It has been justly remarked that when his memory ceases to be an object of veneration “it requires no spirit of prophecy to foretell that English liberty will be fast approaching to its final consummation;” and we may add, that no less a Christian than a patriot, he has left behind a name as dear to English Christians as it is to English patriots. We have seen the spirit which prevailed two years before--we have proofs of its continuance in connection with the last days of Lord William Russell. That nobleman tenaciously held the principle, that in some cases it was lawful to resist Government by force. But Churchmen, who, at the Revolution, in practice approved, if they did not in theory uphold the doctrine, condemned it at this early period not only as impolitic, but as irreligious. Tillotson wrote to Russell just before his execution a letter, in which he said that Christianity plainly discountenanced the resistance of authority, that in the same law which establishes our religion, it is declared to be unlawful, under any pretence whatsoever, to take up arms; and that his Lordship’s opinion was contrary to the doctrine of all Protestant Churches. He also pronounced the same opinion to be an offence of a heinous nature, calling “for a very particular and deep repentance.”[110] [Sidenote: 1683.] Tillotson, in this letter, committed himself to the doctrine of passive obedience; and its publication, without any subsequent denial or recantation, places him before the world as upholding one main-prop of the Stuart despotism. Burnet also, by his conduct at the time, lent his influence to the same side; for, with characteristic haste, and with that inaccuracy, into which haste so often betrayed him, he rushed from Russell’s cell at Newgate, saying, that he had converted his noble friend, who declared his satisfaction in that point to which Tillotson’s letter relates. Such conduct indicated sympathy at the time with the opinions in the letter now mentioned; and, therefore, it involves Burnet in the same responsibility with Tillotson. Russell, however, soon undeceived both his advisers, insisting that the notion which he had of the laws, and of the English Government, differed from that of the two Divines. He died a martyr to the faith, which placed the Crown of England on the head of the Prince of Orange, whose claims Tillotson and Burnet afterwards vindicated, and whose conduct they ever delighted to eulogize.