enemies, and that compassion for the failings of our fellow men, that thou art contracted to promote, contracted and shrunk up within the narrow limits that prejudice and bigotry mark out. But to return;-supposing the gentleman's end to be intentionally good, supposing him indeed to desire all this, in order to extirpate the Doctor's supposedly impious and erroneous doctrines, and promote the cause of truth; yet the means he would use are certainly wrong. For may I be allowed to remind him of this (which prejudice has hitherto apparently prevented him from seeing), that violence and force can never promote the cause of truth, but reason and argument or love, and whenever these fail, all other means are vain, and ineffectual. And as the Doctor himself has said, in his letter to the inhabitants of Birmingham, that if they destroyed him, ten others would arise, as able or abler than himself, and stand forth immediately to defend his principles; and that were these destroyed, an hundred would appear; for the God of truth will not suffer his cause to lie defenceless.'

"This letter of the Doctor's also, though it throughout breathes the pure and genuine spirit of Christianity, is, by another of your correspondents, charged with sedition and heresy; but,

indeed, if such sentiments as those which it contains be sedition and heresy, sedition and heresy would be an honour; for all their sedition is that fortitude that becomes the dignity of man, and the character of Christian: and their heresy, Christianity: the whole letter, indeed, far from being seditious, is peaceable and charitable, and far from being heretical, that is, in the usual acceptance of the word, furnishing proofs of that resignation so worthy of himself. And to be sensible of this, 'tis only necessary, that any one laying aside prejudice read the letter itself with candour. What, or who, then, is free from the calumniating pen of malice, malice concealed, perhaps, under the specious disguise of religion and a love of truth?

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Religious persecution is the bane of all religion; and the friends of persecution are the worst enemies religion has; and of all persecutions, that of calumny is the most intolerable. Any other kind of persecution can affect our outward circumstances only, our properties, our lives; but this may affect our characters for ever. And this great man has not only had his goods spoiled, his habitation burned, and his life endangered, but is also calumniated, aspersed with the most malicious reflections, and charged with every thing bad, for which a misrepresen

tation of the truth and prejudice can give the least pretence. And why all this? To the shame of some one, let it be replied, merely on account of particular speculative opinions, and not any thing scandalous, shameful, or criminal in his moral character. 'Where I see,' says the great and admirable Robinson, a spirit of intolerance, I think I see the great Devil.' And 'tis certainly the worst of devils. And here I shall conclude, staying only to remind your antiPriestlian correspondents, that when they presume to attack the character of Dr Priestley, they do not so much resemble the wren pecking at the eagle, as the owl, attempting by the flap of her wings, to hurl Mount Etna into the ocean and that while Dr Priestley's name 'shall flourish in immortal youth,' and his memory be respected and revered by posterity, prejudice no longer blinding the understandings of men, their's will be forgotten in obscurity, or only remembered as the friends of bigotry and persecution, the most odious of all characters.

“ ΕΛΙΑΣΟΝ.”

In 1793, my father, now fifteen years old, with a view to the calling destined for him-that of a Dissenting Minister-was entered as a student at the Unitarian College, Hackney. It was soon

after this that his mind first became directed to the prosecution of philosophical inquiry,-to him, at least

"Not harsh and crabbed as dull fools suppose,

But musical as is Apollo's lute."

After having diligently studied the works of some of the most eminent metaphysicians, the youthful enthusiast set about forming in his mind a comparison of their various theories and arguments; and his next step was an endeavour to embody his own crude speculations upon some of the subjects in the shape of several short preliminary essays, which, with a palpitating heart, he forwarded to his father, himself not meanly skilled in the abstruser branches of knowledge.* He, however, though naturally proud and gratified at the proof thus afforded him of his son's early development of comprehension and power, became fearful least a perseverance in these abstract inquiries should have the two-fold ill effect of undermining his health, and of diverting him from the great object which it was his paternal wish and prayer that his son might attain, a distinguished name among the Ministers of Dissent. With these feelings he entered into a correspondence with his son, in

* Of these Essays I deeply regret to have been unable to discover any trace.

which he earnestly sought to dissuade him from proceeding either with the essays or with the studies which led to them.

Among my father's

'London, Oct. 6th, 1793.

letters in answer were the following:

"DEAR FATHER,

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“I received your very kind

letter yesterday morning. With respect to my past behaviour, I have often said, and I now assure you, that it did not proceed from any real disaffection, but merely from the nervous disorder to which, you well know, I was so much subject. This was really the case; however improbable it may appear. Nothing particular occurred from the time I wrote last, till the Saturday following. On the Wednesday before, Corrie had given me a theme. As it was not a subject suited to my genius, and from other causes, I had not written any thing on it: so that I was not pleased to hear his bell on Saturday morning, which was the time for showing our themes. When I came to him, he asked me whether I had prepared my theme. I told him I had not. You should have a very good reason indeed, sir, says he, for neglecting it. Why really, sir, says I, I could not write it. you never write any thing, then, says he? Yes, sir, I said; I have written some things.

Did