On Mr. Rutt's Edition of Priestley's Works. rationally explained—who have derived from the perusal of the Bible, and the works which are calculated to illustrate and authenticate its contents, the utmost improvement and delight, and who have resolved to devote a part of their leisure time in extending their acquaintance with such productions:-to these the appeal is made in favour of the proposed edition of Dr. Priestley's Works, and it is ardently hoped it will not be made in vain. Two or three trivial objections have been made to the Proposal in the course of my conversation; and as these may possibly prevent some of your readers from yielding to the natural impulse of generous feeling, it may be well to bestow upon each a passing consideration. 1. There may be and probably are some copies of the larger Theological Works on hand; but this is no real objection to the proposed edition. This must have been the case with Dr. Lardner's Works, which consist almost entirely of two or three principal works; and yet happily for the celebrity of that useful critic, and for the progress of theological science in general, this was considered no sufficient obstacle to Dr. Kippis's edition. The fact is, that a great proportion of the eighteen volumes which it is computed Dr. Priestley's Works will occupy, would be made up of the smaller publications, many of which are little if any thing inferior in importance to the larger works; and many of these are almost inaccessible: this is particularly the case with one of the most valuable, "The Letters to a Philosophical Unbeliever." The consequence of the new edition will be a reduction in the price of the former ones, which will thus become accessible to that interesting class of the community-men who, amid the daily toils for their subsistence, find time to ruminate on the grand truths of religion, and whose minds are often more enlightened on these subjects, than many of those who are favoured with a higher place in the scale of society. Every suitable exertion should certainly be made to secure the efforts of such persons who labour to convey to those of their own rank a knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus. 2. Are there not some of Dr. Priestley's theological writings which partake 523 rather of the nature of ingenious conjecture, than of sound and mature investigation? And would it be advisable, when the Christian world is so extensively combined in warfare against one little (but daily increasing) band, to place in their way any of those parts of the Doctor's writings, which may have already afforded occasion for our opponents to cavil? If the objection had not been actually made, it would not have been deemed deserving of consideration in this connexion. Your present Correspondent, Sir, has learned too highly to prize Dr. Priestley'sexcellencies both of heart and head, to entertain any apprehensions of the general effect that would arise from a perusal of his works. Let a man of ordinary understanding do this with candous and seriousness, and I pronounce it impossible that he should rise from the employment without being a much wiser and better man than he was be fore. The state of the case is indeed this: occasion has been taken to revile Dr. Priestley's character, and to shudder at the thought of giving him a place in company with others of considerable name, (but in reality vastly inferior to him), from a very partial acquaintance with his writings, and the unjustifiable selection (according to the too common practice of orthodox men) of a few passages out of their connection, upón which they found their erroneous and unjust conclusions. Present the whole of the Doctor's gigantic labours in mo rals and religion before the eyes of the discerning public, and no other refutation will be needed of the vile clamours so industriously circulated. The candid will be struck with the piety and intelligence evinced in his numerous productions; the bigot will be suffused with shame from a comparison of his own littleness; and the fair fame of Priestley burst from the ignoble chains in which she is at present confined, and soar aloft amidst the general shout of admiration and gratitude. *Who, that was not bent on giving his system popularity and eclat, would ever have thought of classing together in the same theological list the names of Dr. Isaac Watts and Dr. Joseph Priestley? Have there existed two men antipodes in religious sentiment and religious feeling, these are the two."-Wardlaw's Unitarianism incapable of Vindication. The only remaining objection that I know of, arises from the depression to which trade is at present subject. If the appeal in this letter had been made to the lower classes of the community, it is admitted the objection would have had its force. If it had been made solely to our laymen of easy fortunes, but who have themselves families to provide for, and whose benevolent hearts deeply commiserate the sad condition of the poor around them, there would still perhaps be some appearance of reason:-but the appeal is made, as before stated, to the young men of fortune either in or out of trade who have yet little of the cares of the world, who have just passed through their elementary education, whose minds are deeply impressed with the value and efficacy of truth, and who can easily spare a small portion of their spending money, to the promotion of the noble object which is now contemplated. To such of our body, all who feel interested in the progress of our plans for improvement in know ledge and religion, must look with the utmost confidence. The preachers who are successively educated in our seminaries, may raise their voices in the support of truth, they may contribute by their labours in public and private to the respectability of the cause; but after all, their success will very much depend upon their lay brethren who possess wealth to strengthen the hands of their ministers, and give them their sanction and assistance. If any such, influenced by these friendly and well-intended suggestions, should come forwards to raise this monument to the memory of one who laboured incessantly for the young in particular, to contribute their individual efforts to rescue eminent talents from abuse and calumny, to dissipate the mists of prejudice, bigotry and superstition which envelope the religious atmosphere, happy will the writer of this letter deem himself to be, and fully compensated for the little trouble which it has occasioned him; though this has been already sufficiently rewarded by the mere prospect of the disinterested efforts which he has now contemplated. I am, Sir, with best wishes for the success of your very useful Repository, A SUBSCRIBER OF THE THIRD CLASS. The Gipsies. [From the Liverpool Freeman; or Weekly Magazine. Price 6d. No. 6. Aug 6, 1816.] F late years some attempts have or at any rate to civilize the habits, of that vagabond and useless race, the Gipsies. In pursuance of such purpose, a society of gentlemen have been making all the preliminary inquiries requisite to a proper understanding of the subject. A series of questions have been proposed to competent persons in the different counties of England and Scotland; and answers have been received. Our readers will, we think, be amused with the following specimen of these answers : 1. All Gipsies suppose the first of them came from Egypt. 2. They cannot form any idea of the number in England. 3. The Gipsies of Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, parts of Buckinghamshire, Cambridge and Huntingdonshire, are continually making revolu tions within the ranges of those counties. 4. They are either ignorant of the number of Gipsies in the counties through which they travel, or unwilling to disclose their knowledge. 5. The most common names are Smith, Cooper, Draper, Taylor, Boswell, Lee, Lovell, Loversedge, Allen, Mansfield, Glover, Williams, Carew, Martin, Stanley, Buckley, Plunkett, and Corrie. 6 and 7. The gangs in different towns have not any regular connexion or organization; but those who take up their winter quarters in the same city or town appear to have some knowledge of the different routes each horde will pursue; probably with a desire to prevent interference. 8. In the county of Herts it is computed there may be sixty families having many children. Whether they are quite so numerous in Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire, and Northamptonshire, the answers are not sufficiently definite to determine. In Cambridgeshire, Oxfordshire, Warwickshire, Wiltshire, and Dorsetshire, greater numbers are calculated upon. In various counties, the attention has not been competent to the procuring data for any estimate of families or individuals. Rejoinder to Mr. Rutt on Count Zinzendorf. 525 9. More than half their number taking notice of some of his statefollow no business: others are dealers ments; in doing which I shall endeain horses and asses: farriers, smiths, vour to be as brief as the subject tinkers, braziers, grinders of cutlery, admits. basket-makers, chair-bottomers, and musicians. 19. Children are brought up in the habits of their parents, particularly to music and dancing, and are of dissolute conduct. 11. The women mostly carry baskets with trinkets and sinal wares; and tell fortunes. 12. Too ignorant to have acquired accounts of genealogy, and perhaps indisposed by the irregularity of their habits. 13. In most counties there are particular situations to which they are partial. In Berkshire is a marsh, near Newbury, much frequented by them; and Dr. Clarke states, that in Cambridgeshire, their principal rendezvous is near the western villages. 14. It cannot be ascertained whether, from their first coming into the nation, attachment to particular places has prevailed. 15, 16, and 17. When among strangers, they elude inquiries respecting their peculiar language, calling it gibberish. Don't know of any person that can write it, or of any written specimen of it. 18. Their habits and customs in all places are peculiar. 19. Those who profess any religion represent it to be that of the country. in which they reside: but their description of it seldom goes beyond repeating the Lord's Prayer; and only few of them are capable of that. Instances of their attending any place for worship are very rare. 20. They marry for the most part by pledging to each other, without any ceremony. A few exceptions have occurred when money plentiful. was 21. They do not teach their children religion. 22 and 23. Not one in a thousand can read. me a To expose to the world the failings of a fellow-creature, must necessarily prove a painful task to a benevolent mind; but publicly to advance, or even insinuate, a charge of immorality against an individual unable to defend himself, without substantiating such allegation, appears to procedure altogether unwarrantable. Your Correspondent, however, seems to me placed in this awkward predicament, by his unnecessary and unproved insinuation against the Count. The injurious reflection he threw out in his first paper, I am sorry to find reiterated by him, after what had been advanced by myself. Since what he regards as evidence is not produceable in a work designed for general readers, why advert to so ungrateful a topic at all? Christian charity, not to mention justice, would in my opinion have here dictated silence. But your Correspondent assigns the fellowing reason for his insinuation to the prejudice of the Count. "I considered it my duty, to guard the memories of such men as Watts and Doddridge, from the imputation of an unqualified approbation of Count Zinzendorf." A strange mode of acting this, to exalt one character by depreciating another! But whoever regarded the Count with unqualified admiration? That he was a great and good man I have no doubt, but he had his defects and weaknesses; and in persons of his ardent cast of mind they are always most prominent. In reference to the religious poems to which your Correspondent alludes, (for they were not used as hymns,) let me inform him that scarcely any had the Count for their author; and, as already noticed, as soon as he perceived that they were open to misrepresentation, he checked their further circulation. Yet even these poems, objectionable as their original phraseology is, become far more so in Rimius's hands; and I affirm cannot be justly appreciated from his exhibition of them: his illegitimate renderings, and utter neglect of the connexion in which the passages quoted by him stand, necessarily preclude his work from implicit credit. Permit me, Sir, to add, that the only clue to a just exposition of such phraseology, is to be found in an intimate acquaintance with the theological and moral views of Count Zinzendorf and the brethren of that day. Such phraseology, though open to abuse, was, however, I am warranted in affirming, only employed in a spiritual sense by the brethren themselves, and I am satisfied, from experience and observation, gave rise amongst them to no other than the purest ideas and emotions. Had the excellent Jortin been aware of this circumstance, however he might reprehend such language, he would have refrained from implicating in his censure the character of the Count. But I am blamed by your Correspondent for not having verified my allegations against Rimius; in answer permit me to adopt his own words: "I did not conceive such a discussion adapted to a work designed for general .readers." Your Correspondent and myself are here placed in similar circumstances; however with one material difference: my estimate of Rimius's work appeared necessary, whereas your Correspondent's attack on the Count's character may be considered optional. That I may not however be thought to have advanced charges wholly without foundation, I shall take the liberty of adverting to one instance amongst others of Rimius's unfairness, would I could say incapacity, as a translator: the example I select is his unjustifiable rendering of the German termination lein by little, instead of dear or precious; as in the words lacmlein, wundlein; the literal rendering of these words is I admit little lamb, little wound; but the connexion in which they stand, plainly pointed out to Rimius that they ought to be translated precious lamb, precious wound; Christ and his sufferings being the theine, and the brethren of that time being in the habit of using that termination to express holy endearment. Thus a translator, deficient in ability, or in rectitude, may pervert author's meaning without infringing any grammatical rules." an * In my last paper I noticed the line of conduct the brethren thought proper to adopt, with regard to Rimius's publication; though your Correspondent seems Your Correspondent tells his readers, that my appeal to the case of Dr. Gill" has very little, if any connexion with the subject;" but let me, notwithstanding, still adduce it as well calculated to confirm my position, viz. that there is no necessary connexion between impropriety of language and impropriety of thought and feeling; though I would decidedly protest against the use of any such language myself. On this account I cannot approve of your Correspondent's use of the word amatory, where divine love is the subject, because that word being usually expressive of sensual attachment, will be thus associated in the mind. The compliment paid by your Correspondent, to the brethren of the present day, at the expense of their esteemed predecessors, will I apprehend scarcely be accepted by them." It remains for me only to apologize for the length of this paper, and in conclusion (to avail myself once more of your Correspondent's words) will say that "I am not aware that I ought to trouble him, or any of your readers, further on the disagreeable subject which has very unexpectedly been forced on my attention," but which a sense of duty prompted me to undertake, in behalf of an esteemed individual, whose character I consider unjustly aspersed. With every sentiment of regard, On the Divine Government. FEAR that I do not fully under stand your Correspondent, An Old Inquirer, in the Repository for June, (p. 322,) who animadverts upon the first scheme of Divine Providence to have overlooked what I there said, for he observes, "Crantz and La Trobe have left it' unimpeached." As historians, an answer to that work did not fall within their province, had they been so inclined; full, and I think according to the Count's but I will inform him that he may find a view of Bible truth, a satisfactory reply, to all the charges brought against him, in a quarto volume published in the German language about the year 1754. + It will have been seen that this Correspondent has ceased from his labours, and fallen into his place in our Obituary, p. 487. ED. On the Divine Government. If we admit the existence of God, as the Creator of all things, I think it will follow as an unavoidable consequence, that all lifeless matter that he has formed must obey the laws with which it is impressed, and that therefore not an atom is to be found, which did not necessarily occupy the station and perform the office for which it was appointed. I mean when such atom has not been acted upon or influenced by living existence. So far we seem to proceed, without the intervention of hypothesis, upon grounds absolutely certain, taking for granted only, that matter and its laws were created and made by an intelligent being. If An Old Inquirer deem this a gratuitous hypothesis, namely, that intelligent being created all matter, and impressed it with its laws, I confess it to be an hypothesis-but one, which seems not only reasonable, but what is now generally admitted. So far then, as lifeless matter is concerned, I think we need not enter upon any farther illustration. A vast class of living beings, which we do not deem rational and moral agents, next invite our inquiry, the birds in the air, the fishes in the sea, and the innumerable irrational animals on the earth. The question then will be, do these ever act, or can they act, in contrariety to the laws to which their Creator has subjected them? Have they independent powers, or do they necessarily follow the laws of their nature? For it will not, cannot be denied that they are created subject to certain laws. They have feeling, feel pleasure and pain, and necessarily avoid the one and choose the other. Their actions, are they the simple result of those feelings, or have they a liberty of self-determination? In as far as we can judge from observation, they appear to follow their feelings simply, for we cannot perceive that they have any thing to oppose to these feelings. We kill the tyger because he destroys us, not because in so doing, we imagine him to abuse his liberty and act contrary to his nature. All the actions of these immense tribes of animals, if they be the simple result of the laws of their nature, and not 527 the effect of independent powers, are therefore as much the appointment of God, as the place and action of every atom of lifeless matter. We may be confounded by the variety of effect, and wonder how any mind could comprehend such a vast machinery; but we are no less confounded by the powers of creation. Thus then all matter and its effects, and all animals which we see, and their actions, are of divine appointment, or the necessary, effects of creating power; except indeed the actions of men, which must now be examined. Either man is governed in his whole conduct by the fixed laws of his. nature, or he is emphatically free in all his voluntary conduct-there is no middle supposition which is tenable, and under these opposite suppositions, ́ the greatest names have arranged themselves in argument and disputation. I presume not to determine the question, but only to reason upon · the consequences of either supposition. If man then be an agent perfectly free in all his voluntary conduct, it will follow that he possesses a power from his Creator, which he exerts at pleasure, concerning the effect of which nothing can be predicated. Whatever evils men occasion by their voluntary conduct, and whatever good, is ascribable to them, and not to their Creator. If God formed the first male and female with such powers, then he appointed not the existence of the human race, for it depended upon their voluntary co-operation whether the race should proceed. God gave the powers, the use or abuse of them belongs only to man. According to this reasoning, the maximum of happiness and misery may be fixed; but whatever of happiness or misery be the effect of the voluntary powers of men, as these are free and independent powers, are not of divine appointment, but arrange themselves under Dr. Paley's scheme of chance. Whatever. sufferings come upon brute animals, by the voluntary conduct of man, as it was not foreseen or appointed, is not resolvable into the will of God. This supposition places man in an awful situation, and he cannot but wish that the first pair had died without issue. On the opposite supposition that |