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XVI. 



SUPPOSED AUTOGEAPH LETTEK OF BISHOP BERKELEY 

 m THE LIBRARY OF THE ROYAL IRISH ACADEMY. 

 By swift p. JOHNSTOI^, Professor of Moral Philosophy 

 in the University of Duhlin. 



[communicated by the KEV. JOHX BEENAED, D.D.] 

 [Eead November 12, 1900.] 



Among the Academy MSS. a letter signed George Berkeley has hitherto 

 generally been ascribed to the great Idealist, but certain recent investi- 

 gations have thrown considerable doubt on the correctness of this 

 assumption. To make the case clear let us start from the beginning. 

 George Berkeley, the metaphysician, entered Trinity College, 

 Dublin, in 1700, at the age of fifteen. He worked his way through 

 college, won his fellowship, and published his earlier essays. Then iu 

 1713 he left Dublin, spent some years in travel on the Continent, lived 

 some time in London, and returned to Ireland in 1721. Now the 

 earliest biography of Berkeley, that of Bishop Stock, published in 

 1776, asserts that it was in the capacity of chaplain to the Lord 

 Lieutenant, the Duke of Grafton, that Berkeley came back to Dublin. 

 A contradiction of this statement as to the chaplaincy appeared almost 

 immediately in a review of Stock's "Life" in the Gentleman's 

 Magazine. Professor Eraser, in his biography of Berkeley, adopts 

 Stock's assertion, and supports his opinion by quoting a letter signed 

 George Berkeley that at the time Eraser saw it was in the possession 

 of the late Mr. Malcolmson of Carlow. Hereafter I shall refer to this 

 as the Carlow letter, while the one in the possession of this Society is 

 briefly designated as the Academy letter. 



The Carlow letter is as follows : — 



From y^ Court of Ireland, October 6. 



I thanke you for youi' kind letter, Deare Brother Nelson, though you 

 and y^ postmaster did not agree in y« date, ther being 20 days differ- 

 ence. This hath puzled me a little as to y^ time of your housekeeping; 

 but I hope you keepe your old quarters and are now settled at St. 

 James to your content. I have bin a fortnight in y^ Castle : but 

 excepting a little difference in y' hangings of my chamber, and its 



