Joseph Priestley: Other

“I hope that this account of myself will not be without its use to those who may come after me, and especially in promoting virtue and piety, which, I hope I may say, it has been my care to practise myself, as it has been my business to inculcate them upon others.”

Joseph Priestley

Memoirs of the Rev. Dr. Joseph Priestly (1809). p. 1
Context: Having thought it right to leave behind me some account of my friends and benefactors, it is in a manner necessary that I also give some account of myself; and as the like has been done by many persons, and for reasons which posterity has approved, I make no further apology for following their example. If my writings in general have been useful to my contemporaries, I hope that this account of myself will not be without its use to those who may come after me, and especially in promoting virtue and piety, which, I hope I may say, it has been my care to practise myself, as it has been my business to inculcate them upon others.

Hope , Business

“As I conceive this doctrine to be a gross misrepresentation of the character and moral government of God, and to affect many other articles in the scheme of Christianity, greatly disfiguring and depraving it; I shall show, in a fuller manner than I mean to do with respect to any other corruption of Christianity, that it has no countenance whatever in reason, or the Scriptures; and, therefore, that the whole doctrine of atonement, with every modification of it, has been a departure from the primitive and genuine doctrine of Christianity.”

Joseph Priestley book An History of the Corruptions of Christianity

On conventional doctrines of Jesus Christ's atonement for sins, in Part II : Opinions Relating to the Doctrine of Atonement, Introduction
An History of the Corruptions of Christianity (1782)

God , Departure

“It is known to all persons who are conversant in experimental philosophy, that there are many little attentions and precautions necessary to be observed in the conducting of experiments, which cannot well be described in words, but which it is needless to describe, since practice will necessarily suggest them; though, like all other arts in which the hands and fingers are made use of, it is only much practice that can enable a person to go through complex experiments, of this or any kind, with ease and readiness.”

Joseph Priestley

Experiments and Observations of Different Kinds of Air (1775)

Art , Personality

“From the fame opinion of a soul distinct from the body came the practice of praying, first for the dead, and then to them with a long train of other absurd opinions, and superstitious practices.”

Joseph Priestley book An History of the Corruptions of Christianity

General Conclusions, Part I : Containing Considerations addressed to Unbelievers and especially to Mr. Gibbon
An History of the Corruptions of Christianity (1782)

Soul , Training , Dead

“All hereditary Government is in its nature tyranny. An heritable crown, or an heritable throne, or by what other fanciful name such things may be called, have no other significant explanation than that mankind are heritable property. To inherit a Government, is to inherit the people, as if they were flocks and herds.”

Joseph Priestley

The Rights of Man (1791)

People , Nature

“It is sufficiently evident from many circumstances, that the doctrine of the divinity of Christ did not establish itself without much opposition, especially from the unlearned among the Christians, who thought that it savoured of Polytheism, that it was introduced by those who had had a philosophical education, and was by degrees adopted by others, on account of its covering the great offence of the cross, by exalting the personal dignity of our Saviour.”

Joseph Priestley book An History of the Corruptions of Christianity

Part I : The History of Opinions Relating to Jesus Christ, § IV : Of the Difficulty with which the Doctrine of the Divinity of Christ was Established.
An History of the Corruptions of Christianity (1782)

Education , Christ , Personality

“Contemporary with Vitellio and Peccam was… Roger Bacon, a man of almost universal genius, and who wrote on almost every branch of science. He frequently quotes Alhazen on the subject of optics, and seems to have carefully studied his writings, as well as those of other Arabians, which were the fountains of natural knowledge in those days, and which had been introduced into Europe by means of the Moors in Spain. Notwithstanding the pains this great man took with the subject of opticks, it does not appear that, with respect to theory, he made any considerable advance upon what Alhazen had done before him.”

Joseph Priestley

Period I To the Revival of Letters in Erope
The History and Present State of Discoveries Relating to Vision, Light, and Colours (1772)

Pain , Quotes , Nature , Knowledge

“It is hardly possible not to suspect the truth of this doctrine of atonement, when we consider that the general maxims to which it may be reduced, are nowhere laid down, or asserted, in the Scriptures, but others quite contrary to them.”

Joseph Priestley book An History of the Corruptions of Christianity

Part II : Opinions Relating to the Doctrine of Atonement, § I : That Christ did not die to make satisfaction for the sins of men.
An History of the Corruptions of Christianity (1782)

Truth

“I married a daughter of Mr. Isaac Wilkinson, an ironmaster, near Wrexham, in Wales, with whose family I had become acquainted, in consequence of having the youngest son, William, at my school at Nantwich. This proved a very suitable and happy connexion, my wife being a woman of an excellent understanding, much improved by reading, of great fortitude and strength of mind, and of a temper in the highest degree affectionate and generous; feeling strongly for others, and little for herself. Also, greatly excelling in every thing relating to household affairs, she entirely relieved me of all concern of that kind, which allowed me to give all my time to the prosecution of my studies, and the other duties of my station.”

Joseph Priestley

Memoirs of the Rev. Dr. Joseph Priestly (1809), p. 41

School , Family , Feeling , Understanding