ABSTRACT
All observation on the personal character of a writer, when his conduct is not of a public nature, is of dangerous example; and, when it leads to blame, is severely reprehensible. But it is common justice to say, that there are few instances of more respectable conduct among writers, than is apparent in the subsequent works of Mr. Godwin. He calmly corrected what appeared to him to be his own mistakes; and he proved the perfect disinterestedness of his corrections, by adhering to opinions as obnoxious to the powerful as those which he relinquished. Untempted by the success of his scholars in paying their court to the dispensers of favour, Godwin adhered to the old and rational principles of liberty, violently shaken as these venerable principles had been, by the tempest which had beaten down the neighbouring erections of anarchy.
