June 5.

SACHEVERELL.

This is a name familiar to every reader of history, on account of the notoriety of Dr. Henry Sacheverell, who preached sermons, in the reign of queen Anne, which occasioned him to be impeached by the house of commons, and inflamed the whole kingdom. He died on the 5th of June, 1724. It is proposed to give a brief account of this remarkable character, and of his great ancestor, the rev. John Sacheverell, a man of illustrious reputation in the west of England.

This John Sacheverell was of an ancient family in Nottinghamshire, and grandfather to Dr. Henry Sacheverell. John was son to the estimable minister of Stoke-Underham, in Somersetshire, who had many children. Two of them, John, of whom we are now speaking, and Timothy, were bred ministers. They were both of St. John's College, Oxon; and were both silenced on Bartholomew-day, 1662, the former at Wincanton, in Somersetshire, and the latter at Tarrant-Hinton. John, whose memory is revered in the west, had first the living of Rimpton, in Somersetshire, which he quitted before the restoration of Charles II., and afterwards that of Wincanton, where he had but thirty pounds per annum, certain allowance, with a promise of an augmentation of thirty pounds more from London; of which augmentation he received only one half year. His labors in this place were great, and his conversation was unblamable and exemplary.

He was three times married. By his

say

where ?

S. H. S.

first wife he had only one child, Joshua, whom he sent to King's College, Cambridge. By his second he had no children. By his third he had two other sons, Benjamin and Samuel, and a daughter. The third wife brought him a copyhold estate of sixty pounds a year at Stalbridge, which he returned to her two daughters by the former husband, leaving his library to his son Joshua, and twelve pence only to each of his other children. Joshua is said to have been disinherited by his father for his strict adherence to the established church.

John constantly rose early, and occupied the morning in his study, and the afternoon in visiting his flock, and discoursing with them about religious matters, till the Saturday, which was entirely spent in preparing for the Sabbath. That day was usually thus employed: he began his public worship with a short prayer in the morning, and then read a psalm and a chapter, and briefly expounded them: after singing a psalm, he prayed and preached for an hour and a quarter. In the afternoon he began at one, himself repeating his morning sermon, and examined young people as to what they had remembered; then prayed and preached for about an hour and a half: and afterwards the evening sermon, and examination of young ones about it, concluded the public service.

On the very day of the coronation or king Charles II. he preached a sermon upon 1 Sam. xii. 25, If ye shall still do wickedly, ye shall be consumed, both ye and your king." The observation which he chiefly insisted upon was this:

inat wicked men, continuing in their wicked actions, are the greatest traitors to the king, and the state wherein they live. Several went out of the church in the midst of the sermon; and the rabble got together, and in the market-house held a mock trial of the preacher. They afterwards drew him in effigy, with a book in his hand, which they called his catechism, upon a hurdle, through the town to the top of a hill, where a great bonfire was prepared. The effigy was hanged upon a pole, in order to be burned; but, the wind driving the flames away, the effigy remained untouched, and was shot at by several with a great deal of fury, and at length fell into the flames, where it was consumed. Many, who were the most active in this frantic diversion, had some one or other remarkable calamity that befel them soon after, and several of them died very miserably. In a little while afterwards he was indicted at the assizes, for continuing his ministry without reading the common prayer. On his trial he declared that if he had been required, by authority, to read the common prayer, he would either have done it or immediately have quitted the living. He behaved so well, that the judge expressed himself to this effect to those that were about him : "Have you no other man in your county to single out for a pattern of your severity?" In conclusion the jury brought him in, not guilty.

After he had been silenced by the Bartholomew act he retired to Stalbridge, where he had an estate in right of his wife. Being afterwards taken at a meeting in Shaftesbury, together with Mr. Bamfield, Mr. Hallet, Mr. Ince, and some other ministers, they were all sent to Dorchester gaol, where he remained for three years. In this imprisonment he and the rest of them preached by turns out of a window to a considerable number of people that stood to hear on the other side of the river. In this confinement he contracted such an indisposition, that, of a very cheerful, active person, he became melancholy, and soon after his days were ended. He died in his chair, speaking to those about him with great earnestness and affection, of the great work of redemption. He wrote in the title-page of all his books, "To me to live is Christ, and to die is gain;" Phil. i. 21. This was engraven upon his tomb-stone. Mr. Bangor, who was a fellow-sufferer with him, preached his

funeral-sermon, from Rom. viii. 22, 23 Joshua settled at Marlborough, where he was highly esteemed, and where was born his son Henry, who, with very moderate talents, was exalted by the madness of party, from obscurity to a height of popularity which the present times look back upon with astonishment.

Henry Sacheverell was sent to Magdalen College, Oxford, where he became demy in 1687, at the age of fifteen, and conducted himself so well that, as public tutor, he superintended the education of many persons subsequently eminent for learning and abilities. He took the degree of M. A. in 1696; B. D. and D. D. in 1708. His first preferment was Cannock, in the county of Stafford. He was appointed preacher of St. Saviour's Southwark, in 1705. While in this station he preached an assize sermon at Derby, August 15, 1709, for which he was prosecuted. It advocated principles which would have excluded the house of Hanover, and seated the Stuarts upon the throne. Sacheverell was a vapid highchurch demagogue; a mere puppet played in the van of the tories by their political views, to annoy the whig admi nistration. For another sermon at St Paul's, on the 5th of November following, he was intemperately impeached by the house of commons. His trial began February 27, 1709-10, and continued until the 23rd of March, when he was sentenced to a suspension from preaching for three years, and his two sermons were ordered to be burnt. Sir Simon Harcourt, who was counsel for him, received, on this occasion, a silver bason gilt. This ill-judged prosecution overthrew the ministry, and laid the foundation of his fortune. During these proceedings a stranger would have supposed the fate of the empire depended upon their issue. Queen Anne sat as a private individual, to listen to the idle trial. The hangman burnt the sermons, and the mob set fire to the meeting-houses. The preacher was silenced for three years, and the populace, in revenge, made him the object of their adoration. His enemies triumphed, yet dared not venture abroad, while tens of thousands bent as lowly before him as the Thibetians to the Grand Lama. He went on a tour of triumph through the country, and was received with splendid, respectful pomp, at almost every place he visited. Magistrates, in their formalities, welcomed him into their corporations, and his guard

of honor was frequently a thousand gentlemen on horseback. At Bridgenorth he was met by Mr. Creswell, at the head of four thousand horse, and the same number of persons on foot, wearing white knots edged with gold, and leaves of gilt laurel in their hats. The hedges, for several miles, were dressed with garlands of flowers, and the steeples covered with flags. In this manner he passed through Warwick, Birmingham, Bridgenorth, Ludlow, and Shrewsbury, with a cavalcade better suited to a prince than a priest, on his way to a living near Shrewsbury, which he had been presented with. In the month that his suspension ended, the valuable rectory of St. Andrew's Holborn was presented to him by the queen. His reputation was so high, that he was enabled to sell the first sermon he preached, after his sentence had expired, for £100, and upwards of 40,000 copies were sold He had also interest enough with the new ministry to provide amply for one of his brothers; yet Swift said, " they hated, and affected to despise him." In 1716 he prefixed a dedication to "Fifteen Discourses, occasionally delivered before the University of Oxford, by W. Adams, M. A., late student of Christ Church, and rector of Stanton-upon-Wye, in Herefordshire." After this publication, we hear little concerning him, except his quarrels with his parishioners, and suspicions of his having been engaged in Atterbury's plot. A considerable estate at Callow, in Derbyshire, was left to him by his kinsman, George Sacheverell, Esq. By his will he bequeathed to bishop Atterbury, then in exile, and who was supposed to have penned his defence for him, a legacy of £500. The duchess of Marlborough describes him as an ignorant, impudent incendiary,-the scorn even of those who made use of him as a tool."

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Bishop Burnet says, "He was a bold, insolent man, with a very small measure of religion, virtue, learning, or good sense; but he resolved to force himself into popularity and preferment, by the most petulant railings at dissenters and low-church men, in several sermons and libels, written without either chasteness of style or liveliness of expression." His death is recorded in the "Historical Register," 1724, as of a common person, without either eulogy or blame.*

Mr. Nichols in Gents. Mag. 1779. Noble.

WILL SHIPPEN

William Shippen, Esq., the great leader of the tories, and advocate of the Stuarts, in the reigns of George I. and George II., died in the year 1743. He was son of the rector of Stockport, Cheshire, where he was born in 1672, and educated under Mr. Dale, a man of abilities. In 1707, when John Asgill, Esq., was expelled the house of commons, Mr. Shippen succeeded him as representative for Bramber, through the interest of Lord Plymouth, whose son, Dixie Windsor, was his brother-in-law. He afterwards constantly sat as member for some borough, always acting as a partisan of the expelled family, and never disguising his sentiments. The court endeavoured, but in vain, to soften him. He had not more than £400 per annum, originally but, as he was an economist, he never ex ceeded his income. Of George I. he declared, in the house of commons, that "the only infelicity of his majesty's reign was, that he was unacquainted with our language and constitution;" both sides of the house wished him to soften the expression; and the Prince of Wales, afterwards George II., even sent to him his groom of the bed-chamber, general Churchill, with an offer of £1000, which he declined, and was sent to the Tower. When restored to liberty, he remained the same man. Though the most determined of Sir Robert Walpole's political enemies, he was, like Sir John Barnard, his private friend. Shippen once successfully applied to him in favor of a person who was in trouble for illegally corresponding with the Stuarts, and was himself detected in a similar offence. The postman, by accident or design, delivered a letter into Walpole's hands addressed to Shippen, from the Pretender. Walpole sent for Shippen, and gave him the packet without any seeming resentment, mercly remarking how careless the person employed must be in his delivery. Shippen was covered with confusion; Walpole observed, "Sir, I cannot, knowing your political sentiments, ask you to vote with the administration; all I request is, that you would vote for me if personally attacked." This Shippen promised and performed. He would pleasantly remark, "Robin and I are two honest men; he is for King George, and I. for King James; but those men with long cravats," meaning Sandys, Sir John Rushout, Gybbon, and others," they only desire places,

either under king George or king James."
He would say to the most violent whigs,
"It is necessary to restore the Stuarts."
When asked how he should vote, he used
to say,
"I cannot tell until I hear from
Rome."

Mr. Shippen married the daughter and co-heir of Sir Richard Stote, Knt., of Northumberland, with whom he had £70,000, but this match made no alteration in his conduct, except in living something more expensively. Sometimes he resided in apartments in Holland-House, at others in a hired house on Richmond Hill. In town, he lived for many years in Norfolk-street, where he was surrounded by persons of rank, learning, and talent. His conversation was dignified, and replete with vivacity and wit. In the house of commons he commanded attention, by the fire and force of his sentiments, though he spoke rapidly, in a low tone of voice, and usually with his glove before his mouth. His speeches generally contained some pointed period, which peculiarly applied to the subject in debate, and which he uttered with great animation. His name is still popular through these lines of Pope :

I love to pour out all myself, as plain
As honest Shippen, or downright Montaigne.

He was a poetical as well as a prose politician. Besides several other tracts, he wrote "Faction Displayed" and "Moderation Displayed:" in which he satirized the great whig lords, under the names of the principal Romans who engaged in Cataline's conspiracy. His verses were severe, but not harmonious. Sheffield, duke of Buckingham, mentions him in "The Election of a Poet Laureate."

To Shippen, Apollo was cold with respect,
But said, in a greater assembly he shin'd
As places are things he had ever declin'd.
Mr. Shippen's relict was unsocial and
penurious, and inherited his personality,
as her husband's survivor, according to
their mutual agreement. She repelled all
advances from queen Caroline, and, dying
imbecile, the law gave her fortune to her
sister, the Hon. Mrs. Dixie Windsor.

Mr. Shippen had three brothers, and a sister; one of his brothers, president of Brazen Nose College, Oxford, and some time vice-chancellor of that university, man of distinguished abilities, and was inducted to the living of St. Mary's, Whitechapel, in room of Dr. Welton, who lost it because he would not

was a

OLD BOOKSELLERS, &c.

On the 6th of June, 1796, died at Oxford, in his eighty-fifth year, Mr. Daniel Prince, an eminent bookseller, and during many years manager of the University Press. In that capacity several valuable publications passed under his superintendance. Those on which he most prided himself were Blackstone's Magna Charta, 1759, 4to; Marmora Oxoniensia, 1763, fol.; Listeri Synopsis Conchyliorum, 1770, fol.; Blackstone's Commentaries, 4 vols. 4to., three editions, 1770, &c. Kennicot's Hebrew Bible, 2 vols. fol. 1776; Ciceronis Opera, 10 vols. 4to. 1784; Bradley's Observations and Tables, printed in 1788, though not published till 1796

In the same year, on the 8th of August, the sister University, Cambridge, lost a bookseller of that town in the person of Mr. John Nicholson, who died aged sixty-six, lamented by an unparalleled circle of friends. By unremitting attention to business for upwards of forty-five years, Mr. Nicholson acquired considerable property. He was known in the University by the name of "Maps or

Noble.

Pictures," from his constant habit of offering those articles at the different chambers. He established a very capital circulating library, including most of the lecture books read in the University, and also many of the best and scarcest authors in various other branches of literature; by which means the students were assisted to the most esteemed writers at a small expense. He presented to the University a whole length portrait of himself, loaded with books, which hangs in the staircase of the public library, and under it a print engraven from it.

To the preceding notice of "old Maps" of Cambridge, may be subjoined a memorandum of a person of more literary distinction of the same place. On the 18th of April, 1790, died at his house in All Saints Church, at the age of seventyeight, M. René La Butte, who had taught the French language in that university upwards of forty-years, with great reputation. He was introduced there by Dr. Conyers Middleton, and acquired much credit by publishing a French Grammar, with an analysis. M. La Butte married Mrs. Mary Groves, of Cambridge, and was possessed of a very good estate near Ely, and of money in the funds, all obtained by his great industry and care. He was a native of Angers, in Anjou, and brought up a printer, in which business he excelled. On leaving France, he worked in several respectable printing offices in London, particularly with the late Mr. Bowyer, and solely composed Gardiner's "Tables of Logarithms." He went to Cambridge with the well-known Robert Walker (of Fleet-lane, or OldBailey) and Thomas James, printers, when they first set up printing a weekly newspaper in that town; and, to establish the sale of it, they printed, in 8vo., Lord Clarendon's "History of the Great Rebellion," and Boyer's "History of Queen Anne," with neat cuts, &c., which they gave gratis, a sheet a week, in the newspapers they distributed.*

There are several instances, though at present they are not at hand to be available, of old publishers of country newspapers, printing works and giving them away with their journals to entice people

* Gents. Mag.

to rea the news. One book, however, penes me, will exemplify the fact: "A New History of England-Manchester, printed by Joseph Harrop, opposite the Exchange, 1764." At the end of this octavo volume, which consists of 778 pages, is the following address:

"To the PUBLIC.

"The History of England being now brought down to that period which was at first proposed, the Publisher takes this opportunity of returning his thanks to his friends and subscribers for the kind encouragement they have given his News Paper; and hopes that as he has steadily persevered in going through with, and giving gratis, the History of England, at the Expence of upwards of One Hundred Pounds, they will still continue their Subscription to his paper, which he will spare neither pains nor assiduity to render worthy their perusal.

Jos. HARROP."

From booksellers we have digressed to newspapers, and they bring to recollection a humble laborer upon the "public press," Wells Egelsham, who died on the 4th of April, 1786, in Goldsmith-street, Goughsquare, London, overwhelmed with age, infirmities, and poverty-a character not unknown in the regions of politics, porter, and tobacco. He was originally bred to the profession of a printer, and worked as a compositor, till disabled by repeated attacks of the gout. For some years he was employed in the service of Mr. Woodfall, the father of the printers of "The Public Advertiser" and "Morning Chronicle," to the former of which papers the name of poor Egelsham appeared for some time as the ostensible publisher. Having from nature a remarkable squint, to obviate the reflections of others he assumed the name of "Winkey;" and published a little volume of humorous poetry in 1769, under the title of "Winkey's Whims."

He was one of the founders of the honorable society of "Free and Easy Johns." In 1779 he wrote "A short Sketch of English Grammar," 8vo. There is a small poem by him in Mr. Nicholls's "Anecdotes of Mr. Bowyer," and a great variety of his fugitive pieces in almost all the public prints. The latter part of his life was principally supported by the profits of a very small snuff and tobacco shop, by the collecting