hoift his blue jack, and command the fquadrons of his country. His majesty at all times has been eager to reward his merits. He was created a baronet when the king visited the fleet at Portsmouth, in 1783, at which time he was port-admiral there, in the room of Adiniral Pye, then lately deceased; in September, in the fame year, he became a baron of Ireland; and on May 28th, 1796, a viscount of Great Britain. His lady was created a peerefs of Great Britain, March 27th, 1795, and his brother, Alexander-Arthur, Admiral of the White, Vice Admiral of Great Britain, a Knight of the Bath, and Baron of Great Britain, May 28th, 1796. The heralds, in allufion to the element on which he has diftinguished himself, have given him a brace of mermaids for fupporters; and the motto "VENTIS SECUNDIS," must be allowed to be peculiarly appropriate. His lordship has lately obtained the government of Greenwich Hofpital. GILBERT WAKEFIELD, B. A. THIS gentleman boasts a name well known in the annals of claffical literature; it is alfo intimately connected with the queftions that have lately agitated the minds of the THINKING part of the community, on the fubject of religion; nor has it been unaccompanied by celebrity in the field of political controversy. Refpecting fuch a perfon, the opinions of his fellow N02 citizens citizens will be as various, perhaps, as their principles, Our judgment too often, cameleon-like, borrows its decifions from the hue of party; and, unfortunately. we are never lefs candid, than when political and religious enmitics warp around, and pervert the mind from its natural bias towards juftice. An outline of Mr. Wakefield's life has already been laid before the public by himfelf,* and from it we learn," that he was introduced into this planet on February 22d, 1756, in the parfonage-house of St. Nicholas, in Nottingham, of which church his father was then rector." It appears that his paternal grandmother claimed her defcent both from the Ruffell family, the illuftrious head of which, in the reign of the fecond Charles, bled for the cause of freedom; and that great lawyer, Sir Edward Coke, the latter part of whofe life was devoted to the liberties of his country. With fuch progenitors, added to a fpirit of liberal enquiry, it is but little wonder that he should dare to think for himfelf, and become a ftickler for the popular caufe! On his origin, however, Mr. W. does not feem to plume himself: "Malo pater tibi fit Therfites, dummodò tu fis "Give 'me Therfites' fon, who bravely wields "Memoirs of the Life of Gilbert Wakefield, B. A. 1. vol. 8vo. 1792. From From his earliest infancy, the subject of these memoirs appears to have evinced a difpofition of mind uncommonly grave and ferious. In addition to this, he difplayed an ardent thirst for knowledge, feldom equalled, perhaps never furpaffed in any human bofom; and what is truly wonderful, it has always continued unimpaired to this hour. At the age of three years and three months, when he went to the school of an ancient female, ftill in exiftence, he could fpell the longest words, repeat his catechifm without hefitation, and read the gofpels with fluency-for this early proficiency, he was indebted to the attention of a kind mother. During the following Whitfuntide holidays, and at Christmas in the same year, he difplayed a memory equally precocious. When he had attained his feventh year, he was initiated in the Latin language, at the free-school of Nottingham, under the Rev. Dr. Samuel Beardmore, afterwards mafter of the Charter-houfe; but to this refpectable scholar and gentleman, whom he characterifes as an acrimonious divine," he difavows any obligations whatever, and, after a lapfe of thirty years, he ftill recollects his threats. At the age of nine he was removed to Wilford, near Nottingham, then under the direction of a preceptor of different character, a man of unparalleled fimplicity of manners; he erred, however, in being " righteous overmuch," for he subjected the pupils to a rigorous confinement, of no less than thirteen hours daily; with the intermiffion of only one hundred. Nn 3 dred and twenty minutes, for breakfast and dinner. This practice is unfavourable to health, and militates against the falutary maxim of the Roman poet : "Et puer es; nec te quicquam, nifi ludere, oportet; "Lude; decent annos mollia regna tuos.." On the elder Mr. Wakefield's promotion to the vicarage of Kingston, he was removed from reftraints too irksome, even for a boy of his application, and placed under his father's curate. There, again, he was unfortunate, for his new preceptor proved to be one of those "pedagogical Jehus," fatirized by a great English divine; and, indeed, it is not a little remarkable, when the importance of the subject is confidered, how few are qualified for the task of instruction, and how careless parents in general are, respecting the choice of those who are to form the infant minds of their offspring. At the age of thirteen, Mr. Wakefield, at length, found in the perfon of the Rev. Richard Wooddefon, father of the prefent Vinerian profeffor, a preceptor better fuited to his tafte, at least fo far as difcipline was concerned. His academy feemed a kind of hotbed for feedling authors; Meffrs. Steevens, Keate, Gibbon, Hayley, and Baron Maferes, being all nurtured there; yet he himself hardly ever published any thing, and his ftore of Latinity does not appear to See the difcourfe on "Education" (in his printed sermons, 6 vol. 8vo.), by Dr. Robert South, public orator of the university of Oxford, prebendary of Weftminster, &c. &c. an able man, and a great time-ferver, but who in thofe times could not get a bishoprick. have been great; but he poffeffed a benignant temper, and although armed with a ferula to the full as awful as the fceptre of a defpot, his was a gentle reign. After tafting the ftreams of Greek and Roman literature at their fountain head, his parents began to think of fending him to the university, on which a ftudentey in Chrift church, Oxford, was offered him; this he luckily efcaped, in confequence of his father's predilection for his own college; and it ftill feems to afford a fubject of exultation to the fon, even in his riper years; as " orthodox theology, high church politics, and paffive obedience to the powers that be, fit enthroned," according to him, in a feminary, once "nutrix heroum," the venerable nurfe of Somers, Hales, Selden, Chillingworth, and Locke. At length he obtained a scholarship in Jefus' college, Cambridge; and it so happened, that he exactly fuited the intention of the founder, who preferred" the fon of a living clergyman, born at Nottingham," both of which conditions, as may have been obferved, happened to be united in him. As foon as he was fettled at the univerfity, Mr. W. refumed his claffical ftudies, which had fuffered a long fufpenfion, in confequence of a putrid fore throat and fever, followed by a vacation of feveral months. The college lectures in algebra and logic were, however, particularly odious to him. So enamoured was he of claffic ground, that it was long before he could prevail upon himtelf to approach the lefs inviting regions of fcience and philofophy. At laft, however, he overcame his prejudices, and actually |