[By William Cobbett. Published in The Anti-Jacobin Review and Magazine; or Monthly Political and Literary Censor: from July to December, 1798. Vol. i., pp. 725–8.—Ed.]

In the name of Fun, Amen. I Peter Porcupine, Pamphleteer and Newsmonger, being (as yet) sound both in body and in mind, do, this fifteenth day of April, in the Year of our Lord, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-seven, make, declare, and publish, this my Last Will and Testament, in manner, form, and substance following; to wit:

In Primis,

I leave my body to Doctor Michael Lieb, a member of the Legislature of Pennsylvania, to be by him dissected (if he knows how to do it) in presence of the Rump of the Democratic Society. In it they will find a heart that held them in abhorrence, that never palpitated at their threats, and that, to its last beat, bade them defiance. But my chief motive for making this bequest is, that my spirit may look down with contempt on their cannibal-like triumph over a breathless corpse.

Item. As I make no doubt that the above said Doctor Lieb (and some other Doctors that I could mention) would like very well to skin me, I request that they, or one of them may do it, and that the said Lieb’s father may tan my skin; after which I desire my Executors to have seven copies of my Works complete, bound in it, one copy to be presented to the Five Sultans of France, one to each of their Divans, one to the Governor of Pennsylvania, to Citizens Maddison, Giles, and Gallatin one each, and the remaining one to the Democratic Society of Philadelphia, to be carefully preserved among their archives.

Item. To the Mayor, Aldermen, and Councils of the City of Philadelphia, I bequeath all the sturdy young hucksters, who infest the market, and who to maintain their bastards, tax the honest inhabitants many thousand pounds annually. I request them to take them into their worshipful keeping; to chasten their bodies for the good of their souls; and moreover to keep a sharp look-out after their gallants; and remind the latter of the old proverb: Touch pot, touch penny.

Item. To T—— J——son, Philosopher, I leave a curious Norway Spider, with a hundred legs and nine pair of eyes; likewise the first black cut-throat general he can catch hold of, to be flead alive, in order to determine with more certainty the real cause of the dark colour of his skin; and should the said T—— J——son survive Banneker the Almanack Maker; I request he will get the brains of said Philomath carefully dissected, to satisfy the world in what respects they differ from those of a white man.

Item. To the Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, I will and bequeath a correct copy of Thornton’s plan for abolishing the use of the English language, and for introducing in its stead a republican one, the representative characters of which bear a strong resemblance to pot-hooks and hangers; and for the discovery of which plan, the said society did, in the year 1793, grant to the said language maker 500 dollars premium. It is my earnest desire, that the copy of this valuable performance, which I hereby present, may be shown to all the travelling literati, as a proof of the ingenuity of the author and of the wisdom of the society.

Item. To Doctor Benjamin Rush, I will and bequeath a copy of The Censor for January, 1797; but, upon the express condition, that he does not in anywise or guise, either at the time of my death, or Six months after, pretend to speak, write, or publish an eulogium on me, my calling or character, either literary, military, civil, or political.

Item. To my dear fellow labourer Noah Webster, “gentleman-citizen,” Esq. and News-man, I will and bequeath a prognosticating barometer of curious construction and great utility, by which, at a single glance, the said Noah will be able to discern the exact state that the public mind will be in in the ensuing year, and will thereby be enabled to trim by degrees and not expose himself to detection, as he now does by his sudden lee-shore tacks. I likewise bequeath to the said “gentleman-citizen,” six Spanish milled dollars, to be expended on a new plate of his portrait at the head of his spelling book, that which graces it at present being so ugly that it scares the children from their lessons; but this legacy is to be paid him only upon condition that he leave out the title of ’Squire, at the bottom of said picture, which is extremely odious in an American school-book, and must inevitably tend to corrupt the political principles of the republican babies that behold it. And I do most earnestly desire, exhort and conjure the said ’Squire news-man, to change the title of his paper, The Minerva, for that of The Political Centaur.

Item. To F. A. Mughlenburg, Esq., Speaker of a late house of Representatives of the United States, I leave a most superbly finished statue of Janus.

Item. To Tom the Tinker, I leave a liberty-cap, a tricoloured cockade, a wheel-barrow full of oysters, and a hogshead of grog: I also leave him three blank checks on the bank of Pennsylvania, leaving to him the task of filling them up; requesting him, however, to be rather more merciful than he has shown himself heretofore.

Item. To the Governor of Pennsylvania, and to the late President and Cashier of the Bank of the said State, as to joint Legatees, I will and bequeath that good old proverb: Honesty is the best policy. And this legacy I have chosen for these worthy gentlemen, as the only thing about which I am sure they will never disagree.

Item. To T—— Coxe, of Philadelphia, citizen, I will and bequeath a crown of hemlock, as a recompense for his attempt to throw an odium on the administration of General Washington; and I most positively enjoin my Executors, to see that the said crown be shaped exactly like that which this spindle-shanked legatee wore before Gen. Howe, when he made his triumphal entry into Philadelphia.

Item. To Thomas Lord Bradford (otherwise called Goosy Tom), Bookseller, Printer, News-man, and member of the Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, I will and bequeath a copy of the peerage of Great Britain, in order that the said Lord Thomas may the more exactly ascertain what probability there is of his succeeding to the seat, which his noble relation now fills in the House of Lords.

Item. To all and singular the authors in the United States, whether they write verse or prose, I will and bequeath a copy of my Life and Adventures; and I advise the said authors to study with particular care the 40th and 41st pages thereof; more especially and above all things, I exhort and conjure them never to publish it together, though the bookseller should be a saint.

Item. To Edmund Randolph, Esq., late Secretary of State, to Mr. J. A. Dallas, Secretary of the State of Pennsylvania, and to His Excellency, Thomas Miffin, Governor of the said unfortunate State, I will and bequeath, to each of them, a copy of the sixteenth paragraph of Fauchet’s intercepted letter.

Item. To Citizen John Swanwick, member of Congress, by the will and consent of the sovereign people, I leave bills of Exchange on London to an enormous amount; they are all protested, indeed, but if properly managed, may be turned to good account. I likewise bequeath to the said John a small treatise by an Italian author, wherein the secret of pleasing the ladies is developed, and reduced to a mere mechanical operation, without the least dependence on the precarious aid of the passions. Hoping that these instances of my liberality will produce, in the mind of the little legislature, effects quite different from those produced therein by the King of Great Britain’s pension to his parents.

Item. To the Editors of the Boston Chronicle, the New York Argus, and the Philadelphia Merchants’ Advertiser, I will and bequeath one ounce of modesty and love of truth, to be equally divided between them.

I should have been more liberal in this bequest, were I not well assured, that one ounce is more than they will ever make use of.

Item. To Franklin Bache, Editor of the Aurora of Philadelphia, I will and bequeath a small bundle of French assignats, which I brought with me from the country of equality. If these should be too light in value for his pressing exigencies, I desire my executors, or any one of them, to bestow on him a second part to what he has lately received in Southwark: and as a further proof of my good will and affection, I request him to accept of a gag and a brand new pair of fetters, which, if he should refuse, I will and bequeath him in lieu thereof—my malediction.

Item. To my beloved countrymen, the people of Old England, I will and bequeath a copy of Doctor Priestley’s Charity Sermon for the benefit of poor Emigrants; and to the said preaching philosopher himself, I bequeath a heart full of disappointment, grief, and despair.

Item. To the good people of France, who remain attached to their sovereign, particularly to those among whom I was hospitably received, I bequeath each a good strong dagger: hoping most sincerely that they may yet find courage enough to carry them to the hearts of their abominable tyrants.

Item. To Citizen M——oe, I will and bequeath my chamber looking-glass. It is a plain but exceeding true mirror; in it he will see the exact likeness of a traitor, who has bartered the honour and interest of his country to a perfidious and savage enemy.

Item. To the Republican Britons, who have fled from the hands of justice in their own country, and who are a scandal, a nuisance, and a disgrace to this, I bequeath hunger and nakedness, scorn and reproach; and I do hereby positively enjoin on my executors to contribute five hundred dollars towards the erection of gallowses and gibbets, for the accommodation of the said imported patriots, when the legislators of this unhappy state shall have the wisdom to countenance such useful establishments.

Item. My friend, J. T. Callender, the runaway from Scotland, is, of course, a partaker in the last mentioned legacy; but as a particular mark of my attention, I will and bequeath him twenty feet of pine plank, which I request my executors to see made into a pillory, to be kept for his particular use, till a gibbet can be prepared.

Item. To Tom Paine, the author of Common Sense, Rights of Man, Age of Reason, and a Letter to General Washington, I bequeath a strong hempen collar, as the only legacy I can think of that is worthy of him as well as best adapted to render his death in some measure as infamous as his life: and I do hereby direct and order my Executors to send it to him by the first safe conveyance with my compliments, and request that he would make use of it without delay, that the national razor may not be disgraced by the head of such a monster.

Item. To the gaunt outlandish orator, vulgarly called the Political Sinner, who in the just order of things follows next after the last mentioned legatee, I bequeath the honour of partaking in his catastrophe; that in their deaths, as well as in their lives, all the world may exclaim: “See how rogues hang together”.

Item. To all and singular the good people of these States, I leave peace, union, abundance, happiness, untarnished honour, and an unconquerable everlasting hatred to the French Revolutionists and their destructive abominable principles.

Item. To each of my Subscribers I leave a quill, hoping that in their hands it may become a sword against every thing that is hostile to the government and independence of their country.

Lastly. To my three brothers, Paul, Simon, and Dick, I leave my whole estate, as well real as personal (first paying the foregoing legacies) to be equally divided between them, share and share alike. And I do hereby make and constitute my said three brothers the Executors of this my LAST WILL; to see the same performed, according to its true intent and meaning, as far as in their power lies.