delayed another month, and have no objection to your striking out of my letter all that respects the serious letters, and the application to Mr. Wesley. (On second thoughts I will write it over again.)* As to those people who object to my frequent publications, they are not worth considering at all. To please them I must write nothing, and, if possible, undo all that I have done.

I am sorry you have not time to read my History. I have taken some pains to render the tedious reign of Constantine less heavy, by dividing it into many sections, and have made some strictures on Gibbon,† which you have not seen. We shall finish about Christmas, or sooner.

On the fifth of November I preached a sermon on the Corporation and Test Acts, which I am much importuned to print. I think to do it in a small form, to circulate in the country. My text is 1 Cor. vii. 21.

I rejoice much in your account of Dr. Price's discourse, § and shall be impatient to see it in print. Many Dissenters know nothing of their principles, and are wholly destitute of zeal for them, so that I do not wonder at the censure that has fallen upon him. I, myself, gave more offence to many Dissenters than to the members of the Church of England, by my writings on the subject formerly.

I am very glad that you have succeeded in getting me Horsley's prospectus. I now only want an opinion of a mathematician, of the merit of his Commentary on Newton, such as I may quote. I have just read Gabriel's Facts. Before I had, I could not have believed the story. He¶ can never hold up his head again.**

See infra, p. 44.

+ See supra, p. 27.

See W. XV. 389.

§ "On the Love of our Country, delivered Nov. 4, 1789, at the Meetinghouse in the Old Jewry, to the Society for Commemorating the Revolution in Great Britain." Some passages in this discourse excited the vituperative eloquence of Burke, who was not prepared, like Price, as described by Dr. Knox, to "espouse the cause of freedom, and prefer the happiness of millions to the pomp and pride of a few aspirants at unlimited dominion." See W. XX. 501; "Spirit of Despotism," (1795,) p. 70.

|| See W. XIX. 14.

¶ Dr. White.

** Orig. MS.

DEAR FRIEND,

TO THE SAME.

Heath, Nov. 18, 1789.

HAVING a little leisure, I cannot employ it more agreeably to myself than in writing to you.

It was very fortunate that Mr. Frend met my son at Frankfort. He is very happily situated in an agreeable family, and with agreeable acquaintance, particularly a Mr. Miles, who, he says, is uncommonly civil to him, from his respect to me. I do not know him, but Mr. Frend does, and was to send him some of my publications.

A new antagonist has announced himself, and almost as unexpectedly as Mr. Badcock. It is Mr. H. Croft, the compiler of the new Dictionary of the English Language, who has often called upon me, and written to me on that subject, and to whom I gave a quantity of materials which I had collected for a large work on the structure and present state of our language, when I was at Warrington.*

In a very civil letter, he informs me that he is "reprinting a book against the Socinians of the last age, corrected in the way he means to correct the quotations in his Dictionary, and that to this he subjoins a letter to me, which he hopes will be in time to be noticed in my Christmas publication." I am very glad that he has made choice of this kind of book, as it may draw some more attention on the subject. His own views, I suspect, are preferment. I had always considered him as a

mere belles-lettres man.

I have sent a part of my Defences to the press. There are many important additions, which, I hope, you will not dislike. I shall send you the sheets as I have opportunity. I want the opinion on Horsley's Newton, about which I wrote to Dr. Price; but have had no answer.

Mr. Russell would send you my sermon. I hope you will find it plain, and not violent. Mr. Heywood has sent us a most excellent pamphlet, which must by all means be published, but will not be proper to be done here, as it will be

* See I. 46.

ascribed to me, and will be considered as personal, with respect to Mr. Pitt.

I sent you two copies of the History, that you might send one to Dr. Heberden, or any other friend. I am glad that you and he like it. It will encourage me to proceed, though I shall suspend a year at the least.

P. S. If Mr. Russell send copies of my sermon enow, send in my name to Mrs. Rayner, Mr. Dodson, Dr. Price, Dr. Kippis, Mr. Belsham, Mr. Salte, Mr. Radcliffe, and my friends in general.*

DEAR SIR,

TO REV. THOMAS BELSHAM.†

Birmingham, Nov. 18, 1789. I REJOICE exceedingly at the accounts I hear from several quarters of your reception in the Academy, and the prospect it affords of your being eminently useful there. I hope it will long continue and increase. You will make me happy by informing me occasionally how you go on.

You were so good as to promise to procure for me, if you could, a correct account of what the Bishop of Peterborough (I think it was) said on the subject of the Trinity at Daventry.‡ I have a very convenient place for noticing it in my Defences for the present year, which I have sent to the press, so that there is no time to lose. If I do not hear from you on the subject, I shall give the best account I can recollect from your conversation;§ and the opinion was so very singular, that I think there could not be any great danger of mistaking it.

In these Defences I notice Bishop Horsley, Mr. Barnard, Dr. Knowles, and Mr. Hawkins. Another, however, has just announced himself, requesting to be noticed, Mr. H. Croft, of Oxford, compiler of the Dictionary of the English Language. His letter to me is only now going to the press.

I sent you the first and part of the second volume of my History. I hope to finish in about a month. In the second

* Orig. MS.

See supra, p. 37.

+ New College, Hackney.

§ See infra, pp. 47, 48.

part you will see, I flatter myself, some new light thrown on the history of Arianism.

I am much obliged to you for your reference to Mr. Palmer's remarks on distinctions in the Deity. I have quoted almost the whole of it, but have subjoined some remarks on the indwelling scheme.*

I have printed a sermon preached on the fifth of November on the Corporation and Test Acts, of which Mr. Lindsey will send you a copy.†

TO REV. T. LINDSEY.

DEAR FRIEND,

Birmingham, Nov. 25, 1789. I HAVE received the parcel very safe, and thank you for your care of the particulars. I observe, however, that you in London often see things in a very different light from us in the country, and you do not sufficiently consider that, large as London is, the country is larger. You look upon such a publication as the Gentleman's Magazine with contempt, and think a man disgraced by writing in it; but it does not appear so here, and we think it a great convenience (of which much use may be made) to have access to a place in which we are sure to meet with our opponents, and can write what will be read by literary persons, and be preserved. We, therefore, think it good policy to make that use of it, and to keep the editor in good humour, and engage his impartiality by proper civility.

I own that I partake much of the sentiments of country readers, and have no idea of being disgraced by any thing that answers a good purpose. To comply with your opinion, I shall for the present not send the letters to the Magazine, though I feel no conviction from your reasons. The papers you have, about the apparition are not worth sending to Mr. Wesley. They are the others, more serious ones, relating to his setting out on his religious career,§ that it might import him to see.

* See W. XIX. 102-104.

↑ Essex Street.

+ Orig. MS.

§ See W. XXV. 326–329.

I thank you for the various and valuable information contained in the letters you have sent me, and shall return them the first opportunity. Mr. Garnham is a valuable part of our corps, as, I hope, Mr. Frend will also be.

We shall not fail to print Mr. Heywood's pamphlet, though not as by our Committee. When we shall have printed my Letters to Bishop Horsley, which is the first part of my Defences this year, I shall stop the press for that. It is now in the hands of the printer.

The other piece, I perceive, is Dr. Aikin's. I know his hand-writing. I like it much; but think it rather extraordinary that he should write in this strain, as he was one that was most offended at my former publications of the same kind. At that time there was a violent cry against me in Lancashire. I shall write to Ben Vaughan about Horsley's Newton.

I have put Mr. Dodson's Isaiah into the hands of Mr. Hawkes. I think I shall like it much; but I do not like his inserting the passage concerning John the Baptist,* merely because he takes it for granted that the quotation of the Old Testament in the New must be accurate; and I wondered at his supposing that our Saviour's walking before his sepulchre should be the subject of prophecy.† But these are trifles.

The two pamphlets, for which I thank you, are poor indeed. However, I think to reply to them (anonymous) in our small tracts. I wish we could be sure that they were from the Bishop of Salisbury. Pray who is he, as also the Bishop of Peterborough?

I expect my wife on Friday. I feel very solitary.‡

Dr. Priestley refers, I apprehend, to Mr. Dodson's note on ch, xl., where he says,

"As we have the irrefragable authority of John the Baptist, and of our blessed Saviour himself, for explaining the exordium of the prophecy of the opening of the gospel by the preaching of John, and of the introducing of the kingdom of the Messiah, why should we not be satisfied that the exordium of the prophecy hath no other object than these?" New. Trans. p. 275.

Transferring the beginning of ch. Ivii. to liii. 10, Mr. Dodson thus translates the concluding passage: "He shall arise from his bed, walking before it, although his sepulchre is sealed." Ibid. pp. 117, 118, 124. ↑ Orig. MS.