he had rested from his labours two days preceding. He was buried in the cathedral church of his diocese, where a large stone was laid over his remains, to which a brass plate was affixed, bearing his arms and the following inscription :

Ricardus Corbet, Theologiæ Doctor,
Ecclesiæ Cathedralis Christi Oxoniensis

Primum Alumnus, deinde Decanus, exinde
Episcopus, illinc huc translatus, et

Hinc in cœlum Jul. 28. An. 1635.

By his will "he commits and commends the nurture and maintenance of his son and daughter to the faythful and loving care of his mother-in-law Anne Hutton;" from which, and the total silence as to his wife, I conclude he outlived her-and with a legacy of one thousand pounds to his daughter Alice, to be paid at her attaining the age of sevend

teen, or upon her marriage, he enjoins her not to marry without the consent of her grandmother. By the further provisions of his testament, his son was to be joined with Anne Hutton in the administration upon his attaining the age of seventeen; and in case of the decease of both, the whole was to devolve upon his daughter Alice.

Such was the end of this learned and ingenious prelate and poet, of whose works I have undertaken the revision, and in collecting the scattered memorials for whose biography,

et etiam disjecta membra poetæ,

I have, I hope not unprofitably to myself or others, employed some leisure hours.

His person, if we may rely upon a fine portrait of him in the hall of Christ-Church, Oxford, was dignified, and his frame above the

common size : one of his companions' says

he had

A face that might heaven to affection draw:

and Aubrey says, he had heard that "he had

an admirable grave and venerable aspect.

In no record of his life is there the slightest trace of malevolence or tyranny: "he was," says Fuller, "of a courteous carriage, and no destructive nature to any who offended him, counting himself plentifully repaired with a jest upon him." Benevolent, generous and spirited in his public character; sincere, amiable, and affectionate in private life; correct, eloquent, and ingenious as a poet; he appears to have deserved and enjoyed through life the patronage and friendship of the great, and the applause and estimation of the good.

* Gomersal, in an epistle to Barten Holiday. See his poems, p. 7. edit. 1633.

3 Fuller's Worthies, page 83. fol. 1662.

Apology is not necessary for his writings, or it might be urged that they were not in

"His

tended for publication by their author. " merits are disclosed," and, at the distance of near a century and a half, are now again submitted to the censure of the public.

His panegyric is liberal without grossness, and complimentary without servility: his satires on the Puritans, a pestilent race which Corbet fortunately did not live to see ascendant, and which soon after his decease sunk literature and the arts in "the Serbonian bog" of ignorance and fanaticism, evince his skill in severe and ludicrous reproof; and the addresses to his son and his parents, while they are proofs of his filial and parental regard, bear testimony to his command over the finer feelings. But the predominant faculty of his mind was wit, which he employed

with most success when directed ironically : of this the address. "to the Ghost of Wisdome," and "the Distracted Puritane," are memorable examples. Indeed he was unable to overcome his talent for humour, even when circumstance and character concurred to repress its indulgence. Of this propensity the following anecdotes, copied verbatim from Aubrey's MSS. in Mus. Ashmole*, are curious proofs, and may not improperly close this account of a character which they tend forcibly to illustrate.

"After he was doctor of divinity, he sang ballads at the Crosse at Abingdon; on a market-day he and some of his comrades were at the taverne by the Crosse, (which, by the way, was then the finest of England; I remember it when I was a freshman; it was 4 Headley, i. 38.