gerous sickness at Constantinople some years before. But these remedies availed him not; his malady proved, in the event, an inward, malignant, and insuperable fever, of which he died May 4, 1677, in the forty-seventh year of his age, in mean lodgings, at a saddler's, near Charing Cross, which he had used for several years for though his condition was much bettered by his obtaining the mastership of Trinity College, yet that had no bad influence on his morals; he still continued the same humble person, and could not be prevailed upon to take more respectable lodgings."

Dr Barrow was buried in Westminster Abbey, where a marble monument, surmounted by a bust, still records his manifold abilities and virtues, as well as the affection of his friends.

His profile is said to have borne a strong resemblance to the image of Marcus Brutus on the Roman denarii. He was below the middle size, and very thin, but remarkably athletic and strong. He had a fair complexion, and a tranquil countenance, with a penetrating expression; gray and somewhat short-sighted eyes; light auburn hair, naturally much curled.

Of his general habits, little can now be told. He was a very early riser, and, with two exceptions, very temperate in his habits. He indulged greatly in all kinds of fruit, alleging, that if the immoderate use of it killed hundreds in autumn, it was the means of preserving thousands throughout the year. But he was still fonder of tobacco. He called it his ravpapμakov. Probably he had learned the use of it where he found the opium which killed him at last-in Turkey. He believed that it helped to compose and regulate his thoughts. "But, doubtless," as Ward remarks, with some simplicity and more truth, "the sedateness of his mind, close attention to his subject, and unwearied pursuit of it till he conquered all its difficulties, joined with a great natural sagacity and solid judgment,

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were the true secret why he thought so justly, and wrote with that great accuracy and clearness.”*

The slovenliness in dress for which he was remarkable when a schoolboy, continued with him all his days. A ludicrous example of its effect on one occasion is related by Dr Pope. Dr Wilkins, while rector of St Lawrence-Jewry, asked Dr Barrow to preach for him on a Sunday when he felt indisposed. Accordingly the doctor came, and mounted the pulpit in his ordinary craftsman-looking guise, with a pale meagre countenance, his collar unbuttoned, and his long silky curls dangling in uncombed confusion. "Immediately all the congregation was in an uproar, as if the church were falling, and they scampering to save their lives, each shifting for himself with great precipitation. There was such a noise of pattens of serving-maids and ordinary women, and of unlocking of pews, and cracking of seats, caused by the younger sort climbing hastily over them, that I confess I thought all the congregation were mad. But the good doctor, seeming not to take notice of this disturbance, proceeds, names his text, and preaches his sermon to two or three gathered, or rather left, together, of which number, as it fortunately happened, Mr Baxter, that eminent Nonconformist, was one." Among those who stayed out the sermon was a young man, apparently an apprentice, who accosted the doctor as he came down from the pulpit-"Sir, be not dismayed, for I assure you 'twas a good sermon." Afterwards, when Dr Pope asked him, "What did you think when you saw the congregation running away from you?" "I thought," said he, "they did not like me or my sermon; and I have no reason to be angry with them for that." "But what was your opinion of the apprentice?" "I take him to be a very civil person, and if I could meet with him, I'd present him with a bottle of wine." Though at one period of his life he had suffered much from * Ward's "Lives of the Gresham Professors."

the narrowness of his fortune, he never was infected with the love of money, nor of the luxuries which money can procure. Had he accepted and retained all the lucrative preferments which were offered to him, he would have spent his latter years in opulence; but he never failed to resign such preferment as soon as he could dispense with it; and when he did at last accept an office which many would have coveted for its emoluments, he shewed that he was ambitious of it for better reasons, by relinquishing most of its worldly advantages. Dr Pope once heard him say, "I wish I had five hundred pounds." The doctor answered, "That's a great sum for a philosopher to desire; what would you do with so much?" "I would give it," said he, "to my sister for a portion, and that would procure her a good husband." He soon got the sum; for he received exactly five hundred pounds for putting a new life into the corps of his prebend at Salisbury. Almost all the property which he left was his library. It was so well selected, that it sold for more than it cost.

His good nature seems to have been inexhaustible. The easy facetiousness and rich instruction of his ordinary discourse drew many around him, and there is no instance of his having ever vexed or injured any one by a mischievous or unguarded remark. "Of all the men I ever had the happiness to know," says Tillotson, "he was the freest from offending in word, coming as near as is possible for human frailty to do, to the perfect idea of St James his 'perfect man.'" It is the whimsical regret of his executor and biographer, Hill, that he could hear of no enemy and no calumny from which to vindicate him; and there can be no doubt that the happy equability of his spirits, his superiority to selfish considerations, his humility and large benevolence, secured for him an unusual amount of affection and good will.

It was his custom, whatever he began, to prosecute it till he had brought it to a termination. Although he himself

complained of it as his "imperfection, not to be able to draw his thoughts easily from one thing to another," it was in consequence of this "imperfection" that he so speedily completed whatever he undertook. The only exception was his attempt to learn Arabic; and this he abandoned probably from finding that, in his case, it would not repay the labour of acquisition. The morning was his favourite time for study. He kept a tinder-box in his apartment, and during all the winter and some of the other months, he rose before it was light. He would sometimes rise during the night, burn out

his candle, and return to bed again.

His executors were Dr John Tillotson, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, and Abraham Hill, Esq. It was under the careful revision of the former, and with a biographical preface by the latter, that his Theological Works made their appearance in 1683, in three volumes folio.

In reading Barrow's Sermons there is one circumstance which ought not to be forgotten. He seldom had the advantage of addressing any of them to an actual audience. When a subject appeared to him important, or had long occu pied his thoughts, or when he conceived that it would be of advantage to himself to give it special attention, his plan was to select a text and compose a sermon. In choosing this form he had, no doubt, an ulterior view to the benefit of others; but whilst preparing it, the preaching of it was the remote and contingent consideration. Bearing this in mind, we shall be better able to account for many things, which in a sermon immediately intended for the pulpit it would be difficult to justify; such as the excessive length of some, and the portentous learning of others. Had Barrow written these discourses for a congregation whom he was in the habit of meeting from Sabbath to Sabbath, and with whom he was holding week-day converse from house to house-so as to measure their capacity and ascertain their moral and spiritual

wants-his good sense would have suggested many alterations, and would have brought them nearer the form of a popular address. He tells us that "had he been a settled preacher, he intended them shorter, and he would have trusted to his memory." Nor, in such a case, would brevity have been the only improvement. The long paragraphs would have been shortened; the Greek and Latin would have been translated; the scholastic phrases would have been omitted; and perhaps Aristotle and Seneca would have been more sparingly quoted. By this process their value to the scholar and theologian might have been lessened, but they would have become safer models of pulpit eloquence.*

On the few occasions when Barrow did appear in public, he seems to have given his written sermons in their unabridged dimensions. His " 'Spital Sermon," on "The Duty and Reward of Bounty to the Poor," was delivered at full length; and we can quite believe the assertion, that three hours and a half were consumed in speaking it. When it was finished, and he was asked if he was not tired, he acknowledged "that he began to be weary of standing so long." We are not told whether the patience of the aldermen held out to the close of this long infliction; but occasionally the endurance of his auditory gave way. At one time, when preaching in Westminster Abbey, the hour allowed for the sermon had expired, and a multitude of people had, as usual, assembled for the purpose of viewing the interior. The servants, who saw no prospect of a termination to the service, and trembled for the loss of the customary gratuities, at last could refrain no longer, but "caused the organ to be struck up against him, and would not give over playing till they had blowed him down."

* There is much truth in the remark of Le Clerc "Les sermons de cet auteur sont plûtôt des traitez, ou les dissertations exactes, que de simples harangues pour plaire à la multitude.”—Bibliothèque Universelle, tome iii. p. 325.