d in two
letters, signed Irenaeus, was published in the _Gazetteer_. Bentham's
next performance was remarkable in the same sense. Among the few friends
who drifted to his chambers was John Lind (1737-1781), who had been a
clergyman, and after acting as tutor to a prince in Poland, had returned
to London and become a writer for the press. He had business relations
with the elder Bentham, and the younger Bentham was to some extent his
collaborator in a pamphlet[223] which defended the conduct of ministers
to the American colonies. Bentham observes that he was prejudiced
against the Americans by the badness of their arguments, and thought
from the first, as he continued to think, that the Declaration of
Independence was a hodge-podge of confusion and absurdity, in which the
thing to be proved is all along taken for granted.[224] Two other
friendships were formed by Bentham about this time: one with James
Trail, an unsuccessful barrister, who owed a seat in Parliament and
some minor offices to Lord Hertford, and is said by Romilly to have been
a man of great talent; and one with George Wilson, afterwards a leader
of the Norfolk circuit, who had become known to him through a common
interest in Dr. Fordyce's lectures upon chemistry. Wilson became a bosom
friend, and was one of Bentham's first disciples, though they were
ultimately alienated.[225]

At this time, Bentham says, that his was 'truly a miserable life.'[226]
Yet he was getting to work upon his grand project. He tells his father
on 1st October 1776 that he is writing his _Critical Elements of
Jurisprudence_, the book of which a part was afterwards published as the
_Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation_.[227] In the
same year he published his first important work, the _Fragment on
Government_. The year was in many ways memorable. The Declaration of
Independence marked the opening of a new political era. Adam Smith's
_Wealth of Nations_ and Gibbon's _Decline and Fall_ formed landmarks in
speculation and in history; and Bentham's volume, though it made no such
impression, announced a serious attempt to apply scientific methods to
problems of legislation. The preface contained the first declaration of
his famous formula which was applied to the confutation of Blackstone.
Bentham was apparently roused to this effort by recollections of the
Oxford lectures. The _Commentaries_ contained a certain quantity of
philosophical rhetoric; and as Blackstone was