, however, stand on the same ground, and are equally entitled to your consideration. The first inquiry that naturally presents itself is, who are these petitioners ? The Ursuline Community is a religious association of Catholic nuns, who have taken upon themselves certain religious vows and have assumed certain religious and charitable duties, the principal of which consists in educating children. The order was founded in the year 1537, and takes its name from St. Ursula, a female distinguished in her life for her exemplary virtue, signalized and made manifest by her heroic death. This order of nuns is distinguished from those, which doom the members to lives of entire seclusion and devotion, its duties being of that character, which calls for a constant intercourse with the world, by taking upon itself the arduous labor of educating young females for the world, and of training their minds and hearts to wisdom and virtue, so as to make them useful and accomplished members of society. They are a charitable order, inasmuch as when their means allow, they educate the poor, and prepare them to be the teachers of others. They are a liberal order, inasmuch as they make no distinction of sects among their pupils, all being received on equal terms and reaping equal benefits from their instruction. Throughout Europe this order of nuns have ever been held in the highest respect, and their Communities have always maintained the highest rank as schools of instruction, as places, where the young child could best be trained. to the paths of virtue and wisdom. Even in France, during the outbreaking of infidelity and revolution, when the churches were pillaged, monasteries destroyed, nunneries forced open, and their inmates driven into the world, the Ursulines were unmolested, their virtues and their usefulness alone protected them.† The institution of the present Community you have already been made acquainted with, its high character, as a school has been fully established, and in everything relating to the institution, it has been our wish to make you perfectly familiar. These petitioners have nothing to conceal, and nothing to fear from an entire knowledge by the world, of their condition and character; their sufferings have sprang from a deplorable ignorance and delusion, which they had not the *"St. Ursula, who was the mistress and guide to Heaven to many holy maidens, whom she animated to the heroic practice of virtue," is regarded “as a model and patroness by those, who undertake to train up youth in the sentiments and practice of piety and religion." "Several religious establishments have been erected under her name and patronage for the virtuous education of young ladies." + Appendix Note A. Butler's Lares of the Fathers, &c., vol. 10. Appendix Note B. opportunity to dispel.* We have made you acquainted with the proceedings immediately preceding the twelfth of August, when the Convent was destroyed, and the events of the evening of that day, you are perfectly familiar with. From nine until after eleven o'clock, on that night, a mob was collecting around the Convent, where dwelt these petitioners ;-the air was filled with their angry shouts and menaces. A bonfire was lighted, as a beacon to lead others to the hellish plot of destruction. The work was not to have been done that night, but it was discovered that an explanation, exculpating the Ursuline Community from any blame, and giving the lie to the falsehoods which were industriously circulated concerning them for the purpose of this excitement, was to be published to the world the next day. They were afraid therefore to delay it, the present time was favorable, nobody opposed them, the women were unprotected, the magistrates supine, they rushed on to the destruction, and it was perfectly complete.‡ You have the statements of several who were present; they say that a few resolute persons, sanctioned by a little authority, could not only have arrested the progress of this riot, but every one of the rioters themselves. You have been told by credible and experienced witnesses, that there were engines. upon the spot, firemen enough, and water at a convenient distance, to have quenched the fire, at any stage of it. You have been told that it was not done, that not one drop of water was thrown upon those accusing flames.' You have been satisfied, I am sure, that not one vigorous step was taken by any one to prevent this shameful transaction. The Chairman of the Selectmen of Charlestown, it is true, did advise the rioters not to bring a light, after they had broken into the building, that they had done enough to subject them to punishment, and that if a light were brought they would be seen and detected. This fatherly advice was not obeyed, and he, having weak eyes, and not being very well, went home to resume the peaceful slumbers from which he had been aroused. * Appendix Note C. † Appendix Note D. Appendix Note E. Whether this was a vigorous step or not, is for you to judge, it was the only one taken, and deserves to be recorded in his favor. The systematic manner, in which the petitioners were driven from their beds to the fields, the successive acts of the tragical drama which presented themselves, by distinct and varied atrocities, it is not my intention to dwell upon, they have already been stated to you, and if they had not been, they have become a matter of history, and familiar to the minds of every one. I have stated to you who these petitioners are, their prayer to you is for redress of the wrongs and injuries complained of in their petition. Their story is briefly told therein, and their hopes of favor from this Commonwealth set forth with the reasons on which they are founded. They declare themselves to be good citizens of the Commonwealth, obedient to the laws, and paying all taxes and duties levied upon them by the government; they state that in the destruction of their property, by a mob, in the open and direct violation of the law, they have been rendered destitute; they declare the duty of the government to be to protect them, and to provide a remedy for their wrongs, that it has failed to do so, and that therefore it ought to indemnify them for the losses they have suffered; as a matter of justice, they demand it, as a matter of justice, or of favor, you will indemnify them, if the views, I now am about to present to you, be correct. The petitioners assert, in the first place, that they are inhabitants of this Commonwealth, demeaning themselves as good citizens, and entitled to the full protection of the laws, and unless they are so, they have no claim upon you. If the act, of which they complain has arisen by a crime, or by any illegal act on their part, then, however criminal, those who have despoiled them, may be, the petitioners can have no redress here. If they provoke a breach of the law, they cannot apply to you; for though the majesty of the law must not be offended lightly, it must not go out of its ordinary course to aid those who have been the guilty cause of its ordinances being broken. They must be innocent sufferers, through whom the law has been violated, to receive a moment's consideration from the Legislature, the great conservator of law and justice. They must come to this high place with clean hands, and consciences void of offence, to ask of you, to step beyond the printed statute book to their relief. Innocence is to be presumed, until the contrary is proved. In the present case, no charge has been made against these petitioners, no one has appeared to accuse them of a single crime, they have enemies, but they have not appeared. I regret that no opposition has been made by remonstrance or otherwise, to the claim of these petitioners, because I have sought in vain for an opportunity of discrediting and of putting down the insinuations and vile slanders which have been circulated about these Petitioners, and of shewing to the public in their true colors, the designs of their enemies. I wish for an opportunity to shew how far intolerance, religious rivalry and fanaticism will go, and has, in this case, gone, to pervert the judgment and poison the mind. But I cannot do it, for no charge is produced against them, and their innocence, their purity, their exalted religious character, the christian charity of these petitioners, we have a right to gather, only from the casual opinions of those who know them best, and from the nature of the duties they have so well, so laboriously performed. I might comment largely upon the inconsistency of any but a life of virtue, fixed upon the surest foundations of religion and devotion, and strengthened by the cultivation of the purest social affections, on the part of these petitioners. I might call up the voices of mankind, in every guise that they have ever appeared, to prove to you, that the garb of an austere religion, connected with severe and constant labors, having only an end in death, is the last that vice assumes, and though hypocrisy in religion, as in other matters may be resorted to, to cloak the most vicious habits, yet it never takes so laborious, so self denying a form as this. I might enlarge upon the truism that vice hates labor, and that vanity is the most frequent conductor to the paths of wickedness, but I shall not do any of these things. It would be insulting your pa |