versation she evinced great energies of mind, and a pointed wit; but she never suffered the lively sallies of her imagination to lead her either into levity or ill-nature. The author of this feeble tribute to her merits, who for twenty years enjoyed her friendship, and was improved and delighted by her correspondence, must add, that her mental acquirements were her least praise; for, as a daughter, wife, and mother, she proved herself an excellent woman and a sincere Christian.

Nov. 28. At Witworth, in Lancashire, of a lingering and painful malady, in the fiftieth year of his age, the Rt. Rev. Dr. Matthew Young, Lord Bishop of Clonfert and Kilmacduach; in whom science has lost one of its brightest luminaries; religion a sincere and powerful advocate; his country its proudest boast and ornament; and his friends all that could command esteem and conciliate affection. The versatility of his talents, the acuteness of his intellect, and his intense application to study, were happily blended with a native unassuming modesty; a simplicity of manners, unaffected and irresistably engaging; a cheerfulness and vivacity that knew no bounds but those of innocence; a heart throbbing with the warm feelings of private friendship and general philanthropy; and a firm and inflexible spirit of honour and integrity. He was of a respectable family in the county of Roscommon; was admitted into the University of Dublin in 1766, and elected fellow of the college in 1775. In the prosecution of that object, his attention was necessarily directed to the Newtonian philosophy, of which he early became an enthusiastic admirer; and displayed, at the examination for his fellowship, a knowledge and comprehension of it unexampled. It continued to be his favourite, but not his only study. His active mind embraced in rapid succession the most dissimilar objects; and these he pursued with unceasing eagerness, amidst his various duties as a fellow and tutor; and the freest intercourse with society, which he was formed at once to delight and instruct. His love of literary conversation, and the advantages he experienced from it in the pursuit of science, led him early to engage in forming a society whose principal object was the improvement of its members in theological learning. It consisted of a small number of his most intimate college-friends, and continued to exist for a series of years, with equal reputation and advantage. Out of this association grew another somewhat more extensive, whose labours were directed to

philosophical researches, and in the formation of which Mr. Young was also actively engaged: and this became itself the germ of the Royal Irish Academy; which owes its existence to the zeal and exertions of the members of that society, among whom Mr. Young was particularly distinguished. In the intervals of his severer studies he applied himself to modern languages; and was competently skilled in French, Spanish, and Italian. But he bestowed more pains on one less generally studied, on account of its difficulty, even in the country where it is spoken by the native inhabitants. The controversy about the poems of Ossian induced him to learn Irish, for the purpose of enabling himself to judge of its merits: and he spent a summer in Scotland with the same view. The result of his inquiries may be seen in the Transactions of the R. I. A. to which he also contributed largely on mathematical and philosophical subjects. In the first volume of their Transactions; a synthetical Demonstration of the Rule for the Quadrature of simple Curves per Equationes Terminorum Numero infinitas; On the Extraction of cubic and other Roots; Ancient Gaelic Poems respecting the Race of the Frians collected in the Highlands. In Vol. II. An inquiry into the different Modes of Demonstration by which the Velocity of spouting Fluids has been investigated à priori. In Vol. III. The Origin and Theory of the Gothic Arch. In Vol. IV. Demonstration of Newton's Theorems for the Correction of spherical Errors in the Object-glasses of Telescopes. In the Vth and VIth nothing. In 1786, when the professorship of natural and experimental philosophy in Trinity college became vacant, he had attained to so high a reputation in that branch of science, that he was elected to the office without opposition. His "Essay on Sounds" had been published some years; and he was known to be engaged in the arduous task of illustrating the Principia of Newton. He now devoted himself to the duties of his professorship; and the munificence of the then primate (Robinson) having enriched the philosophical school of the college with the donation of Mr. Attwood's admirable apparatus, Dr. Young (for in that year he proceeded D.D.) had a fortunate occasion, which he improved with the most indefatigable attention, of carrying his lectures in experimental philosophy to a degree of perfection unknown in the University of Dublin, and never perhaps exceeded in any other. He proceeded in the mean time with his great work, "The Method of Prime and Ultimate Ratios, illus

trated by a Commentary on the two first Books of the Principia," and had nearly completed it in English, when he was advised by his friends to publish it in Latin. He readily acquiesced, and thus had an opportunity, while translating it, of revising the whole, and rendering it fuller and more perfect. It was finished a year or two before his appointment to the see of Clonfert, at which time he was engaged in preparing for its publication. His attention was unavoidably diverted from it by the occupations attending so important a change; and before he could return to it, the dreadful malady had commenced, under which he languished for fifteen months, and whose fatal termination we have now to deplore. In the midst of his sufferings, his ardour for science was unabated. Cut off from the intercourse and business of society, he continued his studies with an activity scarcely credible. During his confinement last winter in Dublin, he prepared for the press an Analysis of his Lectures, which was accordingly printed, and every sheet of it corrected by himself. In the same period, he made himself master of Syriac, with a view to improve and perfect a new Version of the Psalms, on which he had been employed for some time, and which is nearly, if not entirely, ready for publication. He amused himself, at intervals, with an Essay on Sophisms (of which he exemplified the different classes from the works of the deistical writers,) and with adding to his Notes on a favourite Latin Poet, of whom he had thoughts of publishing a new edition. His last labours, after he had removed to Whitworth, were devoted to an examination of the Principles on which the existence of God may be most unexceptionably demonstrated and it is to be hoped, that his papers will be found to contain the argument as completed by himself. From the liberal spirit of the present governors of Trinitycollege, and their affection for the memory of their late associate, there is reason to expect, that his valuable MSS. will become the property of that society, and be ushered into the world with every advantage. To his literary acquirements he added no inconsiderable share of polite accomplishments. He was skilled in music as a science, and not ignorant of the practice. Though never instructed in drawing, he was passionately fond of landscape; and, in the course of his residence for two or three summers in North Wales, attempted some sketches, which an eminent artist (Ashford) thought not unworthy of the finishing strokes of his pencil. He was an accomplished botanist; and one

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of the highest gratifications he had promised himself from his removal to Clonfert, was the opportunity it would afford him to explore new regions.

The circumstances of his promotion to the episcopal bench reflect equal honour on himself and the noble person who recommended him to his Majesty. It was a favour as unsolicited as unexpected, unless the report made to his Excellency by his principal secretary, on being consulted who was the properest person to fill the vacant see, may be called solicitation. His report was, that "he believed Dr. Young to be the most distinguished literary character in the kingdom;" and he was recommended accordingly.

poor

November 30. In his eighty-eighth year, after a long and painful illness, at his seat at Monk's Horton, near Hythe, Kent, Matthew Robinson Morris*, Lord Rokeby of Armagh in Ireland (1777,) and an English baronet (1731;) and on Monday, December 8, he was buried in the family vault of that parish, where his father, Matthew Robinson, of West Layton in Yorkshire, Esq. was buried in 1778, aged eighty-four. "His loss," adds the Kentish Gazette," will be sincerely regretted by all who had the pleasure of his acquaintance; and still more by his neighbours, whose wants he was always ready to relieve with the greatest liberality. He many years ago twice represented Canterbury in parliament; during which time he executed the trust delegated to him by his constituents, with singular integrity and independence, in the practice of which he persevered through the course of a long life." In his last pamphlet, "An Address to the county of Kent, 1797," he speaks most truly of himself as "one who did from his early years adopt the principles of an old and true whig, the principles of Mr. Sydney, Mr. Locke, Lord Molesworth, Mr. Trenchard, and such men ; from which he has to the best of his knowledge, throughout a long life, in no single action or circumstance even once varied or swerved, and which he will certainly now relinquish only at his grave." He was elected for Canterbury in 1747

* He took the additional name of Morris, upon coming, on his mother's death, 1745, to the Horton estate, by the will of his great grandfather, Thomas Morris, who died 1717, but was so attached to his first name, that, in the title of a pamphlet he published in 1777, on a political subject, he gave only the initial of his second name, writing himself "Matthew Robinson M."

and 1751; and succeeded his cousin Dr. Richard Robinson, Primate of Ireland, as an Irish peer, &c. in October, 1794, in consequence of the collateral remainder inserted in the Primate's patent. He is succeeded in his titles, and part of his large estates in Kent, Yorkshire, and Cambridgeshire, by his nephew Morris Robinson, late M.P. for Boroughbridge, and now third' Lord Rokeby. His sister, Mrs. Montagu, died 25th of August last aged eighty. But for an account of his family see Archdale's Irish Peerage, vol. VII. and Hasted's Kent, 2nd edit. vol. VIII. p. 57, 58. From another Correspondent we have the following character of this Nobleman:

"Lord Rokeby was a man of very vigorous understanding; who thought upon all occasions for himself, and acted with unexampled consistency up to his own principles, which gave him the appearance, and perhaps the reality, of some eccentricities, of which the relation has been so exaggerated, as to amount to a tissue of the most gross and ridiculous falsehoods. His solitude, though not interrupted by the intercourse of formal visiting, was constantly enlivened by a succession of casual society; and his house, at which nothing was sacrificed to cold and insipid ceremony and ostentation, constantly afforded all the liberal pleasures of ancient hospitality. His address was happy, his manners were easy and attractive; his sentiments were enlarged, candid, and full of philanthropy; and his conversation was original, energetic, and often highly eloquent. He never failed to set the subjects he discussed in a new light; and if he did not always convince, he always interested and entertained. Though single himself, he never lost the most lively anxiety for the welfare of every member of his family. And though the idea of his wealth, added to the hatred of ostentation with which he lived, impressed many with an opinion of his fondness for money, yet the numberless poor neighbours as well as others, whom it now appears that he assisted with loans, through pure benevolence, and on very slight securities, prove how much that part of his character was mistaken. He had early conceived an indignation of the corruptions of power and rank; and of the little mean passions and distinctions, which too often disgrace them. This gave a colour to all his political opinions, in which no man ever displayed more constancy. Independence was his peculiar characteristic; and no motives of personal interest, ambition, or disappointment, ever intruded them