was involved, it is melancholy to see how prone he was to bend before the Court, and how unwillingly he ever could be induced to risk a contest with the immediate dispensers of place. At first he stood on higher ground, and obtained his office through the voice of the country, the ultimate and substantial dispenser of power. But soon the scene changed, and we never find him hazarding any quarrel with the Crown,-or with those whom his father described as behind the Throne, and greater than itself. Other traits of this disposition are to be found in the work before us.

About a month before the death of the bishop of Carlisle, a relation of Sir James Lowther had preached the Commencement-sermon at Cambridge. Mr Pitt happened to sit next to me at church, and asked me the name of the preacher, not much approving his performance. I told him, report said that he was to be the future Bishop of Carlisle; and I begged him to have some respect to the dignity of the Bench whenever a vacancy happened. He assured me that he knew nothing of any such arrangement. Within two months after this, Sir James Lowther applied to Mr Pitt for the bishoprick of Carlisle for the gentleman whom he had heard preach, and Mr Pitt, without the least hesitation, promised it. This was one of the many transactions that gave me an unfavourable opinion of Mr Pitt; I saw that he was ready to sacrifice things the most sacred to the furtherance of his ambition. The gentleman, much to his honour, declined the acceptance of the bishoprick, which Mr Pitt, with true ministerial policy, had offered him.' p. 189.

His conduct towards our author was of a piece with this. He entertained no distrust of Dr Watson's principles; he knew his sincerity, and the soundness of his theology never gave him a moment's disquiet. Yet his most partial friends cannot avoid openly blaming him for yielding his reason to the prejudices of others, and making himself the tool whereby those unjust prepossessions worked against a man whom he admired. Mr Wilberforce thus mentions it in a letter to Dr Watson, upon one of the many occasions of his being overlooked. "I was in "hopes of ere now being able to congratulate Your Lordship on a change of situation, which in public justice ought to have taken "place. It is a subject of painful reflection to me, and I will 66 say no more on it; but as I am writing to Your Lordship you "will excuse my saying thus much. I will only add, that the event at once surprised and vexed me. Lord Camden's opinion upon the same subject, is thus cited by a near relation of his own. "What I think of your public merits can be of no consequence to you; but what Lord Camden thought (in "which I perfectly coincided with him) would perhaps gratify you to know. He never changed; but always told Pitt, that

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"it was a shame for him and the Church that you had not the "most exalted station upon the bench, as due to the unrivalled "superiority of your talents and services."

Dr Watson's views of Church preferment, and of the proper measures to be taken for securing at once the dignity, independence and purity of the establishment, are frequently given in this volume, and they form an appropriate sequel to the remarks which we have just felt compelled to make.

My temper could never brook submission to the ordinary means of ingratiating myself with great men; and hence Dr Hallifax, (afterwards Bishop of St Asaph), whose temper was different, called me one of the Baras; and he was right enough in the denomination. I was determined to be advanced in my profession by force of desert, or not at all. It has been said, (I believe by D'Alembert), that the highest offices in church and state, resemble a pyramid, whose top is accessible to only two sorts of animals, eagles and reptiles. My pinions were not strong enough to pounce upon its top, and I scorned, by creeping, to ascend its summit. Not that a bishoprick was then or ever an object of my ambition; for I considered the acquisition of · it as no proof of personal merit, inasmuch as bishopricks are as often given to the flattering dependants, or to the unlearned younger branches of noble families, as to men of the greatest erudition; and I considered the profession of it as a frequent occasion of personal demerit; for I saw the generality of the Bishops bartering their independence and the dignity of their order for the chance of a transla tion, and polluting Gospel-humility by the pride of prelacy. I used then to say, and I say so still, render the office of a bishop respectable by giving some civil distinction to its possessor, in order that his example may have more weight with both the laity and clergy Annex to each bishoprick some portion of the royal ecclesiastical patronage which is now prostituted by the Chancellor and the Minister of the day to the purpose of parliamentary corruption, that every Bishop may have means sufficient to reward all he deserving clergy of his diocese.

Give every Bishop income enough, not for display of wordly pomp and fashionable luxury, but to enable him to maintain works of charity, and to make a decent provision for his family; but having done these things for hiin, take from him all hopes of a translation by equalizing the bishopricks. Oblige him to a longer residence in his diocese than is usually practised, that he may do the proper work of a Bishop; that he may direct and inspect the flock of Christ; that by his exhortations he may confirm the unstable,-by his admonitions reclaim the reprobate,-and by the purity of his life render religion amiable and interesting to all. p. 71, 72.

Upon Lord Shelburne's accession to office in 1782, he cultivated our author's friendship with the assiduity which he showed in attaching eminently gifted men to him, whether in politi

cal or scientific pursuits. He said, that having Dunning to assist him in matters of law, and Barrè in military questions, he desired to have Dr Watson as his clerical monitor. How far his honest and liberal views of Church affairs qualified him to fill this important office, the following paper may prove, which he gave in to the minister, almost immediately after his promotion to the see of Landaff-offering at the same time to introduce a bill founded on the same principles into the House of

Lords.

، ، There are several circumstances respecting the Doctrine, the Jurisdiction, and the Revenue of the Church of England, which would probably admit a temperate reform. If it should be thought right to attempt making a change in any of them, it seems most expedient to begin with the revenue.

، ، The two following hints on that subject may not be undeserv ing Your Lordship's consideration:-First, a bill to render the bishoprics more equal to each other, both with respect to income and patronage; by annexing, as the richer bishoprics become vacant, a part of their revenues, and a part of their patronage, to the poorer. By a bill of this kind, the bishops would be freed from the necessity of holding ecclesiastical preferments in commendam,-a practice which bears hard on the rights of the inferior clergy. Another probable consequence of such a bill would be, a longer residence of the bishops in their several dioceses; from which the best consequences, both to religion, the morality of the people, and to the true credit of the Church, might be expected; for the two great inducements, to wish for translations, and consequently to reside in London, namely, superiority of income, and excellency of patronage, would in a great measure be removed.

، ، Second, a bill for appropriating, as they become vacant, an half, or a third part, of the income of every deanery, prebend, or canonry, of the churches of Westminster, Windsor, Canterbury, Christ Church, Worcester, Durham, Ely, Norwich, &c. to the same purposes, mutatis mutandis, as the first fruits and tenths were appropriated by Queen Anne. By a bill of this kind, a decent provision would be made for the inferior clergy, in a third or fourth part of the time which Queen Anne's bounty alone will require to effect. A decent provision being once made for every officiating minister in the Church, the residence of the clergy on their cures might more reasonably be required, than it can be at present, and the license of holding more livings than one, be restricted.

p. 96, 97.

، During the interval' (he says afterwards) ، between Lord Slrelburne's resignation and the appointment of the Duke of Portland to the head of the Treasury, I published my Letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury. I sent a copy to every Bishop; and, of them all, the Bishop of Chester alone (Porteus) had the good manners so much as to acknowledge the receipt of it. I had foreseen this timidity of the

bench, and I had foreseen also that he must be a great-min 'ed minister indeed, who would bring forward a measure depriving him of his parliamentary influence over the spiritual lords: but I believed that what was right would take place at last, and I thought that, by publishing the plan, it would stand a chance of being thoroughly discussed. Men's prejudices, I was sensible, could only be lessened by degrees; and I was firmly of opinion that no change ought ever to be made in quiet times, till the utility of the change was generally acknowledged.

Mr Cumberland published a pamphlet against me on this occasion; but he knew nothing of the subject, and misrepresented my design. He laid himself so open in every page of his performance, that, could I have condescended to answer him, I should have made him sick of writing pamphlets for the rest of his life. Some other things were published by silly people, who would needs suppose that I was in heart a republican, and meant harm to the Church establishment. Dr Cooke, Provost of King's College, was one of those few who saw the business in its proper light: he thanked me for having strengthened the Church for at least, he said, an hundred years by my proposal. p. 107, 108.

Nor was it only to secure the independence of the Episcopal bench, and thereby promote the political purity of the Church at large, that his efforts were directed. He was anxious to restore the doctrinal purity of the national faith, or at least of those observances in which it is embodied. A tract had been published by the Duke of Grafton, a most sincere christian, and pious man, to whose publick character infinite injustice has been done, by the sarcastic virulence of Junius, but who deserves the high praise of having been a warm friend of civil and religious liberty, and enjoyed the useful and enviable distinction of transmitting the same principles unimpaired to his family. In this work, his Grace carnestly recommended a revisal of the Liturgy. He was, of course, bitterly attacked by bigots and hypocrites. Our author wrote a pamphlet in his defence, but so liberal, that the Duke most candidly and kindly begged him not to publish it, saying, he never would be forgiven for it. The Bishop, with his accustomed honesty and boldness, after thanking his friend for this considerate advice, declared, that no view of interest could deter him from doing his duty. How' (said he) shall I answer this at the tribunal of Christ? You saw the corruption of my church-you had some ability to attempt a reform; but secular considerations checked your integrity. Accordingly, the pamphlet was published, under the title of Considerations on the expediency of revising the Liturgy and Articles of the Church of Eng

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land-by a Constant Protestant.' One of his principal improvements, was the omission of the Athanasian Creed; and he had concerted a bill for this purpose with the Duke, when the effects of the French Revolution put off, for a long period, all such measures. He had intended to submit the plan to the King, as well as the Archbishops, in the first instance. The King was deemed favourable to such a reform, from the anecdote related by Dr Heberden, of what happened one Sunday in Windsor Chapel. The clergyman,' says our author, on a day when the Athanasian Creed was to be read, began with Whosoever will be saved, &c.; the King, who usually responded with a loud voice, was silent; the minister repeated, in an higher tone, his Whosoever; the King continued silent; at length the Apostle's Creed was repeated by the minister, and the King followed him throughout with a distinct and audible

' voice.

It is pretty certain, that if such a proposition had been made by Bishop Watson, or any Whig in either House of Parliament, the Court, and its devoted servant the minister of the day, would have met it triumphantly, with an outcry of innovation, and danger to the Church and the Religion of the country. This would have been the fate of whatever measure came from the wrong side of the question. Yet few more daring innovators have ever been employed by a Court, than Mr Pitt himself. Witness not only his early projects of Parliamentary Reform, but his Irish Union, his Sale of the Land Tax, and indeed most of his commercial and financial schemes. Not even the sacred precincts of the Church were safe from his rash intrusion, as should seem from the following anecdote, which evinces a great readiness in Mr Pitt to begin ecclesiastical changes, when he thought there was a prospect of helping the credit of the country'—that is, raising the three per cents., and keeping his beloved monied interest in good humour. A more crude, impolitic and unjust plan, than the one sketched in this passage, was, we will venture to say, never proposed by any reformer. It has every fault that a project of the kind can have; and we are truly sorry to see, that it met our author's approbation for

a moment.

In January 1799, I received from the Archbishop of Canterbury

The remark on innovation and alarm of the Venerable Grotius -no rash, ignorant, impracticable theorist, but the writer of all others most addicted to reverence for the authority of ancient wisdom, merits attention. Politici qui sæpe dogmata vera a falsis, salubria a noxiis, non noscunt distinguere, omnia nova suspecta habent...?