Allowances of twenty pounds, or one fhilling, were facetioufly moved. A vague report that a Director had formerly been concerned in another project, by which fome unknown perfons had loft their money, was admitted as a proof of his actual guilt. One man was ruined because he had dropt a foolish fpeech, that his horfes fhould feed upon gold another because he was grown so proud, that, one day at the Treasury, he had refused a civil anfwer to perfons much above him. All were condemned, abfent and unheard, in arbitrary fines and forfeitures, which fwept away the greatest part of their fubftance. Such bold oppreffion can scarcely be fhielded by the omnipotence of parliament: and yet it may be feriously queftioned, whether the Judges of the South Sea Directors were the true and legal reprefentatives of their country. The firft parliament of George the First had been chofen (1715) for three years: the term had elapsed, their truft was expired; and the four additional years (1718-1722), during which they continued to fit, were derived not from the people, but from themselves; from the strong measure of the feptennial bill, which can only be paralleled by il ferrar di configlio of the Venetian hiftory. Yet candor will own that to the fame parliament every Eng. lifhman is deeply indebted: the feptennial act, so vitious in its origin, has been fanctioned by time, experience, and the national confent. Its firft ope. ration fecured the House of Hanover on the throne, and its permanent influence maintains the peace and stability of government. As often as a repeal has been moved in the Houfe of Commons, I

have given in its defence a clear and confcientious

vote.

My grandfather could not expect to be treated with more lenity than his companions. His Tory principles and connexions rendered him obnoxious to the ruling powers: his name is reported in a fufpicious fecret; and his well known abilities could not plead the excufe of ignorance or error. In the first proceedings against the South Sea Directors, Mr. Gibbon is one of the few who were taken into cuftody; and, in the final fentence, the measure of his fine proclaims him eminently guilty. The total eftimate which he delivered on oath to the Houfe of Commons amounted to one hundred and fix thousand five hundred and forty-three pounds five fhillings and fixpence, exclufive of antecedent fettlements. Two different allowances of fifteen and of ten thousand pounds were moved for Mr. Gibbon; but, on the queftion being put, it was carried without a divifion for the fmaller fum. On these ruins with the skill and credit, of which parliament had not been able to defpoil him, my grandfather at a mature age erected the edifice of a new fortune: the labors of fixteen years were amply rewarded; and I have reason to believe that the second structure was not much inferior to the firft. He had realized a very confiderable property in Suffex, Hampshire, Buckinghamshire, and the New River Company; and had acquired a fpacious house', with gardens and lands at Putney, in Surry, where he refided in decent hofpitality. He died in December 1736, at the age of seventy; and his last will, at the expense of Edward,

Edward, his only fon, (with whofe marriage he was not perfectly reconciled,) enriched his two daughters, Catherine and Hefter. The former became the wife of Mr. Edward Ellifton, an Eaft India captain: their daughter and heiress Catherine was married in the year 1756 to Edward Eliot efq (now Lord Eliot), of Port Eliot, in the county of Cornwall; and their three fons are my nearest male relations on the father's fide. A life of devotion and celibacy was the choice of my aunt, Mrs. Hefter Gibbon, who, at the age of eighty-five, ftill refides in a hermitage at Cliffe, in Northamptonshire; having long furvived her fpiritual guide and faithful companion Mr. William Law, who, at an advanced age, about the year 1761, died in her house. In our family he had left the reputation of a worthy and pious man, who believed all that he profeffed, and practifed all that he enjoined. The character of a nonjuror, which he maintained to the last, is a sufficient evidence of his principles in church and state; and the facrifice of intereft to confcience will be always refpectable. His theological writings, which our domeftic connexion has tempted me to perufe, preferve an imperfect fort of life, and I can pronounce with more confidence and knowledge on the merits of the author. His laft compofitions are darkly tinctured by the incomprehenfible vifions of Jacob Behmen; and his difcourfe on the abfolute unlawfulness of stageentertainments is fometimes quoted for a ridiculous intemperance of fentiment and language. "The

"actors and spectators must all be damned: the playhoufe is the porch of Hell, the place of the Devil's "abode, where he holds his filthy court of evil VOL. I.

C

"fpirits: a play is the Devil's triumph, a facrifice "performed to his glory, as much as in the heathen "temples of Bacchus or Venus, &c. &c. " But these fallies of religious phrenfy muft not extinguifh the praise, which is due to Mr. William Law as a wit and a scholar. His argument on topics of lefs abfurdity is fpecious and acute, his manner is lively, his ftyle forcible and clear; and, had not his vigorous mind been clouded by enthufiafm, he might be ranked with the most agreeable and ingenious writers of the times. While the Bangorian controversy was a fashionable theme, he entered the lifts on the fubject of Chrift's kingdom, and the authority of the priesthood: against the plain account of the facrament of the Lord's Supper he refumed the combat with Bishop Hoadley, the object of Whig idolatry, and Tory abhorrenee; and at every weapon of attack and defence the nonjuror, on the ground which is common to both, approves himself at least equal to the prelate. On the appearance of the Fable of the Bees, he drew his pen against the licentious doctrine that private vices are public benefits, and morality as well as religion must join in his applaufe. Mr. Law's mafter-work, the Serious Call, is ftill read as a popular and powerful book of devotion. His precepts are rigid, but they are founded on the gospel: his fatire is sharp, but it is drawn from the knowledge of human life; and many of his portraits are not unworthy of the pen of La Bruyere. If he finds a fpark of piety in his reader's mind, he will foon kindle it to a flame; and a philofopher must allow that he exposes, with equal feverity and truth, the

ftrange contradiction between the faith and practice of the Chriftian world. Under the names of Flavia and Miranda he has admirably defcribed my two aunts-the heathen and the chriftian fifter.

My father, Edward Gibbon, was born in October 1707: at the age of thirteen he could fcarcely feel that he was difinherited by act of parliament; and, as he advanced towards manhood, new prof pects of fortune opened to his view. A parent is most attentive to fupply in his children the deficiencies, of which he is confcious in himfelf: my grandfather's knowledge was derived from a strong understanding, and the experience of the ways of men; but my father enjoyed the benefits of a liberal education as a fcholar and a gentleman. At Westminster School, and afterwards at Emanuel College in Cambridge, he paffed through a regular courfe of academical dif cipline; and the care of his learning and morals was intrufted to his private tutor, the fame Mr. William Law. But the mind of a faint is above or below the prefent world; and while the pupil proceeded on his travels, the tutor remained at Putney, the muchhonored friend and fpiritual director of the whole family. My father refided fome time at Paris to acquire the fashionable exercises; and as his temper was warm and focial, he indulged in those pleasures, for which the ftrictnefs of his former education had given him a keener relifh. He afterwards vifited feveral provinces of France; but his excurfions were neither long nor remote; and the flender knowledge, which he had gained of the French language, was gradually obliterated. His paffage through Besançon