1794

Thomas Beddoes to Davies Giddy, [[after 17] November 1794]

To Davies Giddy Esq

I begin to think of the pneumatic Instⁿ scheme Ca Ira – You I suppose have had a Birmingham newspaper the first in which any subscriptions have been advertised, & you have seen a formidable group of doctors & philosophers. Tho^s Wedgwood writes that he & his fathers and brothers intend subscribing 50 pounds each, & that they will spare neither pains nor expence in promoting the design. The reasons for prosecuting <y^e> investigations (which I think must have been allowed to be strong enough already) every day increase – that is to say, disorders, heretofore incurable, are either palliated or cured under the pneumatic treatment & therefore probably by it – In several cases of gutta serena & other affections of the sight, very unexpected relief has [xxxx] been obtained; also in bad ulcers, by breathing oxygene. Under so much encouragement, it is surely right to make exertions to put this practice on its very best footing.

Do not you think, the quondam patriot, William Pitt, almost done for? If there was an opposition of any credit or strength, he c^d not stay in office two months – He has been the dependant on chance a long time, but it seems now as if chance c^d not befriend him – What an history his administration will make! But do you think we may even, who have witnessed the incapacity & dishonest versatility both of North & Pitt, may not be duped by a 3rd political hypocrite? We seem to have knuckled to the Americans – It is too contemptible a farce, either for dissension or laughter this present administration of our affairs.

T. B.

To — —

While every man, that holds state-corruption in the abhorrence it deserves & values a free but unoffending range of thought & action as the source of national happiness, is rejoicing at your hon^ble acquittal, we who have always professed these sentiments cannot refuse ourselves the satisfaction of congratulating you on so happy an event. – You were surrounded by snares not less formidable than those which in the most melancholy days of humanity have entangled innocence & merit – you were threatened by a mass, miscalled evidence, which if it c^d not convince, was well-calculated to confound, the arbiters of your fate. – You had fallen upon times when the violence of a sanguinary faction in a foreign country had rendered the very name of reformation odious here; & when even the men who receive the unrighteous wages of political corruption prostitution seemed to have become as dear to Englishmen as the Martyrs of freedom were to our predecessors – and yet you have not been overwhelmed –

Above all, we congratulate you on your escape from the dangerous malice of a political adventurer, who began in craft & was proceeding in cruelty; who, like the French Robespierre, having gained ascendancy by feigning to be the advocate of popular rights, adopted a new system of artifice & sought the blood of the associates of his former councils; who had he, like Robespierre, succeeded in securing his authority by terror, w^d have held all good men in a state of silent [xxxx] dejection & who by bribing the corrupt & deluding the weak, has reduced his confiding country to the extremity of danger, while a wise statesman by the powerful influence of his station might have maintained Europe in peace & Britain in prosperity –

You have escaped, yet your satisfaction is incompleat. An innocent victim had fallen, & amid the acclamation of thousands your imagination must have mixed the melancholy tones of the funeral bell. But we forbear the expressions of our regret, since we can add nothing to alleviate that domestic calamity, which casts a cloud of sadness over your signal deliverance.

MS: Cornish Archives MS DG 42/4