Though after I saw reason to change my opinions I found myself
incommoded by the rigour of the congregation with which I was
connected, I shall always acknowledge with great gratitude that I owe
much to it. The business of religion was effectually attended to in
it. We were all catechized in public ’till we were grown up, servants
as well as others: the minister always expounded the scriptures with
as much regularity as he preached, and there was hardly a day in the
week, in which there was not some meeting of one or other part of the
congregation. On one evening there was a meeting of the young men for
conversation and prayer. This I constantly attended, praying extempore
with others when called upon.
At my Aunt’s there was a monthly meeting of women, who acquitted
themselves in prayer as well as any of the men belonging to the
congregation. Being at first a child in the family, I was permitted to
attend their meetings, and growing up insensibly, heard them after I
was capable of judging. My Aunt after the death of her husband, prayed
every morning and evening in her family, until I was about seventeen,
when that duty devolved upon me.
The Lord’s day was kept with peculiar strictness. No victuals were
dressed on that day in any family. No member of it was permitted to
walk out for recreation, but the whole of the day was spent at the
public meeting, or at home in reading, meditation, and prayer, in the
family or the closet.
It was my custom at that time to recollect as much as I could of the
sermons I heard, and to commit it to writing. This practice I began
very early, and continued it until I was able from the heads of a
discourse to supply the rest myself. For not troubling myself to commit
to memory much of the amplification, and writing at home almost as
much as I had heard, I insensibly acquired a habit of composing with
great readiness; and from this practice I believe I have derived great
advantage through life; composition seldom employing so much time as
would be necessary to write in long hand any thing I have published.
By these means, not being disgusted with these strict forms of
religion as many persons of better health and spirits probably might
have been (and on which account I am far from recommending the same
strictness to others) I acquired in early life a serious turn of mind.
Among other things I had at this time a great aversion to _Plays
and Romances_, so that I never read any works of this kind except
Robinson Crusoe, until I went to the academy. I well remember seeing
my brother Timothy reading a book of Knight Errantry, and with great
indignation I snatched it out of his hands, and threw it away. This
brother afterwards, when he had for some time followed my father’s
business (which was that of a Cloth-dresser) became, if possible, more
serious than I had been; and after an imperfect education, took up
the profession of a minister among the Independents, in which he now
continues.
While I was at the Grammar School I learned _Mr. Annet’s Short hand_,
and thinking I could suggest some improvements in it, I wrote to
the Author, and this was the beginning of a correspondence which
lasted several years. He was, as I ever perceived, an unbeliever in
Christianity and a necessarian. On this subject several letters,
written with care on both sides, passed between us, and these Mr.
Annet often pressed me to give him leave to publish, but I constantly
refused. I had undertaken the defence of Philosophical Liberty, and
the correspondence was closed without my being convinced of the
fallacy of my arguments, though upon studying the subject regularly,
in the course of my academical education afterwards, I became a
confirmed Necessarian, and I have through life derived, as I imagine,
the greatest advantage from my full persuasion of the truth of that
doctrine.
My Aunt, and all my relations, being strict Calvinists, it was their
intention to send me to the academy at _Mile-end_, then under the
care of Dr. Cawder. But, being at that time an Arminian, I resolutely
opposed it, especially upon finding that if I went thither, besides
giving an _experience_, I must subscribe my assent to ten printed
articles of the strictest calvinistic faith, and repeat it every six
months. My opposition, however, would probable have been to no purpose,
and I must have adopted some other mode of life, if Mr. Kirkby above
mentioned had not interposed, and strongly recommended the academy of
Dr. Doddridge, on the idea that I should have a better chance of being
made a scholar. He had received a good education himself, was a good
classical scholar, and had no opinion of the mode of education among
the very orthodox Dissenters, and being fond of me, he was desirous
of my having every advantage that could be procured for me. My good
Aunt, not being a bigotted Calvinist, entered into his views, and Dr.
Doddridge being dead, I was sent to Daventry, and was the first pupil
that entered there. My Step-mother also, who was a woman of good sense,
as well as of religion, had a high opinion of Dr. Doddridge, having
been sometime housekeeper in his family. She had always recommended his
Academy, but died before I went thither.
Three years, 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 pursuits, 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 favorable 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 freedoms,
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. The general plan of
our studies, which may be seen in Dr. Doddridge’s published lectures,
was exceedingly favourable to free enquiry, as we were referred to
authors on both sides of every question, and were even required to give
an account of them. It was also expected that we should abridge the
most important of them for our future use. The public library contained
all the books to which we were referred.
It was a reference to Dr. Hartley’s Observations on Man in the
course of our Lectures, that first brought me acquainted with that
performance, which immediately engaged my closest attention, and
produced the greatest, and in my opinion the most favourable effect
on my general turn of thinking thro’ life. It established me in the
belief of the doctrine of Necessity, which I first learned from
Collins; it greatly improved that disposition to piety which I brought
to the academy, and freed it from that rigour with which it had been
tinctured. Indeed, I do not know whether the consideration of Dr.
Hartley’s theory contributes more to enlighten the mind, or improve the
heart; it effects both in so super-eminent a degree.
In this situation, I saw reason to embrace what is generally called
the heterodox side of almost every question.[2] 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. I kept up more or less of a correspondence with
Dr. Ashworth till the time of his death, though much more so with Mr.
Clark. This continued till the very week of his melancholy death by a
fall from his horse at Birmingham, where he was minister.
[2] It will be seen in the course of these memoirs that from time to
time as deeper reflection and more extensive reading incited him,
he saw reason to give up almost all the peculiar theological and
metaphysical opinions which he had imbibed in early youth; some of them
with considerable difficulty, and all of them at the evident risk of
considerable obloquy from those whom he highly respected, as well as
from those on whom his interest appeared to depend.