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    310 Mr . Bchham ' s Strictures on Carpenter ' s Lectures .

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    never allow that his defence of dissenters is injudicious , oj ? that he has injured their cause by it : even admitting , what cannot be proved , and what , if proved , would be but as a feather in the balance , that the offence taken at the freedom of Dr . Priestley ' s language , might operate as one reason amongst others with the legislature , to reject the application of the dissenters for the repeal of the test-laws .

    After having thus laboured to represent Dr . Priestley as having made by his writings as many unbelievers as converts ; as having taken no inconsiderable pains to lessen not only the personal dignity of Christ , but his moral excellence and his qualifications as a teacher sent from God ; as one whose writings have produced a very unhappy effect in lessening people ' s reverence for the sacred scriptures ; as having , injured the cause of the dissenters by his injudicious defence of it , and strengthened the church establishment by his violent attack upon it ; my worthy friend thiriks fit to

    conclude his account , with what consistency he best knows , by bearing testimony to Dr . Priestley " as one of the greatest / and best of men : ' * because , good man ! " he was very in ~ . offensive in'his manners in private life ^ and his character unimpeachable . " I also think with my friend thatDr , Priestley was one of the greatest and best of men : but for a reason somewhat different . With an acuteness of discernment , an energy of character , and a comprehension of mind peculiarly his own , inspired- with an ardent love of truth , and animated by a commanding sense of duty , Dr . Priestley devoted his extraordinary powers through the course of a long life , with the most active and disinterested zeal , to the investigation of philosophical , moral and Christian truth : to the latter of which , all his other pursuits were made subservient . And having succeeded beyond all his

    contemporaries in the object of his researches ; from an earnest desire to instruct and benefit his fellow creatures , he published to the world the result of his enquiries , with a simplicity pf manner , with an invincible courage , and with a force of argument , which has never been exceeded ,, and the . effect of which in exciting the attention of man-, kind to the most important truths surpassed all expectation . He has thus , by the blessing of divine providence , kindled a li g ht which will never be extinguished , and has achieved a triumph which shall transmit with renown , the jiame of the enlightened advocate , and undaunted confessor of pure Christianity to generations yet unborn . Sana posteritas scitt

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1807, page 310, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2381/page/22/