and applying to the Church of Rome many well-known passages in the Apocalypse, no impartial judge will refuse 'to Bishop Halifax the tribute of praise for the skilfulness, ' which he shews, in the choice and arrangement of his matter, and in the perspicuity and elegance of his style. 'He was patronized by a temperate and judicious metro6 politan, Dr. Cornwallis; - he stood high in the estima'tion of the celebrated Bishop Warburton* ; - he lived ' upon terms of the most intimate and confidential friendship with the very ingenious Bishop Hurd; he was respected as a man of learning by his most learned con"temporaries in the Universities; — he had frequently 'had access to the sagacious and contemplative recluse, • Bishop Law; -he first as a companion, and afterwards ' as a son-in-law, was intimately connected with the quaint, 'pompous, but acute and truly critical scholar, Provost 'Cooke ; — he was encountered, and perhaps refuted, by ‘the keen-sighted, strong-armed, high-spirited polemic, < Blackall of Emmanuel; - he was opposed, but not de'spised, by the dauntless, stately, and fulminating dictator, Bishop Watson; - he was a most amiable man in 'domestic life, and his general conduct as a Christian was ⚫ blameless and even exemplary. Let it not be forgotten too that, while honoured with the acquaintance of living 'worthies and living scholars, he felt a manly and generous regard for the memory of the dead. You must 'yourself, Sir, have heard that he republished a Charge, 'written by Bishop Butler of Durham, one of the most

* [It should seem, however, from the Letters between Warburton and Hurd, that Warburton had no personal knowledge of Halifax, but that Hurd, who was the particular friend of Halifax, had taught Warburton to think well of him. E. H. B.]

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'profound philosophers and most enlightened theologians, that ever adorned the Church of England. That Charge, Sir, by some unaccountable misconception in the hearers 6 or readers, had for some time been considered as favou'rable to the Church of Rome; but the illusion vanished, 'when Bishop Halifax republished it, and united with it, 'what I think, a very judicious Preface. Will you par'don me, Sir, for adding that, long before the republica'tion, I had myself adopted and avowed the principles, ' upon which Dr. Butler reasoned, and that I felt very 'great satisfaction from the aid of his arguments, and ' under the protection of his authority? To such per'sons, then, as are acquainted with the events of Bishop Halifax's life, or the character of his writings, must it 'not be highly improbable that a Prelate, who upon one 'occasion, had vindicated the fame of Bishop Butler from 'the imputation of Popery, and who, upon another, de'fended the cause of the Church of England in opposition 'to the Church of Rome, should in his last moments have ' renounced the tenets, which he had so long professed, 'and so ably maintained?' Parr's Letter to Dr. Milner p. 30-33.

"Now these, we doubt not, were Dr. Parr's matured and deliberate sentiments respecting the character of that distinguished Prelate. Is it, then, to be endured that the executors should have given publicity to the splenetic sarcasms against Bishop Halifax, which are recorded in p. 576 of this Catalogue.

(1. Dr. John Jebb, my friend's Account of Theological 'Lectures, now reading at Cambridge; 2. A very argu'mentative and justly severe Letter to Professor Halifax by my friend, Mr. Blackall of Emmanuel; 3. Halifax's Three shewy and amply-rewarded Sermons on Subscrip

tion, Cambr. 1772.') and which it is probable that Dr. Parr himself had long since forgotten? Were they influenced by an impartial desire of furnishing a corrective to what they deemed excessive praise? Or, knowing the public appetite for low slander, when it is directed against distinguished merit, did they publish these piquant notes, in the hope of making their books sell? Judicent æqui.” The British Critic No. 5. Jan. 1828. p. 124.

In my opinion, the executors did right in publishing the Ms. notes, which Dr. Parr had written on the fly-leaves, or in the title-pages, or on the margins of his books, 1. because the books were going to be dispersed by public auction, and the Ms. contents would thus become matter of public notoriety, 2. because, as the Ms. contents would be known, it was better to incur the odium of improper publication, than to subject Dr. Parr's memory to the thousand and one rumours of his having written matter much more offensive than what appears in the Bibliotheca Parriana, 3. because the public might expect that what so eminent a man as Dr. Parr had said about his literary contemporaries, should not be withheld. I am very willing to admit that it would have been politic and proper and charitable to accompany some of Dr. Parr's notices with qualifying remarks. The executors, no doubt, considered that "these piquant notes" would give an additional interest to the Catalogue, and it was na

tural, and not improper for them to introduce them with that view. But the Reviewer is mistaken, when he regards Dr. Parr's words, "Three shewy and amply-rewarded Sermons," as "splenetic sarcasms against Bishop Halifax;" for 1. there is no "sarcasm" at all in the words, 2. there is no "splenetic" effusion at all. The fair inference from Dr. Parr's epithet shewy is that he deemed the Sermons specious, but unsound in argument. He never ceased to think so, but in the Letter to Dr. Milner he chose to say mildly

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"He was encountered, and perhaps refuted, but not derided as a puny and clumsy antagonist by the keen-sighted, strong-armed, high-spirited polemic, Blackall of Emmanuel." When Dr. Parr had said, in a note written many years before his death, that the Sermons of Dr. Halifax were shewy," his meaning is the same, as when, in the Letter to Dr. Milner written towards the close of life, he spoke of Blackall as " having encountered and perhaps refuted" the very Sermons in question. But Dr. Parr characterises the Sermons as "shewy and amply rewarded." Well, and what then? If Dr. Parr considered that these Sermons had conducted Dr. Halifax to the mitre, it is a plain matter of fact, and no sort of sarcasm, that these Sermons were "amply rewarded." If the Sermons had the merit of sound argument, then they might deserve the reward,

though “ample;" but, as the Sermons were in Dr. Parr's opinion both "shewy" and unsound, he might most justly and unsarcastically consider them as "amply" and too "amply rewarded." There were four reasons, which would naturally prevent Dr. Parr from having any great partiality for Bishop Halifax, 1. his courtly and servile spirit, 2. his zealous and uncharitable orthodoxy, 3. his strong attachment to Hurd, his deep veneration for Warburton, and his active sympathy in what related to the literary reputation of either, 4. his treatment of Dr. Parr's friend, Dr. Jebb, and his conduct throughout the severe struggles for university-reforms. If, then, Dr. Parr had really written in any of his books anything "sarcastic" about Dr. Halifax, it would have been nothing wonderful; but in point of fact he did not. When, however, he found Dr. Milner uttering "a most audacious and malignant calumny" against the memory of Dr. Halifax, he generously resolved to vindicate him, he nobly discarded all the unpleasant feelings, which had formerly possessed his mind, he at once forgot the political demerits of the Bishop, and eulogised his intellectual, moral, and literary merits in energetic strains, "amidst the silence of his friends." He acted on this occasion precisely in the same way as he did in respect to Bishop Hurd. He had written a book against Hurd;