Græcum te Albuti quam Romanum atque Sabinum
Municipem Ponti, Titi, Anni, centurio num
Præclarorum hominum, ac primum signiferumque
Maluisti dici.
Soon after his leaving the University, he married, but never was wight more remarkably unqualified for the superintendence of a family, and the regulation of a limited income. The consequence may be easily imagined; and in no long interval, he found himself so overwhelmed with pecuniary obligations and perplexities, that ruin stared him in the face.
The venerable and excellent Bishop Porteus, estimating his literary attainments in their due proportion, and perfectly satisfied that his difficulties arose from no acts of personal indiscretion, or of moral inaccuracy, but from entire ignorance of the world, and from his mind being constantly absorbed in his favourite pursuits, gave him preferment. Two other friends also evinced so much and such successful activity in his behalf, that he was enabled to weather the storm, and he subsequently retired to a situation, where he was not exposed to similar perplexities, and was enabled, without molestation, to pursue the path in which he most delighted.
It might be added, that the art of memory was not among those which he most successfully cultivated. Upon some subsequent occasion, he to all appearance forgot one at least of those friends, and the assistance which their active kindness enabled them to administer to his necessities.
Perhaps enough has been said, but lest the subject of this notice, if he survives, should feel his pride wounded on reading this narrative, it is most willingly added in continuation, that more amiable manners could no where be found. His mind always appeared, and really was, uncontaminated by the dissimulation and hypocrisy of modern refinement; and it may be affirmed, with the small exception above cited, that he was invariably kind, friendly, and benevolent.
But his ignorance of the world, and of the human character, frequently subjected him to be imposed upon. He was sincere himself, and never suspected the deficiency of that quality in others. He was a conscientious and pious Christian, and did not think it possible that infidelity could lurk under the specious mask of liberality, candour, a general taste for literature, a partiality for some of our popular ecclesiastical writers, and an avowed zeal for moral order.
He would not indeed have exposed himself to the ribaldry and indignity of a rabid Trulliber, but in the ordinary concerns of life, and in the barters which necessarily occur in domestic economy, he was unable to distinguish the genuine from the spurious commodity, and knew no more of the mysteries of the drawing-room, or the sacred trifles of politeness, than Slingsby of criticism, or Gabrielli of Greek. Could but these worthies have seen him enter a room,