It was common for him to have four guineas per day and his drink -an object of no small consequence, as he began to drink before he began to paint, and continued to do both alternately, till he had painted as much as he pleased, or till the liquor completely got the better of him, when he claimed his money, and business was at an end for the day. This laid his employer under the necessity of passing his whole time with him, to keep him in a state fit for work; and to carry off the day's work when it was done. By this conduct he ruined his constitution, diminished his powers, and sunk himself into general contempt. He had no society but the lowest of those beings whose only enjoyment is gin and ribaldry. It was from company of this description that he was carried off by a marshalsea writ, for a small sum of money. When taken to a place of confinement, he drank a large quantity of spirits, and was soon afterwards taken ill. The man in whose custody

he was, alarmed at his situation, applied to several of his friends for relief; but that relief, if it was afforded, came too late: the powers of life were exhausted, and he died before he had attained the age of forty years. His wife, whose life had been like his own, died a day or two after him.

men. men.

"Thus perished George Morland; whose best works will command esteem so long as any taste for his art remains; whose ordinary productions will please, so long as any liking for a just representation of what is natural can be found; and whose talents would have insured him a life of happiness, in the most brilliant station he could desire, if his entrance into life had been guided by those who were able and willing to caution him against those snares that are continually preparing, by knaves and fools, for inexperienced youth. His command over every implement of his art was so great, that the use of them seemed to be nearly as natural to him as the use of their native language to other Pictures flowed from his pencil, as words from the lips of other His pictures from ballads, &c. are trifling, considered as works of art; but curious, as the productions of a youth designing from the ideas of others. In his picture of Garrick, he seized the true character of every object he copied, and produced a picture of considerable merit -all circumstances considered-though not an exact copy of the original. What few portraits he painted, had the merit of strong resemblance; and there is no doubt that, if he had followed that branch of the art, he would have attained to great eminence in it. His pictures of familiar subjects had considerable merit in point of composition; and he painted all his figures from nature; but, as these figures were taken from one or two women and children who were much about him, they have too much similarity. But he shines forth in all his glory in picturesque landscape. For about seven years that he painted such subjects, he was in his prime; and while the figures he introduced were of the lower order, they were still in keeping with the scenes, and had nothing to give disgust; but when his increasing irregularity led him from the wood-side to the ale-house, his subject assumed a meaner cast; for he still painted only what he saw. Stage-coachmen, postillions, and drovers, were honoured by his pencil; his sheep were changed for pigs; and, at last, with the true feeling of a disciple of Circe, he forsook the picturesque cottage and the wood-side, and never seemed happy but in a pig-stye. The horse too he has given with much effect, when old,

ragged, and miserable; but a beautiful horse he never could draw as it would be drawn by Gilpin, Stubbs, or any artist of that school."

"He sometimes," says another contemporary critic, "leaves the truth unfinished, but never violated. He affected none of those whimseys that are for ever setting amateurs by the ears, about warm colouring and cold colouring, and forcible lights, and forcible shadows, and subordinations, that, to illustrate one object or action, would sacrifice ninetenths of a picture in a waste of senseless obscurity. He saw none of these violent partialities in nature; and he scorned to please a depraved imagination by fantastic pretences of surpassing that which, as it is, no man can equal. His characters affect no graces nor anti-graces that do not belong to them. His lights and shadows are mild, moderate, and diffusive. The whole together rests easy upon the eye, and pleases a correct taste as much as it would had it surprised a vicious one more. His choice is always good; for he chooses that in which there is nothing essential to reject. He never gives us too much of a thing. His piece is but a cantlet of picturesque nature, neatly cut out, and transferred into a picture-frame. The character of Morland, therefore, as a painter, appears to be remarkably equal and consistent. Gainsborough, sometimes dull, was oftener capricious, and still oftener careless; and the character of Wilson's landscape, seldom purely English, was sometimes mixed, and sometimes absolutely indeterminate; but Morland we are always sure of,-his pictures never make a mistake,—never insult by falsehood, disgust by affectation, disappoint by error, or tease by mystery. Such was the illustrious English artist, George Morland; whose moral character was, at the same time, so notoriously depraved, that, in the course of twenty years that I have been among arts and artists, and anxious as I ever felt to esteem the possessor of such splendid talents, I never heard him mentioned but with some concomitant sentiment of reluctant disgust. Eccentric as his conduct was, beyond all calculation and all powers of description, it did not afford even the melancholy palliation of insanity; for the vigour of his genius, and the soundness of his judgment, never forsook him in a picture, though they scarcely ever accompanied him in any other employment, action, or sentiment of his life. The only character likely to bear a parallel with Morland's seems to be that of Adrian Brauwer, a Flemish painter, of great and deserved celebrity, who lived, I think, in the sixteenth century. The principal differences seem to be, that the Fleming's subjects were as generally nauseous as the Englishman's were decent and pleasing; and that Brauwer was more elaborate, and coloured more richly, though, perhaps, not with greater truth. The latter, therefore, may possibly be surer of pleasing the eye, however he affects the taste or the understanding. The death of Brauwer, at the age of twenty-eight, appears to have been brought on by the same causes, of which accident, or a stronger constitution, protracted the effects in Morland twelve years longer."

Joseph Priestley.

BORN A. D. 1733.-died A. D. 1804.

THE following notice of this celebrated man is principally from the pen of his able and intimate friend Dr John Aikin.

Joseph Priestley, LL.D., F.R.S. and member of many foreign literary societies, was born on March 13th, old style, 1733, at Field-head, in the parish of Birstall, in the west-riding of Yorkshire. His father was engaged in the clothing manufacture, and both parents were persons of respectability among the Calvinistic dissenters. Joseph was from an carly period brought up in the house of Mr Joseph Keighley, who had married his aunt. A fondness for reading was one of the first passions he displayed; and it probably induced his friends to change their intentions of educating him for trade, and destine him for a learned profession. He was sent to a school at Batley, the master of which possessed no common share of erudition. Besides the Latin and Greek languages, he was capable of giving instructions in the Hebrew; and his pupil carried with him the knowledge of all the three to the academy of Daventry, at which he was entered in his 19th year as a student of divinity. This academy was the successor of that kept by Dr Doddridge at Northampton, and was conducted by Dr Ashworth, whose first pupil Mr Priestley is said to have been.

When about the age of twenty-two, he was chosen as an assistantminister to the Independent congregation of Needham-market, in Suffolk. He had at this time begun to imbibe theological opinions different from those of the school in which he had been educated. He had likewise become a student and admirer of the metaphysical philosophy of Hartley, of which during life he was the zealous advocate, and the acute elucidator. After an abode of three years at Needham, he accepted an invitation to be pastor of a small flock at Namptwich, in Cheshire. There he opened a day-school, in the conduct of which he exhibited that turn for ingenious research, and that spirit of improvement which were to be his distinguishing characteristics. He enlarged the minds of his pupils by philosophical experiments, and he drew up an English Grammar upon an improved plan, which was his earliest publication. His reputation as a man of uncommon talents and active inquiry, soon extended itself among his professional brethren; and when upon the death of the Rev. Dr Taylor, the tutor of divinity at Warrington academy, Dr Aiken was chosen to supply his place, Mr Priestley was invited to undertake the vacant department of belles-lettres. It was in 1761 that he removed to a situation happily accommodated to his personal improvement, by the free society of men of large intellectual attainments, and to the display of his own various powers of mind. He soon after made a matrimonial connection with Mary, daughter to Mr Wilkinson of Bersham-Foundry near Wrexham; a lady of an excellent heart, and a strong understanding, and his faithful partner in all the vicissitudes of his life.

At Warrington properly commenced the literary career of this eminent person, and a variety of publications soon announced to the world

the extent and originality of his pursuits. One of the first was a 'Chart of Biography,' in which he ingeniously contrived to present an ocular image both of the proportional duration of existence, and of the chronological period and synchronism of all the most eminent persons of all ages and countries, in the great departments of science, art, and public life. This was very favourably received, and suggested a second 'Chart of History,' in like manner offering to the view the extent, time, and duration of states and empires. Subjects of history and general politics at this time engaged much of his attention. He delivered lectures upon them, of which the substance was given to the world in various useful publications. His notions of government were founded on those principles of the original and indefeasible rights of man which are the sole basis of all political freedom. He was an ardent admirer of the British constitution, according to his conceptions of it, and ably illustrated it in his lectures. With respect to his proper academical department of the belles-lettres, he displayed the enlargement of his views in a set of lectures on the theory and history of language, and on the principles of oratory and criticism; in the latter of which he successfully applied the Hartleian theory of association to objects of taste. Although his graver pursuits did not allow him to cultivate the agreeable parts of literature as a practitioner, he sufficiently showed, by some light and playful efforts, that he would have been capable of excelling in this walk, had he given his attention to it. But he was too intent upon things to expend his regards upon words, and he remained contented with a style of writing accommodated to the great business of instruction, of which the characteristics were accuracy and perspicuity.

Fully as his time might seem occupied by the academical and literary employments above enumerated, he found means, by perpetual activity and indefatigable industry, to accomplish the first great work in natural philosophy which laid a solid foundation for his fame in that department of human knowledge. Having long amused himself with an electrical machine, and taken an interest in the progress of discovery in that branch of physics, he was induced to undertake a 'History of Electricity,' with an account of its present state. As the science was of late date, and all its facts and theories lay within a moderate compass of reading, he thought it a task not beyond his powers to effect completely what he proposed; although his plan included an extensive course of experiment of his own, to verify what had been done by others, and to clear up remaining doubts and obscurities. It appears from his preface, that while engaged in this design, he had enjoyed the advantage of personal intercourse with some eminent philosophers, among whom he acknowledges as coadjutors, Drs Watson and Franklin, and Mr Canton. The work first appeared at Warrington in 1767, 4to. and so well was it received, that it underwent a fifth edition in 4to. 1794. It is indeed an admirable model of scientific history; full without superfluity; clear, methodical, candid and unaffected. Its original experiments are highly ingenious, and gave a foretaste of that fertility of contrivance and sagacity of observation which afterwards so much distinguished the author.

His connexion with the Warrington academy ceased in 1768, when he accepted an invitation to officiate as pastor to a large and respectable congregation of dissenters at Leeds. Considering himself now as

more especially devoted to theology, he suffered that, which had always been his favourite object, to take the lead amid his intellectual pursuits, though not to the exclusion of others. From infancy his mind had been strongly impressed with devotional sentiments; and although he had widely deviated from the doctrinal opinions which he had first imbibed, yet all the pious ardour and religious zeal of the sect among whom he was educated remained undiminished. He likewise retained in full force the principles of a dissenter from the establishment, and those ideas of congregational discipline which had become obsolete among many of the richer and more relaxed of the separatists. Numerous publications relative to these points soon marked his new residence. His Institutes of Natural and Revealed Religion' gave, in a popular and concise form, his system of divinity with its evidences. His View of the Principles and Conduct of the Protestant Dissenters' exhibited his notions of the grounds of dissent and the proper character and policy of a religious sect; and a variety of controversial and polemic writings presented to the world his views of the Christian dispensation. As a divine, if possible, still more than as a philosopher, truth was his sole aim, which he pursued with a more exalted ardour, in proportion to the greater importance of the subject. Naturally sanguine, and embracing the conclusions of his reason with a plenitude of conviction that excluded every particle of doubt, he inculcated his tenets with an earnestness limited by nothing but a sacred regard to the rights of private judgment in others as well as himself.

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The favourable reception of the 'History of Electricity' had induced Dr Priestley to adopt the grand design of pursuing the rise and progress of the other sciences, in a historical form; and much of his time at Leeds was occupied in his second work upon this plan, entitled 'The History and Present State of Discoveries relating to Vision, Light, and Colours,' which appeared in 2 vols. 4to. 1772. This is allowed to be a performance of great merit; possessing a lucid arrangement, and that clear perspicuous view of his subject which it was the author's peculiar talent to afford. It failed, however, of attaining the popularity of his "History of Electricity,' chiefly because it was impossible to give adequate notions of many parts of the theory of optics without a more accurate acquaintance with mathematics than common readers can be supposed to possess. Perhaps too, the writer himself was scarcely competent to explain the abstruser parts of this science. It proved to be the termination of his plan; but science was no loser by the circumstance, for the activity of his mind was turned from the consideration of the discoveries of others, to the attempt of making discoveries of his own, and nothing could be more brilliant than his success. We find that at this period he had begun those experiments upon air which have given the greatest celebrity to his name as a natural philosopher.

In 1770, Dr Priestley quitted Leeds for a situation as different as could well be imagined. His philosophical writings, and the recommendation of his friend Dr Price, had made him so favourably known to the Earl of Shelburne that this nobleman made him such advantageous proposals for residence with him, that regard to his family would not permit them to be rejected. It was merely in the capacity of his lordship's librarian, or rather his literary and philosophical companion, in the hours that could be devoted to such pursuits, that Dr Priestley