1826.] Recolledions of Dr. Parr. 139 



Leamington, and Doctor John Johnstone, of Birmingham ; also by Mr. 

 Jones, surgeon, of Leamington. 



The interest his situation excited in the neiglibourhood was intense, 

 and the number of inquiries from distinguished and titled visitants 

 shewed how general was the regard his great talents and virtues excited. 

 As the author was not present at any of this period, it is deemed proper 

 to leave to his future biographer the minuter details of a time, that can 

 never be remembered by all who loved Dr. Parr but with the deepest 

 emotions of sorrow. 



On Sunday, the 6th of March 1825, at six o'clock in the evening, 

 Dr. Parr breathed his last. It is remarkable that this truly Christian 

 pastor was seized with his mortal illness while performing his parochial 

 duties on the Sabbath day ;and that on the same sacred day the faithful 

 servant wae at length called away from a life of pain to await the award 

 of his Lord and Master. 



Thus have I accomplished the task I proposed to myself, of giving an 

 abstract and brief summary of the character of Dr. Parr. He has been 

 often, but erroneously, compared to Dr. Johnson : those two great 

 luminaries differed in almost every point. Dr. Johnson was a Tory, 

 Dr. Parr was a Whig. Dr. Johnson chiefly distinguished himself by his 

 contributions to original literature ; Dr. Parr by the variety and immen- 

 sity of his acquired erudition. The preface by which Dr. Johnson esta- 

 blished his fame in that species of composition, was in the living lan- 

 guage, and upon the greatest poet of Britain ; the celebrated preface 

 of Dr. Parr is in a dead language, and was less valued on account of the 

 author's name annexed to it, than for the beauty of the diction and the im- 

 portance of the political sentiments it conveyed.* The piety of Dr. John- 

 son bordered on superstition ; the religion of Dr. Parr was enlightened by 

 toleration. The mind of Dr. Johnson, great and benevolent as it was, 

 yet was constitutionally tinged with a morbid melancholy ; that of Dr. 

 Parr was naturally cheerful to excess, and his disposition friendly, so- 

 cial, and expansive. Lastl}^ Dr. Johnson only once attempted the lask 

 of education, and soon relinquished the profession in disgust: while the 

 brightest days of Dr. Parr's life were devoted to the duties of instruc- 

 tion ; and from his hands have issued some of the most eminent wits, 

 scholars, and divines of the age. 



A reputation for unrivalled excellence, in any one department, is sel- 

 dom obtained but at the expense of some abatement in the other qua- 

 lities of the possessor. In Dr. Parr, the flime of his erudition was sup- 

 posed to supersede the necessity of other attainments, and " like 

 Aaron's serpent swallowed up the rest." But Dr. Parr was by no 

 means a mere scholar, and there was no branch of knowledge (music, 

 perhaps, excepted) of which he was ignorant, or towards which he was 

 indifferent. He was well versed in history, local and general — fond of 

 antiquities — ^liis judgment in English style was unrivalled ; and some 

 observations he made upon French, shewed him a critic in that language. 

 That he placed his chief pride in his profound attainments in the dead 

 languages is not surprising, as there lay, indubitably, his tower of strength. 



• The notes contained in the second volume of the Philopatris Varvicensis will (if 

 nothing else remains) carrj- his name down to posterity with honour. Some of the 

 purest and most eloquent specimens of style, and tlie noblest sentiments are to be 

 found in them, and a mass of erudition not easily equalled — Edit. 



T 2 



