KIRWAN. 361 profess from the pulpit his reasons for renouncing the doctrines of the Romish church, those expectations were never realised; and the reverend orator never was known, publicly at least, to vindicate the motives of his conversion to the Protestant faith, by condemning the principles of that he had relinquished; for he carefully avoided polemi cal discussion, and confined himself to the pure principles of christian charity. Whatever were the ultimate views of the reverend orator, a circumstance, but little known to the public during his subsequent career of celebrity in the established church, seems to have mainly led to his con version, and to have accelerated a purpose which perhaps he might not otherwise have had the courage to realise, under the moral certainty of a permanent hostility with his family and connexions. To the suite of the Neapolitan ambassador, to whom Mr. Kirwan was chaplain, the celebrated Signor Lunardi, of aeronautical fame, was attached as a page; and this gentleman, who was the first in this country that ventured to ascend in a balloon, and, like another Columbus, traverse those regions before unexplored by human ken, attracted at that moment much popular notice in London. For, notwithstanding the frequent experiments of this kind which had been recently made in France by Montgolfier, and other aeronauts, the English public, yet incredulous on the subject, regarded it as an event at open war with the laws of gravitation; and therefore considered it a mere French hoax, and totally impossible. But Lunardi, who was a man of no philosophical knowledge, had the courage to make the attempt in a balloon prepared for the purpose by a Monsieur Noble, a foreigner resident in London. He took his aérial flight with great firmness from the Artillery Ground, near Moor Fields, not without some risk, if he failed, of being sacrificed by the mob, whose curiosity had been twice before disappointed by other adventurers. He rapidly ascended to the higher regions of the atmosphere—entered a cloud, and vanished from a l l earthly view; and, after a n aerial voyage o f six
