ly living.

Accepts a fami- mately decided on availing himself of the opportunity thus presented. The step once taken, he transferred to his sacred calling all the ardour and devotion which he had evinced in his scientific investigations. His merits as a rural clergyman are perhaps rather of that order which commends itself to a practical conception of active benevolence, than of that ideal standard which more readily attracts the theorist and wins the fancy. Unlike Férrar, he would give both medicine and medical advice to his parishioners; and, like him, would pay his congregation to attend punctually at church; while "a hospital,” i.e. alms-houses, adorned by his own manual skill as a carver in stone, and endowed schools, sufficiently attested his concern for the well-being of the poor. This preference for the practical is discernible, indeed, in his whole character. Though a staunch Episcopalian he looked upon church His religious ceremonies "as things indifferent," "never admiring them," says the narrator, "nor judging them otherwise than Calvin did, for tolerabiles ineptias." Along with Cawdrey and many other eminent divines of that day, he cherished no little respect and esteem for many members of the dissenting body. "Both were episcopal in their judg ments, yet both were highly prized by their dissenting brethren for their piety and moderation: both much wished a reformation in the church in many particulars, and in that fatal Bartholomew-day, which silenced so many able ministers, these two did scruple at many things with the rest of the dissenters; and the bishop of the diocese took a great deal of pains to satisfy their doubts, that they might not be deserters among the rest of the dissenters."

views.

His recreations.

If we add to these characteristics that, in his younger days, he kept "a small pack of beagles, with which he usually hunted once per week;" that he "never wanted a choice gelding of great value for his pleasure in galloping,

and a beautiful, curiously going pad for his saddle;" that he had "a small stud of brood mares, the finest and largest that he could find out in the whole north;" that he appears to have considerably augmented his income by horse-dealing, and compiled a work on the rearing and management of horses, which nothing but professional considerations prevented him from giving to the world; and, finally, that the charger which carried the Duke of Monmouth at the memorable battle of Bothwell Bridge was bred from the stock of the Rev. Matthew Robinson, Vicar of Burneston,we have perhaps said enough to show that the Puritan lament over the "contemplative idle life" of Ferrar and his household, would, in the present instance, have been totally uncalled for1.

to theology.

Nor do his theological studies appear to have suffered His attention from the attention thus bestowed on more secular pursuits. His annotations on the whole Bible, in two large folios of manuscript, still remain to testify to his labours in this direction; he was a warm supporter in the matter of the publication of Poole's Synopsis; and a volume, entitled Cassander Reformatus, written with a view to satisfying the scruples of conscientious dissenters, proved the thoughtful earnestness with which he entered into the controversial questions of his day.

Matthew Robinson died in the sixty-sixth year of his age. The latter part of his life was a period of almost uninterrupted suffering from an excruciating complaint; his exemplary patience under this affliction, and the tone of unfeigned piety which pervaded those writings wherein he sometimes found a brief oblivion of his pain, sufficiently attested the reality of the religion he professed.

1 It is almost unnecessary to observe how unjust it would be to judge these traits by the present standard of opinion. Such recreations involved nothing unbecoming to the clerical profession in the eyes of ordinary observers at that time. See Mr Mayor's note.

Tolerant spirit of the Anglican party.

It is obvious that, as a representative of the party to which he was theoretically allied, but little stress can be laid on the character and life of Matthew Robinson. His virtues were of a different order from those which generally distinguished the Anglican and the Platonic schools; he disliked Aristotle, nor is there any evidence that he set much value on Plato. His character, however, is worthy of note, if regarded simply as a contrast. Whatever importance we may be disposed to attach to his opinions as a theorist, it is evident that they were mainly formed under the influences of his college life. There are those who regard with small admiration the virtues of a More or a Mede; to whom a life of seclusion and philosophic study appears little better than a timorous repudiation of those duties of active life which it is intended all should share. Without entering upon this question, we may yet oppose to such objectors the character of Matthew Robinson, in evidence that the religious earnestness of Cambridge in those days could find expression in a simple unaffected zeal in the discharge of the duties of a parish priest, as well as in the retirement of academic life and the speculations of a philosophic enthusiasm.

It is gratifying, in conclusion, to point to one noble trait of character, as common to one and all of those great men whom we have named. While possessing strongly defined convictions of their own, it is not a little to the honour of the great Anglican party, that, in times when controversy and an appeal to arms had called up all the passions most prejudicial to candour and forbearance, they retained, with but few exceptions, a respect for religious freedom not inferior to that of their opponents; and that they sought to compose the religious differences of their day by a spirit of compromise and forbearance which we . may often seek in vain among the polemics of the Puritan

school. We cannot then but enter an emphatic protest against such a method of treatment as that which, after depicting the character of Laud in its most unfavourable light, exaggerating his public vices and ignoring his private virtues,-deliberately brings forward the darkened portrait thus drawn, as a fitting representation of the moral and intellectual qualities of most of those with whom that prelate was associated.

New schools of thought.

Descartes.

CHAPTER IV.

THE CARTESIAN PHILOSOPHY.

FROM those more general characteristics which have formed the subject of the preceding chapter, we must now turn to devote a few pages to a special consideration of that new philosophy which, though of external growth, exerted so marked an effect on the thought of our University towards the latter part of the century, and aided so materially in that revolution in her studies which the close of the century beheld.

It is somewhat after the middle of the seventeenth century that we are first able to discern the influence of two widely dissimilar but not unfriendly schools of thought upon the mental tendencies of the time. The one, the product of a single intellect, and antagonistic or indifferent to nearly all pre-existing schools; the other, almost equally at 'variance with the traditional teachings of the day, but a natural development from those classical studies which we have already described.

It was in the winter of the year 1619 that a young French officer, pacing the snows of Neuberg on the Danube, the solitary scene of his winter-quarters, fell into a vein of philosophic speculation, favoured alike by his own genius and the circumstances of his situation. Though a soldier, he was not ignorant of letters. He had studied as a youth at the Jesuit College of La Flêche, and during his stay