of the sulphurous matter concealed beneath. All that time had passed
in the contemplation of church preferment, with the aerial perspective
lighted by a visionary mitre. But Henley grew indignant at his
disappointments, and suddenly resolved to reform "the gross impostures
and faults that have long prevailed in the received _institutions_ and
_establishments_ of _knowledge_ and _religion_"--simply meaning that
he wished to pull down the _Church_ and the _University_!

But he was prudent before he was patriotic; he at first grafted
himself on Whiston, adopting his opinions, and sent some queries by
which it appears that Henley, previous to breaking with the church,
was anxious to learn the power it had to punish him. The Arian Whiston
was himself, from pure motives, suffering expulsion from Cambridge,
for refusing his subscription to the Athanasian Creed; he was a pious
man, and no buffoon, but a little crazed. Whiston afterwards
discovered the character of his correspondent, he then requested the
Bishop of London.

"To summon Mr. Henley, the orator, whose vile history I knew so well,
to come and tell it to the church. But the bishop said he could do
nothing; since which time Mr. Henley has gone on for about twenty
years without control every week, as an ecclesiastical mountebank, to
abuse religion."

The most extraordinary project was now formed by Henley; he was to
teach mankind universal knowledge from his lectures, and primitive
Christianity from his sermons. He took apartments in Newport market,
and opened his "Oratory." He declared,

"He would teach more in one year than schools and universities did in
five, and write and study twelve hours a-day, and yet appear as
untouched by the yoke, as if he never bore it."

In his "Idea of what is intended to be taught in the _Week-days'
Universal Academy_," we may admire the fertility, and sometimes the
grandeur of his views. His lectures and orations[49] are of a very
different nature from what they are imagined to be; literary topics
are treated with perspicuity and with erudition, and there is
something original in the manner. They were, no doubt, larded and
stuffed with many high-seasoned jokes, which Henley did not send to
the printer.

Henley was a charlatan and a knave; but in all his charlatanerie and
his knavery he indulged the reveries of genius; many of which have
been realised since; and, if we continue to laugh at Henley, it will
indeed be cruel, for we