#john thelwall

[livrery]

Thelwall führte den Jakobinismus an die Grenzen des Sozialismus; und er führte ihn an die Grenzen der Revolution.

Edward P. Thompson, Die Entstehung der englischen Arbeiterklasse (p. 173)

[livrery]

Währen [John Thelwall], wie Paine, vor der generellen Kritik der privaten Akkumulation von Kapital zurückscheute, wollte er doch die Wirkungen von »Monopolen« und »Handelsausbeutung« begrenzen. Seine ideale Gesellschaft war die einer Assoziation kleiner Bauern, kleiner Kaufleute, Handwerker und Arbeiter, deren Arbeitsbedingungen, Arbeitszeit, Gesundheit und Lebensabend geschützt sein sollten.

Edward P. Thompson, Die Entstehung der englischen Arbeiterklasse (p. 173)

[nulla-felix-carceres]

“When, however, I speak of sentiment, I do not use the term in its too general sense. They who look for the sighs of personal regret, and the elegiac tenderness of complaint, will certainly be disappointed. The pathetic Ovid might lament his banishment from the country of his mistress and the social circle of his friends; but the Patriot, immured in the walls of the bastille, is called upon, by important duties, to repel every enervating sensation, and cultivate those habits of reflection only which may increase the energy of his mind, and enable him to render his sufferings ultimately beneficial to mankind. And if he feels as he ought, whatever affections or attachments may be incidental to him, one preponderating yea will be constantly present to his imagination: - THE SACRED CAUSE FOR WHICH HE SUFFERS.”

- John Thelwall, Poems written in close confinement in the Tower and Newgate, under a charge of high treason (1795)

[poniatowskaja]

In a characteristically funny and perceptive lecture on the bill delivered on 9 November at Beaufort Buildings, Thelwall produced a long whole series of remarks, actions, even accidents, that could not be charged as overt acts of these new treasons. Thus it would now be high treason 'to compass and imagine an alteration in the King's title' - to 'declare', for example, 'that the King of England ought not to be the King of Corsica, that the King of England ought not to arrogate to himself the empty title of Defender of the Faith, or King of France'. 'If a brewer's dray happen to break down', and so impede the progress of the king's coach, 'I should not wonder if the Attorney General were to cram horses, driver, and proprietor, the venders of malt and hops, and the manufacturers of the hoops and barrels into one indictment of high treason for restraining his Majesty's person.' This was a serious joke; for Thelwall points out that the expression 'imprisonment or restraint' in the bill suggests that the Government was intending that it should be high treason to conspire to restrain the king in some other way than by imprisoning him. 'What other sort of restraint may they mean then?' If, at the 1794 trials, 'they attempted... to make it high treason to compass, design or attempt to put any restraint upon the inclinations, and wishes of the King, or any of the constituted authorities, by overawing them, as it was called, are we not to suppose the word restraint is used here in the same signification?' Thelwall's supposition would turn out to be well founded; the distortion at the trials of Hale's doctrine on the physical restraint of the king into a nation of the virtual restraint of his government and authority would soon emerge as central to the new law of treason.

John Barrell, Imagining the King’s Death: Figurative Treason, Fantasies of Regicide 1793-1796, pp.575-6, the bill in question being the Treasonable and Seditious Practices Act, otherwise known as the Treason Act 1795.

[lovegodsmashtyrants]

It is sufficient for the law, that we fear the gallows: Our friends and companions, it is true, the guardians of our interests, and the instructors of our children, we would seek among men who act upon more generous principles.

From The Rights of Nature Against the Usurpations of Establishments by John Thelwall

[poniatowskaja]

Not content, but manner of delivery

He always delivered speeches spontaneously, with the assistance of at most a few written notes. Perhaps Thelwall’s preferring Danton to Robespierre might have been because the former spontaneously delivered speeches whereas the latter read rehearsed, written speeches.

Michael Scrivener, John Thelwall and Jacobin Writing