writing of which book he was craft, against a late Writer, fully laughed at by the wags of the argued and disputed. Wagstafie university, because, as they said, appears to have been more read he himself looked like a little than his learned opponent, for wizard, being a little crooked "Dr. Casaubon's book lying dead man and of despicable presence. on the bookseller's bands, he "He died in his lodgings, oppo- printed, in 1672, a new title, runsite the end of Chancery Lane, in ning thus, A Treatise, proving Holborn, September 2, 1677, Spirits, Witches and supernatural aged 44, or the reabouts, and was Operations, by pregnant Instances buried in Guildhall chapel." and Evidences." Wood adds, without giving any It is remarkable that Meric Casauthority besides his assertion, aubon should have advocated the and he has been charged with a vulgar notions of witchcraft, as he propensity to evil-speaking, "This had published in 1655, "A Trea person died in a manner distract- tise concerning Enthusiasm, as it ed, occasioned by a deep conceit is an effect of Nature; but is misof his own parts, and by a con- taken by many for either Diving tinual bibbing of strong and high- Inspiration or Diabolical Posses tasted liquors." sion." Sir W. Temple in his To. Wagstaffe was attributed, Essay on Poetry, first published as Wood believes unjustly, what about 1686, applauds this trea he calls, "a libellous pamphlet, tise and regrets that the author had entitled, Sundry Things from seve. not added in a second part, an ral hands, concerning the Univer. "Account of Fascination, which,” sity of Oxford, 1659." Among he says, "might, perhaps, prevent these things, is A Model for a many public disorders and save College Reformation. the lives of many innocent, deluOf Wagstaffe's two opponents, ded, or deluding people, who sufmentioned in this account, the fer so frequently upon account of name of R. T. is quite unknown witches and wizards." He adds, to me. Dr. Meric Casaubon, son "I have seen many miserable ex. of the celebrated Isaac Casaubon, amples of this kind, in my youth, was a native of Geneva, and ac- at home, and though the humour companied his father to England or fashion be a good deal worn out in 1610. He was educated at of the world, within thirty or Oxford, and became a beneficed forty years past, yet it still remains clergyman. He died in 1671, in in several remote parts of Germany, his seventy-second year. This Sweden and some other countries." work of Meric Casaubon, publish- Dr. Kippis, in his additions to ed in 1670, according to Biog. Casaubon's Life, notices Sir W. Brit. ii. 309, was entitled, Of Temple's judgment of that author, Credulity and Incredulity in things and adds, "However well quali Divine and Spiritual: wherein fied Meric Casaubon was to treat (among other things) a true and concerning Enthusiasm, it is cerfaithful Account is given of the tain that his mind was not suffici Platonic Philosophy, as it hath ently enlarged to discuss rationally reference to Christianity: as also the subject of fascination; since it the Business of Witches and Witch is plain, from his writings on cre dulity and incredulity, that he wished, that neither want of taste, was a zealous assertor of the reality as in the case of " the pair of bio. of apparitions and witchcraft." graphers," nor a depraved taste, B. B. iii. 309. as in the case of the customers to our circulating libraries, more pernicious to public morals than our liquor-shops, had ever prevented the study. To the sentence of Dr. Watts, contained in the let ter of Otiosus, (p. 679,) permit me to add a more extended judg ment, pronounced by the same amiable writer, in his Improvement of the Mind, P. I. ch. iv, § 15. I will lengthen this letter no further than by asking of some one of your correspondents, an account of the Occasional Papers, of which Dr. Watts speaks very highly, both here and elsewhere? Of The Doctrine of Devils, mentioned at the close of the last number, I cannot give even a tol érable account within the limits of your present volume. It is there fore reserved for the service of your next, Deo volente; a condition most seasonable, when I observe in your last obituary (p. 644,) his unexpected decease, of whom it were no compliment to say, was To him the wit of Greece and Rome I had once hoped, alas! how vainly, to have occasionally availed myself of my truly learned friend's ability and readiness to impart in formation, for rendering these papers more worthy of your acceptance. VERMICULUS. Messrs. Bogue and Bennett's SIR, Dec. 1, 1812. Among these writings of the latter kind, we may justly reckon short miscellaneous essays, on all manner of subjects; such as the Occasional Papers, the Tatlers, the Spectators, and some other books that have been compiled out of the weekly or daily products of the press, wherein are contained a great number of bright thoughts, ingenious remarks, and admirable observations, which have had a considerable share in furnishing the present age with knowledge and politeness. You have properly exposed the presumption and folly of Messrs. Bogue and Bennett, in their critical judgment on the Spectator. Is it possible that these writers should ever have read that inimitable work, one of the most durable "I wish every paper among monuments of British genius, or these writings could have been re. even have mixed with any persons commended, both as innocent and of competent taste, that had form. useful. I wish every unseemly ed an opinion of it from actual idea and wanton expression had perusal ! Such a censure does been banished from amongst them, not call for a vindication of the and every trifling page had been work, against which it is vainly excluded from the company of the levelled, but it furnishes not an rest, when they had been bound unfit occasion of reviving critiques, up in volumes: but it is not to be formerly made by adequate judges, expected, in so imperfect a state, upon the writings of our early es- that every page or piece of such sayists; of which it were to be mixed public papers should be en tirely blameless and laudable. Yet vindicating the sole exclusive wor ship, due to our infinitely great, wise and good Creator, "the One" only "living and true God," whom "our Lord and Master, the one Mediator between God and man, the man, Christ Jesus, the Son of Joseph, of the seed of David," expressly acknowledges, in his in the main, it must be confessed, there is so much virtue, prudence, ingenuity and goodness in them, especially in eight volumes of Spectators, there is such a rever. ence of things sacred, so many valuable remarks for our conduct in life, that they are not improper to lie in parlours, or summer charge to Mary Magdalene, – houses, or places of usual resi- "Go to my brethren, and say unto dence, to entertain our thoughts them, I ascend to my Father and in any moments of leisure, or va- your Father, and to my God and cant hours that occur. There is your God," and who is repeatedly such a discovery of the follies, ini- declared in Christian scripture, to quities and fashionable vices of be "the God and Father of our mankind contained in them, that Lord Jesus Christ." I glory in we may learn much of the hu- my inflexible adherence to this mours and madnesses of the age, grand fundamental truth, as well and the public world, in our own of natural as of the revealed religi solitary confinement, without the on of the gospel, and "count it danger of frequenting vicious com- all joy," that my God has judged pany, or receiving the mortal in. me worthy to suffer" worldly fection." "shame," and poignant distress "for his name." In consequence of the great defalcation of rev. enue, incurred by the deprivation of my rectory, I have been so reduced in my finances, as unavoidably to contract debts, which, from I thank you for your kind gra- my inability to discharge them, tuitous accommodation of me with have plunged me, now in the a copy of your instructive Reposi- seventy-fifth year of my age, with tory for October, and for the like a wife and eight children, in a in future, in consequence of being state of imprisonment in the rules compelled, in the year 1810, to of the King's Bench, for two years discontinue the purchase of it, by and upwards, without the prosthe deficiente crumená, occasioned pect of enlargement. I regret. by the severe sentence of the Spi- that, from the same cause, ritual Court, in depriving me of res angusta domi has pressed so my rectory of Cold Norton, on ac- hard upon me, notwithstanding count of my Visitation Sermon.- the pecuniary beneficence I exIn this sermon, in conformity to perienced from you and other the sixth scriptural article of the friends, both churchmen and Dischurch, and to my scriptural or. senters, that I have been obliged dination-engagements, with that to drop also the Monthly Review, bishop who ordained me priest, I after becoming a regular purchaser acted up to a sense of my duty, of that valuable body of criticism, and especially, in the instance of upwards of forty years. From the Rev. F. Stone. the I recollect that, in one of your exercise. His oldest son was just numbers, you expressed a wish, beginning to preach last July, his that such of your correspondents, studies not quite finished. Both as had been acquainted with the Strand Street and Eustace Street late Rev. Henry Taylor, rector have a charity.school for boys, to of Crawley and vicar of Ports- whom, besides the other school edu. mouth, Hants, as also with the cation, they take great pains to give Jate Rev. William Hopkins, rector as critical a knowledge of the Bible, of Bolney, Sussex, would give as their education and youth are you some information concerning capable of. There are two Unitathem. Having now re-commenced rian meetings in Belfast. Dr. Bruce, a correspondence with you, Mr. the writer has heard with much Editor, as I was well known to edification, in Strand Street. Uni. both, but in particular, to that tarians are supposed more numelearned adept in theology, Mr. rous in the North, than in any Taylor, the celebrated Benjamin other part of Ireland. There is a Ben-Mordecai, I propose, Sir, in Unitarian minister in Cork, the a future epistle, to communicate Rev. Mr. Hincks, who published to you, such anecdotes respecting an excellent defence of Christianthem, as came within my personal ity, in an address to the inhabiknowledge. For the present, I have the honour to subscribe my. self, disdaining all anonymous or pseudonymous signatures, Your obliged, obedient, tants of Cork, in answer to Mr. Paine's Age of Reason. There is also an Unitarian congregation in Clonmell. The Unitarians have an Annual Association. It was in Dublin last July; an excellent sermon was preached in Eustace Street. The minister's name the Irish Unitarians. writer cannot recollect at present. (In answer to the inquiry, p. 617.) The writer's family is in Dublin, There are four Unitarian minis- and go to Strand Street; he goes ters in Dublin; all excellent to Eustace Street, and receives preachers, men of great respecta. the Lord's Supper in it. He left bility, erudition, unaffected piety Dublin July last, 14th, with a towards God, and universal bene. view to visit his native country bevolence towards men: the Rev. fore his death, has preached in Dr. Moody and the Rev. Mr. Kilwinning, Paisley, Glasgow, EdArmstrong, in Strand Street, a large and rich congregation, an organ in their meeting-house; and the Rev. Mr. Taylor, and the Rev. Mr. Joseph Hutton, in Eustace Street, the congregation genteel and re. spectable, but not so numerous as Strand Street. In winter, Hutton lectures, in a most instructive manner, on the Old and New Testament, from the beginning of both, regularly, first in the Old, and then in the New, in the same VOL, VII. Mr. 5 E inburgh, Kirkcaldy and Dundee, An old Unitarian Minister, or Answer to Metaphysical Queries. Queries in your last, permit me or foretell the actions of any one? Can there be any medium between |