Memoirs of Dr Joseph Priestley, Written by Himself, to the Year 1795 ...

MEMOIRSOFWRITTEN BY HIMSELF.-..*. .l .*a-(1.) Having thought it right to leave behind me someaccount of my friend8 and benefactors, it is in a mannernecessary that 1 also give some account of my8eW; and asthe' like has been done by many persons, and for reasonswhich posterity has approved, I make no further apologyfor following their example. If my writings in generalhave been useful to my contemporaries, I hope that thisaccount of myself will not be without its use to those whomay come after me, and especially in promoting virtue andpiety, which, I hope I may say, it has been my care topractise myself, as it has been my business to inculcate themupon others.L(2.) My father, Jonas Priestley, was the youngest sonof Joseph Eestley, a maker and dresser of woollen cloth.His first wife, my mother, was the only child of JosephSwift, a farmer at Shafton, a village about six miles southeastof Wakefield. By this wife he had six children, foursons and two daughters. I, the oldest, was born on thethirteenth of March, old style, 1733, at Fieldhead, aboutsix miles south-west of Leeds, in Yorkshire. Ny motherB