[692] _Massachusetts Mercury_, Aug. 28, 1798. In explanation of the delicacy and difficulty of such a task as Robison’s, Morse offered to his readers the following: “The schemes and views of Conspirators are often veiled in language and signs intelligible only to themselves; they correspond under fictitious names; their papers are sparingly multiplied, artfully detached, and most cautiously concealed.” (_Ibid._) The apologetic motive is evident.
[693] _Ibid._ With a “summary account” of the documents upon which Robison had relied in the composition of his book and of which Morse had no first-hand knowledge, and with an examination of the alleged differences between the accounts of the “conspiracy” by Robison and Barruel (_cf. ibid._, Aug. 31, 1798), Morse’s prolix discussion of the subject came to a close. During the time that his articles were in process of publication, “Censor” contributed a fresh article to the _Mercury_, admitting that his faith in the existence of the European Illuminati was growing, but still protesting that Robison was to be regarded as extremely blameworthy on account of the false and calumnious attacks that he had made on worthy private characters in his _Proofs_. _Cf._ the _Massachusetts Mercury_ of August 28 for this article by “Censor.” What degree of unmixed comfort this may have afforded Morse, we may guess.
[694] As yet Barruel’s _Memoirs of Jacobinism_ was known to Americans only in the literature of English reviews.
2. INCONCLUSIVE DEVELOPMENTS OF MORSE’S SECOND FORMAL DELIVERANCE
With the approach of the anniversary thanksgiving in Massachusetts, late in November, 1798, public discussion of the Illuminati broke out afresh. Once more the columns of the _Massachusetts Mercury_ became the chief medium of communication. Stirred, it appears, by the announcement from abroad that the first three volumes of the Abbé Barruel’s _Memoirs of Jacobinism_ had been translated into English, a contributor to the _Mercury_ took occasion to comment at length on the marvelous corroboratory evidence which that work was about to supply to the English reading public with respect to the great and terrible conspiracy which Professor Robison had laid bare.[695]