I love to consider an Infidel, whether distinguished by the title of deist, atheist, or free-thinker, by three different lights, in his solitude, his afflictions, and his last moments.... [In these situations such people show themselves] in solitude, incapable or rapture or elevation,... in distress, [with] a halter or a pistol the only refuge [they] can fly to,... [and liable to conversion] at the approach of death.

The Tatler; Or, Lucubrations of Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq (ed. 1709)