Α

PREFATORY EPISTLE

TO THE

REVEREND MR. H——D.

DEAR SIR,

THE celebrated Dr. Priestley having long presented

to the world a character new and curious in its kind, you expressed a desire, that a portrait of him might be taken from his works, and given to the public upon a

small scale.

In consequence of what had passed, the writer of the following pages, having some acquaintance with the Doctor's publications, sat down to a sketch of his whole-length; which, being verified by proper authorities, may be considered as a piece taken from the life. He has employed some pains to make the drawing correct, and he he hopes the colours will stand: that if the Doctor's writings should hereafter be scarce, (as it is conjectured they will be) people may know what he was. With the outward tabernacle of Dr. Priestley he

has

has no concern; but with that Dr. Priestley only, which is to be found in books and pamphlets to a very great amount: mens cujusque is est quisque and if the present exhibition of him to the connoisseurs, at the usual price of one shilling a-piece, shall furnish you (or nearly so) with the thing you wished for, and convey to the public a just idea at a small expence, I shall be happy, that in a time of leisure, while the town is empty, I could turn my pencil to the present subject.

What have you and I lived to see! a staymaker of Thetford, and a Dissenting teacher of Birmingham, called upon to take their share of the government in that city, which in the last age affected universal monarchy! Thus was Babylon once the mistress of the world: but if we should go to look for it now, the Prophet tells us, we shall find a nest of owls. When you think on these things, you will not forget

Your affectiontate Brother,

and humble Servant,

THE AUTHOR.

A SMALL

SMALL WHOLE-LENGTH

OF

DR. PRIESTLEY.

1. The Style and Learning of Dr. Priestley. OF what kind soever our sentiments may be, on subjects of religion and literature, the manner in which they are delivered is of so much consequence, that when an author is spoken of, we generally enquire in the first place, how he writes. The work which first made Dr. Priestley more extensively known to the public, was his History of Electricity. Let any reader of judgment cast his eye over the preface to that history, and he will be shocked with the affectation and poverty of his diction. There is such a jumble of scenes, prospects, objects and ideas, as render his style boyish and ridiculous. The word Views, which occurs ten times in a

few

few paragraphs, would never have been permitted to stand, if the writer had understood how to revise and correct his own language. We are told (p. 1.) of pleasing objects according to all the genuine and universal principles of taste, deduced from a knowlege of human nature—of objects throwing a pleasing idea upon scenes: which is profound nonsense; though the author probably took it for fine writing.

When he produces himself as the champion of his party against Mr. Burke, the poor lame English which he presents to the supreme critical eye of that learned gentleman, becomes more remarkable and offensive-What I have more particularly replied to is what he has advanced, &c. and again (p. 2.) there is nothing extraordinary in this revolution having excited, &c. In a plain unassuming person, of little education, such mistakes might be considered as vernacular oversights; but when they come from a teacher of eloquence, who writes books upon rhetoric, they take a very different cha

racter.

As to Dr. Priestley's skill in the learned languages, there is a vast appearance of it in his voluminous writings; but in the critical analysis of Greek and Latin, he is ill grounded and in

judicious;

judicious; insomuch that any well-trained scholar will soon find out that he was never put into proper possession of school-learning. The Bishop of St. David's (then Archdeacon of St. Alban's) charges him with gross blunders, even, to the mistaking of a passage, the sense of which was hardly to be missed at first sight by a school-boy in his second year of Greek. (Tracts, p. 101.) When any man does his best, candour will be ready to make the most of him; but when such a person holds in contempt and defiance his adversaries, who are better learned, he has then no longer any claim upon our candour or politeness, but deserves to be held up to the public in his true colours; more especially, if any evil purpose is to be promoted amongst the ignorant and the disaffected by his pretensions to superior learning. None of Dr. Priestley's principles are more mischievous in their intention than his political: we shall therefore begin with a short sketch of his politics from his own writings.

II. The Politics of Dr. Priestley.

HIS system is briefly this. To gain clear ideas, as he tells us, he supposes (in common with some higher authors who ought to have

known