258 



He became President of this Society in 1828, on the resigna- 

 tion of Sir Humphry Davy ; a situation from which he retired in 

 1831. He continued, however, for the remainder of his life, to take 

 a prominent part in the concerns of the Society ; and there are few 

 of my brother-Fellows, whom I have now the honour of addressing, 

 who have not had opportunities of observing and appreciating his 

 constant zeal for the interests of science, the variety and philoso- 

 phical character of his conversation, the simple and unaffected elo- 

 quence of his public addresses, and, above all, that sweetness of 

 temper and kindness of heart which beamed forth in the expression 

 of those truly classical and benevolent features, which one of the 

 most accomplished of our artists (himself a brother-Fellow) has so 

 happily perpetuated in the portrait which adorns these walls. The 

 very absence of that inflexibility of purpose and of opinion which 

 sonie might consider essential to the perfection of the character of 

 a philosopher, seemed, in his case, the proper developement of that 

 natural benevolence and humanity which made him so justly beloved 

 in every relation of life, whether as a husband, a father, and a brother, 

 — as a master, a landlord, and a friend. 



Mr. Gilbert was the author and editor of several antiquarian and 

 other works relating to his native county, whose interests he always 

 laboured to promote with more than common zeal and patriotism. 

 He was President of the Cornish Geological Society from the period 

 of its first establishment in 1814>, and he never omitted attending 

 its meetings, though on the last occasion he was so weak as to be 

 compelled to resign the chair to his friend and countryman Sir 

 Charles Lemon. In 1808, he married Miss Gilbert, and assumed 

 her name in 1817, on succeeding to a verj large property in 

 Sussex. The same simple and unaffected character which distin- 

 guished him in public life was still more conspicuous in his domestic 

 relations. He died on the 24th of December last, and his body was 

 borne to the grave by his own labourers, and followed by his widow 

 and family in that primitive and unostentatious form which best 

 suited the simplicity and natural humility of his own character. 



Dr. Samuel Butler, Bishop of Lichfield, was born in l??^, at 

 Kenilworth,which was likewise the birth-place of two other contempo- 

 rary prelates of our church. He was educated at Rugby, and became 

 afterwards a member of St. John's College, Cambridge, where he 

 gained the highest classical honours which the University could 

 confer. In 1798 he was made Head ?>Iaster of Shrewsbury School, 

 over which he continued to preside during aperiod of thirty-eight years. 

 His great acquirements as a scholar, his eminent skill as a teacher, 

 his active interest in the welfare of his pupils, and the tact and 

 knowledge of character which he showed in their management, all 

 contributed to raise the school to the highest reputation, and to give 

 it, during many years, the pre-eminence over every other school in 

 the kingdom in the number and rank of the academical honours 

 which were gained by his scholars. The date of his elevation to 

 the Bench was nearly contemporaneous with the appearance of that 

 fatal disease which, after three years of the most depressing suffer- 



