MRS GODWIN, SENR., ON MARRIAGE. 325 all projected changes of human institutions, it appears to me of the highest importance previously to ascertain as nearly as possible how much evil is to be attributed to these institutions, and how much is absolutely independent of them. "I have made this letter much longer than I at first intended; and I certainly ought to apologise for taking up so much of your valuable time : but if your avocations will not permit you to answer it, I shall hope for some future opportunity of hearing your opinions upon the subject, when I have the pleasure of seeing you.-I am, dear sir, yours sincerely, A. MALTHUS." A letter from Mrs Godwin, senior, will close the record of the year. Mrs Godwin, senior, to William Godwin. [WOOD DALLING, 1798.] "MY DEAR WM.-I'm a poor letter writer at best, but now worse than ever. After thanking yo. for yr. genteel present of the Memoirs of yr. wife. Excuse me saying Providence certainly knows best, the fountain of wisdom cannot err. He that gave life can take it away, and none can hinder, and tho we see not his reasons now, we shall see them hereafter. I hope yo are taught by reflection your mistake concerning marriage, there might have been two children that had no lawful wright to anything yt was their fathers, with a thousand other bad consequences, children and wives crying about ye streets without a protector. You wish, I dare say, to keep yr. own oppinion, therefore I shall say no more but wish you and dear babes happy. Dose little Mary thrive? or she weaned? You will follow your wives direction, give them a good deal of air, and have a good oppertunity, as yo. live out of ye. Smoke of the city. You will be kind enough to let yr. Sister know Mr and Mrs G. and self wish to know if she recd. a box with eggs whole, they were all new, and sundry trifels I sent her, with a new piece of print for my grand-daughter Mary for a gown, with 2/6 to pay for the making, a pr. little Stockens and Hat for yr. Ch. 16 March last. Am greatly concerned to hear yr. Bro. has lost his place at Wright's; am affraid it's from the old cause; Seneca's morals he bostes off is not sufficient, there is something else wanting of greater moment and importance. I dont write to him because he gives me such hard names, as that I don't act up to the carrector my blessed Saviour has set me, &c., though I wish him well, and think I discharge my duty towards him. He wrote me word he wish'd he had done with Sirvitude or with life, I'm afraid he is prepared for neither. I have been burning a great number of old letters, but when I came to yours, it was with great reluctance that I destroyed them, there is such a kind and benevolent spirit in them towards your dear S. and J. in their necessities. What a burthen has John been to yo! Poor creature, what will become of him I tremble to think. He trusts providence, but its in a wrong way, not in ye of well doing. I have sent him a new shirt for Mr Sothren to send by private hand, directed to Hanh. I coud send him my riding-coat, its so very heavy, and I so very week I cant wear it, and perhaps Natty a waistcoat, but imagain the use he will make of them will be to lay them in pawn, but so he must if he will, Money is of no use, nor is it much otherwise with some others which I shall not name. way who can help it? "By seling a little Timber, and frugality in my expences, hope to be able a little after Mic[haelmas] to help you and the rest to £10 a-piece, taking yr. notes for it, perhaps will just keep their heads above water. I wd. reserve somthing to keep yr. S. from starving, but yt. will be difficult. If I leave her a place for her life, and she be deep in debt, and have interest to pay, she will be nothing ye better. I wish you to write very soon by post with your opinion of the matter, and also how Joe conducts himself towards his wife and family. I sent Mary a pritty mourning ring with an emethist and 2 sparks in it; do you ask to see it, also a box for it; hope she will not loose it. Would not wish yo to declare the contents of my letter: my best wishes attend you and yours. Yr. Bro. Hull and wife and Natt join me in the same, Mrs G. is in ye increesing way; their eldest has got the measels A MOTHER'S ANXIETIES. 327 is very full, but hope no danger. I see in ye news a Miss Foster married of Wisbeach.-From yr. affecate. Mother, A. G. "I wish you woud let me know if there is any better way of directing letters or parcels, are they no more than letters to London when directed to Somers Town. "What I send Han wou'd be glad yo. to be her director what use to make of it. She has told me some former letters she was affraid she sh'd be put to trouble, and often exprest yo. have been a father to her, but it stands yo. in hand to take care of yourself; an aspiring temper will be beat down, while the humble shall be exalted." CHAPTER XII. ST LEON-MRS REVELEY. 1799. THE year 1799 began with a breach with Mackintosh, which afterwards grew wider. Mackintosh delivered early in that year, in the hall of Lincoln's Inn, a course of lectures on the Law of Nature and Nations. To some expressions in the first of these Godwin objected, as unfairly directed against himself. His letter is not preserved, but its purport can be in great measure divined from the following reply: Mr, afterwards Sir, James Mackintosh to I think I am The strongest "SERLE STREET, LINCOLN'S INN, 30th Jany. 1799. "DEAR SIR,—I read your very candid and good-tempered letter with real pleasure. I owe you an honest answer. disposed to make it a perfectly good-natured one. expression you quote, 'Savage Desolators,' you will find on reperusal to be a half-pleasantry directed against metaphysicians in general, amongst whom I have sometimes the vanity to number myself. "Those who disguise commonplace in the shape of paradox' is most certainly not an allusion to you. The thing is so common as an art of literary empiricism that I rather think no particular writer was present to my mind when I wrote the passage. Your opinions do not stand in need of any contrivances to make them appear more singular than they are. As to Turgot, Rousseau, and Condorcet, I have the highest reverence for the first of these writers. The second I have long considered as the most eloquent BREACH WITH MACKINTOSH. 329 The third I always and delightful madman that ever existed. thought a cold and obscure writer; I never could think very highly of his talents, partly perhaps because I am no great judge of his mathematical eminence, which is, I believe, the principal part of his reputation. His conduct did not appear to me to have been that of a good man. But in none of the phrases which you have selected have I even so much as insinuated that he or any other mistaken speculator was influenced by bad motives. man may be 'mischievous' with the best 'motives' in the world. In all discussions of 'Speculative Principles' it is always a most unfair act of controversy to load the author whom we oppose with the 'immoral consequences' which we suppose likely to flow from his opinion, not to mention that it is a sorry and impertinent sophism to urge such consequences as an argument against the truth of a speculative proposition. But the case is very different in moral and practical disputes. There the consequences are everything, and must be constantly appealed to, especially by those who, like you and myself, hold utility to be the standard of morals. To apply this to the present subject. With respect to you personally, I could never mean to say anything unkind or disrespectful. I had always highly esteemed both your acuteness and benevolence. You published opinions which you believed to be true and most salutary, but which I had from the first thought mistakes of a most dangerous tendency. You did your duty in making public your opinions. I do mine by attempting to refute them; and one of my chief means of confutation is the display of those bad consequences which I think likely to flow from them. I, however, allow that I should have confined those epithets, which I apply to denote pernicious consequences, merely to doctrines. Though these epithets, when they are applied by men to me, are never intended to convey any aspersion upon the moral or intellectual character of individuals, but merely to describe them as the promulgators of opinions which I think false and pernicious, yet I admit that I should not in any way have applied the epithets to men. I feel gratitude to you for having recalled my attention to this great distinction which I shall observe in my proposed |