mmon kind. If
I hold out till I have finished what I have now on hand, I shall
retire from the scene, satisfied and thankful.

This was written in August, and the Doctor stuck bravely to his literary
labors. A few months later he wrote Lindsey,--

I really do not expect to survive you.

Yet, he also entertained the thought that he might,--

assist in the publication of a whole Bible, from the several
translations of particular books, smoothing and correcting them
where I can.

January of 1804 brought him many interesting, splendid and valuable
books from friends in London. He was overjoyed on their arrival.
Promptly he gave himself to their perusal because his deafness confined
him to home and his extreme weakness forbade any excursions. Then the
winter kept him from his laboratory, and his sole occupation was reading
and writing. He entertained a variety of plans, proceeding with some
but in the midst of these tasks of love--in the very act of correcting
proof, he quietly breathed his last! It was Monday, February 6, 1804,
that Thomas Cooper, the devoted friend of Priestley, wrote Benjamin
Rush:--

Dear Sir:

Mr. Joseph Priestley is not at present in spirits to write to his
friends, and it falls to my lot therefore to acquaint you that Dr.
Priestley died this morning about 11 o'clock without the slightest
degree of apparent pain. He had for some time previous foreseen
his dissolution, but he kept up to the last his habitual
composure, cheerfulness and kindness. He would have been 71 the
24th of next month. For about a fortnight there were symptoms of
dropsy owing to general debility: about two days before his death,
these symptoms disappeared, and a troublesome cough came on
perhaps from a translation to the chest.

Yesterday he had strength enough to look over a revise of the
_Annotations_ he was publishing on the Old and New Testament, and
this morning he dictated in good language some notices which he
wished his son Mr. Priestley to add to his unpublished works. I
am sure you will sincerely regret the decease of a man so highly
eminent and useful in the literary and philosophical world, and so
much presumably your friend.

Yes, the valiant old champion of a lost cause was no more. Two days
before his death "he went to his laboratory"--but, finding his weakness
too great, w