power) perform like Nature's self the great offices of life without noise or tumult. Robert Dawson falls within the latter species of the genus Man. With half the ambition of Baynbrigg, or apostacy of Curwen, -with a tythe of the vanity of Watson,-he might in the drama of life have played the lion with success, and left his impression on the womb of Time. But as he performed the great offices of life without noise or tumult, governing his actions by the rules of virtue, and regulating his thoughts by those of reason, this memoir can have no attraction but for those who derive enjoyment from the contemplation of Virtue, and of a life spent in her service. He was born at Kendal in 1589. He was of a highly-respectable family, holding, from the first incorporation of the borough to the beginning of the present century, the highest municipal offices. On a monument to the wife of Jacob Dawson-one of the family-is written the fulsome trash" who by a free and cheerful resignation of herself, even in the midst of this world's affluence, has left us just grounds to hope she is now happy:" and hence arose the well-known Kendal toast,-" May we live as Jacob Dawson's died." As he was on Dr. Lupton's foundation in St. John's College, Cambridge, the presumption is, that he was educated at Sedbergh School. The sum in first entry in the College books is of the date of Nov. 8, 1604, and is as follows: "Ego Robertus Dawson, Westmorlandiensis, admissus discipulum hujus Collegii pro Doctore Lupton," -" non juratus." The other entry is of the 5th April, 1609 "Ego Robertus Dawson, Westmorlandiensis, admissus sum in perpetuum socium hujus Collegii pro Doctore Lupton." From the words non juratus in the first entry, it is pretty clear that he had not then completed his sixteenth year; because the scholars before that period were not required to take the oath of admission. We are indebted for this suggestion about age to the present obliging and gifted President of St. John's, Dr. Tatham. The Baptismal Register at Kendal had misled us many years. There is no record of his first entry as a member of the College, but we shall not be far wrong in supposing it to be on or about the date of the first entry above referred to. On Dr. Lupton's Foundation, he became Scholar and Fellow. He graduated in Divinity. In 1624 he was made Prebendary of Donoughmore, and in the same year Dean of Down. In 1626 he was consecrated to the See of Clonfert. Here he remained until the Irish rebellion broke out, when he made his escape, and retired to his father's house in Kendal, where he died in 1643. He was buried in the Chancel of Kendal Church; on a brass plate we find the following simple Epitaph: "HIC JACET REVERENDUS IN CHRISTO PATER, ROBERTUS DAWSON, EPISCOPUS CLONEFERTENSIS ET DUCENSIS APRILIS, 1643." Chomas Barlow". BISHOP OF LINCOLN, ARCHDEACON OF OXFORD, MARGARET PROFESSOR OF DIVINITY. 1607-1691. "Whose honesty they all durst swear for, Though not a man of them knew wherefore." HUDIBRAS. HIS man had a very-very large share of knowledge in the latin and greek tongues; it is said also of school divinity, and of the civil law but, withal, a man whom truth and justice bid us to describe as a time-server and a sycophant. Be assured, that the plant which supplied the material for the web of his life wanted the staple of honesty. Fuller speaks of him, it is true, in another and different tone, and exclaims "O that I had but re * There is a very fine portrait of him in Queen's College, Oxford. ceived some information from my worthy friend Dr. Thomas Barlow, Provost of Queen's College in Oxford, who for his religion and learning is an especial ornament of Westmorland." Our amiable and intelligent friend, Mr. John Barnabas Maude, the present Senior Fellow of the same College, has also a high regard for his memory. May we ask him, and those who think so, to reconsider their verdict. Barlow was the son of Richard Barlow, and born in 1607, at Lang-hill, in the parish of Orton. He several times told Anthony Wood (from whom this Memoir is for the most part taken) that he sprung from the ancient house of Barlow, in the county of Lancaster. He was educated at Appleby School under Mr. Pickering. In 1624 he went thence to Queen's College, Oxford, where he became Fellow in 1633. In 1635 he was Metaphysic Reader of the University, and his lectures, being much approved, were afterwards published. When the garrison of Oxford was surrendered for the use of the Parliament in 1646, he sided with the men then in power, and by the favor of Colonel Thomas Kelsey, Deputy-Governor of the said garrison, to whom he made application, he kept his Fellowship during the Parliamentarian visitation in 1648; as, in like manner, did Job Houghton of Brasen-nose, and Tim Baldwin of All Souls, who, with Barlow, had presented to the wife of the said Kelsey certain |