ever reach a second edition, the obshould be expunged.

noxious passages

The same solicitude was also very strongly marked in another instance, upon his perusing the Life of Bishop Warburton, by Bishop Hurd. His own words, which follow, show how quick and alive his feelings were upon this subject, at the same time that they had nothing in them of bitterness and animosity.

"In this work," he says, "I found the merit of Archbishop Secker greatly underrated, as a writer, a scholar, a divine, and a critic in Hebrew. I therefore thought myself called upon, by honour and by gratitude, to vindicate my old master against these unjust and injurious attempts to lower his character; which I did by publishing, in a separate form, a new edition of the life prefixed to his works, adding at the same time a preface,

and

and a few notes tending to confute Bishop Hurd's misrepresentations of him and his writings. Still, however, this act of justice to my great Patron, never in the least diminished the high respect and veneration which I always entertained for the character of Bishop Hurd; whose 'piety, learning, taste, and genius, rendered him the great ornament of literature and religion, and very justly gained him not only the esteem, but the affection, friendship, and confidence of his Sovereign, and raised him to that distinguished situation, which he filled with so much dignity both in public life, and in an honourable retirement for so long a course of years."

After Archbishop Secker's death, Dr. Porteus devoted his entire attention to the care of his two benefices, Hunton and Lambeth. Till his parsonage at the former place was ready for his reception,

he

he resided at a small neat cottage in the village of Linton, which was near enough to enable him to perform with ease his parochial duties, superintend the repairs, and make such alterations as the great capability of the situation suggested to his mind. He had found the premises at first in a very ruinous and neglected state, no rector having lived there for above thirty years but he saw at one glance the natural beauties of the place, and that it required only a little skill and taste to display them to advantage. This was gradually, and at some expense, completely effected. A new room was afterwards added to the house; and, by ornamenting the grounds about it, and letting in the rich luxuriant prospect which it commanded on every side, he made it at last a most comfortable and delightful residence. Every thing indeed

concurred

concurred to attach him strongly to Hunton. "It was to me," he says, with all

that animation, which was so peculiar to him, "a little terrestrial Paradise: for

σε

though there are many parsonages larger, handsomer, and more commodious, yet in comfort, warmth, repose, tranquillity, and cheerfulness, in variety of walks, shelter, shade, and sunshine, in perfectly rural and picturesque scenery, I know few superior to it. What however is of more importance, no place was ever better calculated to excite and cherish devout and pious sentiments towards the great Creator and Preserver of the Universe. The solemn silence of the thicket and the grove, the extensive horizon that opened to the view, the glories of the rising and the setting sun, the splendour of a moon-light night and a starry sky,

all

all which presented themselves to the eye, to a vast extent without interruption, from the lawn before the house; these, and a variety of other sublime and pleasing objects, could not fail to soothe and tranquillize and elevate the soul, and raise it up to high and heavenly contemplations. But it was not the charms of the country only which formed the delight of Hunton. The neighbourhood was excellent, consisting principally of antient and long-established families, who lived on their own estates in that decent hospitality, and that judicious mixture of society and retirement, which constitute the true felicity of human life, and which so remarkably and so fortunately distinguish the gentry and nobility of England from almost all other countries in Europe. The greater part of them

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