THE LITERATURE AND LITERATI OF BATH. MR. PRESIDENT, Unequal as I feel myself to do justice to the subject I have taken in hand, I yet venture upon it, in the hope of contributing my humble mite (even among those who have so many talents to bestow) towards the object of the Society to which I have the undue honor to belong; and because, Sir, I consider it the bounden duty of every member of an association-for whatever purpose bandedto make some exertion to promote its interests, or carry out its views. True it is that the drone flies not to the hive, richly laden with treasure like the honey-bee; nevertheless, we are told by naturalists, that he hovers over the flowers and extracts some of their sweets, though he turns them not to the same valuable account. I have been induced to fix on the subject of this light Essay which bears, at least, on the title of our Societyfrom having often heard surprise expressed that a city so distinguished as Bath for its classical structures, its local antiquities, and its many other advantages, should never have been celebrated as the birth-place of talent, or the nucleus of genius and literature, but is famed merely as the resort of the invalid, the trifler, and the lover of pleasure and dissipation. On one occasion I was challenged to mention any man of genius or of fame who had ever been born here as though the steam and fog of our thermal springs had rendered our valley altogether Baotian. The first name which occurred to me at the moment was that of my school-fellow, EDWARD PARRY, who surely must be considered a man both of genius and of fame, and one worthy to stand by the side of an ANSON or a COOK. A commemorative column proudly lifts its head on the Cleveland Hills, above the native village of the latter; and equally deserving is the Arctic Explorer to have a pillar raised to his honor on one of our circumjacent hills; his nautical science entitles him to a place on Neptune's roll of worthies; while his important and well-penned volumes on the Arctic regions claim for him a niche in Minerva's Temple ! † * Ayton, North Riding, Yorkshire, three miles from Stokesly. This obelisk, 60 feet high, and appropriately inscribed, was erected in 1827, on Easby Hill. † Sir EDWARD PARRY has likewise turned his attention and his talents to graver studies, and has given to the world his "Thoughts on the Parental Character of God," which has passed through a third edition. A hero likewise famed in our naval annals, was likewise educated at the Bath Grammar School, and it was the boast of our worthy old pedagogue (the Rev. NATHANIEL MORGAN), that he had flogged the man who had flogged the French ; For here, dauntless Sidney* famed heroes among, As our anniversary school song used to record;† or, as the gifted HEBER has more elegantly and poetically expressed his deeds at Acre:— "What hero thus triumphant Gaul dismayed? Admiring Asia saw the unequal fight E'en the pale Crescent blessed the Christian's might!" I will now proceed to the proof, that many other gifted individuals and literary characters have either been born in Bath, or have made it their residence, and that many savants have been in the constant habit of resorting to it. Some I may omit, from ignorance or want of memory, who · are highly worthy of a place in our annals; and it would be impossible, without too great trespass on your time, even if I possessed the ability, to speak at length of the works or the lives of those I shall bring forward: this paper, therefore, can at best be looked upon but as a * Sir SIDNEY SMITH. + Written by WILLIAM MEYLER, editor of the Bath Herald. C Catalogue raisonné, although I hope, by these means, to call to your recollection some names which have been connected with our beautiful city, and are dear to literature and the muses. .* It is not in accordance with my present purpose to revert to those days of the City of Aqua Solis, when its chief temple was dedicated to the Goddess of Wisdom, or to dive deep into antiquity; otherwise, I might expatiate on the learning of Gildas Badonicus, the father of English History; of Elfege (a native of the village of Weston, and Prior of the Monastery); of John de Villula, through whose influence the Church of the Monastery became the Cathedral of the diocese ;* or of Athelardus Bathoniensis, who brought from Arabia the elements of Euclid;-neither will I dwell on the worthies of the next century, or record the memorabilia of that eminent physician, Reginald, of Bath; of that profound lawyer, Henry, of Bath; of that learned divine, William, of Bath; or of the many others who, in monastic times, shed a halo of learning around old Bladud's City; but, in passing on to the 16th century, I will mention one to whom his contemporaries gave the epithet of the ever memorable," and well may Bath be proud to its latest days of such a son as JOHN HALES,† of whom it was said that he was one of the best characters that ever existed * Ralph de Diceto places the removal of the Episcopal Seat in the year 1091. † Born in Bath, 1584; died, 1656. in any age. He was so excellent a scholar, that, when twenty-eight years old, he was appointed Greek professor to the University of Oxford; he was also a very skilful logician; and was afterwards appointed Provost of Eton College. Although he wrote much, and was esteemed an elegant poet, "Golden Remains," a collection of religious tracts, was the only work ever published. He suffered great hardships in the Rebellion, and died at the age of 72. At the commencement of the 17th century, may be recorded the name of a man of as great ability as was JOHN HALES, but of a mind very differently constituted. WILLIAM PRYNNE, who was a conspicuous character in the reign of Charles I., and during the Commonwealth, and a very profound lawyer, was born at our (modern) town's end, being a native of the parish of Swainswick.* His mother was the daughter of SHERSTON, the first Mayor of Bath, under the charter of Elizabeth, and he himself was Recorder; twice was he returned to represent the borough in Parliament; he also sate for Newport, in Cornwall. He commenced his education at the Grammar School, and finished his classical studies at Oriel College, Oxford; his religious and political opinions are too well known to readers of history to need comment; and such was his cacoethes scribendi and itch for publishing that, in spite of the terrors of the Star-Chamber, the pillory, loss of ears, branding, fine and imprisonment, he still wrote on, * Born, 1609; died, 1669. |