On this page
-
Text (1)
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
tension may ; from any cause , be incbftvenient , has an undoubted rights not , indeed , to retain the volumes he has received , without applying for the rest , and thus to leave imperfect sets
in the hands of the Editor ; but to return those volumes , claiming from the Editor the return of tlie first subscription , and the price paid for each volume . To such equitable claims I shall pay an immediate attention .
As to others , who are sufficiently satisfied with the progress of the undertaking , or disposed to make allowance for unavoidable , delays , and have no other reason for ceasing to be subscribers , thfcy will , I hope , allow me toT urge upon their consideration , the
Teijr great inconvenience and embarrassments to which an Editor is unavoidably exposed , by not having an opportunity of receiving payment for the volumes as soon as they are printed . Those subscribers who are not already in correspondence with me , will , I
trust , immediately send their directions accordingly . I beg leave here to repeat my request to any of your readers , who can oblige me with any letters to or from Dr . Priestlev , or
any information which may assist me in arranging materials for the Life , illustrating the remainder of the works preparing for the press , or correcting any errors in the works already printed .
-I ought to apologize for occupying any of your pages with a subject so personal , and which can interest only a small proportion of your readers . To make the amends just now in my
power , I offer you a letter , which you will , I think , deem sufficiently interesting to be worthy of your preservation . I copied it , some time since , from the valuable papers of Dr . Birch , in the British Museum , arid have no
reason to suppose it was ever printed . At least he has not given it , where it might have been expected , in his Life of Boyle . Probably , when Dr . Birch published that Life in 1744 , the letter was not in his possession .
The writer , Lady Caroline Boyle , who married Viscount Ranelagh , is less distinguished as the wife or mother of a peer , than as the sister and friend of Robert Boyle , who , dedicating to I ^ ad y Ranelagh , under the name of Sopnronia , his 4 f Occasional Reflec-
Untitled Article
tions , " describes himself as attached to her " mores ujKtathedetiqvint of esteem and gratitude , than df nature itself . " Bishop Burnet , in hfs sermon on the Death of tbe great Philosopher ]
in 1691 , remarks , that " ma sister and he were pleasant in their litres , and in their deaths tfiey were not divided ; for as he had lived with her above forty years , so he did not outlive her above a week . " After
describing Lady Ranelagh as applying the influence of her rank and property to the most benevolent purposes , the Bishop appears to represent her as belonging to some sect of
Nonconformists , yet in the exercise of the most catholic spirit . " Though some particular opinions , " says he , " might shut her up in a divided communion , yet her soul was never of a party . She divided her charities and
friendships , both her esteem , as well as her bounty , with the truest regard to merit , and her own obligations , without any difference made upon the account of opinion . "
Of " Dr . Worsley , " mentioned by Lady Ranelagh , I can find no account . a Mr . Oldenburgh" is well known as the correspondent of JMr . Ray and the principal philosophers of his time . According to Dr . Birch , ( Life of Boyle ,
p . 114 , ) he was " a native of Bremen , ' * and " agent for th ^ t city in England . " He was appointed ¦ " Secretary to the Royal Society , and died suddenly in September 1677 , which ascertains the date of the letter . It appears that Mr . Boyle took the charge of Mr .
Oldenburgh ' s two orphans . " The Countess and our youths" were , I suppose , the daughter-in-law arid grandsons of Lady Ranelagh , who had been for some years a widow . " Mr . Wood /* concerning whom Dr . Evans inquires , ( XVIII . 690 , and of whom see XII . 385 , ) is mentioned
by Dr . Priestley in a note to the second of his Familiar betters , as " the Dissenting Minister at Chowbent , in Lancashire , " who , c < in the first Rebellion , took the field himself at the head of his congregation . " In Mr . H . Toulmin ' s Account of Mr . Mort ,
published in 1793 , pp . 4 — 9 , Dr . Evans will also find some interesting particulars 6 i Oeneral Woods , who was the son of an ejected minister , and died in 1759 . J . T . RUTT .
Untitled Article
28 Couftte&s of Rtinelagh's Letter to Mi * . Boyle .
-
-
Citation
-
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1824, page 28, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2520/page/28/
-