With these habits and powers, he united (what does not always accompany them) the curiosity of a naturalist, and the eye of an observer; and, accordingly, his information about every thing relating to physical science, and to the useful arts, was extensive and accurate. His memory for historical details was not so remarkable; and he used sometimes to regret the imperfect degree in which he possessed this faculty. I am inclined however to think, that in doing so, he underrated his natural advantages; estimating the strength of memory, as men commonly do, rather by the recollection of particular facts, than by the possession of those general conclusions, from a subserviency to which such facts derive their principal value. Towards the close of life, indeed, his memory was much less vigorous than the other powers of his intellect; in none of which could I ever perceive any symptom of decline. His ardour for knowledge too remained unextinguished to the last; and when cherished by the society of the young and inquisitive, seemed even to increase with his years. What is still more remarkable, he retained, in extreme old age, all the sympathetic tenderness, and all the moral sensibility of youth; the liveliness of his emotions, wherever the happiness of others was concerned, forming an affecting contrast to his own unconquerable firmness under the severest trials. Nor was the sensibility which he retained, the selfish and sterile offspring of taste and indolence. It was alive and active wherever he could command the means of relieving the distresses, or of adding to the comforts of others; and was often felt in its effects, where he was unseen and unknown.-Among the various proofs of this, which have happened to fall under my own knowledge, I cannot help mentioning particularly (upon the most unquestionable authority) the secrecy with which he conveyed his occasional benefactions to his former parishioners at New Machar, long after his establishment at Glasgow. One donation, in particular, during the scarcity in 1782,-a donation which, notwithstanding all his precautions, was distinctly traced to his beneficence, might perhaps have been thought disproportionate to his limited income, had not his own simple and moderate habits multiplied the resources of his humanity." Mary Wollstonecraft. Born a. d. 1759.—died A. D. 1797. MARY, daughter of Edward-John and Elizabeth Wollstonecraft, was born on the 27th of April, 1759. Her mother was of the family of the Dixons of Ballyshannon in Ireland, her paternal grandfather a manufacturer in Spitalfields, from whom her father is supposed to have inherited property to a considerable amount. Mr Wollstonecraft's family consisted of six children, (three sons and three daughters,) of whom Mary was the second. It does not appear that Mr Wollstonecraft (who near the period of his daughter's birth occupied a farm on Epping Forest) was brought up to any profession. Nor is it certair whether the subject of our narration received her existence in London or on the Forest, where the first five years of her life were principally spent. She gave early indications of those strong feelings and vigo rous powers of mind which led to the subsequent incidents and exertions of an eventful life. It is possible that the restraint which she is said to have experienced, and the severity under which she occasionally suffered from the irascible and capricious temper of her father, might tend to rouse that indignant impatience of injustice and oppression which formed a distinguishing feature of her maturer character. In 1768 her father removed from the Forest to a farm near Beverley in Yorkshire, where he resided with his family for six years. During this interval his daughter occasionally frequented a day-school in the neighbourhood. From Beverley Mr Wollstonecraft repaired to a house in Queen's Row, Hoxton, near London, with a view of engaging in commerce. Mary Wollstonecraft had now entered her sixteenth year. About this period she became acquainted with a Mr Clare, a near neighbour, a clergyman, a man of taste, and a humorist, to whom she was indebted for encouragement and assistance in the cultivation of her mind, and at whose house she frequently passed days and weeks. By the wife of Mr Clare she was introduced to a young person of her own sex, Frances Blood, who resided in the village of Newington, and for whom, on their first interview, she conceived a friendship that partook of all the fervour of her character. Frances Blood, two years older than her friend, is described as having been an accomplished and exemplary young woman; an affectionate intercourse and correspondence succeeded between them, in which the aspiring temper of the younger was roused to emulation by the superior attainments of the elder, who undertook to be her instructor, and whose lessons were received with grateful delight. In 1783 Mary Wollstonecraft, who had now entered her twentyfourth year, in conjunction with her friend Frances, and sisters, formed and executed a plan for the opening of a day-school in the village of Islington: from Islington they thought proper, in the course of a few months, to transfer their residence to Newington-Green. The health of her friend, Frances Blood,-whose character, though amiable, was timid and feeble, now began to decline; disappointment and indulged grief had impaired her constitution, and symptoms of a consumption appeared for which she was advised to try the effects of a southern climate. In the beginning of the year 1785 she accordingly set sail for Lisbon, having previously suffered herself to be prevailed upon to accept, on her arrival, the hand of a gentleman who had for some time past paid his addresses to her. The affectionate solicitude of Mary Wollstonecraft induced her to quit for a time her school, and to subject herself to various inconveniences, for the purpose of passing over to Portugal, to administer aid and consolation to her friend; but a short period before her arrival at Lisbon, the lady in question was prematurely delivered,—a crisis which proved fatal both to the mother and child. In 1785 she, for the first time, appeared as an authoress, in a duodecimo pamphlet, entitled Thoughts on the Education of Daughters,' for the copy-right of which she obtained ten guineas from Mr Johnson, bookseller in St Paul's church-yard. Disgusted with the disappointments that had attended her project of public tuition, she now determined to resign her school, and accept a proposal made to her of residing in the family of Lord-viscount Kingsborough, in the capacity of private governess to his daughters. In the summer of 1787, she repaired with Lord Kingsborough and his daughters to Bristol, whence they had projected a tour to the continent; this purpose was soon afterwards relinquished, and Mary closed her engagements with the family, At Bristol, the small volume entitled Mary, a Fiction,' was composed, in which is delineated, under fictitious circumstances, a glowing picture of the writer's peculiar sentiments and character, as connected more especially with her affection for her deceased friend, Frances Blood. Having quitted Bristol and arrived at the metropolis, she commenced, with avidity, her literary carcer. Her novel, which had not yet passed the press, she prepared for publication, and made some progress towards an Oriental tale, The Cave of Fancy,' which was afterwards relinquished. At this period she also produced a little work, Original Stories from Real Life,' for the use of children. From the suggestion of her publisher, she applied herself to the acquisition of the French, Italian, and German languages, with a view of qualifying herself for translation; and, in pursuance of this plan, translated in part, The New Robinson,' from the French, in which, however, before its conclusion, she was anticipated. She also abridged and altered Young Grandison,' from the Dutch; and compiled, on the model of Dr Enfield's Speaker, 'The Female Reader.' In the Analytical Review, instituted by Mr Johnson in the middle of the year 1788, Mary Wollstonecraft was induced to take a considerable share; she also employed herself in translating from the French a work by M. Necker, on the importance of religious opinions; she abridged from the same language Lavater's Physiognomy; and compressed Salzmann's Elements of Morality,' a German production, into a publication in three volumes duodecimo, which produced a correspondence between herself and the author, who, in a subsequent period, returned the compliment, by translating into German the Vindication of the Rights of Woman.' These miscellaneous avocations comprehended a period of three years, from the autumn of 1787 to the autumn of 1790. In the intervals of her engagements, she enjoyed and profited by the literary society in which she occasionally mingled under the hospitable roof of her friend Johnson. Among others may be mentioned, as men whose friendship she held in high estimation, Mr George Anderson, accountant to the board of control; Mr Bonnycastle, the mathematician; Mr Fuseli, the painter; and Dr George Fordyce. 6 The literary exertions of Mary Wollstonecraft, though productive of some pecuniary emolument, had not yet been of a nature to obtain public distinction; her progress had been silent and unambitious; the period, says her enthusiastic biographer, had now arrived, when her daring genius asserted its powers and assumed its prerogatives. The publication of Burke's Reflections on the French Revolution,' in November 1790, stimulated into action Mary's newly acquired political ardour; she hastened to answer that brilliant work, and in a strain of impetuous reasoning and eloquent indignation, combated the arguments of this great champion of establishments. Accustomed to rapid composition, hers appeared foremost of the numerous answers provoked by this extraordinary production, and was received with considerable applause by the public. A just confidence in her own talents, increased probably by the suc cess of this publication, now induced her to essay her strength on a subject that affected her still more,-a subject on which she had oft and deeply meditated,-a 'Vindication of the Rights of Woman.' "In the cause of half the human race," says her biographer, "she stood forth, deprecating and exposing, in a tone of impassioned eloquence, the various means and arts by which women had been forcibly subjugated, flattered into imbecility, and invariably held in bondage. Dissecting the opinions, and commenting upon the precepts of those writers who, having expressly considered the condition of the female sex, had suggested means for its improvement, she endeavours with force and acuteness to convict them of narrow views, voluptuous prejudices, contradictory principles, and selfish though impolitic ends. It is but justice to add, that the principles of this celebrated work are to be found in Catherine Macauley's Treatise on Education." In the close of the year 1792 Mary Wollstonecraft quitted England on a tour to France, with a view, as she expressed herself to a friend on the eve of her departure, "to lose in public happiness the sense of private misery." She proposed only an excursion of a few weeks, but protracted her stay in Paris for more than two years. Four months after her arrival in Paris, she commenced an acquaintance with a Mr Gilbert Imlay, a native of North America, which, "without the forms," says her biographer, "had with her all the sanctity and devotedness of a matrimonial engagement!" We pass over the narrative of this extraordinary connexion in silence. Suffice it to say, it proved as miserable for both parties as might have been anticipated. Imlay soon formed another attachment, and poor Mary, in the depth of her wretchedness, attempted to commit suicide. In the beginning of April 1796, Mrs Wollstonecraft, as her apologist now calls her, removed to lodgings at Pentonville, in the neighbourhood of Someton, in which resided Mr Godwin, the celebrated author of Caleb Williams.' Mr Godwin had casually met Mrs Wollstonecraft in a mixed company, previously to her excursion to the continent, when, from some difference in their principles, they parted with impressions mutually unfavourable. Their acquaintance was now renewed in more favourable circumstances, and terminated in Mrs Wollstonecraft becoming Mrs Godwin. A production in which she had for some time been engaged, was now announced to the public under the title of The Wrongs of Woman,' being designed to exemplify those evils as she regarded them—arising out of the laws and customs of civil institutions, more peculiarly appropriate to her sex. She had likewise planned a series of letters on the management of infants, to be subjected to the revision of a medical friend, the introductory letter of which has appeared in her posthumous works: also a series of books for the instruction of children, a fragment of which, found among her papers, has been since published. In the midst of these schemes and employments, Mrs Godwin was cut off in child-bed, on the 10th of September, 1797. Her remains were interred in the church-yard of St Pancras, Middlesex, where a plain monument is erected to her memory, bearing the following inscription:— Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.' Born 27th April, 1759, died 10th September, 1797." In estimating the character of this singular woman, we freely concede 66 to her eulogist, that the powers and resources of her mind, amidst the disadvantages of her sex and station, bespeak talents of the highest order; that her conceptions were bold and original; and that she manifested great freedom of thinking and courage in stemming popular opinions. It does not appear that she was acquainted with any science, or pretended to learning in its appropriate sense; her knowledge of the French language had been incidentally acquired for colloquial purposes, and the business of translation; with the latter view, she had also applied herself to the German. Confiding in the strength of her faculties, and the richness of her imagination, she paid but little atten tion, even in her native language, to grammatical propriety,—an error of which, in the latter periods of her life, she became fully sensible. Her person was above the middle height, and well-proportioned; her form full; her hair and eyes brown; her features pleasing; her countenance changing and impressive; her voice soft, and though without great compass, capable of modulation.' Richard Farmer, D. D. BORN A. D. 1735.—died a. d. 1797. RICHARD FARMER was born at Leicester in the year 1735. His early education he received at Leicester, under Mr Andrews, and left it with the character of being estimable for temper and talents. He entered, when of proper age, a pensioner at Emanuel college, Cambridge, when Dr Richardson was master; his tutors were Mr Bickham and Mr Hubbard. Dr Richardson was a good-humoured man, warmly attached to tory principles, and no less strict in the minutiae of college discipline. It was matter of triumph to him to have been present, when a boy, at the trial of Sacheverell; and so rigid a disciplinarian was he, as to punish the wearing of a neckcloth-which at that time was deemed unacademical-instead of a stock, with the same strictness as a deviation from moral rectitude. On this view of Richardson's character a wag wrote a copy of verses, closing with these lines, A crime like this all human nature shocks,- The same strictness was preserved by Richardson, when Dr Jebb introduced a Grace into the senate-house for public examination. Dr Jebb was a zealous whig, and his grace, in the judgment of Richardson, carried the appearance of dangerous innovation. Dr Richardson at the same time was old and feeble; but he chose to be carried to the senate-house: and when his shrill voice, on giving his vote, could scarcely be heard, he cried out to one of the masters, inquiring whose voice it was, "It was I, master, it was I; I came to save the univer sity!" Dr Richardson was author of a folio volume written in Latin, on the prelates of England. Dr Farmer, while an under-graduate, was neither distinguished for any gross vices nor for any extraordinary qualities. He was, however, IV. 'Abridged from an anonymous memoir. |