I am ready to admit that many grave points of doctrine and church discipline are handled in that very witty composition in a most unbecoming way; but, whoever reads the Author's Apology,' prefixed to the Tale, will be disarmed of a large portion of his indignation, when he learns that the publication took place without his privity; that the book was printed eight years after it was written; and that, as he says, had he been master of his papers for a year or two before their publication,' he could easily have prevented objections by a very few blots.'-It is well known that Archbishop Sharp was much scandalized at the licentiousness in which the author had indulged, and that his disapprobation had a sensible effect, with Queen Anne, in impeding the preferment of Swift. It is said, that the Archbishop afterwards saw the affair in a more favourable light, and was concerned to find that the opinion which he had once given, was the cause of preventing the rise of the Author in his profession. However this may be, it seems never to have struck Swift's editors, or Sharp's biographers, that both the Dean and the Archbishop adopted, to a certain degree, the same allegory—the father-the sons -and the last will and testament. - Dr. Sharp published 'a Refutation of a Popish Argument handed about in MS. in 1686,' being at that time rector of St. Giles's in the Fields, and Dean of Norwich. Eleven years after, viz. in 1697, Swift (assuming him as the author, then a young man, unpreferred,) wrote the Tale of a Tub. He tells us, in the Author's Apology,' that he resolved to proceed in a manner that should be altogether new, the world having been already too long nauseated with endless repetitions upon every subject:' and it is curious enough that the worthy rector of St. Giles's bad, so many years before, fallen upon a mode of illustrating part of his argument against the pretensions of the Church of Rome, similar, in a leading point, to that which Swift seized on as altogether new *. After mentioning that I quote from Mr. Nichols's edition of Swift's Works, in 24 Vols. 12mo. 1803, where the Author's Apology (well worth reading) occurs, p. 20; and from the edition of Abp. Sharp'sWorks, in 7 Vols. 8vo. 1754; *Swift's second motto claims originality of conception ;— Juvatque novos decerpere flores, Insignemque meo capiti petere inde coronam, Unde prius nulli velarunt tempora musa." I proceed to lay the passage in question a visible Church that hath, from Christ's "But that I may fully expose the sophistry of this argument to the meanest understanding, and enable every one to give an answer to it, I will put the whole force of it into an obvious case. "The argument is, that if we cannot shew a visible Church distinct from the Roman, that hath in all times, from the beginning, opposed the doctrines and practices of the present Church of Rome, then it will undeniably follow, that the present Church of Rome is the only visi→ ble Church. "Why now, methinks, this is just such an argument as this: "A father bequeaths a large estate among his children, and their children after them. They do for some generations quietly and peaceably enjoy their several shares, shares, without disturbance from each other. At last, one branch of this family (and not of the eldest house neither) starts up, and being of greater power than the rest, and having got some of the same family to join with him, very impudently challengeth the whole estate to himself, and those that adhere to him; and would dispossess all the rest of the descendants, accounting them no better than bastards, though they be far more in number than his own party, and have a far greater share in the inheritance. Upon this they contest their own right against him, alledging their father's will and testament, and their long possession, and that they are lawfully descended from their first common ancestor. "But this gentleman, who would lord it over his brethren, offers this irrefragable argument for the justice of his claim. If, says he, you deny me and my adherents to be the sole proprietors of this estate, then it lies upon you to shew, that, ever since the death of our progenitor, who left us this estate, there hath appeared some of the family who have always opposed my claim to this estate. But that you cannot shew; and therefore I have an undoubted title to the whole estate: I am lord of the whole inheritance. "I do appeal to any man living, whether this plea would pass in any court of judicature; nay, whether any private man, though never so unlearned, can believe that this insolent pretender doth offer any fair reason for the disseising the coheirs of their inheritance. And yet this is just the argument with which those learned gentlemen would persuade us to give up our birth-rights, to depart from that share of the inheritance we have in the Catholic Church. "Well, but what will the co-heirs that are concerned, say to this argument? Why there are three things so obvious to be said to it, that if the persons concerned have not the wit to hit upon them, they are fit to come under the custody and guardianship of this pretended heirgeneral. May they not say to this gentleman that makes so universal a claim, Sir, your claim was not so early as the death of our forefather, who left us this joint-inheritance. Your ancestors and ours lived a great while peaceably together, without any clashing about this estate; and we were suffered for some ages to enjoy our own right, without any molestation from you or those you derive from: And the case being so, there was no need of opposing your pretences, because you made none. But then, (which is the second thing) when you did set up for this principality, and wheedled some of our family, and forced others to join with you, you know you were presently opposed by others of our family, who would not so easily part from their rights. You know, that, as soon as ever you made your claim, there were some that stoutly declared against it, though they had not power, and strength, and interest enough in the world to stem the torrent of your ambition. "But then thirdly, may they say; supposing it was not so; supposing you had met with no rub in your pretences (which yet you know you did); supposing our family were not so suddenly aware of the mischief that would come upon them from those your usurpations, as to make a present opposition; doth now it follow, that, because no opposition was just then made to your pretences, therefore your pretensions to the whole estate are justifiable? No, we can prove they are not so; for it is plain by the testament, by the settlement of our common father, that we have as much a right to our parts in this estate as you have, or as your ancestors ever had. Tell not us, that you were not at first, or that you were not always, opposed in your claim: but tell us by what right or justice you can pretend to be the sole lord of this inheritance. Let the will of our common parent be produced, and that will plainly shew, that we have as much a share in this estate as you have. "This allegory is so pat to our business, and the application of it so easy to our present case, that I think I should injure the most vulgar understanding, if I should suspect his ability to make that use of it which I intend." I conceive, Mr. Editor, that I need not offer any apology for this Letter, which at once contains what I am inclined to deem a literary curiosity, and an argument against the encroaching spirit of Popery.-Of this at all events be assured, that no man can possibly wish success to the efforts of The Protestant Advocate more sincerely than, Sir, Yours, &c. Mr. URBAN, INDAGATOR." July 16, OUR Correspondent, Parti. p.551, Y is perfectly correct in considering the Imprecations in the 109th Psalm, as spoken not by David against his Enemies, but by his Enemies against him. There is nothing in the original language against this interpretation, but on the contrary, something in its favour. For what is more common in Hebrew than the omission of the word saying? If this word were supplied at the end of the 5th verse, all all would be clear: Thus," They have rewarded me evil for good, saying, Set thou a wicked man over him," &c. I cannot, however, agree with your Correspondent, that David supplicates that his slanderous enemies may be themselves the victims of those calamities which they had imprecated upon him. If indeed the 20th verse be properly rendered in our Translation, "Let this be the reward of mine adversaries," it must be so. But our Translators were certainly mistaken. The verse should be rendered thus: "Such is the requital of those who falsely accuse me before Jehovah;" or "This behaviour of mine enemies is from Jehovah;" as David says of Shimei in the 16th Chapter of the 2d Book of Samuel, "Let him curse, because the Lord hath said unto him, curse David.” And—“ Let him curse, for the Lord bath bidden him." All the antient versions support such a translation. Dr. Sykes (in his Comment on the Epistle to the Hebrews) was the first who proposed the above interpretation of the 109th Psalm; and it has since been adopted by several learned men; viz. Green in his translation of the Psalms; and Keate and Partridge in single Sermons. W. W. Mr. URBAN, Chelsea, July 15. Mr. URBAN, July 19. GLADLY avail myself of the permission accorded to me in the very polite and instructive Letter of "Investigator," received in London yesterday; and with deference offer a few observations in reply. The work on the Pleasures of Reading, which has been honoured by Investigator's notice, is very humble in all its pretensions: copiousness (which the subject invited) was designedly avoided in what I was pre-determined should be a concise volume; and to save it from the neglect to which gravity might have exposed it in the eyes of the young and gay, who are too apt to think it impossible to be pleased and serious at the same time, I have done no more than glance at religious reading; of all reading sure ly the most calculated to produce pleasurable effects. Investigator has instanced the great Lord Mansfield as one of those who were inclined to maintain the authenticity of The Poems of Ossian.”—If he believed those poems genuine, Lord M. may have biassed in his INRseh, Richard Yates, and your opinion by national feelings, but I Correspondent, canvassed votes for the Lectureship of Chelsea; I was favoured soon by the clergyman who retained the appointment with a written assurance, that "it was not his intention to resign the duty."-In June 1814, the Rev. John Rush, Jas. Gibson, and your Correspondent, canvassed votes for the same office: I was again favoured, thus: "Dear Sir, From the repeated assurances of respect which I have frequently received from you, I should be very ungrateful indeed if I did not answer your Letter, to acknowlege that I gave you the earliest information of my wish to resign the Lectureship of Chelsea: consequently, no inhabitant can think you were premature in your canvas. I have been induced to give up the intention, in the hope that my poor services may be acceptable to a very large portion of the inhabitants. Had I retired, it would have been very grateful to my feelings, to have been succeeded by so able and couscienti really had supposed the question decided by the result of recent inquiries; and, for my own part, I believe the Poems to be, strictly speaking, forgeries by M'Pherson, i. e. that he built his volume on the slight foundation of a few traditionary fragments of uncertain date: if so, the book thus made, ceases to be what it professes, namely, a curious specimen of antient manners, and actually the poetry of a very remote period. I am unconscious of having consigned all kinds of Light Reading to contempt; in the Essay on that subject I have carefully excepted some works belonging to that class of books, and endeavoured to join my feeble voice to the loud applauses which most deservedly attend on the venerable name of Samuel Richardson. In the volume of Letters lately published, Richardson is introduced without the smallest intention of attempting to depreciate an author to whom his Country is under eternal obligation; and for whose genius genius and virtues my high admiration has been more than once publicly avowed. The reference to Sir Charles Grandison was made to support what had been previously said in favour of the efficacy with which truth is employed where a lesson of good is given, when, as it appears to me, and indeed I deem the position a safe one, the most homely narrative, if authentic, would be more operative, than the most artfully-composed fiction-even' though the production of such a master as Richardson. The notion thrown out by Investigator, of an Edition of Richardson's Novels clad in a modern costume, is very lively; but the experiment would be a bold one; and perhaps not prove altogether friendly to Richardson's fame: he is an English Classick; the garb of his immortal personages belongs specifically to their day, and, in some measure, to their peculiar modes of thought and action-and where is the band that would dare to touch the beautiful fabrick! Yours, &c. Mr. URBAN, EDW. MANGIN. July 9. ALLOW me to ask some of your Friends, either at Enfield, or at Trinity College, Cambridge, whether Dr. Robert Üvedale, who was Vicar of Enfield from 1721 to 1731, was the same person with the celebrated Botanist, who planted the large Cedar in the garden of the Manor-house.If so, he must have received the benefice late in life. If not, when did the Botanist die? and was the Vicar bis Son? Mrs. Brooke, the justly-celebrated Authoress of "Julia Mandeville," "Rosina," &c. was buried at Sleaford in Lincolnshire; where the memories of her uncle and father are preserved by her elegant inscriptions. If that Lady has any Epitaph in the same church, a copy is requested. CARADOC. Mr. URBAN, July 15. brated in the political world for Whig Principles 'At College too, such quibbles prove Envy oft the mind will move." OLIVIA WILMOT SERRES. It is necessary, in absolute justice to myself, I should state, I have PROOF beyond the possibility of doubt in my possession-that Dr. Wilmot was the composer and writer of the Letters signed Junius. *We have to acknowledge the Receipt of a long Letter from Mr. John Birch; in which that respectable Gentleman (no doubt with the purest motives) perseveres in his Fulminations against Vaccination; condemning it in toto, and anathematizing its Practisers and Abettors, the College of Physicians, the Royal Vaccine Institution, and the Parliamentary Committees. Thus far we think it right to notice Mr. Birch's Letter; at the same time entering our most solemn Protest against the doctrine it would inculcate ; and forbearing to spread the Terrors it has a tendency to excile. Such parts of the Letter as relate to Mr. Birch, and his own Mode of Practice, we shall, however, submit to the conside ration of the Publick. IN answer to the general Invectives flung out by the Board against all who dare to think for themselves and to reject their associations, I must beg leave to say for myself, that I never lost a patient by Inoculation; and that I consider even the Natural Small-pox a mild disease, and only rendered malignant by mistakes in nursing, in diet, and in medicine, and by want of cleanliness: which last is the fomes of Hospital fevers and of all Camp and contagious disorders. It would hardly be too bold to say, that the fatal treatment of this disease, for two centuries, by warming and confining the air of the Chamber, and by stimulating and heating cordials, was the cause of two-thirds of MR. Gaspar's Letter, Parti. p. 535, the mortality which ensued. has met my eye. In reply to that Writer, I have only to observe-with a correct attention to truth-I gave the extracts of Major Hankin's Letter to the world; and I should suppose the allusion by that Gentleman to the Whig Club may bear this explanation: That Junius published his Essays with the patronage, &c. of Gentlemen who were afterwards cele It is not to the wisdom of the Col lege of Physicians that the Publick is indebted for the present successful treatment; but to the family of the Suttons, who were indicted for their practice at the Quarter Sessions at Chelmsford, but acquitted, with great encomiums for their success, and with the thanks of the Grand Jury for the lesson they were teaching the Faculty. Mr. I discusion with to continue the discussion on the state of the Soul after death. The arguments have been laid before your Readers, and of the justness of them they will judge. A. H. (p. 548. b.) does not find himself "convinced of any er. ror." Perhaps not; for to prove is one thing, and to convince is another. He is "surprised by" my conceding to all he is arguing for, in the definition of Paradise as the state or abode of the soul, in rest and conso lation, when separated from the body, between the hour of death and the day of resurrection." This does not surprise, but it does astonish, me. A. H. contends that there is no such state of rest to the soul, and I maintain that there is; and by thus maintaining the direct contradiction of his opinion, 1" concede all that he argues for" !!! Again, he says:-St. Paul's being "caught up to Paradise cannot be assumed as an authority for the future intermediate state of the soul, because St. Paul afterwards lived on earth, and died." To any plain understanding, as seems to me, the reverse must be obvious. What was exhibited to St. Paul, in vision, was no delusion, but has a real existence in nature. Heaven and Paradise were so exhibited to him; and therefore Heaven and Paradise are no delusion, but have a real existence in nature. 66 A. H. says: "It is true, that a man who kills the body, kills the soul also for a season." On the contrary, he who knew both worlds, all things invisible as well as visible, says, they "which kill the body, are not able to kill the soul." Matth. x. 28. He says: Lazarus, and those who were visibly raised, left no light to shew what their soul had either enjoyed or suffered since their deaths." He should rather have said, No such light is recorded; though, at the same time, it is probable, that if they had attempted to describe what they had seen, the attempt would have been fruitless: the things of the invisible world, even in that part which is not the region of highest beatitude, being, as St. Paul assures us, unspeakable," such as cannot be expressed in human language. 2 Cor. xii. 4. GENT. MAG. July, 1814. 66 He thanks me (and T. V. likewise, p. 550.) for referring him to "the passages which he cited before." But There are many other things in this Mr. URBAN, July 14. your Magazine of June, the WAS much gratified, when I read very just and sensible observations of A. S. respecting the late "Stipendiary Curates' Bill." As I am ignorant of the real author, I can only address him through you, or the mediam of your Monthly Publication. In confirmation of the " judicious remarks of A. S. respecting the plurality of Curates," I will here recite a true copy of a Letter from a Curate addressed to a Rector, within these few days: "I refused a Curacy, pleasantly situate, with a good house and four acres, rent and tax free, and a stipeud of 75 guineas, for one church and single duty. A few days before, 1 refused a neat house and field, rent and tax free, and 1107. salary, for two churches, within a mile of each other, and single duty alternately. I expect (he adds) beside a neat house, 1007. or guineas, for one church; and, if I serve two, Lexpect at least 50%. more. For less, I will never again be Curate !” I wish to call the attention of A. S. to another subject, materially connected with the Established Church; I mean, the Curates of Lay-Impropriators. Surely they ought to be compelled by the Legislature, in a similar proportion, to augment their stipends. I could cite many cases in point. I will content myself, at present, with noticing only two of them :-The Per petual Curacy of Flamstead, Hertfordshire, appointed by the Master and Fellows of University College, Oxon. Their lessee (Sir John Sebright) occupies the great and small tithes; and likewise receives all the fees for vaults, monuments, tombs, not only in the chancel and body of the Church, but likewise in the church |