5. It debases religion as best set forth.--'Religion (says Miss Martineau) is, in its widest sense, "the tendency of human nature to the infinite;" and its principle is manifested in the pursuit of perfection in any direction whatever. It is in this widest sense that some speculative atheists have been religious men; religious in their efforts after self-perfection; though unable to personify their conception of the infinite. In a somewhat narrower sense, religion is the relation which the highest human sentiments bear towards an infinitely perfect being. There can be no further narrowing than this. Any account of religion which restricts it within the boundaries of any system, which connects it with any mode of belief, which implicates it with hope of reward, or fear of punishment, is low and injurious, and debases religion into superstition.' How much more is religion degraded that is made the subject of reward and punishment here? Thus speaks the common law upon these points, and thus, as part of the common law, speaks Christianity. Will you, by a verdict of guilty this day, send forth to the world this card of credentials of the religion of Jesus? The intention of a libel constitutes its criminality. It is for you, gentlemen, to say whether I knowingly, wickedly, and maliciously offended the law? Malice is necessary to a libel--conscientious words are allowable, 'Contumely and contempt are what no establishment can tolerate: but on the other hand it would not be proper to lay any restraint upon rational and dispassionate discussions of the rectitude and propriety of the established mode of worship.' 4 Bla. Com. 51; 1 Pmp. 219. And Mr. Starkie, on the subject, says 'that it may not be going too far from the principles and decisions, that no author or preacher who fairly and conscientiously promulgates the opinions with whose truth he is impressed for the benefit of others, is for so doing amenable as a criminal, that a malicious and mischievous intention is in such case the broad boundary between right and wrong; and that if it can be collected from the offensive levity with which so serious a subject is treated, or from other circumstances, that the act of the party was malicious, then, since the law has no means of distinguishing between different degrees of evil tendency, if the matter published contain any such tendency, the publisher becomes amenable to justice.'* * Starkie on Libel, pp. 496-7.