-paid the following
tribute to his character and erudition:

His range in science was most extensive; he was familiar with the
whole circle of the accurate sciences.... Nothing can add to the
esteem which they [i.e. "those who were personally acquainted with
him"] felt for his talents and worth or to the respect in which
they now hold his memory.[5]

Nevertheless, the lies circulated against both Robison and Barruel were
not without effect. Thirteen years later we find another American, this
time a Freemason, confessing "with shame and grief and indignation" that
he had been carried away by "the flood of vituperation poured upon
Barruel and Robison during the past thirty years," that the title pages
of their works "were fearful to him," and that although "wishing calmly
and candidly to investigate the character of Freemasonry he refused for
months to open their books." Yet when in 1827 he read them for the first
time he was astonished to find that they showed "a manifest tendency
towards Freemasonry." Both Barruel and Robison, he now realized, were
"learned men, candid men, lovers of their country, who had a reverence
for truth and religion. They give the reasons for their opinions, they
quote their authorities, naming the author and page, like honest people;
they both had a wish to rescue British Masonry from the condemnation and
fellowship of continental Masonry and appear to be sincerely actuated by
the desire of doing good by giving their labours to the public."[6]

That the author was right here in his description of Barruel's attitude
to Freemasonry is shown by Barruel's own words on the subject:

England above all is full of those upright men, excellent citizens,
men of every kind and in every condition of life, who count it an
honour to be masons, and who are distinguished from other men only
by ties which seem to strengthen those of benevolence and fraternal
charity. It is not the fear of offending a nation amongst which I
have found a refuge which prompts me to make this exception.
Gratitude would prevail with me over all such terrors and I should
say in the midst of London: "England is lost, she will not escape
the French Revolution if the masonic lodges resemble those I have
to unveil. I would even say more: government and all Christianity
would long ago have been lost in England if one could suppose its
Freemasons to be