a populous town in the west, a post the great personage. He was a young chaise and four came rattling along, with prodigious velocity, and with the usual a companiments of dogs barking, women and children screaming, &c. &c. The usual concourse appeared at the gate of the inn to fee man apprehended for a forgery on the Your humble servant, Account of UGSTON, in Derbyshire, the Seat of Francis Turbot, Efq. With a VIEW of that handsome Manfion. Of GSTON, the feat of Francis mile, commences a barren and dreary Turbo, efq. stands on an ele- moor, two miles in length, and nearly vation about eight miles from Chester- as broad; but this is compensated for, field, and feven from Matlock. It in proceeding, by the rich profpect is a handfome house, built of stone, of the hills and torrs of Matlock, with a Venetian window over the hall Cromford, &c. with numberless hills door. It is feen from fome distance, beyond them for many miles. Of and, together with a very rich hilly Matlock so much has been faid that country, forms, on a fummer's sun- little can be added that is new. set, a grand profpect, bounded by what is fo, Mr. Arkwright's Caftle craggy hills, intermixed with others and cotton works form a striking ch more fertile. At the foot of one of ject. This caftle was unfortunately these hills is a very fine lead mine, destroyed by fire, when near finished: which is not far from Matlock. The but it is now rebuilding, and, when earth, in these parts, abounds with completed, will be a very capital manevery description of ores, except gold fion. The profpect from Ugston is and filver. For some distance toward much confined in front, as, at one Matlock, the country is pleasing and mile distance, rises a confiderable hill, greatly cultivated; but, at the fourth on which stands Higham. Further EXTRACTS from the MISCELLANEOUS WORKS of Edward Gibbon, Esq. racter. After a short trial of a few Account of the Rev. William Chilling- months, Mr. Chillingworth was again worth. WILLIAM CHILLINGWORTH, M. A. and fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, was, at the age of twenty-eight years, perfuaded to elope from Oxford, to the English seminary at Douay in Flanders. Some disputes with Fisher, a subtle jefuit, might first awaken him from the prejudices or education; but he yielded to his own victorious argument, that there must be fomewhere an infallible judge; and that the church of Rome is the only Christian society which either does or can pretend to that cha : tormented by religious scruples: he returned home, refumed his ludies, unravelled his mistakes, and delivered his mind from the yoke of authority and fuperftition. His new creed was built on the principle, that the Bible is our fole judge, and private reason our fole interpreter: and he ably maintains this principle in the religion of a proteftant, a book which, after startling the doctors of Oxford, is still esteemed the most solid defence of the reformation. The learning, the virtue, the recent merits of the author, entitled him to fair preferment: but • See Universal Magazine, June, page 406... D quent changes proceeded from too nice an inquisition into truth. His doubts grew out of himself; he affifted them with all the strength of his reason: he was then too hard for himself; but finding as little quiet and repose in those victories, he quickly recovered, the flave had now broken his fetters; and the more he weighed, the less was he disposed to subscribe to the thirty-nine articles of the church of England. In a private letter he declares, with all the energy of language, that he could not subscribe to them without subscribing to his own damna- by a new appeal to his own judgment: tion; and that if ever he should de- so that in all his fallies and retreats, he was in fact his own convert. Account of the celebrated Peter Bayle. part from this immoveable resolution, he would allow his friends to think him a madman, or an atheist. As the letter is without a date, we cannot afcertain the number of weeks or months that elapsed between this paffionate abhorrence and the Salisbury Register, which is still extant. • Ego Gulielmus Chillingworth, - omnibus hisce articulis, et fingulis in iifdem contentis volens, et ex animo fub- and in the twenty-second year of his fcribo, et confenfum meum iifdem præbeo. 20 die Julii 1638.' But, alas! the chancellor and prebendary of Sarum foon deviated from his own subscription: as he more deeply scrutinized the article of the Trinity, neither scripture nor the primitive fathers could long uphold his orthodox belief; and he could not but confefs, that the doctrine of Arius is either a truth, or at least no damnable heresy.' From this middle region of the air, the descent of his reason would naturally rest on the firmer ground of the Socinians: and if we may credit a doubtful story, and the popular opinion, his anxious inquiries at last subsided in philosophic indifference. So confpicuous, however, were the candour of his nature and the innocence of his heart, that this apparent levity did not affect the reputation of Chillingworth. His fre BAYLE was the son of a Calvinist minister in a remote province of France, at the foot of the Pyrenees. For the benefit of education, the proteftants were tempted to risk their children in the Catholic universities; age, young Bayle was seduced by the arts and arguments of the jefuits of Thoulouse. He remained about seventeen months (19th March 166919th August 1670) in their hands, a voluntary captive; and a letter to his parents, which the new convert composed or fubfcribed (15th April 1670) is darkly tinged with the spirit of popery. But nature had designed him to think as he pleased, and to fpeak as he thought: his piety was offended by the excessive worship of creatures; and the study of physics convinced him of the impossibility of tranfubstantiation, which is abundantly refuted by the teftimony of our senses. His return to the communion of a falling sect was a bold and disinterested step, that exposed him to the rigour of the laws; and a speedy flight to Geneva protected him from the re * Mr. Gibbon too lightly adopts the calumny which was propogated against this great and good man, by the bigots of the last century, of his having fubfided into that philofophic indifference, which, it is probable, was not so honourable in his estimation as in the opinion of Mr. Gibbon.- To adopt the charges of bigots but ill becomes a philosopher. Chillingworth was called an infidel by the zealots of his age, because he was moderate, candid, and rational. A Tillotson, a Locke, an Emlyn, &c. have been traduced in like manner: yet the Christianity of Chillingworth was perfectly confiftent, both in doctrine and spirit, with that of Newton and Locke, of Watfon an Paley, and other illustrious persons among both the clergy and laity; men, not only ornaments to religion, but to human nature; and while Christianity continues to be professed and defended, in its own genuine spirit, by such men, the greatest masters of human reafon, it can never be injured by the derision of its adversaries, their fly in. Snuations, or more open and direct attacks. Editor. sentment of his spiritual tyrants, un- other. The wonderful power which confcious as they were of the full value he so boldly exercised, of afsembling of the prize, which they had loft. doubts and objections, had tempted Had Bayle adhered to the Catholic him jocosely to assume the title of the Obfervations on a Tour in Swisserland. church, had he embraced the eccle- νεφεληγερέτα Ζευς, the cloud-compelling siastical profeffion, the genius and fa- Jove; and in a conversation with the vour of fuch a profelyte might have ingenious abbé (afterward cardinal) aspired to wealth and honours in his de Polignac, he freely disclosed his native country: but the hypocrite universal Pyrronism. I am most would have found less happiness in the truly (faid Bayle) a Proteftant; for I comforts of a benefice, or the dignity protest indifferently against all systems of a mitre, than he enjoyed at Rot- and all fects.' terdam in a private state of exile, indigence, and freedom. Without a country, or a patron, or a prejudice, he claimed the liberty and fubfifted by the labours of his pen: the inequality of his voluminous works is explained and excused by his alternately writing for himself, for the booksellers, and for pofterity; and if a fevere critic would reduce him to a fingle folio, that relic, like the books of the Sybil, would become still more valuable. A calm and lofty spectator of the religious tempeft, the philosopher of Rotterdam condemned with equal firmness the perfecution of Lewis the fourteenth, and the republican maxims of the Calvinists; their vain prophecies, and the intolerant bigotry country is not less diversified by the which sometimes vexed his folitary retreat. In reviewing the controversies of the times, he turned against each other the arguments of the difputants; fucceffively wielding the arms of the Catholic and Proteftants, he proves that neither the way of authority, nor the way of examination can afford the multitude any test of religious truth; and dexterously concludes that custom and education must be the fole grounds of popular belief. The ancient paradox of Plutarch, that atheism is less pernicious than superstition, acquires a tenfold vigour, when it is adorned with the colours of his wit, and pointed with the acuteness of his logic. His critical dictionary is a vaft repository of facts and opinions; and he balances the false religions in his sceptical scales, till the oppofitie quantities (if I may use the language of algebra) annihilate each DURING two years, if I forget some boyith excursions of a day or a week, I was fixed at Lausanne; but at the end of the third summer, my father consented that I should make the tour of Swisserland with Pavilliard: and our short abfence of one month (September 21st - October 20th, 1755) was a reward and relaxation of my assiduous studies. The fashion of climbing the mountains and reviewing the Glaciers, had not yet been introduced by foreign travellers, who seek the sublime beauties of nature. But the political face of the、 forms and spirit of so many various republics, from the jealous government of the few to the licentious freedom of the many. I contemplated with pleasure the new profpects of men and manners; though my conversation with the natives would have been more free and instructive, had I poffefsed the German, as well as the French language. We passed through most of the principal towns of Swisserland; Neufchâtel, Bienne, Soleurre, Arau, Baden, Zurich, Bafil, and Bern. In every place we visited the churches, arsenals, libraries, and all the most eminent persons; and after my return, I digested iny notes in fourteen or fifteen sheets of a French journal, which I dispatched to my father, as a proof that my time and his money had not been mif-spent. Had I found this journal among his papers, I might be tempted to felect passages; bụt 1 I will not transcribe the printed accounts, and it may be sufficient to notice a remarkable spot, which left a deep and lasting impression on my memory. From Zurich we proceeded to the Benedictine Abbey of Einfidlen, more commonly styled Our Lady of the Hermits. I was aftonished by the profufe oftentation of riches in the pooreft corner of Europe; amid a favage scene of woods and mountains, a palace appears to have been erected by magic; and it was erected by the potent magic of reigion. A crowd of palmers and votaries was proftrate before the altar. The title and worship of the Mother of God provoked my indignation; and the lively naked image of superstition suggested to me, as in the same place it had done to Zuinglius, the most preffing argument for the reformation of the church. About two years after this tour, I passed at Geneva a useful and agreeable month; but this excursion, and some short vifits in the Pais de Vaud, did not materially interrupt my studious and sedentary life at Lausanne. Anecdotes of Voltaire. BEFORE I was recalled from Swifserland, I had the fatisfaction of feeing the most extraordinary man of the age; a poet, an hiftorian, a philosopher, who has filled thirty quartos, of prose and verse, with his various productions, often excellent, and always entertaining. Need I add the name of Voltaire? After forfeiting, by his own misconduct, the friendship of the first of kings, he retired, at the age of fixty, with a plentiful fortune, to a free and beautiful country, and resided two winters (1757 and 1758) in the town or neighbourhood of Lausanne. My defire of beholding Voltaire, whom I then rated above his real magnitude, was eafily gratified. He received me with civility as an English youth; but I cannot boaft of any peculiar notice or distinction, VirgiLum vidi tantum. The ode which he composed on his first arrival on the banks of the Le man Lake, O Maison d'Ariftippe, O Jardin d'Epicure, &c. had been imparted 'as a secret to the gentleman by whom I was introduced. He allowed me to read it twice; I knew it by heart; and as my difcretion was not equal to my memory, the author was foon displeased by the circulation of a copy. In writing this trivial anecdote, I wished to observe whether my me mory was impaired, and I have the comfort of finding that every line of the poem is still engraved in fresh and indelible characters. The highest gratification which I derived from Voltaire's refidence at Lausanne, was the uncommon circumstance of hearing a great poet declaim his own productions on the stage. He had formed a company of gentlemen and ladies, fome of whom were not destitute of talents. A decent theatre was framed at Monrepos, a country-house at the end of a fuburb; drefies and scenes were provided at the expence of the actors; and the author directed the rehearsals with the zeal and attention of paternal love. In two successive winters his tragedies of Zayre, Alzire, Zulime, and his sentimental, comedy of the Enfant Prodigue, were played at the theatre of Monrepos. Voltaire represented the characters best adapted to his years, Lufignan, Alvaréz, Benassar, Euphemon. His declamation was fashioned to the pomp and cadence of the old stage; and he expressed the enthusiasm of poetry, rather than the feelings of nature. My ardour, which foon became confpicu ous, seldom failed of procuring me a ticket. The habits of pleasure fortified my taste for the French theatre, and that taste has perhaps abated my idolatry for the gigantic genius of Shakspeare, which is inculcated from our infancy as the first duty of an Englishman. The wit and philosophy of Voltaire, his table and theatre, refined, in a visible degree, the manners of Lausanne; and, however addicted to study, I enjoyed my share of the amusements of society. After the representation of Monrepos I some times fupped with the actors. I was now familiar in some, and acquainted in many houses, and my evenings were generally devoted to cards and conversation, either in private parties or numerous affemblies. Interefting Account of Modemoiselle Cure chord, afterward Wife of the celebrated M. Necker. in the sciences and languages; and in her short vifits to some relations at Lausanne, the wit, the beauty, and erudition of mademoiselle Curchord were the theme of universal applaufe. The report of fuch a prodigy awakened my curiofity; I saw and loved. I found her learned without pedantry, lively in conversation, pure in sentiment, and elegant in manners; and na the first fudden emotion was fortified. I HESITATE, from the apprehension of ridicule, when I approach the delicate subject of my early love. By this word I do not mean the polite attention, the gallantry, without hope, or design, which has originated in the spirit of chivalry, and is interwoven with the texture of French manners. I understand by this paffion the union of defire, friendship, and tenderness, which is inflamed by a fingle female, which prefers her to the rest of her sex, and which seeks her possession as the fupreme or the fole happiness of our being. I need not bluth at recollecting the object of my choice; and though my love was disappointed of fuccess, I am rather proud that I was once capable of feeling such a pure and exalted sentiment. The perfonal attractions of mademoiselle Susan Curchord were embellished by the virtues and talents of the mind. Her fortune was humble, but her family was respectable. Her mother, a native of France, had preferred her religion to her country. The profession of her father did not extinguish the moderation and philosophy of his temper*, and he lived content with a small falary and laborious duty, in the obfcure lot of minifter of Crafty, in the mountains that separate the Pays de Vaud from the county of Burgundy. In the folitude of a sequestered village he bestowed a liberal, and even learned, education on his only daughter. She furpassed his hopes by her proficiency taste and luxury she refifted the temp * It has been observed, that this is a scoff, neither dictated by the spirit of moderation, nor by that of true philosophy. Editor. |