In his personal concerns he receives an enormous revenue from the people he thus misgoverns. See in his management of that revenue a parsimony at which even his enemies blush. See the paltry sum of a single joe[7] refused to any Protestant charity, while his bounty is unknown even at the Popish institutions for benevolent purposes. See the most wasteful expenditure of the public money--every job patronized--every profligacy encouraged. See the resources of Portugal diminished. See her discords and her internal feuds increased. And, lastly, behold the course of justice perverted and corrupted. It is thus, gentlemen, the Protestant Portuguese seek to obtain relief by humble petition and supplication. There can be no crime surely for a Protestant, oppressed because he follows a religion which is, in his opinion, true, to endeavor to obtain relief by mildly representing to his Popish oppressors, that it is the right of every man to worship the Deity according to the dictates of his own conscience; to state respectfully to the governing powers that it is unjust, and may be highly impolitic, to punish men, merely because they do not profess Popery, which they do not believe; and to submit, with all humility, that to lay the burdens of the state equally, and distribute its benefits partially, is not justice, but, although sanctioned by the pretence of religious zeal, is, in truth, iniquity, and palpably criminal. Well, gentlemen, for daring thus to remonstrate, the Protestants are persecuted. The first step in the persecution is to pervert the plain meaning of the Portuguese language, and a law prohibiting any _disguise_ in apparel, shall be applied to the ordinary _dress_ of the individual; it reminds one of _pretence_ and _purpose_.