Mr. Eaton.—Paine’s Age of Reason. [III]

—What I have now to communicate under this head gives me singular mortification.—In my last I announced, that the Rector of Botley had authorized me to promise, in his name, an answer to the work, which the Attorney General (Gibbs) declared to be calculated to produce “consequences DREADFUL in the EXTREME.” But, since the publication of my last Register, the Rector has informed me, that he will not write an answer, lest by its being published at Mr. Eaton’s shop, he, the Rector, should “contribute to the MERCENARY views of the CONVICTED vender thereof.”—I will leave the English reader (and I am sure I safely may) to form his opinion of the language in which this excuse is conveyed; but, as to the excuse itself, it must not and shall not, serve the purpose for which it manifestly appears to be intended; for, if the Rector will write an answer to the book in question, I will pay all the expenses of printing and publication; it shall be published at whatever bookseller’s in London the Rector may choose; that bookseller shall keep the account of receipts and outgoings; if there be any loss upon the publication, I will sustain it; and, if any gain, it shall be given to build a cottage, or to buy a fat hog, for any poor man in the parish of Botley whom the Rector himself may name.—I wait for his reply.