Memoirs of Dr. Joseph Priestley

by Joseph Priestley

To these difficulties, arising from the sentiments of my congregation, was added that of the failure of all remittances from my aunt, owing in part to the ill offices of my orthodox relations; but chiefly to her being exhausted by her liberality to others, and thinking that when I was settled in the world, I ought to be no longer burdensome to her. Together with me she had brought up a niece, who was almost her only companion, and being deformed, could not have subsisted without the greatest part, at least, of all she had to bequeath. In consequence of these circumstances, tho’ my aunt had always assured me that, if I chose to be a minister, she would leave me independent of the profession, I was satisfied she was not able to perform her promise, and freely consented to her leaving all she had to my cousin; I had only a silver tankard as a token of her remembrance. She had spared no expence in my education, and that was doing more for me than giving me an estate.

But what contributed greatly to my distress was the impediment in my speech, which had increased so much as to make preaching very painful, and took from me all chance of recommending myself to any better place. In this state, hearing of the proposal of one Mr. Angier to cure all defects of speech, I prevailed upon my aunt to enable me to pay his price, which was twenty guineas; and this was the first occasion of my visiting London. Accordingly, I attended him about a month, taking an oath not to reveal his method, and I received some temporary benefit; but soon relapsed again, and spoke worse than ever. When I went to London it was in company with Mr. Smithson, who was settled at Harlestown in Norfolk. By him I was introduced to Dr. Kippis and Dr. Benson, and by the latter to Dr. Price, but not at that time.

At Needham I felt the effect of a low despised situation, together with that arising from the want of popular talents. There were several vacancies in congregations in that neighbourhood, where my sentiments would have been no objection to me, but I was never thought of. Even my next neighbours, whose sentiments were as free as my own, and known to be so, declined making exchanges with me, which, when I left that part of the country, he acknowledged was not owing to any dislike his people had to me as heretical, but for other reasons, the more genteel part of his hearers always absenting themselves when they heard I was to preach for him. But visiting that country some years afterwards, when I had raised myself to some degree of notice in the world, and being invited to preach in that very pulpit, the same people crowded to hear me, though my elocution was not much improved, and they professed to admire one of the same discourses they had formerly despised.

Notwithstanding these unfavorable circumstances, I was far from being unhappy at Needham. I was boarded in a family from which I received much satisfaction, I firmly believed that a wise providence was disposing every thing for the best, and I applied with great assiduity to my studies, which were classical, mathematical and theological. These required but few books. As to Experimental Philosophy, I had always cultivated an acquaintance with it, but I had not the means of prosecuting it.

With respect to miscellaneous reading, I was pretty well supplied by means of a library belonging to Mr. S. Alexander, a quaker,[3] to which I had the freest access. Here it was that I was first acquainted with any person of that persuasion; and I must acknowledge my obligation to many of them in every future stage of my life. I have met with the noblest instances of liberality of sentiment and the truest generosity among them.

[3] QUAKERS. That instances of liberality of sentiment with respect to religious opinion are frequently to be found among the Quakers there can be no doubt, but this is certainly no part of their character as a Sect. Thomas Letchworth one of the most acute and ingenious of their preachers at Wandsworth near London, who from the writings of Dr. Priestley had become a firm convert to his Unitarian opinions, informed me that the expression of those opinions would be attended with certain expulsion from the Society. Very lately Hannah Bernard, a female public friend who went from America to England, was prohibited from preaching by the Society, on account of her Unitarian doctrines.

Thomas Letchworth has been dead many years. In the short contest on the question of liberty and necessity which was occasioned by Toplady’s life of Jerome Zanchius, he wrote a good defence of the doctrine of necessity signed Philaretes in answer to one from a disciple of Fletcher’s of Madely, under the signature of Philaleutheros. There is a trifling account of him containing no information, by one William Matthews.

T. C.

My studies however, were chiefly theological. Having left the academy, as I have observed, with a qualified belief of the doctrine of Atonement, such as is found in Mr. Tomkin’s book, entitled, Jesus Christ the Mediator, I was desirous of getting some more definite ideas on the subject, and with that view set myself to peruse the whole of the old and new testament, and to collect from them all the texts that appeared to me to have any relation to the subject. This I therefore did with the greatest care, arranging them under a great variety of heads. At the same time I did not fail to note such general considerations as occurred to me while I was thus employed. The consequence of this was, what I had no apprehension of when I began the work, viz. a full persuasion that the doctrine of Atonement, even in its most qualified sense, had no countenance either from scripture or reason. Satisfied of this, I proceeded to digest my observations into a regular treatise, which a friend of mine, without mentioning my name, submitted to the perusal of Dr. Fleming and Dr. Lardner. In consequence of this, I was urged by them to publish the greater part of what I had written. But being then about to leave Needham, I desired them to do whatever they thought proper with respect to it, and they published about half of my piece, under the title of the Doctrine of Remission, &c.

This circumstance introduced me to the acquaintance of Dr. Lardner, whom I always called upon when I visited London. The last time I saw him, which was little more than a year before his death, having by letter requested him to give me some assistance with respect to the history I then prepared to write of the Corruptions of Christianity, and especially that article of it, he took down a large bundle of pamphlets, and turning them over at length shewing me my own; said, “This contains my sentiments on the subject.” He had then forgot that I wrote it, and on my remarking it, he shook his head, and said that his memory began to fail him; and that he had taken me for another person. He was then at the advanced age of ninety one. This anecdote is trifling in itself, but it relates to a great and good man.