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LA BELLE ASSEMBLÉE;

For SEPTEMBER, 1814.

A New and Improved Series.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF ILLUSTRIOUS AND

DISTINGUISHED CHARACTERS.

The Sixty-Second Number.

JOANNA SOUTHCOTT.

THAT mysteries, far above the complete comprehension of human reason, are the foundation of our holy religion, is admitted by all; but it does not follow, that reason, though it may believe what it does not understand, is yet to yield implicit credence to-mysteries that are in direct opposition to common sense!

To illustrate our position, let us look at some of the simplest miracles of our blessed Redeemer, and we shall find, that though beyond the ordinary course of nature, still they were not in opposition to the manifest evidence of the senses, the only real medium through which reason can acquire the means of forming a correct judgment of facts, and of drawing inferences from them. At the wedding of Cana, Christ turned water into wine, a miracle which nature only performs by a long process in the vine; he, evidently by divine power, did that, in a moment, and without the natural means, which every day's experience shews us can be done; and, therefore, the history of the miracle, as related by the inspired evangelists, does not outrage our understandings, nor give offence to a wise man, though some fools and self-called philosophers have pretended to deny it;-but, if Matthew, Mark, and the other New Testament writers had told us that Christ packed up all the wine jars into one of the smallest drinking vessels, then indeed common sense would have said, "The thing is absurd and impossible." Again, we are told that Christ fed five thousand people with five loaves, there his divine power

may have miraculously created additional food during the progress of the miracle itself;-but if we had been told that he made five men eat five thousand loaves, then indeed common sense would again have been outraged, and the relation would have been disbelieved.

This we look upon as a pretty good test for the truth of modern prophets; for if their predictions will not stand the assay of this crucible, it must be unnecessary to examine into any proofs which may be adduced in favour of divine missions: and this much we have premised, before entering on the miraculous life of the far-famed Joanna Southcott, whose portrait, if it does not embellish our present Number, will, at least, serve to gratify the curiosity of our fair readers, all of whom must have heard, of late, so many wonderful, and, we are sorry to see, so many indelicate, stories about this heavenly upholsterer, who seems a fitter candidate for a late impostor's 66 celestial bed," or indeed, rather for a bed of straw, than for that share of public notice which her own folly, and the greater folly of her followers, have procured for her,

We shall not so far insult the good sense of our readers as to attempt to refute the absurdities which, in the following pages, it will be our duty, as faithful biographers, to relate; as we trust that the test of miracles, which we have already specified, will be quite sufficient to check any belief in her doctrines, or rather in her impudence, for doctrines she has none, though so many of the ignorant and enthu

siastic self-dubbed teachers of the immense, population of the metropolis, pretend to believe in the divine origin of her mission.

It was in the very middle of the last century that this holy virgin (as she states herself to be, notwithstanding all the chitchat and scandal about her and the learned Doctor, the learned Carpenter, and several others of her faithful servants), first opened her eyes upon a world who, at that time, little thought of the blessing in store for them, and inhabiting the cottage of two poor, but simple country folks, William and Hannah Southcott, then living by means of their daily industry in farming work; two honest souls, who read their Bibles and went to church, whither they also carried the young Joanna, for the first time, on the 6th of June, 1750.

This was in the parish of Ottery St. Mary's, in Devonshire: but, though the circumstance of her baptism is recorded in the parish registers, yet we find no account of any extraordinary rejoicings on that occasion;-an omission, however, supplied by Joanna herself, who has since assured us, that the angels had a merry-making upon that occasion!

We know nothing of her younger days, and must suppose that she did as others do whose fate confines them to a cottage; but as she is now a jolly old woman, we may well suppose that she was then a buxom young one, so that there was nothing miraculous in her having a sweetheart at the age of sixteen.

other remarkable events in her younger days, they can scarcely be expected, at least she has not chosen to favour the world with any of them, though her friends say she was very religious. This, indeed, according to their ideas, may be very true, for Devonshire was, at that time, overrun with fanatical preachers, a class so well ridiculed in the Spiritual Quixote, the reverend writer of which actually lays his scene not far from Joanna's immediate neighbourhood.

From that period until she was “fair, fat, and forty," we have nothing to record of her; but in the year 1790, she was employed in the city of Exeter by a holy upholsterer, who kept a shop in that capital of the west, and in which situation many ungodly tales have been told of her. We will not extend the scandal, but merely record that the pious visitors of her master soon began to notice her heavenly gifts, as her serious turn of mind gave them hopes of a convert, little expecting that she would so soon set up for herself. Conferences now ensued, and Joanna wrestled, in the spirit, with those holy men; but she seems even then, to have had the gift of tongues, so that she soon silenced them, and began to fancy herself a greater woman than she had ever done before, whilst she endeavoured to enhance her importance in the eyes of the ignorant, by dreams, which she stated to come from the Deity, assuring her of her being inspired beyond the ordinary course of human knowledge.

It was at this period that she found her The youth who thus felt the force of her seal, of which so much has lately been said, heavenly charms, was a deserving lad in and of which we shall present our readers the vicinity, Noah Bishop by name; and, in with a fac-simile. It seems she was occutruth, a name most ominous to him, for to all pied one morning in an apostolic mission of his pleadings she merely answered "No-ah! sweeping out the shop, when she discover. Ah-no!" and thus left the swain to sighed the seal, with the initials of I. C.in solitude. Yet she loved him, she confesses; and, in fact, she has been raving about Bishops ever since; but whether from any hopes of finding her dear Noah on the bench, we shall not pretend to say, though we are firmly of opinion, that he was as well qualified for the lawn sleeves at twenty, as she is to be a virgin at sixtyfive!

Whim, or caprice, which she now calls a love of celibacy, seems to have induced her to neglect his attentions; and as for any

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Now some uninspired folks might have thought of advertising such a thing, particularly if it was a golden one; but then our heroine, as she said, had dreamed a dream, and therefore it was a miracle! Some accounts state that the initials on the seal were J. S.; but we presume that is a fact of very little consequence, except as far as it might have led the right owner to a recovery of his property.

The seal of this impostor, of which we here present a fac-simile :

R. & A. Ne...

IC

"The Sealed of the Lord the Elect precious

Mans Redemption to Inherit thee

Free of Life

To be made Heers of God-and Joint Hairs

with Jesus Christy Joanna southcosp

April 8th 1806

the vengeance of Heaven. It appears from her own story, that she had no directions to perform this holy work gratis, as Heaven sends all its other blessings; but then she was directed, secretly and unconditionally, to seal his present Majesty,-God bless him! and keep him from such Doctors!

seems to be nothing more nor less than a religious Valentine, only it is not sent gratis, nor post paid; for these dispensations of the benevolence of the Lord are nothing without a little touch of the lucre of Mammon, like the prescriptions of the physician for his own use, which never answered except when he touched his own She now began to preach and prophecy, palm with a guinea. Every candidate for and soon found it a better trade than atthis passport to salvation, is obliged to sign tending in the shop; and even as early as his name on a prepared list, like an address 1791, she told a long story to her disciples to Heaven, as signifying his wish that of her being to be tried by the twelve Satan may be destroyed, or forced to re-judges, who were also to sentence her; but

sign should he find himself in a minority; after which one of the ready made documents is filled up with the applicant's name, and a notification that it is not to be broken open: all which, Joanna says, she was ordered to do from Heaven, being told by the spirit of the dreadful judgments that were coming upon earth, and being much concerned for those that must fall a prey to

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as no time was fixed for its fulfilment, perhaps she may yet expect it to come to pass.

The year 1792 was, however, a busy year with her, for then she publicly opened her commission, declaring herself to be the woman spoken of in the Revelations, as "The bride, the Lamb's wife, and the wo man clothed with the sun!" Some of her

Exeter friends were not amongst the chosen, and accordingly they thought she was gone mad; and she herself made so much noise about her mission, that she was followed by all the boys and idle people, which the elect dignified with the name of persecution.

Nay, she even went so far as to write to the Dean and Chapter; who very justly concluded that an ignorant woman, unable to write plain English, could not be inspired by any spirit, unless it was that one which is too vulgar to be mentioned by name in the biography of an agent from heaven.

She now stated herself to be strangely visited night and day, concerning what was coming upon the whole earth; and she was, according to her own account, ordered to set it down in writing, which she | obeyed, though not without strong external opposition; but what the external opposition was, she does not explain.

Strange indeed must her visitors have been, if the Lord promised to enter into an everlasting covenant with her, and then sent her a vision sometimes in the shape of a cat, and then of a cup, which she kicked to pieces, which afforded her great uneasiness, as the methodist preachers plainly told her that the devil was in her, and that Satan was amusing himself with her ignorance and superstition.

Yet it appears that some of the methodist clergy thought her a chosen vessel, as they actually held a meeting at her request, in order to ascertain the heavenly or infernal nature of her mission. We know not what arguments she made use of with this learned assembly, but as great stress has been laid upon it by her followers, we shall look at the thing plainly and fairly.

The meeting was closed by drawing up the following document :

am clear in whom I have believed, that all my writings came from the spirit of the most high God.-JOANNA SOUTHCOTT. "Signed in the presence of fifty-eight per•

sons, including the methodist preachers, who assented to the truth of the statement."

Now to what did those people give their testimony?-Not to the truth of her doc trines; but merely to her own assertion, that she was clearly convinced; but it did not follow that they were convinced also!

And why was she convinced? because it was impossible !-But how did she know that? or what have we, or what had the witnesses, to convince us that mysteries had been brought round by divine agency? In short, the whole piece is nothing but the production of a silly mad woman, attested by people as silly, and some of them, per haps more roguish than herself.

She talks indeed of the truth of her prophe cies; but in that very year she prophecied that she would live only seventeen years longer, so that if there had been any truth in her prophecy she has lived just five years too long; and as little attention need we pay to her prophecies in the same year, of corn getting dear, and of England being in distress: as well might every man who hazards an opinion in politics pretend to the gift of soothsaying.

Joanna, however, was determined to write down these prophecies, but her sister would not permit her; soon after, she says, that she took advantage of her absence and wrote of what has since followed in this nation and all others; "but the end is not yet:"-no, indeed, the end is not yet, most certainly, for the world is not at an end, nor does there seem any end to her prophecies, which, however, she takes care never to give to the world until the foretold events have been previously fulfilled.

"I, Joanna Southcott, am clearly con- In this year, 1792, she appears to vinced that my calling is of God, and my have been very troublesome to the clerwritings are iudited by his spirit" (wegy, particularly to the Reverend Mr. wish not to be profane, but we really think || L▬▬, who, indeed, was little more of a that the Deity would have chosen a better amanuensis)." It is impossible for any spirit but an allwise God, that is wondrous in working, wondrous in wisdom, wondrous in power, and wondrous in truth, could have brought round such mysteries, so full of truth, as is in my writings; so I

prophet than Joanna herself, for he told her that the war would be over in half a year; he also assured her that it all came from the devil; adding, that he believed her to be a good woman, particularly as her friends spoke of her in the highest terms; but as for the Lord revealing any thing to

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She boasts that in 1793, three remarkable things happened, which she prophecied in the preceding year, which events strengthened her judgment, as she says, respecting the divine origin of her mission, applying to herself, with that facility which all enthusiasts possess, the words which are to be found in scripture respecting a very different kind of personage" What ever I put into thy mouth, I will do upon the earth."

Not satisfied with the opinion of the Reverend Mr. L, respecting her notions, Joanna went to St. Peter's cathedral,

In 1795, she again wrote to Mr. Ltelling him that danger was still before us; and that the truth of her prophecies in 1792 was to be proved by twelve men. To this Mr. L wrote back, that he thought the wisest way would be to collect those twelve wise men of the west together on the Monday following; but in the interim Joanna had many communications from heaven, and she says she was told that this was agreed to in order to convince her of her folly, so she was bid to go to him; and, according to her account, the Lord said something to her in rhyme, or rather in measure, which, for the badness of the poetry, and some other reasons, might almost be supposed the production of some of our own modern poets, particularly as there was something almost prophetic in the first three lines :

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"But, Oh thrice happy is the man,
"That doth begin, and will go on,

"Till every curtain be drawn back," &c.

This rhyme of man and go on, would in

west country deity who had inspired this she apostle; who in a few days afterwards was favoured with another piece of bad poetry, in which man and done were obliged to serve each other the same office as in the former couplet.

in Exeter, where she heard another clergy-deed lead us to suppose that it was some man preach from a well known text, of "walking in the light, lest darkness should come." This seemed a new light for the apostoless, for such we suppose we must call her; and no sooner was the sermon over than her heavenly spirit gave her a nudge, and said, “If L― give it up, go to the preacher, for he will not, as the laws of the Lord are written in his heart."

Yet this manifestation of the spirit was no more fulfilled than another old woman's prophecy in 1794, of corn getting dear, a prophecy which any person indeed could have made, when they saw the little probability of a good harvest: all this, however, was of little consequence to Joanna, whose followers were now increasing rapidly, all her friends supplying her with money and valuable presents, so that her living was now as good as if she had been ordained a regular member of the church.

We know not precisely her various modes of collecting her tythes; but we understand that the Pope sells his indulgences at a much cheaper rate than she did her beatitudes, even at that early period of her ministry, as they were sold, if not by her, at least by her agents, from twelve shillings to one guinea, according to the state of the faith and the state of the pockets of each customer.

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The Lord told her also to visit Mr. L-; which she did; and after detailing her reasons of belief, which Mr. Land his wife, and all the company, listened to with silent attention, the honest clergyman, no doubt seeing the futility of reasoning with her, plainly told her that if her words were from God, more of their truth would be soon known; but, if of herself, her head was wiser than his.

Next week Mr. L, after the receipt of some more divine poetry, too absurd and too ridiculous for insertion here, informed the prophetess that he had given up all further examination of her gift and mission; so that having nothing further to hope from the Establishment, she thought proper to try her hand with the Dissenters; and was ordered by the Lord to get together six of them to try their judg

ment.

She confesses that four of them refused to attend, as they either thought that the devil was in her, or that she was both knave

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