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say any thing to justify myself to you. I shall always think your own reflection on my carriage, both to you and all mankind, will sufficiently do that. Instead of that, give me leave to assure you that I am more ready to forgive you than you can be to desire it; and I do it so freely and fully, that I wish for nothing more than the opportunity to convince you that I truly love and esteem you, and that I have the same good-will for you as if nothing of this had happened. To confirm this to you more fully, I should be glad to meet you any where, and the rather, because the conclusion of your letter makes me apprehend it would not be wholly useless to you. But whether you think it fit or not, I leave wholly to you. I shall always be ready to serve you to my utmost, in any way you shall like, and shall only need your commands or permission to do it.

"My book is going to press for a second edition; and, though I can answer for the design with which I write it, yet, since you have so opportunely given me notice of what you have said of it, I should take it as a favor if you would point out to me the places that gave occasion to that censure, that, by explaining myself better, I may avoid being mistaken by others, or unawares doing the least prejudice to truth or virtue. I am sure. you are so much a friend to them both, that, were you none to me, I could expect this from you. But I cannot doubt but you would do a great deal more than this for my sake, who, after all, have all the concern of a friend for you, wish you extremely well, and am, without compliment, &c."*

To this letter Newton made the following reply:

6 66 SIR,

"The last winter, by sleeping too often by my fire, I got an ill habit of sleeping; and a distemper, which this summer has been epidemical, put me farther out of order, so that when I wrote to you, I had not slept an hour a night for a fortnight together, and for five days together not a wink. I remember I wrote to you, but what I said of your book I remember not. If you please to send me a transcript of that passage, I will give you an account of it if I can. I am your most humble servant, ""Is. NEWTON. pp. 217, 219.

666

Cambridge, Oct. 5th, 1693."'

The world is under obligation to Dr. Brewster for clearing up all doubts on this unpleasant subject. It would be painful to think of Newton in the condition of the subtle doctor, who, when he was old, wept because he could not understand

*The draft of this letter is endorsed "J. L. to I. Newton."

his own books. Dr. Brewster has also shown that the theological works of Newton were not all among his latest productions; but that some of the most remarkable of his scientific exertions were made after the time when La Place would stultify him, in order to destroy the weight of his authority in favor of Christianity. No human change would be more discouraging to think of, than the eclipse of such a mind; we therefore rejoice to be assured that it retained its light, strength, and glory to the last.

Adam Smith, in his Theory of Moral Sentiments,' has a speculation upon the irritability of men of taste, compared with the quiet of men of science: the explanation is ingenious and satisfactory; but whoever reads the life of Newton will doubt, whether the repose of science is quite so profound as it is represented. The most brilliant period of Newton's life was one long vexation, owing to the controversies in which he was involved, sorely against his will. When he discovered the different refrangibility of the rays of light, which led to the construction of his reflecting telescope, the moment it was disclosed to the world, it occasioned a perfect storm. Pardies, a Jesuit, of Clermont, began the war, but was soon silenced by the heavy fire of Newton. Next, Linus, a physician of Liege, published a letter upon the subject in which he treated Newton with a contempt which now seems ludicrous to the last degree. This letter Newton declined answering, but conveyed an assurance to Linus, that he was mistaken in supposing that the experiments were made under the circumstances which he had represented. Linus again took the field, and maintained that this assurance was false. This letter Newton was prevailed upon by his friends to answer, though it did not, in his opinion, require or deserve a reply. It was long before this matter was settled, and it cost Newton more trouble to show the cause of the mistakes of his adversaries, than to establish his greatest truths. When this was over, he was forced into a conflict with Dr. Hooke, a great genius, but very unamiable man, who criticized his telescope and the principles on which it was made. Newton answered him in an argument to which he did not attempt a reply. Huygens followed, and was routed by a reply in which Newton treated him with more respect than his other adversaries. When his Principia' appeared, his philosophy was opposed by some of the first mathematicians

on the continent; and made slow progress even in England, which would not be surprising if a complacent remark of Dr. Brewster were true, when he says that Newton made a popular statement of some of the most important propositions for his friend Locke, who had not turned his attention to mathematics; there can be no doubt,' observes the Doctor, in a most oracular way, that even in their modified form, they were beyond the capacity of Mr. Locke!' Newton's controversy with Leibnitz is generally known. Though he was successful in all his conflicts of the kind, even his victories gave him constant pain, and he often determined to renounce philosophy altogether. This shows that glory must be earned, and that troubles and disappointments abound in conditions which seem most calm and enviable to common eyes. There is very little incident in the history of Newton's private life. His mother married another husband several years after his father's death, but when he was fourteen years of age she became again a widow, and recalled him from school to prepare him for the management of her farm. She found however that he had a decided passion for study, and wisely judged that she ought not to resist it. He therefore prepared himself for the university of Cambridge, which he entered in his eighteenth year. Dr. Barrow's optical lectures were published when Newton was twenty-seven years of age, and they contain an acknowledgment of valuable aid received from his hand. He had already been appointed to a Senior Fellowship, and at this time Dr. Barrow resigned the Professorship of Mathematics in his favor. At this early period of his life his brilliant course of discovery began. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society two years afHe remained in the seclusion of his college, devoted to scientific pursuits, till he was forty-five years of age, when he was appointed one of the Delegates who were chosen to defend the interests of the university against the usurpations of James the Second. The part which he took in this affair, together with his general reputation, induced his friends to propose him as member of Parliament in the succeeding year; and being elected, he sat as member of the Convention Parliament till it was dissolved. His finances were too limited to allow the expense of living in London, and it was complained of as a national disgrace that nothing was done for such a man. But in 1695, he was appointed to an office in

ter.

the Mint, and in 1699 was promoted to the place of Master of the Mint, an office worth twelve hundred pounds a year, which he filled with great usefulness and ability. This accession of good fortune came when he was fifty-seven years of age, and he was elected President of the Royal Society four years after, an office to which he was annually rëelected during the remaining twenty-five years of his life. The charge of his domestic establishment was left to his niece, who, with her husband, Mr. Conduit, resided in his house, the husband acting as his deputy in the discharge of his official duties in his later years. He died after a long and distressing illness, which he endured with perfect resignation in 1727, in his eighty-fifth year. His papers are still in existence in various bands; and though Horsley thought some of them unfit for publication, and Dr. Brewster fancies that nothing would be found in them peculiarly interesting to science, we hope that they will at last be given to the world. They would probably remove all doubt, if there is any, from the subject of his religious opinions, though they are not wanted to establish the fact, that he was a liberal and enlightened, as well as fervent and humble Christian.

ART. II.-Library of Useful Knowledge. - History of Parts I.-X.

the Church.

SEVERAL of the late numbers of the 'Library of Useful Knowledge' have been devoted to the subject of ecclesiastical history, and furnish, on the whole, a useful compend, written in a vigorous and correct style and with tolerable fairness. The following extract from the Introduction shows a spirit of candor and liberality in the writer.*

'The reader of this work will observe, from the experience of every age of Christianity, that, through the failings and variety of our nature, diversity in religious opinion is inseparable from religious belief; they will observe the fruitlessness of every forcible attempt to repress it; and they will also remark, that it has seldom proved dangerous to the happiness of society,

* George Waddington, Trinity College, Cambridge.

unless when civil authority has interfered to restrain it. The moral effect of this great historical lesson can be one only uncontentious, unlimited moderation, a temperate zeal to soften the diversities which we cannot possibly prevent, a fervent disposition to conciliate the passions where we fail to convince the reason; to exercise that forbearance which we surely require ourselves, and constantly to bear in mind that in our common pursuit of the same eternal object, we are alike impeded by the same human and irremediable imperfections.'- p. 3.

So much Christians should have learned from the result of the effort made under Constantine to crush the heresy of Arius at its birth. This was the first grand experiment of the wisdom of attempting to repress freedom of thought by the arm of power, and should have been the last.

The Arian impiety,' as the old writers call it, first appeared on the banks of the Nile, and the devil, envious of the prosperity of the church under the first Christian emperor, sowed the seeds of it. All the Ante-Nicene fathers, however, admitted the inferiority of the Son to the Father. This implied that, in their opinion, they were two essences, which some of them distinctly assert. It is true, the learned Platonizing Christians sometimes use expressions, which now bear an orthodox sense, and it is hastily inferred, therefore, that they were orthodox in the modern signification of the term. But nothing could be further from the truth. A very moderate acquaintance with the remains of Christian antiquity must convince any unprejudiced mind that the language in question was used by the Fathers in a sense very different from that now attributed to it. If we go on to the assumption that they employed it in the modern sense, we shall mistake their sentiments at every step. Thus they occasionally make use of a phraseology which, in the mouth of a modern Trinitarian, would imply a belief that the Son is of one numerical essence with the Father. But this they never thought of asserting. The most they meant to affirm, was, that the Son, by virtue of his birth, partook, in some sort, of the same specific nature with the Father, that is, a divine, just as an individual of our race partakes of the same nature or essence with the parent from whom he sprung, that is, a human. At the same time, they taught that he was relatively inferior to the Father, from whom he was derived, and entitled to only inferior homage; he was not uncaused as the

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