scribed into the Life of Lardner, prefixed to 
Dr. Kippis’s edition of bis works, and will de- 
scend. to the latest posterity, in connexion 
with a name which will be an everlasting 
honour to our country. Upon the death of 
Dr. Benson, which had happened some years 
previous to this, Mr. R. had paid. the Jast 
honours at his grave. This oration appeared 
attached to the sermon and brief memoir by 
the Rev. Mr. Pickard, and is in the same 
style of simple manly eloquence as that for 
Lardner. In 176%, Mr. R. published a Fast 
Sermon, and in the following year, a discourse 
on the Anniversary of the Hanoverian Suc- 
cession, preached on the Lord’s day morning 
lecture, at Little St. Helen’s,: boch published 
at the request of these who heardthem. In 
the latter, the preacher, from our Lord’s words, 
*¢ my kingdom is not of this world,” takes 
occasion to lay down, and in his usual clear 
and forcible manner, the genuine principles of 
religious liberty. Inthe year 1769, Mr. R. 
was united in marriage to Miss Parish, eldest 
daughter of the late Edward Clarke Parish, esq. 
of Walthamstow. ‘This lady survives to la- 
ment his loss, a loss heightened by the high 
value which her own excellent understanding: 
enabled her to set on his distinguished talents, 
and by the affecticnate and unremitting atten- 
tions, which he considered it both his duty 
and his happiness to render, under the loss of 
sight, and other distresses, with’ which it 
pleased Heaven to afflict her. He left an 
only daughter, married to S. Iveson, esq. of 
Leeds, Yorkshire. 
lideral on religions subjects, the penal statutes 
against dissenting ministers and schoo] -mas- 
ters, who could not conscientiously subscribe to 
the doctrinal articles of the church of England, 
had falien into disuse, and it was hoped that 
the time was come when,parliament would 
cordially join in repealing them. The great 
Doddridge had himself bad a prosecution 
commenced against him, for keeping an 
academy; but the late king had interfered on 
that occasion to put a stop to it, and it was 
presumed, that as the country seemed now 
ashamed of executing these unjust laws, the 
legislature would-be glad of an opportunity of 
doing them away altugether. The dissenters 
appli ied to parliament i in a maniy and respect- 
ful manner; but owing to the epposition of 
the bench of bishops, the application at that 
time failed of success. It was at this juncture, 
that Mr. R. wrote his celebrated Letters to 
the Prelates ; a production, which if he had 
not written another line, would have stamp- 
ed him as one of the most powerful writers 
of theage. His name did not appear to them, 
nor did he ever publicly acknowledge them 
tf be his 5 but his contemporaries never doubt- 
ed of the fact, and he himself says, ** This 
yeat (1775) the Letters to the Prelates ap- 
peared, which occasioned much enquiry about 
the author.” It is but saying little of this 
geasterly producticn te observe, thateit is con- 
Account of the late Ebenezer Radcliffe. 
At a period when the” 
public mind seemed growing decidedly more. 
(Jan. ly 
vincing and decisive on the subject: there 
never was an argument more triumphantly 
pursued; it is a torrent of manly eloquence 
from beginning to end. Some persons, and 
those not meanly skilled in the critical art, 
have conjectured that the writer of these 
letters must have been Junius himself. ‘The 
language is all nerve; sometimes grave and 
solema, in other parts bitingly sarcastic, but 
throughout clear, manly, and dignified in the 
highest degree : the author carries you irresist~ 
ably along with him, and it is not too much 
to assert, that let any one, however opposite his 
prepossessions, sit downto read these letters, 
he would rise from the reading of them with 
an impression of inward respect for the de-— 
feated party. The force of truth, thus 
powerfully maintained, at length prevailed, at 
least to a certain degree 3 and to the honour 
of the prelates clonal ves let it be mentioned, 
that one of their body was the Renan to suge 
gest to the dissenters that if they applied 
again, their petition would not be opposed. 
After thus for a considerable number of years 
filling up the office of a minister of religion, 
and exerting his great powers in the pulpit, 
and out of it, in the sacred cause of religious 
liberty, Mr. R. in the year 1777, and in the 
46th year of his age, thought proper to with- 
draw from the fatigues of active labour, and 
to lead the life cf a private gentleman, which 
he did till the time of his death. The reasons 
which weighed in his mind in taking this 
step, shall be given in his own words: *¢ This 
year (1777) after giving six months’ notice, 
I resigned preaching, which I thought it bet-— 
ter to do too soon rather than too late ; [ had 
survived those sanguine ideas of usefulness I 
once entertained. Every sunday’s exertion 
cost me an indisposition of several days; the 
duties I performed were as well supplied by 
others, and no person was left destitute of the 
means of instruction, or the helps of deyotion, 
by my resignation.” But though after this 
time Mr. R. was not officialiy engaged, his 
aclive mind was never idle; he had always 
some plan of benevolence, or some little 
anonymous literary labour to occupy him. To 
the periodical publications of the day he was 
a frequent contributor, especially to the Gen- 
tleman’s Magazine ; as he had formerly been 
to a work, of a more religious cast, called the 
Library. The society of his iriends (amongst 
whom his inexhaustivle fund of genuine anec- 
dote, his wit, his peculiarly happy mode of 
condensing and expressing striking ' senti- | 
ments, could not failto make him a most 
welcome guest) filled up some portion of his 
leisure. His literary reflections upon the pas= 
sing scenes, of the world, ministering to the 
wants, and cheering the eahieudee of his near- 
est Connections, and the occupation of his gar- 
garden, were now his principal objects. == 
At length, having survived the ordinary 
period of the life of man, he bade the world 
adieu, with a tranquillity worthy of himself. 
ERO An ely 
3 
