have lived too long, and have endured too many conflicts; my consciousness of desert is too well corroborated by the consenting regards of estimable men; to enable such persecutions, on such principles, even to pollute the current, much less to extinguish the source, my consolations. of In the mean time, I look forwards with enraptured anticipation to a removal of these unenlightened operations, these vexatious encroachments, of a mistaken policy, by those gentle triumphs of religion and philosophy, which will hereafter bind the whole creation in one indissoluble tie of benevolence and peace: when all attempts to eradicate opinions and produce conviction by oppressive force will be regarded as the very excess, not of injustice only, but of puerile delusion; as an extravagance no less disgraceful to humanity, than contradictory to common sense: and I now appeal, with entire confidence in the purity of my intentions and the intrinsic meritoriousness of my conduct, from rash and inapprehensive ignorance to the sober votaries of philosophy and letters; from the perturbed spirits of my delirious contemporaries to the unalarmed judgments of future generations; from the reversible formularies of transient judicatures to the unswerving tribunal of " changeless Truth; from the perishable dispensations of worldly polities to the constitutions of the everlasting Gospel; from the condemning sentence of frail and mistaken men, to the irrevocable decision of an absolving and applauding God. THE FIRST SATIRE OF JUVENAL IMITATED. 1800. STILL, still shall struggling SPLEEN repress her hand, This spawn of scribblers croaking through the land? See Chalmers urge with persevering page To doubt and dulness a discerning age? See Reeves enjoy his pension and applause, Who Freedom libell'd, and provok'd her laws? With unindignant apathy pass by Of Antijacobins the filthy stye? Wars, murders, their delight; not **'s more; Their Law, CONFUSION stalking through the world: Raptur'd to view the ensanguin'd trophies nod How plotting Priestley's grains of powder lie a During the debate in the House of Commons in 1787, on the Repeal of the Test Act, one of the present writers heard Sir William Dolben, Member of Parliament for the University of Oxford, quote the following passage, to which Mr. Wakefield alludes, from Dr. Priestley. " -the silent pro How crafty Tooke and bawling Thelwall plann'd To whelm wealth, titles, in Rebellion's flood, And drench the scaffold with their Sovereign's blood; Not, through the paths of bliss our steps to lead, Of Law, Rank, Order; and enjoy the blaze:- tell, Of quitted felons, genuine imps of hell: On such stale themes, to me far better known, pagation of the truth will in the end prove efficacious. We are placing, as it were, grain by grain, a train of gunpowder, to which the match will one day be laid to blow up the fabric of error, which can never be again raised upon the same foundation." The worthy Baronet now displayed his sagacity in detecting the design of the Philosopher, and, as in duty bound, alarmed the House by laying no common emphasis on every grain of the metaphorical combustible. Mr. Courtenay, whose pleasantry has so often relieved the tædium of parliamentary business, undertook to calm the apprehensions of the Representative of the University of Oxford, and reminded him that the deep design, whatever it might be, was only against "the fabric of error," and therefore Sir William must be satisfied that the Church of England could be in no danger. This subject is treated with all suitable gravity by the late Dr. Geddes, in his "Epistola Macoronica," occasioned by a meeting of the Dissenters, in 1790, to procure the repeal of the Test Act. Non aderas, Priestley! potior te cura tenebat. Rure, ubi magna inter centum miracula rerum, Church quibus et churchmen, in cœlum upblowere possis. Each yelping cur of lurcher placemen barks, I too was form'd by pædagogic rules, From which e'en G....e his gross rebukes may shower, Safe in the ermine of judicial pow'r? Some Lord of Lincoln make his readers nod, From which, good Wilberforce can prove, at least, b"You must permit me, sir, to say, that I consider the Dedication of a Work designed to promote the knowledge of the SACRED SCRIPTURES as peculiarly appropriate to you, who have evinced yourself the zealous FRIEND OF RELIGION. But above all, I may state with inexpressible satisfaction, that under the influence of RELIGIOUS PRINCIPLE, your conduct has afforded an eminent example of private as well as of public virtue."!! See Dedication of the " ELEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY." "To the Right Honourable William Pitt, First Lord Commissioner of his Majesty's Treasury, &c. &c. &c." 1799. · c Mr. Wilberforce, having lamented the notorious contempt of national |