But worse than all, John was head over ears in debt, and had a strange way of paying. One of his creditors came to him with a claim for a hundred guineas, while we were in the house. John, who always appeared polite and gentle, fought his creditor, and paid him with a sword-wound. It was apprehended the wounded man would die; and John, notwithstanding lord Peterborough's protection, ran the risk of imprisonment and hanging.
[1] In 1737 Bishop Warburton published his famous work, The Divine Legation of Moses, in which he asserted, "that the doctrine of a future state of reward and punishment was omitted in the books of Moses," and then proceeded to demonstrate "from that very omission, that a system which could dispense with a doctrine, the very bond and cement of human society, must have come from God, and that the people to whom it was given must have been placed under His immediate superintendence." In other words, the divine origin of the Mosaic "system" is demonstrated, because Moses did not teach to the chosen people the doctrine of a future life beyond the grave. Voltaire clearly saw the fallacy of this fantastic argument, and has not failed to severely satirize the right reverend author.
Robert Carruthers, Esq., in his Life of Alexander Pope styles Bishop Warburton "a learned, turbulent, ambitious adventurer"—"an indefatigable and unscrupulous divine," and says of The Divine Legation of Moses, that it was "so learned, so novel, so paradoxical, so arrogant and absurd, that it took the world as it were by storm, and challenged universal attention."
Dr. Johnson says that Warburton's "diction is coarse and impure, and his sentences are unmeasured;" and a writer in the seventh volume of the Quarterly Review (as quoted by George Godfrey Cuningham, Esq., in his Lives of Eminent and illustrious Englishmen) says: "the rudeness and vulgarity of his manners as a controvertist, removed all restraints of decency or decorum in scattering his jests about him. His taste seems to have been neither just nor delicate." He combined "the powers of a giant with the temper of a ruffian."
Gibbon, in his History of Christianity, pointedly alludes to the author of The Divine Legation of Moses, and satirically styles the omission of the doctrine of immortality from the law of Moses, as "a mysterious dispensation of providence." "The real merit of Warburton," he says, "was degraded by the pride and presumption with which he pronounced his infallible decrees."—E.
CHAPTER V.
THEY WANT TO GET JOHN MARRIED.
You remember the anguish of the venerable Freind when he learned that John was in the prison of the inquisition at Barcelona. Imagine his rage when he learned of the debauchery and dissipation of the unfortunate lad, his way of paying debts, and his danger of getting hanged! Yet Freind restrained himself. This excellent man's self-command is really astonishing. His reason regulates his heart, as a good master rules his servants. He does every thing reasonably, and judges wisely with as much celerity as hasty people act rashly.
"This is no time to lecture John," said he. "We must snatch him from the precipice."