It is important to know how far the powers of human reason extend in matters of religion, and where they fail. Reason can examine the claims of a divine revelation, and determine its authority by the most conclusive arguments. It can expose error, and establish the truth; attack infidelity within its own entrenchments, and carry its victorious arms into the very camp of the enemy. It can defend all the outworks of religion, and vindicate its insulted majesty. But at this point its powers begin to fail. It cannot confer a spiritual apprehension of the truth in the understanding, nor a spiritual reception of it in the heart. This is the province of grace. "No man knoweth the things of God, but the Spirit of God, and he to whom the Spirit hath revealed them." "Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord." Men of learning endeavour to attain to the knowledge of divine things, in the same manner as they acquire an insight into human things, that is, by human power and human teaching. Whereas divine things require a divine power and divine teaching. "All thy children shall be taught of God." Not that human reason is superseded in its use. Man is always a rational and moral agent. But it is reason, conscious of its own weakness, simple in its views, and humble in its spirit, enlightened, guided, and regulated in all its researches by the grace and wisdom that is from above. John Cowper expresses the substance of this idea in the following emphatic words:—"I have learned that in a moment, which I could not have learned by reading many books for many years. I have often studied these points, and studied them with great attention, but was blinded by prejudice; and unless He, who alone is worthy to unloose the seals, had opened the book to me, I had been blinded still."
The information supplied respecting John Cowper by preceding biographers is brief and scanty. The following are the particulars which the Editor has succeeded in obtaining. John Cowper was considered to be one of the best scholars in the university of Cambridge. In 1759 he obtained the Chancellor's gold medal, and in 1762 gained both the prizes for Masters of Arts. He was subsequently elected Fellow of Bennet, and became private tutor to to Lord Walsingham. He translated the four first books of the Henriade; his brother William, it is said, the four next (Hayley states two cantos only, and alleges Cowper's own authority for the fact); E. B. Greene, Esq., a relative of Dr. Greene, the master of the college,[770] the ninth, and Robert Lloyd the tenth book. It appeared in Smollett's edition, in 1762, but the writer has not been able to procure a copy. He afterwards engaged in an edition of Apollonius Rhodius,[771] when his sedentary and studious habits produced an imposthume in the liver, which brought him to his grave in the thirty-third year of his age. He was buried at Foxton in Cambridgeshire, of which place he was rector.
Dr. Bennet, Bishop of Cloyne, in a letter addressed to Dr. Parr, bears the following honourable testimony to his merits.
"TO THE REV. DR. PARR.
"Emanuel College, April 18, 1770.
"We have lost the best classic and most liberal thinker in our university, Cowper of Ben'et. He sat so long at his studies, that the posture gave rise to an abscess in his liver, and he fell a victim to learning. The goddess has so few votaries here, that she resolved to take the best offering we had, and she employed Apollonius Rhodius to strike the blow. I write the author again, Apollonius Rhodius. Cowper had laboured hard at an edition of him for several years, and applied so much to his favourite author, that it cost his life. I shall make a bold push for his papers. Yet, what omens I have! Melancthon did but think of a translation, and he died. Hoeltzlinus owns he wrote the latter part of the annotations, manu lassissimâ et corpore imbecillo, and died before he put the last hand to them. Cowper collates all the editions, makes a new translation, and follows his predecessors. One would think that by some unknown fate, or by some curse of his master, Callimachus, our poet was doomed to remain in obscurity. His enemies may say, that the dulness of his verses bears some resemblance to the torpedo, and benumbs or kills whatever touches it."—See Dr. Parr's Works, vol. vii. p. 75.
The following elegy was also composed in honour of his memory by one of his fellow collegians, which evinces the high sense entertained of his character and classical attainments.
ELEGY
ON THE DEATH OF THE REV. JOHN COWPER, OF CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE, BY A FELLOW COLLEGIAN.