The Right Rev. S. C. Sandes, Bishop of Killaloe, to the vacant See of Cashel and Waterford. The Right Hon. and Rev. Lord Wriothesley Russell, to the Deanery of Exeter. Williams, R. Wakefield Vaynor Patron. Chap. of Llandaff Archbp. of York Heirs of J. Hunt 88 Brecon St. David's The Queen Whitmore, A. H.. Leasingham, N. & S. 924 Lincoln Lincoln Sir J. Thorold, Bt. THE ARCHBISHOP OF CASHEL.-Since the death of Bishop Van Mildert, no theologian of equal eminence has rested from his labours, and imposed upon us the duty of paying the like tributes of respect to piety and talent: but we are now called upon to repeat these testimonies by the decease of the Most Reverend the Archbishop of Cashel, Dr. Richard Laurence, who died in Merrion-street, Dublin, on Friday night, December 28th, at the close of his seventy-ninth year. On the day of his death he remained up stairs, but was not confined to his bed; and on that day, for the first time in a life nearly extended to fourscore years, he had the attendance and advice of a physician. Dr. Richard Laurence, at the age of eighteen, was matriculated, July 14, 1778, as an Exhibitioner of Corpus Christi College, Oxford; his brother, Dr. French Lawrence, being at that time a scholar on the county of Somerset. He took the Degree of B.A. April 10, 1782, and of M.A. July 9, 1785. Having left College upon taking his Bachelor's Degree, he married, became Curate of Coleshill, and engaged in tuition. His literary labours were here extended far beyond the instruction of pupils; for he contributed articles of criticism to the Monthly Review, and with still greater distinctness of purpose and employment, undertook the historical department of the Annual Register. On the 27th of June, 1794, he took the Degrees of B. and D.C.L., having re-entered his name (which he had taken off the books of Corpus Christi College) at University College, where he found his old friend and fellow-student at Corpus Christi College, an academic distinguished as much by his high tone of principle, as he was by his love of the fine arts and by social virtues-the late Rev. Dr. James Griffith, Master of University, at that time Fellow of the College. Upon his brother's appointment to the Regius Professorship of Civil Law, in 1796, he was made Deputy Professor, and as such permanently resided in Oxford; where, with his wonted zeal and application, he soon obtained an exact knowledge of the laws and constitution of the University, which he often evinced upon statutory questions and convocational practice. His addresses, on presenting candidates for Honorary Degrees, were distinguished by the strength and terseness of their Latinity. But whilst he was thus fulfilling his duties as deputy to his brother, he was preparing himself, by indefatigable study, for more powerful proofs of his learning and talents, in the University pulpit, as preacher of the Bampton Lecture. In 1804 he delivered a course, of which no more will be said at present than that it was distinguished by unity of design and orderly distribution, by the new line of inquiry which it pursued, and the depth and breadth of the knowledge it displayed, by the strength of its style as a composition, and the cogency of its reasoning as an argument, and by its usefulness as a theological service in the Calvinistic controversy. Such demonstrations of successful labour, intellectual power, and literary attainment, did not long remain without friends o approve, and patrons to reward them, particularly as they were followed by succesive evidences of the same sort, both from the pulpit and the press. In 1814 h was made Regius Professor of Hebrew, and Canon of Christ Church. The patronage which helped him to this notice of the crown was that of the late Lord Stowell, then Sir William Scott, to whom, in the year 1814, he dedicated his Remarks upon the Systematical Classification of the MSS. adopted by Griesbach: in his dedication he says, that Sir William "had conferred upon him obligations too great to be requited, and too flattering to be forgotten." But though he was thus indebted to Sir William's favourable opinion, the Professorship was actually given by the Earl of Liverpool, to whom, in like manner, he dedicated his Ethiopic Pseudepigraphum of the Asce nsion of Isaiah"propter benevolentiam in se collatam, cujus recordationem nulla dies eripiet." 8 e By the same careful observer of clerical qualifications for the high offices in the Church, he was raised to the archiepiscopal chair, as Archbishop of Cashel, in 1822, upon the death of Dr. Broderick: so that the statement made in the Irish papers relating to Sir Robert Peel's patronage is altogether erroneous, and equally so is that part of it which informs us that the Archbishop was Sir Robert Peel's tutor (that honourable office having belonged to the late elegant scholar and learned divine, Bishop Lloyd). We have now traced the course of academic and theological duties which was pursued by the late Prelate, and which ultimately conducted the Curate of Coleshill to the See of Cashel. A more resolute devotion to study, a more undeviating course of benevolence and integrity, a more amiable picture of social and domestic virtues, a more gentle, kind, condescending deportment, were never entered upon the records of private or public life and if to these were added the sincerity and soundness of his christian faith in the promises of the gospel, of his christian obedience to its precepts, of his humility before God and his good-will to man, there would then be formed a true representation of the life and character of the late Archbishop. But it would be to forget or neglect very important features in this representation, if special attention were not to be paid to these characteristics by which he was known to the theological world, as an able, learned and judicious defender of the truths which our Church attests and teaches, and the Scriptures prove and establish. Archbishop Laurence was eminently a theological scholar; upon every department of theology was his scholarship employed: but all his laborious studies were directed to the conviction of others by printed argument, as well as to the satisfaction of himself by private meditation. His was a communicative and serviceable erudition, which did not only do good, by refuting error and defending truth, but by enabling others to engage, with the like success, in the defence of the one, and the refutation of the other. It was also a discriminating erudition, which, whilst it explored what was dark, and verified what was doubtful, loved to enucleate and set forth, in an orderly argument, the results of extensive inquiry and careful speculation. The truth of the adage, Qui bene distinguit, bene docet, was never better exemplified than in Dr. Laurence's statements of fact, and explication of doctrine. His erudition was, moreover, as circumspect as it was discriminating, and carefully avoided the maintenance of extreme opinions, and all approximations toward them. Without any farther endeavour to characterise the style, spirit, or method of this writer, it is due to his powerful and prudent theological labours to have recourse to them, as to a large body of evidence, to prove the extent, variety, and usefulness of his knowledge. The casual purchase of an Ethiopic manuscript, containing the Canonical Prophecy of Isaiah, and the Pseudepigraphum of the Ascensio Isaia Vatis, led Dr. Laurence, at that time Regius Professor of Hebrew, to investigate its history, and to settle its date, A.D. 69. The writing, though apocryphal, was made subsidiary to doctrinal as well as critical purposes; it was not used to prove any point of faith, but it furnished arguments against the Unitarian falsification of passages in the New Testament. For theological purposes of the same sort, he translated and commented upon another Ethiopic MS. entitled the Book of Enoch, the same which Bruce had brought from Abyssinia, and presented to the Bodleian; and of which M. de Sacy had previously translated some chapters, (another MS. of the same work having been given by Bruce to the Royal Library at Paris.) Of these apocryphal writings, Dr. Laurence, with his usual judgment, observes that "from the influence of theological opinion, or theological caprice, they have been sometimes injudiciously admitted into the canon of Scripture; whilst, on the other, from an over anxiety to preserve the canon inviolate, they have not only been rejected, but loaded with every epithet of contempt and obloquy. The feelings, perhaps, of both parties have, on such occasions, run away with their judgments." Other instances of exact learning, careful statement, and judicious avoidance of extremes, are to be found in his remarks upon "The Critical Principles adopted by the Writers who have recommended a new Translation of the Bible;" and also in a Sermon, preached at St. Mary's, upon a subject closely connected with these Unitarian extravagances-" On Singularity and Excess in Theological Literature." But whilst he was directing the energies of a powerful mind and the stores of a large and various erudition against the aggressions of the Unitarian, he perceived that, by the revival of the old questions respecting the Calvinism of the Articles of our Church, other fields of research were to be explored, and adversaries from • Penes me codex est Ethiopicus quodam ausu comparatus. |