a

upon them more than they were able to stand to. To borrow a most applicable sentence, "He never forgot the use of his understanding, nor was solicitous to show what he knew more than what he thought. He never reasoned from memory, or spoke from quotation." "Wherever settled, or however employed, it was impossible for him not to observe or reflect; with such internal resources he wanted no library."b

He builds surely, because he considers well the foundation, but he builds no more upon it than it will bear. He seems to have known, by a close examination of the workings of his own mind, how much the attention was fatigued by multiplying proof, and how much intricacy is avoided by adhering to one point-how much, in short, simplicity of design adds to perspicuity, and ensures a reader's attention; he therefore rarely attempts more than will bring his subject down to the level of an ordinary comprehension. When it might seem to require whole tomes of divinity to treat of the Evidences of Christianity-when others would, perhaps, have consulted volume upon volume, to give a connected view of Moral Philosophy with any satisfaction to themselves or their readers, or as such a mind might be expected to entertain such a subject, he goes to work in a different way. Christianity is treated as it would offer itself to the illiterate fishermen, or the ignorant natural man. Moral Philosophy is brought to the level of common sense. The writings of St. Paul are noticed as speaking to ordinary capacities, with reasonings and deductions obvious to the generality of minds. Nor is it in his writings only that he seems to have been an advocate for common sense; in all his actions as well as speculations he made that his great standard, before he allowed himself to adopt any opinion, "retinuitque, quod est difficilimum, ex sapientiá modum."

In one of his sermons before the university, he says, "In our wishes to convince, we are extremely apt to overdo our arguments." He seldom made too much use of any one proof, but seems rather to reserve a volume of proof for an inferior purpose. There are, indeed, one or two favourite sentiments which are to be found in more places and works than one: these, as the produce of much deliberation, or of some happy hit, he uses as occasion arises; but he never seems to introduce a reflection or an argument for the sake

a

Edinburgh Review, No. 70.

b

Quarterly Review.

of dwelling upon it, or drawing more from it than the one conclusion he aimed at. Inferences or corollaries seem not to claim any part of his attention, but he leaves his reader to draw them for himself, not suffering himself to doubt that he is fully equal to the writer.

His candour and liberality are apparent in what is called by his biographers and others, his inconsistency, equivocation, casuistry. The allowances that he made to every position, viz. that it might be otherwise, were carried so far that, however incompatible with the general tendency of his mind, that view sometimes seems to approach towards vacillation or paradox, which is only the produce of a different train of reasoning, or a different way of handling a subject.

His style may be the strongest expression of his mind-strong, nervous, unvarnished, easily rising into dignity or pathos, though seldom put to such uses, it has not a word too much, nor scarcely an expression or term that would be improved by changing; yet it is so easy, so natural, so original, so characteristic of the writer, that though it is unlike most other styles, it serves as no other would do, to convey his peculiar sentiments in a most substantial manner. It is by a comparison, whimsical enough, represented in the Quarterly Review to be formed on the model of Johnson. Nothing can surely be farther from the characteristic of the two writers as to general style. It may be observed from the specimens given in this place, as well as afterwards, that the same strong and substantial, and rather opinionated way of expressing himself, seems to have adhered to him from the first commencement of his public duties to the last. His public lectures, as well as his early sermons, are full of the same sort of commanding positive strain, which may bear some resemblance to Johnson, but is not uncommonly assorted with superior talents. The homeliness of his style, indeed, might depend upon the circumstances which called him forth as a writer; but much of the familiar and unpolished air which his writings assume was probably contracted from his habit of communicating instruction by conversation to his pupils, and afterwards to his parishioners,-to whose minds he found the readiest access by a still plainer treatment of his subject; and thus, having been used to commit his thoughts to paper in this way, he thought no longer of ornament or embellishment. So much of it as was acquired, (and no doubt a good deal must have been acquired by the very demand for it, and by its running in the same peculiar course through the whole of his writings,) seems to have been gained

from his unwillingness to hide any of the workings of his mind; from a frankness in showing all the ways by which he caught his thoughts, by a reluctance to keep his readers at a distance in order to gain credit for any great or shining qualities of genius. He seems to have embraced a sentiment and turned it over till he gained such an expression for it as he himself felt would convey his meaning, without giving himself much farther trouble about the arrangement of his words. Every sentence is sure to contain some substance which the reader has no difficulty in applying, and some substance which cannot be dispensed with, and so cannot be omitted or guessed at. He is rarely led, in the course of expressing one conception, to wander into a kindred suggestion, like a dreamer or a driveller. Matter of fact is his aim; and he seems to bind himself in one straight-forward course, by a constant recollection of and recurrence to his subject. He never makes a sacrifice to style, nor ever courts smoothness, or avoids roughness, to obtain a more refined mode of expression. He appears to be careful, in the first place, to form a habit of thinking and reasoning correctly, and then trusts to his natural faculties for conveying his thoughts to others. From his constant habit of noting down occasional and detached sentiments, his language was likely to be full of breaks, and from the hardness, and decision, and pointedness of his ways of thinking, equally subject to knots, roughnesses, and unevennesses; but these are seldom felt by the reader, because the sentiments tell to his entire satisfaction. Not the least conspicuous quality of his mind and heart is, a perfect freedom from any high opinion of his own powers. Few are likely to be disgusted with his works from their assuming a dictatorial tone, or breathing an air of superiority; though few works are so full of little allusions to the author and his opinions, yet the artlessness of such allusions is so immediately apparent, that it dwells not on the reader's attention.

This seems a proper place to mention, that from some circumstances which took place about the time of publishing the Moral Philosophy, it is fair to conclude that he had little notion of estimating his own powers previous to that period. He could not indeed be ignorant of his own abilities, and therefore it would be only an oblique praise to lower them for him; but he seems not to have guessed at the reception which his works would meet with, and at best to have been much surprised and gratified at finding they ranked so high. The sudden

rise of his powers in his own opinion is, perhaps, to be dated from the appearance of this work, and his first consciousness of public consequence to the great eagerness and demand for these volumes. It will be shown, in speaking of some of his future works, what was his opinion at a more advanced stage of literary reputation; at present it will be a sufficient indication that it was not very high, if we observe that on his own negociation with a bookseller in London, who was recommended to him at first by being concerned with the writings of the bishop of Carlisle, he would have concluded a bargain for two or three hundred pounds, had not his friend, then bishop of Clonfert, undertaken the management of it for him, and refused the offer till he should consult an eminent bookseller in Dublin. Meantime, Milliken, a bookseller in Carlisle, came forward in the name of this very Dublin bookseller, and offered £1000 for it. This offer was forwarded to the bishop in London, and would have been closed with at once, had not Mr. Paley wished to make the same proposal to the former bookseller in London. Without much scruple, though with considerable surprise at the enlargement of the speculation, he closed with the terms immediately. This let Mr. Paley into the secret of his own worth; for, on mentioning the circumstance to some of his family afterwards, "Little," says he, "did I ever think of making a thousand pounds by any work of mine!" The demand for it, however, as well as for his future works, gave neither him nor his bookseller any cause for dissatisfaction"; nor had he to wait for proposals on other occasions, but for his future publications made his own, and they were accepted.

But it is time to return from the work to the author, who, during this digression, is left at Appleby.

The account of his preferments, and the various movements to which he was subject in consequence, uninteresting as they may be to the general reader, are given with sufficient accuracy b. Nor are they in fact necessary to be detailed, except as connected with some interesting points of his character, and as showing that the same mind and principles accompanied him through all his situations, though under improved circumstances. Much of what is now to be given rests upon what could scarcely be known out of his own family. The policy of patronage is not often made public, * I have now before me the twenty-first edition, dated 1814.-ED. b Meadley and Chalmers.

and it is only the distance of time, and the unconcern of all parties, that make the entertainment cheap at the price of a slight indiscretion.

After holding the living of Appleby for about three years, he gave it up to enable the bishop to provide for a relation, and went to reside at Dalston; with an understanding, however, that he should soon be provided for by a more dignified station in the Cathedral at Carlisle. At the vicarage-house of Dalston it was necessary to make improvements, and alterations, and additions, and he therefore began, as he used to say, “adding to the dignity of its appearance;" and commenced farmer, by taking about twenty acres of glebe into his own hands. In this concern it was that he soon became a bankrupt, according to his own account, related by Meadley, but to what extent may be conjectured. In less than six months a prebendal stall became vacant, which he was informed of by his friend the archdeacon, who happened to be at Rose at the time, in the following short but good-humoured easy way :- "If you mean to have this, come here directly, for my father is old and weak, and there is an eager applicant for it now in the house." It is probable, however, that the archdeacon's injunction was useless; for, without the shadow of a demur, or any solicitation from Mr. Paley himself, he became forthwith the fourth prebendary of Carlisle, about the same time at which he vacated Appleby. He soon after divided his residence between this city and his living of Dalston, which was only four miles distant, and three from Rose, where he still had much concern and more interest than in any other object, in his capacity of chaplain.

About two years after this, in consequence of some important services rendered to the Duke of Portland fifteen or twenty years before by a clergyman in Cumberland, (it is said, by his deciphering some old English manuscripts or inscriptions, which had puzzled many antiquarians, in order to prove the Duke's claim to some disputed property,) his grace very honourably wished to return the favour by being of service to him; yet from that clergyman's station, as well as from some eccentricities, passable enough in a character compounded strangely of much strong and original genius, and a temper irritable to an excess on trifles, he was unsuitable for the bench of bishops, in the filling of which the Duke of Portland, as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, had then considerable sway. The bishopric of Clonfert happened to be at this time, 1782, vacant.

The son of the bishop of