quickly determined to have nothing more to do with him.

He often seemed to recollect this first setting out for himself in the cares of a householder and a clergyman, at the age of twenty-three, with great amusement. His first pupil, for whom he ever after expressed great affection, yet not more than was his pupil's regard for him, was of a delicate constitution, and had been nicely brought up. Mr. Paley had no place to receive him into but a house with a stone floor, and being too poor to comply immediately with his mother's request for a carpet, he good-humouredly and thriftily made him stand upon the bellows. The first fee he ever got for the performance of his clerical duties he recollected with equal gratification, as it reminded him of his own simplicity. Being called upon by some great family to give private baptism to one of the children, he was presented with a slip of paper containing some piece of coin, which, to use his own words, he so pressed and fumbled about from an anxiety to know what it contained, that he had scarcely got out of the door when he ventured to peep; but on so venturing, he turned his head towards the house, and saw the whole family laughing at the windows. He soon, however, took the rat-sickness, as he said, from the load of duty laid upon him as assistant curate; for he reckoned that it was bad enough to be a simple rat, as was his cant term for curate, but to be the rat of rats, was as many degrees below a curate, as a deputy-sexton is below him. Not

long after this time he was elected a fellow, and as soon as his favourite pupil, who had resided with him at Greenwich, was ready for college, he accompanied him thither, and commenced a residence in the university. Here he engaged in private tuition, still keeping his first attention fixed upon his companion and pupil. Shortly after his fixing in college, Dr. Shepherd, who had been long tutor, and on Dr. Backhouse's retirement, sole tutor for some time, and had lately been much engaged in forwarding Lord Sandwich's interest, as well as in other pursuits which called him much out of college, wished to have Mr. Law* for his assistant tutor in mathematics, and some little time after offered Mr. Paley his departments in natural law and in Locket.

They continued a little more than three years as sub-tutors to Dr. Shepherd, when finding that a conscientious discharge of their duty, an eager interest ́in the improvement of their pupils, the confidence of their college in their abilities, and their own consciousness of superior talents wholly employed upon the one object of tuition, had the success generally attending such qualifications both upon themselves and the university, they proposed to Dr. Shepherd that he

Afterwards Bishop of Elphin.

+ I am not certain that he lectured in Locke at all. In the Public Characters, to which allusion has already been made, it is stated that Law lectured on Locke, to which it is added in the margin, dele Locke. Of his lectures on Locke I never heard, nor were they left among his papers with his other lectures. ED...

should admit them to a share in the tuition. After some struggle they obtained what they wanted, and what Law humorously called a trisection. Dr. Shepherd continued long after they both had left their situation in college; but he is represented by an account*, which probably would have been corrected had it been inaccurate, to have been at that time a sort of sleeping partner. It is well known, however, that Law continued in the mathematical department, and Paley lectured on moral philosophy, each giving a lecture in the evenings-Law in classics, and Paley in the Greek Testament: not in addition, as is stated by Meadley, but as Dr. Backhouse had lectured in the Greek Testament and the classics before, Mr. Paley lectured in, and chose that branch of divinity, in which consists the practical part of a clergyman's duty. But the addition, if any, or as it might then be called, the innovation, was in fixing upon the evening for this lecture. It is curious that this choice of departments, which was more accidental than designed, or perhaps more determined by the mutual indifference of both, than by any previous inclination to these studies, should have been the chief source from which the one derived his celebrity, and the other an amusement, even for life. Certain it is, that Paley often declared he would have taken either part. Indeed, his mind was not only capacious, but of that serviceable kind which is not uncommon.

He could

* Public Characters.

F

VOL. I.

draw upon it for any occasion. He was more particularly attached to that closeness, and precision, and keenness, and deep penetration, which are eminently called forth at the bar. He used to think himself formed for a lawyer, both from his fondness for such sort of pointed investigation as is required on cross-examination of witnesses, and his cleverness in weighing evidence. In the latter part of his life he has been heard to say, that he often amused a sleepless night by making speeches to answer those of Mr. Pitt, Mr. Fox, and other of the leading men in parliament, and he thought he got on very well.

It might seem invidious*, not to say idle, to ground any singular fame upon the manner in which any department is filled in the university, and more especially when it is considered that the same office of tutor has been discharged to this day by many with answerable effects, though they be not much called forth into public notice. It is no less consistent with his own views through life than with his just estimate of the exertion of others, to prefer classing him with a crowd, rather than catch at fame or eminence by speaking of the manner in which he discharged his

Meadley has employed about sixty pages on Mr. Paley's university career. This rather speaks for a general want of incident in other stages of his life, than any want of discrimination in Mr. Meadley; though a farther acquaintance with his subject might have enabled him to discern between what belonged to the individual, and what was partly owing to his situation.

office; neither did he himself seem inclined to lay any great stress upon his residence in the university as the happiest or most useful time of his life. He used indeed to revert to his college life very frequently, as is not unusual with others, and was much pleased in marking it as the time of his acquaintance with literary men of his day. There are, nevertheless, one or two circumstances attendant on his situation worth noticing, as at this period of life his character seems to have assumed more settled features, and as he now first, at the age of thirty, laid the foundation of his future celebrity as well as fortune.

The first feeling of a man's way, and the being accounted for something in the dramatis personæ of life, is undoubtedly gratifying, both at the first discovery and at the recollection of it; and here probably he found himself, at the age of twenty-eight or twentynine, set on his feet more than at any other date. His former habits of life had not been much above a low condition, and his own sentiments were very far removed, then and afterwards, from any overweening views of his own importance. He was now called to comparative independence, and to an association and equality, both in public and private, with many of the first-rate abilities. He appears to have been much esteemed, and even looked up to amongst his literary as well as his private friends in the university. His acquaintance with the men of note about his standing seems to have been large enough, though not remarkable. In a Cambridge calendar with which,