archdeacon of Winchester. These repeated favours were acknowledged by Lowth in terms of gratitude. On the 8th of July, 1754, the university of Oxford conferred upon him the degree of D.D. by diploma,— an honour for which he was probably indebted to his prelections on Hebrew poetry, then lately published. He had travelled with Lord George and Lord Frederick Cavendish; and in 1755, the duke of Devonshire being then lord-lieutenant of Ireland, Dr Lowth went to that kingdom as his grace's first chaplain. Scon after this appointment he was offered the bishopric of Limerick; but preferring a less dignified station in his own country, he exchanged it with Dr Leslie, prebendary of Durham and rector of Sedgefield. In November 1765 he was chosen F.R.S. In June 1766 he was, on the death of Dr Squire, preferred to the bishopric of St David's, which, in October following, he resigned for that of Oxford. In April 1777 he was translated to the see of London, vacant by the death of Bishop Terrick; and in 1783 he declined the offer of the primacy on the death of Archbishop Cornwallis. In Having been long afflicted with the stone, and having borne the severest sufferings of pain and sickness with the most exemplary fortitude and resignation, this great and good man died at Fulham on the 3d of November, 1787. On the 12th his remains were privately interred in a vault at Fulham church, near those of his predecessor. Lowth's literary character is of the very highest stamp. His Prelections on Hebrew Poetry' naturally attracted general attention, and the work was received with equal applause at home and abroad. these prelections the author exhibits himself to the greatest advantage, as a poet, a critic, and a divine; and such is the classic purity of his Latin style, that there is not in it a single phrase to which a critic of the Augustan age could have objected,-an excellence this which. neither Milton nor Johnson, nor indeed any other English writer of Latin ever attained, unless perhaps Atterbury and Buchanan be excepted. To the prelections was subjoined a short confutation of Bishop Hare's system of Hebrew metre; which occasioned a letter from Dr Edwards of Clare-hall to Dr Lowth, in vindication of Hare's theory. To this Lowth replied in a Larger Confutation,' in which Bishop Hare's system is completely overthrown, and the fallacy upon which it is built accurately investigated. 6 In 1758 he published The Life of William Wykeham, Bishop of Worcester,' with a dedication to Bishop Hoadly, which involved him in a dispute concerning the bishop's decision respecting the wardenship of Winchester college. This controversy was carried on with great ability on both sides. In 1762 Lowth published a Short Introduction to English Grammar,' which has gone through many editions. In 1765 he engaged with Bishop Warburton in a controversy which made much noise at the time, and attracted the notice even of royalty. Warburton had attacked some propositions advanced by Lowth in his 'Prælectiones.' In the opinion of Dr Johnson, Warburton had the most scholastic learning, and Lowth was the most correct scholar; but in their contests with each other, neither of them, he says, had much argument, and both were extremely abusive. We think the superiority of wit and argument in this contest was on the side of Lowth. The bishop of Gloucester having thrown out a sneer at the university of Oxford and the kind of education which his antagonist must there have received, Lowth retorted in the following terms: "Pray, my lord, what is it to the purpose where I have been brought up? To have made a proper use of the advantages of a good education is a just praise, but to have overcome the disadvantages of a bad one is a much greater. Had I not your lordship's example to justify me, I should think it a piece of extreme impertinence to inquire where you were bred, though one might possibly plead as an excuse for it, a natural curiosity to know where and how such a phenomenon was produced. It is commonly said that your lordship's education was of that particular kind, concerning which it is a remark of that great judge of men and manners, Lord Clarendon, that it peculiarly disposes men to be proud, insolent, and pragmatical. Colonel Harrison was the son of a butcher, and had been bred up in the place of a clerk to a lawyer, which kind of education introduces men into the language and practice of business; and if it be not resisted by the great ingenuity of the person, inclines young men to more pride than any other kind of breeding, and disposes them to be pragmatical and insolent.' Now, my lord, as you have in your whole behaviour, and in all your writings, remarkably distinguished yourself by your humility, meekness, good manners, good temper, moderation with regard to the opinions of others, and modest diffidence of your own, this unpromising circumstance of your education is so far from being a disgrace to you, that it highly redounds to your praise. But I am precluded from all claim to such merit; on the contrary, it is well for me if I can acquit myself of a charge that lies hard upon me, the burden of being responsible for the great advantages which I enjoyed. For, my lord, I was educated in the university of Oxford. I enjoyed all the advantages, public and private, which that famous seat of learning so largely affords. I spent many years in that illustrious society, in a well-regulated course of useful discipline and studies, and in the improving commerce of gentlemen and scholars, in a society where emulation without envy, ambition without jealousy, contention without animosity, excited industry and awakened genius; where a liberal pursuit of knowledge and a generous freedom of thought was raised, encouraged, and pushed forward by example, by commendation, and by authority. I breathed the same atmosphere that the Hookers, the Chillingworths, and the Lockes had breathed before,-who always treated their adversaries with civility and respect,―who made candour, moderation, and liberal judgment as much the rule and law as the subject of their discourse,-who did not amuse their readers with empty declamations, and fine-spun theories of toleration, while they were themselves agitated with a furious inquisitorial spirit, seizing every one they could lay hold on, for presuming to dissent from them in matters the most indifferent, and dragging them through the fiery ordeal of abusive controversy." In 1778 Lowth published his last great work, 'A Translation of Isaiah.' In this work, to his literary and theological abilities the translator joined an exquisitely critical knowledge of the character and spirit of Eastern poetry. Several occasional discourses of the bishop have been published; they are all worthy of their excellent author. 6 Of the bishop's poetical pieces none display greater merit than his 'Verses on the Genealogy of Christ,' and The Choice of Hercules,' both written in very early life. He wrote a spirited 'Imitation of an Ode of Horace,' applied to the alarming situation of this country in 1745, and some smaller poems. The following inscription on the tomb of his daughter has all the merit of the ancient epitaph, and affords a fine specimen of his lordship's Latinity : Cara, vale, ingenio præstans, pietate, pudore, Cara Maria, vale! At veniet felicius ævum, Learning and taste, however, did not constitute Bishop Lowth s highest excellence. His amiable manners rendered him an ornament to his high station, whilst they endeared him to all with whom he conversed. Of his modesty and gentleness we have the testimony of one whose decision will hardly be disputed: "It would answer no end," says his great antagonist, Warburton, "to tell you what I thought of the author of Hebrew Poetry' before I saw him. But this I may say, 6 I was never more surprised, when I dic see him, than to find him of such amiable and gentle manners,-of so modest, sensible, and disengaged a deportment." Lowth united, indeed, in an eminent degree, the qualities of the gentleman with those of the scholar; he conversed with elegance and wrote with accuracy. His piety had no tincture of moroseness; his charity, no leaven of ostentation. Francis Blackburne. BORN A. D. 1705.-DIED A. D. 1787. THIS celebrated polemic was born at Richmond, Yorkshire, in 1705. After a preparatory course of classical education in the neighbouring schools, he entered the university of Cambridge, 1722, as a pensioner of Catherine hall. He remained at the university five years, during which period he took his bachelor's degree, and at the expiration of which he was ordained a deacon in the church. He had already gained a high reputation for his attainments and devotedness to study; but, being disappointed in his expectation of a fellowship, by reason of the sentiments which he had openly avowed concerning church power and civil liberty, he left the university and lived nearly ten years in retirement with his uncle in Yorkshire. He had early acquired a fondness for the writings of Locke, Hoadly, and others of the same character, who were distinguished for the freedom and power with which they spoke of general toleration and religious liberty. The spirit which he thus imbibed gave a tone to his future character, and was the ground-work of that toleration and love of liberty which he ever after manifested. In the year 1739 he was settled as a clergyman in Richmond, his native place; and eleven years after, he was appointed archdeacon of Cleveland, by Hutton, archbishop of York. His residence was always at Richmond. On this occasion he is said to have entertained scruples against subscribing the thirtynine articles, which, however, were removed on his perusing Dr Clarke's Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity,' and half-a-sheet of arguments, in manuscript, from the pen of Dr Law. At no distant date from his first settlement he commenced his labours as an author, and, as would be natural to expect, was soon drawn into the field of controversy. A translation of Erasmus's preface to his paraphrase of Matthew was made at his request, and one of his first publications was a discourse prefixed to this translation. The tendency of this discourse was rather practical than controversial, and was chiefly designed as a preservative against the influence of popery, and an encouragement to study the scriptures. The two or three succeeding pieces which he published were chiefly aimed at the abuses of church power, faults of discipline, and errors of systematic forms of worship and faith. His next subject of controversy was the intermediate state of the soul. Bishop Law, in the appendix to his Theory of Religion,' had defended the doctrine of the unconscious being of the soul between death and the resurrection. This appendix was attacked with vehemence. Blackburne defended it, and attempted to show, that the scriptures afford no proof of an intermediate state of happiness or misery. The controversy was protracted, and Blackburne came forward several times to meet the arguments of his opponents. In the progress of the discussion, he published remarks on certain passages in Warburton's Divine Legation,' and on the account given by that writer of the opinions of the Jews concerning the soul. He at last wrote a historical view of the whole controversy. 6 But the work which has gained him greater celebrity than any other is 'The Confessional; or a full and free Inquiry into the Right, Utility, Edification, and Success of establishing systematical Confessions of Faith and Doctrine in Protestant Churches.' This was published in 1766, and passed through three editions in four years. Its object is well-expressed in the title. This work was the beginning of a controversy which sent many publications into the world, and did not terminate for several years. The following is the language of the author in his preface to the second edition: "The favourable reception which 'The Confessional' hath met with from the public, though it will not be admitted as an argument of the merit of the book, is undeniably an argument of something of much more consequence. It is an argument that the love of religious liberty is still warm and vigorous in the hearts of a considerable number of the good people of England, notwithstanding the desponding apprehensions of some good men, that these stiflers had well nigh succeeded in their unrighteous attempt. 'The Confessional' hath likewise had the good fortune to make another valuable discovery, namely, that encroachments on religious liberty in protestant communities, by whatever specious pretences they are introduced, can never be defended upon protestant principles." About the same time that 'The Confessional' was published a vacancy happened in the congregation of dissenters at the Old Jewry, London, by the death of their pastor, Dr Chandler. From the sentiments which Blackburne was known to entertain, it was thought by some persons that he might be induced to leave the established church and accept an invitation to take charge of this society. The proposal was encouraged by some of the friends of the archdeacon, and he was consulted; but he declined the offer. Blackburne's opposition to the established church, and his continuance in it, have been considered an anomaly not easily to be explained. He died on the 7th of August, 1787, in the eighty third year of his age. His works were collected and published by his son in seven volumes. Bishop Law. BORN A. D. 1703.-DIED A. D. 1787. THIS prelate was born in the parish of Cartmel, Lancashire, in 1703. His father, who was a clergyman, held a small chapel in that neighbourhood, but the family had been situated at Askham in the county of Westmoreland. He was educated for some time at Cartmel school, afterwards at the free grammar-school at Kendal; from which he went, very well-instructed in the learning of grammar-schools, to St John's, Cambridge. He took his bachelor's degree in 1723, and soon after was elected fellow of Christ's college in that university, where he took his master's degree in 1727. 6 During his residence here, he became known to the public by a translation of Archbishop King's Essay upon the Origin of Evil,' with copious notes; in which many metaphysical subjects, curious and interesting in their own nature, are treated of with great ingenuity, learning, and novelty. To this work was prefixed, under the name of a 'Preliminary Dissertation,' a very valuable piece written by Mr Gay of Sidney college. Our bishop always spoke of this gentleman in terms of the greatest respect. "In the Bible, and in the writings of Locke, no man," he used to say, was so well-versed." Mr Law also, whilst at Christ's college, undertook and went through a very laborious part, in preparing for the press an edition of Stephens's Thesaurus.' His acquaintance, during his first residence in the university, was principally with Dr Waterland, the learned master of Magdalen college; Dr Jortin, a name known to every scholar; and Dr Taylor, the editor of Demosthenes. 66 In 1737 he was presented by the university to the living of Graystock, in the county of Cumberland, a rectory of about £300 a-year. The advowson of this benefice belonged to the family of Howards of Graystock, but devolved to the university for this turn, by virtue of an act of parliament which transfers to these two bodies the nomination to such benefices as appertain, at the time of the vacancy, to the patronage of a Roman catholic. The right, however, of the university was contested, and it was not until after a lawsuit of two years' continuance, that Mr Law was settled in his living. Soon after this he married Mary, the daughter of John Christian, Esq. of Unerigg, in the county of Cumberland. In 1743 he was promoted by Sir George Fleming, bishop of Carlisle, to the archdeaconry of that diocese; and in 1746 went from Graystock to settle at Salkeld, a pleasant village upon the banks of the river Eden, the rectory of which is annexed to the archdeaconry. But he was not one of those who lose and forget themselves in the country. During his residence at Salkeld, he published 'Considerations on the Theory of Religion;' to which were subjoined 'Re |