the Jewish Chriftians, the Ebionites or Nazarenes, believed in the proper humanity of Chrift; and endeavours to fhew, that Mr. Howes has totally mistaken the meaning of Tertullian, and mifapplied the words of Epiphanius, in two pages of his work adduced to prove that the Ebionites afcribed Divinity to Chrift. In reply to the charge (which Mr. Howes, in his great zeal, had inferted, not only in the title-page of his work, but in his public advertisement) of a wilful anachronism, in making Plotinus inftruct the first Chriftian Fathers in the Platonic catechism, a whole century before Plotinus was born, Dr. Priestley fays:

So far have I been from faying that Juftin Martyr, or any of the Christian Fathers, quoted Plotinus, that I no where fay that they adopted the principles of any of the later Platonifts, but of Platonism in general. Examine all my quotations, and you will find that they refer to Plato only. If any thing that I have faid should imply more, it is a cafual overfight.

If I had faid that the Chriftian Fathers adopted any principles of the later Platonifts, as different from those of Plato himself, there would have been no anachronism in it. I fhould only have reprefented them as adopting the principles of the fchool, which principles I fhew to have exilted by means of the writings of the later Platonis. With the fame colour of truth Mr. Howes might have faid that I had made Juftin Martyr the fchoiar of Jamblicus, Julian, or even Proclus, who lived in the year 600. For I quote them as much as I do Plotinus, and for the fame purpose, viz. to ascertain what were the doctrines of their school.

If Mr. Howes meant to affert that Plotinus was the founder of the fect of later Platonifts, which is the only fenfe in which his calling him the oldeft can be to his purpose, it is notoriously falfe. He himfelf quotes retavius, as laying that Plotinus was the scholar of Ammonius," and in the fame place he quotes without cenfure my faying that thole who are ufually called the later Platonifts were thole philofophers, chiefly of Alexandria, who a little before and after the commencement of the Chriftian æra, adopted the general principles of Plato." If then the fchool, and its tenets, existed before the Chriftian era; what anachronism is there in making the Chriftian Fathers borrow from it? Does not Philo appear to have imbibed the principles of this school, as much as any of the Chriftian Fathers? Did they not therefore exift long before Plotinus ?

Mr. Howes fays I have fuggefted this monftrous anachronism, "both by my arrangement, and my expreffions, in the body of my hiftory," which is abfolutely falfe. For in the book itself, as you will fee, vol. iv. p. 353, I give the age of Plotinus right, faying that he died in 270 aged 66; though, by fome accident, perhaps the mistake of the er graver, the name is placed in the Chart, just a century wrong; which, if I were to explain to you the mechanical method of drawing fuch charts, I could fatisfy you was the eafieft of all mistakes. In my large Chart of Biography, which I could not mean to depart from, but really thought I had copied, Plotinus is placed

where he should be.

Thus,

• Thus, Gentlemen, can a man, who profeffes to difclaim all the arts of controversy, write. I could not have imagined that any perfon cold have fufpected another of attempting fuch an impofition as Mr. Howes charges me with putting on the public, an impofition, that a school-boy might have detected and expofed, as well as Mr. Howes. I ought, however, to except Dr. Horfley who charged me with wilfully falfifying the common English translation of the New Teftament. I fhould blush, and retire for ever from the fight or converse of scholars, if I had been convicted of fuch a piece of miferable chicanery as this of Mr. Howes. These are the boafted champions of modern orthodoxy. Had any Unitarian endeavoured to take fuch an advantage of his opponent in controverfy, I should have thought it neceffary to difclaim all connection with him. Let us fee how Dr. Horne, and others, advocates for the doctrine of the Trinity, will act on this occafion. How different from this conduct of Mr. Howes is that of Dr. Geddes. If I fhould be obliged to furrender at difcretion, it would be a pleasure to give my iword to fo generous an adversary."

The remainder of thefe Letters confifts chiefly of replies to perfonal invectives, or general remarks on fubfcription, and other topics, which do not concern the main queftion. We fhall conclude our account of this first part of Dr. P.'s annual Mifcellany, with quoting the words in which he concludes one of his letters to Dr. Price:

Nothing remains-but that, with mutual candour, we exhibit our refpective opinions with their proper evidence; being all of us perfuaded, that the time is coming, when the whole Chriftian world will embrace our opinion; and that, in due time, all those who now think differently from us, will come to think just as we do, and wonder that they should ever have thought otherwise '

If all have this perfuafion, it is evident that all but one must, and that all may, be difappointed. Impartial by-tanders will perhaps think the latter most probable. If fo, would it not be the w feft measure, for the contending parties, to lave themfelves the trouble, and the public the vexation, of prosecuting thefe fruitless inquiries, by agreeing to retire, on all fides, trom the field of controverfy?

ART. III. Mr. Jefferson's Notes on the State of Virginia, concluded; fee our laft, p. 382.

TH

HE following extract exhibits an excellent plan of public education, in which liberality and policy unite:

Another object of the revifal is, to diffufe knowledge more generally through the mafs of the people. This bill propofes to lay off every county into small districts of five or fix miles fquare, called hundreds, and in each of them to establish a school for tea hing reading, writing, and arithmetic. The tutor to be supported by the hundred, and every perfon in it entitled to fend their children three years gratis, and as much longer as they pleate, paying for it. Thefe

fchools

schools to be under a vifitor, who is annually to chufe the boy, of best genius in the fchool, of those whofe parents are too poor to give them further education, and to fend him forward to one of the grammar fchools, of which twenty are propofed to be erected in different parts of the country, for teaching Greek, Latin, geography, and the higher branches of numerical arithmetic. Of the boys thus fent in any one year, trial is to be made at the grammar schools one or two years, and the beft genius of the whole felected, and continued fix years, and the refidue difmiffed. By this means twenty of the best geniuses will be raked from the rubbish annually, and be inftructed, at the public expence, fo far as the grammar fchools go. At the end of fix years inftruction, one half are to be difcontinued (from among whom the grammar fchools will probably be fupplied with future mafters); and the other half, who are to be chofen for the fuperiority of their parts and difpofition, are to be fent and continued three years in the study of fuch fciences as they shall chufe, at William and Mary college, the plan of which is propofed to be enJarged, as will be hereafter explained, and extended to all the ufeful fciences. The ultimate refult of the whole scheme of education would be the teaching all the children of the ftate reading, writing, and common arithmetic: turning out ten annually of fuperior genius, well taught in Greek, Latin, geography, and the higher branches of arithmetic: turning out ten others annually, of ftill fuperior parts, who, to those branches of learning, fhall have added fuch of the fciences as their genius fhall have led them to: the furnishing to the wealthier part of the people convenient schools, at which their children may be educated, at their own expence.-The general objects of this law are to provide an education adapted to the years, to the capacity, and the condition of every one, and directed to their freedom and happiness. Specific details were not proper for the law. Thefe muft be the business of the visitors entrusted with its execution. The firft ftage of this education being the schools of the hundreds, wherein the great mafs of the people will receive their inflruction, the principal foundations of future order will be laid here. Inftead therefore of putting the Bible and Teftament into the hands of the children, at an age when their judgments are not fufficiently matured for religious enquiries, their memories may here be ftored with the most useful facts from Grecian, Roman, European, and American history. The first elements of morality too may be instilled into their minds; fuch as, when further developed as their judgments advance in ftrength, may teach them how to work out their own greatest happiness, by fhewing them that it does not depend on the condition of life in which chance has placed them, but is always the refult of a good confcience, good health, occupation, and freedom in all just purfuits.-Thofe whom either the wealth of their parents or the adoption of the ftate fhall deftine to higher degrees of learning, will go on to the grammar fchools, which contitute the next flage, there to be inftructed in the languages. The learning Greek and Latin, I am told, is going into difufe in Europe. I know not what their manners and occupations may call for but it would be very ill-judged in us to follow their examp' in this inftance. There is a certain period of life, fay from

eight to fifteen or fixteen years of age, when the mind, like the body, is not yet firm enough for laborious and clofe operations. If applied to fuch, it falls an early victim to premature exertion; exhibiting indeed at first, in these young and tender fubjects, the flattering appearance of their being men while they are yet children, but ending in reducing them to be children when they should be men. The memory is then moft fufceptible and tenacious of impreffions; and the learning of languages being chiefly a work of memory, it feems precifely fitted to the powers of this period, which is long enough too for acquiring the moft ufeful languages ancient and modern. I do not pretend that language is fcience. It is only an inftrument for the attainment of fcience. But that time is not loft which is employed in providing tools for future operation: more especially as in this cafe the books put into the hands of the youth for this purpose may be fuch as will at the fame time imprefs their minds with ufeful facts and good principles. If this period be fuffered to pass in idlenefs, the mind becomes lethargic and impotent, as would the body it inhabits if unexercifed during the fame time. The fympathy between body and mind during their rife, progrefs, and decline, is too ftrict and obvious to endanger our being milled while we reafon from the one to the other.-As foon as they are of fufficient age, it is fuppofed they will be fent on from the grammar fchools to the univerfity, which conftitutes our third and last stage, there to study those sciences which may be adapted to their views. By that part of our plan which prefcribes the felection of the youths of genius from among the claffes of the poor, we hope to avail the ftate of those talents which nature has fown as liberally among the poor as the rich, but which perish without ufe, if not fought for and cultivated. -But of all the views of this law, none is more important, none more legitimate, than that of rendering the people the fafe, as they are the ultimate, guardians of their own liberty. For this purpofe the reading in the firft ftage, where they will receive their whole education, is propofed, as has been faid, to be chiefly hiftorical. Hiftory, by apprifing them of the paft, will enable them to judge of the future; it will avail them of the experience of other times and other nations; it will qualify them as judges of the actions and defigns of men; it will enable them to know ambition under every disguise it may affume; and knowing it, to defeat its views. In every government on earth is fome trace of human weaknefs, fome germ of corruption and degeneracy, which cunning will difcover, and wickednefs infenfibly open, cultivate, and improve. Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves therefore are its only fafe depofitories. And to render even them fafe, their minds must be improved to a certain degree. This indeed is not all that is neceffary, though it be effentially neceffary. An amendment of our conftitution must here come in aid of the public education. The influence over government muft be shared among all the people. If every individual which compofes their mafs participates of the ultimate authority, the government will be fafe; because the corrupting the whole mafs will exceed any private refources of wealth and public ones cannot be provided but by levies on the people. In this cafe every man would have to pay

his own price. The government of Great Britain has been corrupted, because but one man in ten has a right to vote for members of parliament. The fellers of the government, therefore, get nine-tenths of their price clear. It has been thought that corruption is reftrained by confining the right of fuffrage to a few of the wealthier of the people but it would be more effectually reftrained by an extenfion of that right to fuch numbers as would bid defiance to the means of corruption.'

There is great good fenfe in this plan, and fuch an inftitution would be a fecurity againft educating dunces: the only objection to it is, that it operates inverfely to the propofed end, the diffu fion of political knowledge, where the influence over government must be shared among all the people.' For is it diffufion to rake annually a few from the RUBBISH? Even under political refinement we fee that the multitude are confidered, and are ftill to remain, as rubbish: and yet, if every individual which composes their mafs participates of the ultimate authority, the government will be fafe!' Befide, thofe difmiffed at the intermediate ftages, as undeferving farther inftruction, will be turned into life with half-formed minds working on crude 'notions; and if not made worse than the generality of the rubbish on this fide the ocean, by fpeculative efforts to make them better, will at moft only rank in the fame claffes. Turbulence has been remarked as incident to free ftates, but turbulence may not always indicate a well-poifed government.

Our Author has inforced the reasonableness of a general toleration in religion by many striking arguments; but we truft that fubject is now too well understood here, to render it neceffary for us to pay particular attention to what he urges; especially as he quotes one of our own writers on the subject.

The query as to the ftate of manufactures and commerce, receives the following poignant answer:

We never had an interior trade of any importance. Our exterior commerce has fuffered very much from the beginning of the - prefent conteft. During this time we have manufactured within our families the most neceffary articles of clothing. Those of cotton will bear fome comparison with the fame kinds of manufacture in Europe; but thofe of wool, flax, and hemp, are very coarfe, unfightly, and unpleafant and fuch is our attachment to agriculture, and fuch our preference for foreign manufactures, that be it wife or unwife, our people will certainly return as foon as they can, to the raising raw materials, and exchanging them for finer manufactures than they are able to execute themselves.

The political economifts of Europe have established it as a principle that every state should endeavour to manufacture for itself and this principle, like many others, we transfer to America, without calculating the difference of circumftance, which should often produce a difference of refult. In Europe the lands are either cultivated, or locked up against the cultivator. Manufacture must therefore be re

forted