1813.] Dr. Joseph Priestley i ^5 



Reid, Beattie, and Oswald, a book which he tells us he finished 

 in a fortnight; but of which he afterwards, in some measure, 

 disapproved. Indeed, it was impossible for any person of 

 candour to approve of the style of that work, and the way in 

 which he treated Dr. Reid, a philosopher certainly much more 

 deeply skilled than himself in metaphysics. 



After some years, Lord Shelburne began to be weary of his 

 associate; and expressing a wish to settle him in Ireland, Dr. 

 Priestley, of his own accord, proposed a separation^ to which 

 his Lordship consented, after settling on him an annuity of 

 1501., according to a previous stipulation. This annuity he 

 continued regularly to pay during the remainder of the life of 

 Dr. Priestley. 



His income being much diminished by his separation from 

 Lord Shelburne, and his family increasing, he found it difficult 

 wow to support himself. At this time Mrs. Rayner made him 

 very considerable presents, particularly at one time a sum of 

 4001.; and she continued her contributions to him almost 

 annually. Dr. Fothergill had proposed a subscription, in order 

 that he might prosecute his experiments to their utmost extent, 

 and be enabled to live without sacrificing his time to pupils. 

 This he accepted: it amounted at first to 401. per annum, 

 and was afterwards much increased. Dr. Watson, Mr*. 

 Wedgewood, Mr. Gal ton, and four or five more, were the 

 gentlemen who joined with Dr. Fothergill in this generous 

 subscription. 



Soon afterwards he settled in a meeting-house at Birningham, 

 and continued for several years keenly engaged in theological and 

 chemical iavestigations. His apparatus, by the liberality of his 

 friends, had I ncome excellent; and his income was so good that 

 he could prosecute his researches to their full extent. Here he 

 published the last three volumes of his Experimevts on Air, 

 and many papers on the same subject in the Philosophical 

 Transactions. Here, too, he continued his theological repo- 

 sitory, and published a variety of tracts on his peculiar opinions 

 in religion, and upon the history of the primitive church. Here 

 he unluckily engaged in controversy with the established clergy 

 of the place, and expressed his opinions on political subjects 

 with a degree of freedom, which, though it would have been of 

 no consequence at any former period, was ill suited to the 

 peculiar times which were introduced by the French revolution, 

 and to the political maxims of Mr. Pitt and his administration* 

 His answer to Mr. Burke's book on the French Revolution 

 excited the violent .indignation of that extraordinary man, and 

 he inveighed against his character repeatedly, and with particular 

 virulence, in the House of Commons. The clergy of the 

 Church of England too, who began about this time to be 

 alarmed for their establishment, of which Dr. Priestley was the 



