Chapter IV: Part 4

In reviewing the whole controversy at a distance of more than half a century, with, we must admit, a strong bias in Thirlwall’s favour, it is impossible not to admit that he had made a mistake. In all questions of college management it is most important that the authorities should appear, at any rate, to be unanimous; and the words ‘my imprudence,’ which occur in the passage quoted above from his letter to Whewell, indicate that by that time he had begun to take the same view himself. It is easy to see how he had been drawn into an opposite course. He had never considered that he had anything to do with the chapel discipline; he had agreed to attend himself, but he did not consider that such attendance implied approval of the system. His own attendance, as we learn from a contemporary, was something more than formal; he was rarely absent, morning or evening; and his behaviour was remarkable for reverence and devotion. With him, religion had nothing to do with discipline; and it was infinitely shocking to his pure and thoughtful mind to defile things heavenly with things earthly. The far too rigorous rules of attendance which were then in force had exasperated the undergraduates, and their behaviour, without being absolutely profane, was careless and irreverent. Talking was very prevalent, especially on surplice nights, when the service is choral. Thirlwall probably knew, from the friendly intercourse which he maintained with the younger members of the College, what their feelings were, and determined to do his best to get a system altered which produced such disastrous results. It must be remembered that at that time the Act of Uniformity prevented any shortening of the service. Whewell’s mind was a very different one. Without being a bigot, he had a profound respect for the existing order of things; shut his eyes to any defects it might have, even when they were pointed out to him; and regarded attempts to subvert it, or even to weaken it, as acts of profanity.

It will be readily conceived that these events rendered Cambridge no pleasant place of residence for Thirlwall, deprived of his occupation as a teacher and unsupported by any particularly strong force of liberal opinion in the University. Yet he had the courage to make the experiment of continuing to live in college. He went abroad for the Long Vacation of 1834, and returned at the beginning of the October term. In a few weeks, however, the course of his life was changed by an unexpected event. Lord Melbourne’s first Ministry broke up, and just as Lord Chancellor Brougham was regretting that Sedgwick and Thirlwall were the only clergymen who had deserved well of the Liberal party for whom he had been unable to provide, came the news of the death of a gentleman who was both canon of Norwich and rector of Kirby Underdale, a valuable but very secluded living in Yorkshire. He at once offered the canonry to Sedgwick and the rectory to Thirlwall. Both offers were accepted, we believe, without hesitation; and both appointments, though evidently made without regard to the special fitness of the persons selected, were thoroughly successful. Sedgwick threw himself into the duties of a cathedral dignitary with characteristic vigour; and Thirlwall, whose only experience of parochial work had been at Over, in Cambridgeshire, a small village without a parsonage, of which he was vicar for a few months in 1829, became a zealous and popular parish priest. We are told that ‘the recollection still survives of regular services with full and attentive congregations, including incomers from neighbouring villages; of the frequent visits to the village school; of the extempore prayers with his flock, of which the larger number were Dissenters; of the assiduous attentions to the sick and poor.’ And his old friend Hare, writing to Whewell in 1840, describes his work in his parish as ‘perfect,’ and holds up his example as ‘an encouragement’ to his correspondent to go and do likewise[56].

Thirlwall did not revisit Cambridge until 1842, when he stayed in Trinity College for two days during the installation of the Duke of Northumberland as Chancellor. Such an occasion, however, does not give much opportunity for judging of the real state of the University. He paid a similar visit in 1847, when Prince Albert was installed. After this he did not see Cambridge again until the spring of 1869, when he stayed at Trinity Lodge with his old friend Dr Thompson, and on Whitsunday, May 16, preached before the University in Great S. Mary’s Church. He has himself recorded that he was never so much pleased with the place since he went up as a freshman, and has given an amusing description of a leisurely stroll round the backs of the colleges and through part of the town[57], which, he might have added, he insisted upon taking without a companion. Those who conversed with him on that occasion remember that he was much struck by the changes which had taken place in the University since he had left it; and that he observed with pleasure the increased numbers of the undergraduates, and the movement and activity which seemed to reign everywhere.

It was at Kirby Underdale that Thirlwall wrote the greater part of the work on which his reputation as a scholar and a man of letters will chiefly rest—his _History of Greece_—of which the first volume had been published before he finally left Cambridge[58]. It is, perhaps, fortunate for the world that he had bound himself to produce the volumes at regular intervals[59], and that his editor, Dr Dionysius Lardner (whom he used to call ‘Dionysius the Tyrant’), was not a man to grant delays; for, had the conditions been easier, parochial cares and new interests might have retarded the production of it indefinitely, or even stopped it altogether. From the first Thirlwall had applied himself to the work with strenuous and unremitting energy. At Cambridge he used to work all day until half-past three o’clock in the afternoon, when he might be seen leaving his rooms for a half-hour’s rapid walk before dinner in Hall, then served at four o’clock; and in the country he is said to have spent sixteen hours of the twenty-four in his study. We do not know what was the original design of the work, as part of the _Cabinet Cyclopædia_, but we have it on Thirlwall’s own authority that it was ‘much narrower than that which it actually reached[60],’ and before long it was further expanded into eight goodly octavos. The first of these was scarcely in the hands of the public when Grote’s _History of Greece_, published, like its predecessor, volume by volume, began to make its appearance. It was mentioned above that Grote and Thirlwall had been school-fellows; but, though they met not unfrequently in London afterwards, Thirlwall knew so little of his friend’s intentions that he had been heard to say, ‘Grote is the man who ought to write the History of Greece.’ When it did appear, he at once welcomed it with enthusiasm. ‘High as my expectations were of it,’ he writes to Dr Schmitz, ‘it has very much surpassed them all, and affords an earnest of something which has never been done for the subject either in our own or any other literature[61]’; and to Grote himself, when the publication of four volumes had enabled him to form a maturer judgment, he not only used stronger words of praise, but contrasted it with his own History in terms which for generosity and sincerity can never be surpassed. After alluding to ‘the great inferiority’ of his ‘own performance,’ he concludes as follows: ‘I may well be satisfied with that measure of temporary success and usefulness which has attended it, and can unfeignedly rejoice that it will, for all highest purposes, be so superseded[62].’ It would be beside our present purpose to attempt a comparison of the relative merits of these two works, which, by a curious coincidence, had been elaborated simultaneously. They have many points of resemblance. Both originated in a desire to apply to the history of Greece those principles of criticism which Niebuhr had applied so successfully to the history of Rome; both were intended to counteract the misrepresentations of Mitford; both were the result of long and careful preparation. Grote has a decided advantage in point of style; he writes vigorous, ‘newspaper’ English, as might be expected from a successful pamphleteer; while Thirlwall’s periods are laboured and somewhat wooden. Grote has infused animation into his work by being always a partisan. We do not mean that he wilfully misrepresents facts; he certainly does not; but he unconsciously finds ‘extenuating circumstances’ for those with whom he sympathizes, and condemns remorselessly those whose springs of action are alien to his own. Thirlwall, on the contrary, holds the judicial balance with a firm hand. In estimating character his serene intellect is never warped by partisanship, or by a wish to present old facts under a new face; while from his scholarship and critical power there is no appeal.

After a residence of five years at Kirby Underdale Thirlwall was unexpectedly made Bishop of S. David’s by Lord Melbourne. Lord Houghton, an intimate friend of both the Bishop and the Minister, has recorded that Lord Melbourne was in the habit not merely of reading, but of severely judging and criticising the writings of every divine whom he thought of promoting. By some accident the translation of Schleiermacher’s essay had fallen in his way soon after it appeared; he had formed a high opinion of Thirlwall’s share in the work, and so far back as 1837 had done his best to send the author to Norwich instead of Dr Stanley. On this occasion the bishops whom the Minister consulted regarded the orthodoxy of the views sustained in the essay as questionable, and Thirlwall’s promotion was deferred. In 1840, however, Lord Melbourne got his way, and the bishopric of S. David’s was offered in due form to the Rector of Kirby Underdale. His first impulse was to refuse; but his friends persuaded him to go to London, and at least have an interview with Lord Melbourne. We do not vouch for the literal accuracy of the following scene, but it is too amusing not to be related. The time is the forenoon; the place, Lord Melbourne’s bedroom. He is supposed to be in bed, surrounded by letters and newspapers. On Thirlwall’s entrance he delivers the following allocution:

‘Very glad to see you; sit down, sit down. Hope you are come to say you accept? I only wish you to understand that I don’t intend, if I know it, to make a heterodox bishop. I don’t like heterodox bishops. As men they may be very good anywhere else, but I think they have no business on the bench. I take great interest,’ he continued, ‘in theological questions, and I have read a good deal of those old fellows,’ pointing to a pile of folio editions of the Fathers. ‘They are excellent reading, and very amusing. Some time or other we must have a talk about them. I sent your edition of Schleiermacher to Lambeth, and asked the Primate (Howley) to tell me candidly what he thought of it; and look, here are his notes in the margin. Pretty copious, you see. He does not concur in all your opinions, but he says there is nothing heterodox in your book. Had he objected I would not have appointed you[63].’

We should like to know how Thirlwall answered this strange defender of the faith; but tradition is silent on the point. Before leaving, however, the offer was accepted; and, with as little delay as possible, the Bishop removed to his diocese and entered upon his duties.

Thirlwall’s life as a bishop did not differ much, at least in its outward surroundings, from his life as a parish clergyman. The palace at S. David’s having been allowed to fall to ruin, the Bishop is compelled to live at Abergwili, a small village near Carmarthen, distant nearly fifty miles from his cathedral. Most persons would have regretted the isolation of such a position, but to Thirlwall the enforced solitude of Abergwili was thoroughly congenial. There he could read, as he delighted to do, ‘literally from morning till night.’ Except in summer time he rarely quitted ‘Chaos,’ as he called his library, where books lined the walls and shared with papers and letters the tables, chairs, and floor. It is curious that a man with so orderly a mind should have had such disorderly habits. His letters are full of references to lost papers; and when offers to arrange his drawers were made he would answer regretfully, ‘I can find nothing in them now, but if they were set to rights for me I should certainly find nothing then.’ Books accompanied him to his meals; and when he went out for a walk or a drive he read steadily most of the time. He does not seem to have had any favourite authors; he read eagerly new books in all languages and on all subjects. We believe that he took no notes of what he read; but his singularly powerful memory enabled him to seize all that he wanted, and, as may be seen from the collection of his writings which is now before us, to retain it until required for use. His charges, essays, and serious correspondence reveal his mastery of theological literature, both past and present; the charming _Letters to a Friend_ give us very pleasant glimpses of the gentler side of his character. We find from them that he took a keen interest in the general literature of England and the Continent, whether in philosophy, science, history, biography, fiction, poetry; and, as he and his young correspondent exchanged their sentiments without restraint, we can enjoy to the full his criticisms, now serious, now playful, on authors and their productions, his generous appreciation of all that is noble in life or art. We must find room for one passage on George Eliot’s last story, written in 1872, when he was seventy-five years old.

‘I suppose you cannot have read _Middlemarch_, as you say nothing about it. It stands quite alone. As one only just moistens one’s lips with an exquisite liqueur to keep the taste as long as possible in one’s mouth, I never read more than a single chapter of _Middlemarch_ in the evening, dreading to come to the last, when I must wait two months for a renewal of the pleasure. The depth of humour has certainly never been surpassed in English literature. If there is ever a shade too much learning that is Lewes’s fault[64].’

But there was another reason for his enjoyment of Abergwili. Student as he was, he delighted in the sights, the sounds, the air of the country. He never left it for his annual migration to London without regret, partly because it was so troublesome to move the mass of books without which he could not bear to leave home, but still more because the bustle and dust of London annoyed him; and in the midst of congenial society, and the enjoyment of music and pictures, his thoughts reverted with longing regret to his trees, his flowers, and his domestic pets. He had begun his social relations with dogs and cats in Yorkshire, and an amusing story is told of the way in which the preparations for his formal reception when he came home after accepting the bishopric of S. David’s, were completely disconcerted by the riotous welcome of his dogs, who jumped on his shoulders and excluded all human attentions[65]. At Abergwili he extended his affections to birds, and kept peacocks, pheasants, canaries, swans, and tame geese, which he regularly fed every morning, no matter what the weather might be. They treated him with easy familiarity, for they used to seize his coattails with their beaks to show their welcome. His flowers had to yield to the tastes of his four-footed friends. One day his gardener complained, ‘What am I to do, my Lord? The hares have eaten your carnations.’ ‘Plant more carnations,’ was his only reply. Fine summer weather would draw him out of ‘Chaos’ into the field or garden; and one of his letters gives a delicious picture of his enjoyment of a certain June, sitting on the grass while the haymakers were at work in the field beyond, reading _The Earthly Paradise_, and watching the movements of ‘a dear horse’ who paced up and down with a ‘system of hay rakes behind him to toss it about and accelerate its maturity[66].’

It must not, however, be supposed that Bishop Thirlwall lived the life of an indolent man of letters. No bishop ever performed the duties of his position more thoroughly, or with greater sacrifice of personal ease and comfort. His first care was to learn Welsh, and in a little more than a year he could read prayers and preach in that language. In his large and little-known diocese locomotion was not easy, and accommodation was often hard to obtain. Yet he visited every part of it, personally inspected the condition of the schools and churches (deplorable enough in 1840), and regularly performed the duties of confirmation, preaching, and visitation. In the charge of 1866 he reviewed the improvements which had been accomplished up to that time, and could mention 183 churches to the restoration of which the Church Building Society had made grants, and more than thirty parishes in which either new or restored churches were in progress. Besides these, there were some which had been restored by private munificence; others, including the cathedral, by public subscription; many parsonages had been built, livings had been augmented, and education had been largely increased[67]. To all these excellent objects he had himself been a munificent contributor, and we believe that between the beginning and the end of his episcopate he had spent nearly £40,000 in charities of various kinds[68]. Yet with all these claims on the gratitude of the clergy we are sorry to have to admit that he was not personally popular. It would have been more wonderful perhaps had he been so. The Welsh clergy forty years ago were a rough and uncultivated body of men, narrow-minded and prejudiced, and with habits hardly more civilized than those of the labourers around them. They were ill at ease with an English man of letters. He was to them an object of curiosity, possibly of dread. The new Bishop intimated his wish that the clergy should come to his house without restraint, and when there should be treated as gentlemen and equals. This was of itself an innovation. In his predecessor’s time when a clergyman called at Abergwili he entered by the back door, and if he stayed to dinner he took that meal in the housekeeper’s room with the upper servants. Thirlwall abolished these customs, and entertained the clergy at his own table. This was excellent in intention, but impossible in practice. The difference in tastes, feelings, manners, between the entertainer and the entertained made social intercourse equally disagreeable to both parties; and the Bishop felt obliged to substitute correspondence for visits, so far as he could, reserving personal intercourse for the archdeacons, or those clergymen whose education enabled them to appreciate his friendship[69]. Again, the peculiar tone of his mind must be remembered. He was nothing if not critical; and, further, as one of his oldest friends once said in our hearing, ‘he was the most thoroughly veracious man I ever knew.’ He could not listen to a hasty, ill-considered, remark without taking it to pieces, and demonstrating, by successive questions, put in a slow, deliberate tone of voice, the fallacy of the separate parts of the proposition, and, by consequence, of the whole. Hence he was feared and respected rather than beloved; and those who ought to have been proud of having such a man among them wreaked their small spite against him by accusing him of being inhospitable, of walking out attended by a dog trained to know and bite a curate, and the like. These slanders, of which we hope he was unconscious, he could not answer; those who attacked him in public he could and did crush with an accuracy of exposition, and a power of sarcasm, for which it would be hard to find a parallel. We need only refer to his answers to Sir Benjamin Hall, M.P. for Marylebone, on the general question of the condition of the churches in his diocese, appended to his charge for 1851, and on the special case of the Collegiate Church of Brecon, in two letters to the Archbishop of Canterbury; or to the _Letter to the Rev. Rowland Williams_, published in 1860. Mr Williams had published some sermons, entitled _Rational Godliness_, the supposed heterodoxy of which had alarmed the clergy of his diocese, seventy of whom had signed a memorial to the Bishop, praying him to take some notice of the book; in other words, to remove the author from the college at Lampeter, of which he was vice-principal. The Bishop had declined to interfere, and in his charge of 1857 had discussed the question at length, considering it, as was his manner, from all points of view, and, while he found much to blame, defending the author’s intentions, on the ground of the high opinion of his personal character which he himself held. This, however, did not satisfy Mr Williams. We cannot help suspecting that he was longing for a martyr’s crown; and, indignant at not having obtained one, he addressed the Bishop at great length in what he called _An Earnestly Respectful Letter on the Difficulty of bringing Theological Questions to an Issue_. He described the charge as ‘a miracle of cleverness,’ but deplored its indefiniteness; he drew a picture of ‘a preacher in our wild mountains’ who came to seek counsel from his bishop and got only evasive answers—‘in all helps for our guidance Abergwili may equal Delphi in wisdom, but also in ambiguity[70]’—and entreated the Bishop to declare plainly his own opinion on the questions raised. For once Bishop Thirlwall’s serenity was fairly ruffled. Stung by the ingratitude of a man whom he had steadily befriended, and whose aim was, as he thought, to draw him into admissions damaging to himself, he struck with all his might and main, and, as was said at the time, ‘you may hear every bone in his adversary’s body cracking.’ One specimen of the remarkable power of his reply must suffice. On the comparison of himself to the Delphic oracle he remarked:

‘Even if I had laid claim to oracular wisdom I should have thought this complaint rather unreasonable; for the oracle at Delphi, though it pretended to divine infallibility, was used to wait for a question before it gave a response. But I wish above all things to be sure as to the person with whom I have to do. I remember to have read of one who went to the oracle at Delphi, “ex industriâ factus ad imitationem stultitiæ”; and I cannot help suspecting that I have before me one who has put on a similar disguise. The voice does not sound to me like that of a “mountain clergyman”; while I look at the roll I seem to recognize a very different and well-known hand. The “difficulties” are very unlike the expression of an embarrassment which has been really felt, but might have been invented in the hope of creating one. They are quite worthy of the mastery which you have attained in the art of putting questions, so as most effectually to prevent the possibility of an answer[71].’

But if Thirlwall’s great merits were not fully appreciated in his own diocese, there was no lack of recognition of them in the Church at large. His seclusion at Abergwili largely increased his influence. It was known that he thought out questions for himself, without consulting his episcopal brethren or his friends, and without being influenced in any way, as even the most conscientious men must be, in despite of themselves, by the opinions which they hear expressed in society. Hence his utterances came to be accepted as the decisions of a judge; of one who, standing on an eminence, could take ‘an oversight of the whole field of ecclesiastical events[72],’ and from that commanding position could distinguish what was of permanent importance from that which possessed a merely controversial interest as a vexed question of the day. We have spoken of the advantages which he derived from his secluded life; it must be admitted that it had also certain disadvantages. The freshness and originality of his opinions, the judicial tone of his independent decisions, gave them a permanent value; but his want of knowledge of the opinions of those from whom he could not wholly dissociate himself, and, we may add, his indifference to them, caused him to be not unfrequently misunderstood, and to be charged with holding views not far removed from heresy. ‘I will not call him an unbeliever, but a misbeliever,’ said a very orthodox bishop, whose love of epigram occasionally got the better of his charity. His brother bishops, like the Welsh clergy, feared him more than they loved him; they knew his value as an ally, but they knew also that he would never, under any circumstances, become a partisan, or adopt a view which he could not wholly approve, merely because it seemed good to his Order to exhibit unanimity. It was probably for this reason, as much as for his eloquence and power, that he had the ear of the House of Lords on the rare occasions when he addressed it. The Peers knew that they were listening to a man who had the fullest sense of the responsibilities of the episcopate, but who would neither defend nor oppose a measure because ‘the proprieties’ indicated the side on which a bishop would be expected to vote. Two only of his speeches are republished in the collection before us—on the Civil Disabilities of the Jews (1848), and on the Disestablishment of the Irish Church (1869). We should like to have had added to these that on the grant to the Roman Catholic College of Maynooth (1845), which seems to us to be equally worth preserving. On these occasions Bishop Thirlwall took the unpopular side at periods of great excitement; his arguments were listened to with the utmost attention; and in the case of the Irish Church it has been stated that no speech had a greater effect in favour of the measure than his.

In all Church matters he was a thorough Liberal. His view of the Church of England cannot be better stated than by quoting a passage from one of his _Letters to a Friend_. He had been reading Mr Robertson’s sermons; and after saying that their author was specially recommended to him by the hostility of the _Record_, ‘which I consider as a proof of some excellence in every one who is its object,’ he thus proceeds:

‘He was certainly not orthodox after the _Record_ standard, but might very well be so after another. For our Church has the advantage—such I deem it—of more than one type of orthodoxy: that of the High Church, grounded on one aspect of its formularies; that of the Low Church, grounded on another aspect; and that of the Broad Church, striving to take in both, but in its own way. Each has a right to a standing-place, none to exclusive possession of the field. Of course this is very unsatisfactory to the bigots of each party—at the two extremes. Some would be glad to cast the others out; and some yearn after a Living Source of Orthodoxy, of course on the condition that it sanctions their own views. To have escaped that worst of evils ought, I think, to console every rational Churchman for whatever he finds amiss at home.’[73]

Had the Bishop added that he wished each of these parties to have fair play, but that none should be exalted at the expense of the others, we should have had a summary of the principles which regulated his public life. Let it not, however, be supposed that he was an indifferent looker-on. He held that truth had many sides; that it might be viewed in different ways by persons standing in different positions; but still it was to him clear, and definite, and based upon a rock which no human assailant could shake. This, we think, is the keynote which is struck in every one of those eleven most remarkable Charges which are now for the first time collected together. We would earnestly commend them to the study of all who are interested in the history of the Church of England during the period which they cover. Every controversy which agitated her, every measure which affected her welfare, is discussed by a master; the real question at issue is carefully pointed out; the trivial is distinguished from the important; moderation and charity are insisted upon; angry passions are allayed; and, while the liberty of the individual is perpetually asserted, the duty of maintaining her doctrines is strenuously inculcated. As illustrations of some of these characteristics we would contrast his exhaustive analysis of the Tractarian movement or the Gorham controversy, with his conduct respecting _Essays and Reviews_. In the former cases he hesitated to condemn; he preferred to allay the terror with which his clergy were evidently inspired. In the latter, though always ‘decidedly opposed to any attempt to narrow the freedom which the law allows to every clergyman of the Church of England in the expression of his opinion on theological subjects,’ he joined his brother bishops in signing the famous ‘Encyclical,’ which we now know was the composition of Bishop Wilberforce, because he thought that in this case the principles advocated led to a negation of Christianity.

Thirlwall’s position towards theological questions has been called ‘indefinable[74].’ In a certain sense this statement is no doubt true. It was quite impossible to label him as of this or that party or faction; or to predict with any approach to certainty what he would do or say on any particular occasion. He had no enthusiasm (in the ordinary sense of the word) and no sentiment, and therefore, when a question was submitted to him, he did not decide it in the light of previous prejudices, or welcome it as a point gained towards some cherished end. He considered it as if it were the only question in the world at that moment, and as if he had never heard of it, or anything like it, before; he looked all round it, and balanced the arguments for and against it with the accuracy of a man of science in a laboratory. As a result of this process he frequently came to no resolution at all, and frankly told his correspondent that he would leave the matter referred to him to the decision of others. But, if what he held to be truth was assailed, or the conduct of an individual unjustly called in question, Thirlwall’s hesitation vanished. We have already mentioned his conduct in the House of Lords; but it should never be forgotten that he was one of the four Bishops who dissented from the resolution to inhibit Bishop Colenso from preaching in the various dioceses of England; and that he stood alone in withholding his signature from the address requesting him to resign his see. Again, when Mr J. S. Mill was a candidate for Westminster in 1865, and his opponents circulated on a placard some lines from his _Examination of Sir W. Hamilton’s Philosophy_ intended to shock the minds of the electors as irreverent if not blasphemous,—a proceeding which was eagerly followed up by the _Record_ and the _Morning Advertiser_ in leading articles—Thirlwall at once wrote to the _Spectator_, maintaining that this passage contained “the utterance of a conviction in harmony with ‘the purest spirit of Christian morality’; that nothing but ‘an intellectual and moral incapacity worthy of the ‘Record’ and its satellite could have failed to recognise its truth’; and that it ‘thrilled’ him ‘with a sense of the ethical sublime’[75].”

There were many other duties besides the care of the diocese of S. David’s to which the Bishop devoted himself, but these we must dismiss with a passing notice. We allude to his work as a member of the Ritual Commission, as chairman of the Old Testament Revision Company, and in Convocation. Gradually, however, as years advanced, his physical powers began to fail, and he resolved to resign his bishopric. This resolution was carried into effect in 1874. He retired to Bath, where he was still able to continue many of his old pursuits, and, by the help of his nephew and his family, notwithstanding blindness and deafness, to maintain his old interests. He died rather suddenly, July 27, 1875, and was buried in Westminster Abbey, where, by a singularly felicitous arrangement, his remains were laid in the same grave as those of George Grote.

Regret has been often expressed that Bishop Thirlwall did not write more. We do not share this feeling. Had he written more he would have thought less, studied less, possessed in a less perfect degree that ‘_cor sapiens et intelligens ad discernendum judicium_[76]’ which was never weary of trying to impart to others a portion of its own serenity. At seventy-six years of age, just before his resignation, he could say, ‘I should hesitate to say that whatever is is best; but I have strong faith that it is _for_ the best, and that the general stream of tendency is toward good’; and in the last sentence of his last charge he bade his clergy remark that even controversies were ‘a sign of the love of truth which, if often passionate and one-sided, is always infinitely preferable to the quiet of apathy and indifference.’

-----

Footnote 1:

1. _William Whewell, D.D., Master of Trinity College, Cambridge. An
Account of his Writings, with Selections from his Literary and
Scientific Correspondence._ By I. TODHUNTER, M.A., F.R.S., Honorary
Fellow of S. John’s College. 2 vols., 8vo. (London, 1876.)

2. _The Life and Selections from the Correspondence of William
Whewell, D.D., late Master of Trinity College, Cambridge._ By Mrs
STAIR DOUGLAS. 8vo. (London, 1881.)

Footnote 2:

In the fifteen years from 1800-1814 inclusive the average was 205;
from 1815-1829 it was 402; and from 1830-1844 it was 433; from
1845-1859 it was 444; from 1859-1874 it was 545.

Footnote 3:

Todhunter’s _Life_, ii. 91.

Footnote 4:

_Life and Letters of Sir C. Lyell_, ii. 38. In the same letter he
expresses his astonishment at finding that Whewell, while writing one
of his papers on the Tides, was passing through the press _four other
works_.

Footnote 5:

The inscription runs: munificentia · fultus · Alex. J. B. Hope,
generosi · hisce · ædibus · antiquam · speciem · restituit. W.
Whewell. Mag. Collegii. A. D. MDCCCXLIII. Mr Hope gave £1000, and the
Master himself £250; but the liberality of the College, which spent
some £4000 before the work was finished, is unrecorded. It was on this
occasion that somebody wrote a parody on _The House that Jack Built_,
beginning:

This is the House that Hope built.
This is the Master, rude and rough,
Who lives in the House that Hope built.
These are the Seniors, greedy and gruff,
Who toady the Master, rude and rough,
Who lives in the House that Hope built.

Footnote 6:

The _Times_, February 25 and 26, 1847. Mrs Stair Douglas, p. 285,
prints a letter from Archdeacon Hare, who had been disturbed by
reports of the Vice-Chancellor’s vehemence.

Footnote 7:

The visit of Queen Victoria to the University in 1843.

Footnote 8:

_A Letter to the Rev. W. Whewell, B.D., Master of Trinity College,
etc. By an Undergraduate._ 8vo. London, 1843.

Footnote 9:

_The Victory of Faith, and other Sermons._ By J. C. Hare, M. A. 8vo.
Cambridge, 1840, p. x.

Footnote 10:

Mrs Stair Douglas, p. 216.

Footnote 11:

Dr Lightfoot’s Sermon, preached in the College Chapel on Sunday, March
18, 1866.

Footnote 12:

They appeared in _Punch_ for March 17, 1866.

Footnote 13:

The letter is dated 30 October, 1857.

Footnote 14:

Mrs Stair Douglas, p. 208.

Footnote 15:

Memoir by Sir John Herschel, _Proceedings of Royal Society_, XVI., p.
lvi.

Footnote 16:

Bishop Goodwin’s article in _Macmillan’s Magazine_ for December, 1881,
p. 140.

Footnote 17:

We are not sure that he ever allowed the _Origin of Species_ to be
admitted into the College Library. It was certainly refused more than
once, being probably dismissed with the expression which he was fond
of using when, as Chairman of the Seniority, he read the list of books
proposed—‘a worthless publication.’

Footnote 18:

1. _Remains, Literary and Theological, of Connop Thirlwall, late Lord
Bishop of S. David’s._ Edited by J. J. STEWART PEROWNE, D.D. Vol. 1:
Charges delivered between the years 1842 and 1860. Vol. 2: Charges
delivered between the years 1863 and 1872. 8vo. (London, 1877.)

2. _Essays, Speeches, and Sermons._ By CONNOP THIRLWALL, D.D., late
Lord Bishop of S. David’s. Edited by J. J. STEWART PEROWNE, D.D. 8vo.
(London, 1880.)

3. _Letters to a Friend._ By CONNOP THIRLWALL, late Lord Bishop of S.
David’s. Edited by the Very Rev. ARTHUR PENRHYN STANLEY, D.D. 8vo.
(London, 1881.)

4. _Letters, Literary and Theological, of Connop Thirlwall, late Lord
Bishop of S. David’s._ Edited by the Very Rev. J. J. STEWART PEROWNE,
D.D., Dean of Peterborough, and the Rev. LOUIS STOKES, B.A. Corpus
Christi College, Cambridge. With Annotations and Preliminary Memoirs
by the Rev. LOUIS STOKES. 8vo. (London, 1881.)

5. _Letters to a Friend._ New Edition. (London, 1882.)

Footnote 19:

Dr Perowne’s Preface to _Letters_, &c., p. vi.

Footnote 20:

_Letters_, &c., p. 177.

Footnote 21:

_Primitiæ_, p. 52. The essay is endorsed: ‘Composed 1st January, 1806.
Eight years old.’

Footnote 22:

_Primitiæ_, p. 224. The piece is dated October 28, 1808.

Footnote 23:

_Letters to a Friend_, p. 155. As a matter of fact the Bishop did buy
and destroy all the copies that he could.

Footnote 24:

Dean Perowne mentions (Preface, p. viii.) that ‘at school he did not
care to enter into the games and amusements of the other boys, but was
to be seen at play-hour withdrawing himself into some corner with a
pile of books under his arm.’

Footnote 25:

Candler was seven years older than Thirlwall. He was junior assistant
in a draper’s shop at Ipswich, and afterwards set up in business on
his own account at Chelmsford, where he became a leading member of the
Society of Friends. He died, nearly eighty years of age, in 1872. We
have not been able to ascertain how he became acquainted with
Thirlwall.

Footnote 26:

_Letters_, &c., p. 7.

Footnote 27:

_Letters_, &c., p. 17.

Footnote 28:

_Ibid._ p. 8.

Footnote 29:

_Letters to a Friend_, p. 225.

Footnote 30:

_Letters_, &c., p. 21. The letter is dated December, 1813, when the
writer was sixteen years old.

Footnote 31:

Professor Monk, who had examined Thirlwall on one of these occasions,
was so much struck with the vigour and accuracy of his translations
that he remarked to a friend, who had also had experience of his worth
as a scholar, ‘Had I been sitting in my library, with unlimited access
to books, I could not have done better.’ ‘Nor so well,’ was the reply.

Footnote 32:

Cooper’s _Annals of the Town and University of Cambridge_, iv. 516.
The words between inverted commas in our text are from a pamphlet
entitled ‘A Statement regarding the Union, an Academical Debating
Society, which existed at Cambridge from February 13, 1815, to March
24, 1817, when it was _suppressed by the Vice-Chancellor_.’ The
‘statement’ is evidently official, and is thoroughly business-like and
temperate. The Vice-Chancellor was Dr Wood, Master of S. John’s
College; the officers of the society were: Mr Whewell, _President_; Mr
Thirlwall, _Secretary_; Mr H. J. Rose, _Treasurer_. The late Professor
Selwyn, in a speech at the opening of the new Union building, October
30, 1866, stated that on the entrance of the proctors the President
said, ‘Strangers will please to withdraw, and the House will take the
message into consideration.’

Footnote 33:

_Autobiography of John Stuart Mill_, p. 125. Mill is describing a
debate at ‘a society of Owenites called the Co-operation Society,’ in
1825. ‘It was a _lutte corps à corps_ between Owenites and political
economists, whom the Owenites regarded as their most inveterate
opponents; but it was a perfectly friendly dispute.... The speaker
with whom I was most struck, though I dissented from nearly every word
he said, was Thirlwall, the historian, since Bishop of S. David’s,
then a Chancery barrister, unknown except by a high reputation for
eloquence acquired at the Cambridge Union before the era of Austin and
Macaulay. His speech was in answer to one of mine. Before he had
uttered ten sentences, I set him down as the best speaker I had ever
heard, and I have never since heard anyone whom I placed above him.’

Footnote 34:

_Letters_, &c., p. 31.

Footnote 35:

An old friend of Bishop Thirlwall informs us that he retained his
preference for the ‘Paradiso’ in after years.

Footnote 36:

_Life and Letters of Frances Baroness Bunsen_; by Augustus J. C. Hare.
8vo. Lond. 1882: i. 138.

Footnote 37:

Letter to Bunsen, November 21, 1831, _Letters_, &c., p. 99.

Footnote 38:

_Memoirs of Baron Bunsen_, i. 339.

Footnote 39:

Marsh was professor from 1807 to 1839. The first volume of his
translation of Michaelis had appeared in 1793.

Footnote 40:

_Letters_, &c., p. 55.

Footnote 41:

_Edinburgh Review_, April, 1876, p. 291.

Footnote 42:

_A Critical Essay on the Gospel of S. Luke._ By Dr Frederick
Schleiermacher. With an introduction by the Translator, containing an
account of the controversy respecting the origin of the first three
Gospels since Bishop Marsh’s dissertation. 8vo. London: 1825.

Footnote 43:

F. D. Maurice writes, 25 February, 1848: ‘The Bishop of S. David’s
very injudiciously translated, about twenty years ago,
Schleiermacher’s book on S. Luke—the one of all, perhaps, which he
ever wrote the most likely to offend religious people in England, and
so mislead them as to his real character and objects.’ _Life of F. D.
Maurice_, i. 454.

Footnote 44:

Between 1827 and 1832 he held the college offices of Junior Bursar,
Junior Dean, and Head Lecturer. In 1828, 1829, 1832, and 1834 he was
one of the examiners for the Classical Tripos.

Footnote 45:

See Dean Stanley’s Memoir of Archdeacon Hare, prefixed to the third
edition of _The Victory of Faith_. 1874.

Footnote 46:

_A Vindication of Niebuhr’s ‘History of Rome’ from the Charges of the
‘Quarterly Review.’_ By Julius Charles Hare, M.A. Cambridge, 1829. The
passage commented on will be found in the _Quarterly Review_ for
January 1829 (vol. xxxix. p. 8). The first edition of Niebuhr’s own
work had been highly praised in an article in the same _Review_ for
June 1825 (vol. xxxii. p. 67).

Footnote 47:

On the Life of Dr Whewell, printed above. It was originally called
‘Half a Century of Cambridge Life,’ and appeared in the _Church
Quarterly Review_, April 1882.

Footnote 48:

The _Caput Senatus_ consisted of five persons, viz. a Doctor of
Divinity, a Doctor of Laws, a Doctor of Physic, a non-regent Master,
and a regent Master. These persons held office for a year. They were
elected by the votes of the Heads of Colleges, the Doctors in all
faculties, and the Scrutators. Each member had the right to veto any
proposal of which he disapproved. The _Caput Senatus_ was established
by the Statutes of Elizabeth, 1570, Cap. xli, and abolished by the
University Act, 1856.

Footnote 49:

The first petition was presented to the House of Lords on March 21,
1834; the protest is dated April 3; and the counter-petition was
presented on April 21 in the same year.

Footnote 50:

_A Letter_ etc., p. 20.

Footnote 51:

_A Letter_ etc., pp. 21, 22.

Footnote 52:

When the ‘Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Undergraduates’
tabulated the weekly attendance of the Fellows at Chapel in the Lent
Term of 1838, and finally published a list, like the class list at the
end of an examination, Whewell was placed in the middle of the second
class, having obtained only 34 marks. The Deans, being obliged, in
virtue of their office, to attend twice daily, were disqualified from
obtaining the prize—a Bible—which the Society gave to Mr Perry,
afterwards Bishop of Melbourne, who had obtained 66 marks.

Footnote 53:

It has been said that the Master was advised to take the course he did
by Mr Hugh James Rose, who was in the University at the time, and on
Whitsunday, May 18, had preached a sermon at Great S. Mary’s on the
‘Duty of Maintaining the Truth,’ from S. Matt. x. 27: ‘What ye hear in
the ear, that preach ye upon the house-tops.’ Thirlwall’s letter,
however, was not published before May 21, so that, unless the nature
of it had been known beforehand, it is clear that anything which Mr
Rose had said in his sermon could not have referred to it. That
Thirlwall believed that there was some connexion between the sermon,
or at any rate the preacher, and his dismissal, is evident from the
fact that after showing the Master’s letter to one of the junior
Fellows, who expressed indignant surprise that such a course could
have been taken, he remarked: ‘Ah! let this be a warning to you to
preach truth, if need be, upon the house-tops, but never under any
circumstances to preach error.’ Thirlwall was a regular attendant at
Great S. Mary’s, and no doubt heard the sermon in question.

Footnote 54:

The letter, dated 27 May, 1834, is printed by Mrs Stair Douglas, _Life
of Dr Whewell_, p. 163.

Footnote 55:

The letter, dated 23 September 1834, is printed in _Letters of Bishop
Thirlwall_, p. 124; and by Mrs Stair Douglas, _Life of Dr Whewell_, p.
168. Dr Wordsworth’s action was noticed with disapproval beyond the
limits of Trinity College, for Professor Babington records in his
Diary:

_Nov. 17 [1834]\._ Attended a meeting at Mr Bowstead’s rooms at
Corpus, to vote an address to Mr Connop Thirlwall expressive of our
sorrow at his being prevented from acting as tutor, and of our
disapprobation of the discussion of things not forming part of the
duties of tuition being made a cause for depriving a tutor of his
office.

_Nov. 29._ A meeting was called for 28th to take into consideration
the address to Thirlwall. Laing, Henslow, and I supposed that it was
this day, and went, and found that the meeting was over and the
address, much to our sorrow burnt. (_Memorials, etc. of Charles
Cardale Babington_, 8vo. Camb. 1897, p. 33). Professor Mayor (_Ibid._
265) conjectures, with much probability, that the address was
destroyed at Thirlwall’s own suggestion. It is curious that his
friends should have deferred their action for so many months.

Footnote 56:

_Life of Dr Whewell_, by Mrs Stair Douglas, p. 211.

Footnote 57:

_Letters to a Friend_, p. 191.

Footnote 58:

The preface to the first edition of vol. i. is dated ‘Trinity College,
June 12, 1835.’ He was instituted to Kirby Underdale, 13 February,
1835 (_Letters_, p. 136), but he did not take up his residence there
till July following (_Ibid._ p. 137). The dates of the subsequent
volumes are ii. iii., 1836; iv., 1837; v., 1838; vi., 1839; vii.,
1840; viii., 1844.

Footnote 59:

_Letters_, &c. p. 138.

Footnote 60:

Preface to the second edition, dated ‘London, May 1845.’

Footnote 61:

_Letters_, &c. p. 194. The letter is dated April 9, 1846.

Footnote 62:

_The Personal Life of George Grote._ By Mrs Grote, p. 173.

Footnote 63:

_Memoirs of Viscount Melbourne._ By W. M. Torrens, M.P. Vol. ii. p.
332. Lord Houghton in the _Fortnightly Review_, February 1878.

Footnote 64:

_Letters to a Friend_, p. 278.

Footnote 65:

_Letters_, &c. p. 161.

Footnote 66:

_Letters_, &c. p. 292.

Footnote 67:

_Charges_, vol. ii. pp. 90-100.

Footnote 68:

In his charge for 1851 (_Charges_, vol. i. p. 150) he announced his
intention to devote the surplus of his income to the augmentation of
small livings, and in 1866 he pointed out that the fund had up to that
time yielded £24,000 (_Ibid._ vol. ii. p. 98).

Footnote 69:

He particularly disliked gossip. At Kirby Underdale the old sexton
used to relate how Mr Thirlwall said, ‘I never ’ears no tales’; and
the following story shows that he maintained the same wise discretion
after he became a bishop. One of his archdeacons thought it right to
tell him that a certain clergyman in the diocese, who was a clever
mimic, was fond of entertaining his friends with imitations of the
Bishop. Thirlwall listened, and then inquired, ‘Does he do me well?’
‘I am sure I cannot say, my Lord,’ replied the informer; ‘I was never
present myself at one of these disgraceful exhibitions.’ ‘Ah! I should
like to know, because he does _you_ admirably,’ replied the Bishop. It
is needless to say that no more stories were carried to his ears.

Footnote 70:

_An Earnestly Respectful Letter_, 8vo. 1860, pp. 20-23. See also _The
Life and Letters of Rowland Williams, D.D._, London, 1874, chap. xv.,
where his determination to make the Bishop declare himself, under the
belief that he really agreed with him, is expressly stated.

Footnote 71:

_A Letter to the Rev. Rowland Williams_, 8vo. 1860, p. 19.

Footnote 72:

Dean Stanley’s preface to the _Letters to a Friend_, p. xi.

Footnote 73:

_Letters to a Friend_, p. 54.

Footnote 74:

Review of ‘The letters of Bishop Thirlwall,’ _The Times_, 23 November,
1881.

Footnote 75:

_The Edinburgh Review_, for April, 1876, p. 292.

Footnote 76:

These words are inscribed upon Bishop Thirlwall’s grave.

RICHARD MONCKTON MILNES,
LORD HOUGHTON[77].

It is much to be regretted that Lord Houghton did not write his own biography. Those who know his delightful _Monographs, Social and Personal_, can form some idea of how he would have treated it. From his early years he lived in society—not merely the society to which his birth naturally opened the door, but a varied society of his own creating. He had an insatiable curiosity. It is hardly too much to say that in his long life he was present at every ceremony of importance, from the Eglinton Tournament to the Œcumenical Council; he knew everybody who was worth knowing, both at home and abroad—not merely as chance acquaintances, but as friends with whom he maintained a correspondence; he was both a politician and a man of letters, a friend of the unwashed and the associate of princes. What a book might have been written by such a man on such a subject! But, alas! though he often spoke of writing his own life, he died before he had leisure even to begin it; and, instead, we have to content ourselves with the volumes before us. They are good—unquestionably good; they abound with amusing stories and brilliant witticisms; but we confess that we laid them down with a sense of disappointment which it is hard to define. Perhaps it was beyond the writer’s ability to draw so complex a character—a man of many moods, a creature of contradictions, a master of what _not_ to do and _not_ to say, as a lady of fashion told him to his face; perhaps he was overweighted by a wish to bring into prominence those solid qualities in his hero which society often failed to discover, while judging only ‘the man of fashion, whose unconventional originality had so far impressed itself upon the popular mind that there was hardly any eccentricity too audacious to be attributed to him by those who knew him only by repute[78].’ We are not so presumptuous as to suppose that we can paint a portrait of Lord Houghton that will satisfy those who were his intimate friends; but we hope to present to our readers at least a faithful sketch of one for whom we had a most sincere admiration and respect.