1827.] Anecdotes and Conversations. 257 



over to the county town to witness, what was then a rarity, the ascent of 

 an air-balloon. The archdeacon, however, would not budge. The inven- 

 tion, he justly remarked, was French ; and he added, " timeo Danaos et 

 dona ferentes" Besides, he asked, " where is the pleasure in seeing two 

 fools impiously setting Providence at defiance;" a remark, the justice of 

 which I have often had reason to recal. It was on this occasion, that 

 our village surgeon presumed, somewhat too jocosely, to say to him, " you 

 are afraid, lest they should get near to Heaven, and find out how little 

 you doctors of divinity know about the matter." I never saw the arch- 

 deacon so seriously angry as then. Rebuking the surgeon for his levity 

 and indifference in religious matters, which he said belonged to his cloth, 

 he continued with a prophetic solemnity <( this reigning taste for experi- 

 ment, bodes no good. Franklin's rods and his blasphemous boast of 

 *' eripuit fulmen calo," have deeply injured religion. Men no longer can 

 say, " calo tonantem credimus." He who is solicitous concerning 

 second causes, is but too apt to overlook the first." For the rest of that 

 evening he sat silent ; nor did he ever afterwards hear balloons mentioned 

 without launching forth some contemptuous sarcasm. Another fashionable 

 folly, which roused the indignation of the archdeacon, was, the unlimited 

 admiration of Sterne. The fellow, he would say, is a disgrace to the 

 church. His religion is full of levity ; and what is worse, his levity is not 

 full of religion. The antithesis was striking. 



At the breaking out of the French Revolution, the Doctor, in common 

 with all right-thinking men, was seriously alarmed lest the principles of 

 the people should be injured; and when Burke published his diatribe 

 against that insane and atheistical ebullition of a stiff-necked generation, 

 he took a journey to London, solely to see that splendid orator; availing 

 himself of the opportunity to solicit the then vacant archdeaconry ; an 

 energy wonderful in a person of his years and infirmities. Burke received 

 him as he deserved, and invited him to Beaconsfield. Pitt was of the 

 party, and port and politics were the order of the day. The port was as 

 sound as the politics, and the politics as old as the port ; so the Doctor, 

 we may be sure, enjoyed the feast of reason and flow of soul. Indeed, 

 this evening was a constant theme of conversation with him for the rest of 

 his life. Among many anecdotes that he was in the habit of telling, I 

 shall repeat only one or two. The French armies were in rapid advance, 

 and the stocks were falling. Pitt, for once in his life, spoke despondingly; 

 and Burke said something about the chivalry of stock-jobbers being gone : 

 but Botherum reminded the premier of the just confidence a British prime 

 minister ought ever to have in Divine Providence, which would not suffer 

 a set of miscreants, who had not only killed their king, but had actually 

 abolished tithes, to prosper. A foreign ambassador, who was at table, 

 whispered something about " gros lataillons" which the doctor was 

 not Frenchman enough to understand, but which made the premier 

 smile. However he was not discouraged ; but pledging the master of 

 the house in a bumper, he thundered forth with an air of inspiration. 

 Jl7rcw$E? 'EXXwuv m, ixiydifatfn Tarpi^a, &c. &c. ; and Pitt shaking him heartily 

 by the hand, bid him not to fear, " with such right-thinking persons on 

 our side," he said, " we are confident against the world in arms ; and so, 

 doctor, I hope for your vote at Cambridge on the approaching election." 

 The doctor lamented that the distance of his living and his age, had pre- 

 vented his voting the last time ; and Pitt significantly shaking his head, 

 replied, " I think we may remedy that before long." 



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