Rev. THO. DUNHAM WHITAKER, LL.D. F.R.S.F.S.A.

This exemplary Divine and very able Topographical Antiquary was the descendant, in a direct line, from a family which have been seated at the Holme in Lancashire, almost as early as the middle of the fifteenth century*.

He was born June 8, 1759, at the parsonage-house of Rainham, Norfolk, of which his father was then Curate; but the next year succeeded his brother in the paternal estate of Holme, which the family had possessed from about 1431. He received the rudiments of education from the Rev. John Shaw, of Rochdale; and after an interval of weakly health, was placed under the Rev. William Sheepshanks, at Grasington in Craven, and in 1775, at St. John's College, Cambridge. He proceeded LL. B. in 1780, intending at that time to follow the Civil Law as a profession; but in 1782 the death of his father transferred his residence to the Holme, and three years after he was ordained Deacon by Dr. Law, Bishop of Clonfert, who also adinitted him to the order of priesthood in the year following. In 1797 he became perpetual Curate of Holme, a Chapel founded by his ancestors, but rebuilt and re-endowed chiefly at his own cost: took the degree of LL. D. in 1801, was presented by the Archbishop of Canterbury to the Vicarage of Whalley in 1809, and to that of Blackburn in 1818. Previous to this last presentation, he had for some years held the Rectory of Heysham, which he resigned.

He married Lucy, daughter of Thomas Thoresby, Esq. of Leeds, a kinsman of the celebrated Antiquary of that name, who survives him, and by whom he has left three sons and one daughter, having lost a daughter in 1816, and his eldest son in

The Whitakers were not only connected by marriage with the first families of Lancashire, the Sherburnes, the Townleys, Stanleys, Harring tons, and Nowells, but allied to a constellation of ecclesiastics, whose erudition and talents were superior to their stations: among whom may be enumerated, Alexander and Laurence Nowell, respectively Deans of St. Paul's and Lichfield; and Woolton, Bishop of Exeter, whose daughter married Francis Godwyn, Bishop of Hereford (son of Thomas Godwyn, Bishop of Bath and Wells), the learned Commentator "De Præsulibus Angliæ." Amongst these celebrated Divines shone conspicuously, perhaps the most eminent man of his family, Dr. William Whitaker, Master of St. John's College, Cambridge, who was born (saith Fuller) "in the first year of that pious Prince, Edward VI. at the manor of Holme, in the parish of Burnley, cu Lancaster." In the same house, after an interval of more than 250 years, did the descendant of his elder brother write the elegant Life of him which appears in the "History of Whalley." The Master of St. John's died at the early age of 48. "He was a man of acute and strong understanding, exercised in the most difficult questions of theology; he was also celebrated for the mildness of his controversial style." Bishop Hall thus panegyrises him: "That honour of our schools, and angel of our Church, learned Whitaker, than whom our age saw nothing more memorable. What clearness of judgment; what sweetness of style; what gravity of person, what grace of carriage; was in the man. Whoever saw him without reverence, or heard him without wonder?"

August

August 1817, in consequence of a fall from horseback, the shock of whose melancholy death he never fully recovered.

As a literary man, in which character he is most generally, though perhaps not most deservedly known, he was distinguished not less for industry and acuteness in research, accuracy of reasoning, and extent of knowledge, than warmth of imagination and vigour of style. To the study of English Antiquities, which the lovers of Greek and Roman lore too often affect to despise as barbarous and uninteresting, he brought a rich store of classical information, and what is of much rarer occurrence, a correct and classical taste; and when to these we add the knowledge of such modern languages as throw most light on the subject, an intimate acquaintance with the Anglo-Saxon and Gothic dialects, on which our own is chiefly founded, and the habit of close attention to those numerous traces they have left in the rude tongue of the people around him, it may be admitted that few champions have appeared in the arena of antiquarian warfare more completely armed for the field. He must, indeed, be considered as having mainly contributed to the revival of a school in topography, which had well nigh become extinct. In the days of Leland and Camden, the fathers of this delightful study, it was thought no sin for an antiquary to be a man of genius and letters, and we find this ground occupied by the very first scholars of the age but in succeeding times, the race had greatly degenerated, and a fell array of county and local historians might be produced, the heaviness of whose matter is only exceeded by the dulness of their manner, and whose dense folios will be found to contain little beside transcripts of parish registers, title-deeds, public records, and monumental inscriptions, not often possessing even the merit of accurately representing their originals. Did an erratic antiquary now and then forsake the beaten track, making ever so slight pretensions to brilliancy of imagination, or warmth of feeling, he was looked upon by his brethren as one whose levity was altogether inconsistent with the gravity of the corps, and whose light weapons were calculated to injure rather than benefit the cause; like a young divine, who should exhibit symptoms of wit before the Convocation, or a knight errant who would break the ranks of a regular army to tilt and be slain for the honour of his lady. The natural consequence was, that the dulness of the whole brotherhood became proverbial: they were supposed to occupy the humblest place in the scale of literary existence, a step, perhaps, above the penman of the counting-house, but very far below the lowest pretenders to literature in any other department. The possible utility of their pursuits in the illustration of History, Manners, and the Arts, was quite overlooked by themselves and others. If they were ever praised, it was for patience and industry: but even this scanty tribute was often withheld by those who did not hesitate to profit by their pains.

From this degraded state it is not too much to say that the Historian

Historian of Whalley, Craven, and Richmondshire, has redeemed his favourite study, and to him we are chiefly indebted, if it has, in modern times, been discovered, that topography may be united with the keenest relish for natural beauty, with the most devoted attachment to the Fine Arts, with the grave contemplation of the Moralist, the edifying labours of the Biographer, and the loftiest flights of the Bard. Nor will this merit be denied him, though the advocates of the old system may now and then triumph in a trifling inaccuracy, or raise the hue and cry against the inordinate amibition that would pant after higher honours than that of having compiled an index to a Record Office-that would aspire to the distinction of being read, and be but ill content with the immortality of resting in a library, to be produced only on the transfer of a manor, the proof of a pedigree, or the sale of an advowson. But Topography, though the favourite, was by no means the only station he occupied ; and in addition to the acknowledged works by which these minor claims on public regard are supported, the Quarterly Review owed some of its most distinguished articles to his pen; and his Speech on the public distresses, delivered at a meeting in Blackburn, may be instanced as a specimen of sound reasoning, calculated long to survive the particular occasion that called it *.

In the fields of verse he never rambled, though no man could better appreciate the merits of poetry, or more readily transfuse its chief graces into his own compositions. His style was

nervous, yet elegant; concise, yet fluent; averse to the modern barbarisms and affectation which degrade the English tongue, but never hesitating to naturalize a foreign word, so it were of respectable origin, and would conform to the usages of its adopted country. In the use of simile and quotation he was remarkably happy; but, above all, excelled in the faculty of painting (if it may be so called) the object before him—of seizing at once the chief features, whether of scenery, architecture, or human character, and by a few well-chosen epithets, or by one masterly stroke, conveying a rapid but finished picture to the mind. In this respect, he strongly resembled Camden; and, had the custom of publishing in a learned language prevailed now, as it did in the Elizabethan age, we have reason to suppose, from his little work, " De Motu per Britanniam civico, &c." that he would not have fallen short of that great Master in his Latin style. To his characteristic warmth, however, the defects as well as the merits of his works may be mainly ascribed; nor is it to be wondered, that though for the most part no less accurate than vivid in his ideas, his rapidity should now and then have overlooked an object worthy of notice, or represented it in a manner which a second glance would infallibly have corrected; that in his opposition to principle, he should occasionally have appeared somewhat too unsparing of persons; and that his zeal, when counteracted by those with whom reason and authority had about * See it printed in the Gentleman's Magazine, vol. LXXXVII. i. 213.

equal