CHAPTER XIV.

Death of

Bradbury.

BRADBURY, the indomitable opponent of the Jacobites in the reign of Anne, and the last survivor of the energetic band who united with him in the defence of the gospel against its Arian opponents, preached his last sermon, August 12, 1759, from Micah v. 5, and died, "rejoicing in hope," at Warwick Court, Sept. 9, 1759, aged eighty-two.

Job Orton.

On the death of Doddridge, JOB ORTON became chief adviser to the Church at Castle Hill and to the academy, which was removed from Northampton to Daventry in 1761. To CALEB ASHWORTH, the newly-appointed tutor, Orton suggested various emendations on the plans of Doddridge.

Advice to Caleb Ashworth.

"I really think," he said, "the students lived too well at Northampton." "I hope," he added, "I need not caution you against that error in the good Doctor in saying true things to and of almost everybody." "When Dr. Doddridge expounded in the morning, it was seldom less than an hour, which is quite too much." "I hope you will never be the slave of any persons, either Independents or Presbyterians, orthodox or otherwise. Set out upon a generous plan, and be steady." "Pecuniary penalties are very proper, but of late years they answered no end, because the students never paid them, but they were put down to their

account, which was no punishment to them. Insist upon their paying every week. Especially warn the students against metaphysical and philosophical prayers, but let not your animadversions be severe, as the good Doctor's often were, when he thought they were not evangelical, which intimidated and discouraged many of his pupils. Errors that will naturally mend by years and experience should be gently treated."

William

Having settled the plan of the academy, Orton next pressed the claims of William Hextal on the attention of the Church at Castle Hill as Hextal. the successor of Doddridge in the pastoral charge. "A few persons," he said, "made some objections, but they were such as I imagine they would readily give up for the sake of the peace of the Church." Dr. Ashworth, in a note to Mrs. Doddridge, dated Daventry, Feb. 20, 1762, refers with some solicitude to the state of matters.

Everything you say about Mr. H. astonishes me. I only wish, as you do, that nothing may be said about it at present; thongh, on second thoughts, I know not what to wish or say. I will not cease to pray that God may over-rule all for the comfort of the Society and His glory. This is all I can do."

Much to the satisfaction of Orton, Hextal was elected. "This is an encouragement," he writes, Aug. 18, 1762, "not to be weary in well-doing, for I really never undertook anything of the kind with less hope of success.'

The position of Dr. Ashworth was extremely trying. By the failure of Rivington, her bookseller, Mrs. Doddridge sustained heavy loss, and in the care and perplexity occasioned by this distressing circumstance, the young tutor rendered all the help in his power, but

Trying
Position of
Ashworth.

* Mr. J. Wilson's MSS.

the strain upon him in the academy was too

severe.

"I never wanted to see you," he writes to Mrs. Doddridge, "so much as at present, but Mr. Tayler, though an excellent youth, and a charming assistant, leaves me a great deal of additional work, and some of it what I am as ignorant of as my pupils. I have two classes in an important and difficult part of their course-one on the Trinity, the other on the Atonement. The loss of my time by illness throws the senior classes backward, who must finish by the vacation, and many of my people are ill with colds, and require all the remains of my time I can get."

In another letter, dated Daventry, July 10, 1765, he writes:

"I thank God I am wonderfully recovered. I ride out two or three times a day. My strength every day returns sensibly, yet I am weak and soon weary. I find my understanding and memory as weak as my bodily health. A little reading or thinking discomposes me. I bless God that where I had most apprehensions, my mind was very composed. I hope I have committed myself to an Almighty Saviour, according to the directions and encouragements of the glorious gospel, and there I fix my trust. How glorious is the gospel scheme, which can enable a poor, vile sinner, conscious of unnumbered instances of aggravated guilt, to entertain hope! Yet though, through divine goodness, I was not distressed in the view of dying, I find, as I return to the world, my connections with it are renewed. I look on my wife and children with great endearment, and feel a pleasure on finding myself still among them. My friends here and the town in general have carried it with great respect. I wish I may live for the glory of God and the good of the world. It will then be a pleasure to live." *

Joseph Priestley was admitted at Daventry as the first student for the ministry, though he had not become a member of a church, not being prepared

*Mr. Joshua Wilson's MSS.

either to give a relation of personal Christian experience, or to make a profession of faith.

Joseph
Priestley.

"Three years," he says, " viz., from September, 1752 to 1755, I spent at Daventry, with that peculiar satisfaction with which young persons of generous minds usually go through. a course of liberal study, in the society of others engaged in the same pursuit, and free from the cares and anxieties which seldom fail to lay hold on them when they come out into the world. In my time, the academy was in a state peculiarly favourable to the serious pursuit of truth, as the students were about equally divided upon every question of much importance, such as liberty and necessity, the sleep of the soul, and all the articles of theological orthodoxy and heresy; in consequence of which, all these topics were the subject of continual discussion. Our tutors also were of different opinions; Dr. Ashworth, taking the orthodox side of every question, and Mr. Clark, the sub-tutor, that of heresy, though always with the greatest modesty.

"Both of our tutors being young, at least as tutors, and some of the senior students excelling more than they could pretend to do in several branches of study, they indulged us in the greatest freedom, so that our lectures had often the air of friendly conversations on the subjects to which they related. We were permitted to ask whatever questions, and to make whatever remarks we pleased, and we did it with the greatest, but without any offensive freedom.

"In this situation, I saw reason to embrace what is generally called the heterodox side of almost every question. But notwithstanding this, and though Dr. Ashworth was earnestly desirous to make me as orthodox as possible, yet, as my behaviour was unexceptionable, and as I generally took his part in some little things by which he often drew upon himself the ill will of many of the students, I was upon the whole a favourite with him.

'Notwithstanding the great freedom of our speculations and debates, the extreme of heresy among us was Arianism; and all of us, I believe, left the academy with a belief, more or less qualified, of the doctrine of atonement.

"In the course of our academical studies, no provision was then made for teaching the learned languages. Our course of

lectures were only defective in containing no lectures on the Scriptures, or on ecclesiastical history, and by the students in general, commentators in general, and ecclesiastical history, also were held in contempt."

Priestley tells us that he was invited at Needham Market to a small congregation, about a hundred people, under a Mr. Meadows, who was superannuated.

"They had been without a minister the preceding year, on account of the smallness of the salary, but there being some respectable and agreeable families among them, I flattered myself that I should be useful and happy in the place, and therefore accepted the unanimous invitation to be assistant to Mr. Meadows, with a view to succeed him when he died. He was a man of some fortune.

"This congregation had been used to receive assistance from both the Presbyterian and Independent funds; but upon my telling them that I did not choose to have anything to do with the Independents, and asking them whether they were able to make up the salary they promised me (which was forty pounds per annum) without any aid from the latter fund, they assured me they could. I soon, however, found that they deceived themselves; for the most that I ever received from them was in the proportion of about thirty pounds per annum, when the expense of my board exceeded twenty pounds.

"Notwithstanding this, everything else for the first half year appeared very promising, and I was happy in the success of my schemes for promoting the interest of religion in the place. I catechised the children, though there were not many, using Dr. Watts' Catechism; and I opened my lectures on the theory of religion from the Institutes,' which I had composed at the academy, admitting all persons to attend them without distinction of sex or age; but in this I soon found that I had acted imprudently. A minister in that neighbourhood had been obliged to leave his place on account of Arianism; and though nothing had been said to me on the subject, and from the people so readily consenting to give up the Independent fund, I thought they could not have much bigotry among them, I found that when I came to treat of the unity of God, merely as an article of religion, several of my audience were attentive to nothing but the soundness of my faith in the doctrine of the Trinity.