In 1732 Sterne put his name upon the back of two bills—one for subdividing large preferments, the other for enforcing residence. Nothing came of the bills, but Sterne's action elicited a terrible letter from Swift to his old friend, dated July 1733. To the startling candour of this epistle the bishop answered, after a very long interval, with a suavity and a tact which give the reader a high opinion of him as a courtier. Sterne died at Clogher, unmarried, on 6 June 1745. No one enjoyed more of the confidence of Archbishop William King [q. v.], who about 1728 (that is, a year before his death) wrote to Sterne: ‘It would be a comfort to me, if I were dying, to think that you would be my successor, because I am persuaded that you would prosecute right methods for the good of the church.’
By his will, dated 13 May 1741, Sterne munificently endowed a large number of local charities, especially Steevens's Hospital [see Steevens, Richard] and the Blue Coat Hospital, Dublin. He also left 600l. to Dean Swift's hospital for lunatics. He rebuilt the episcopal mansions at Dromore and Clogher, as well as St. Patrick's deanery, and he bequeathed 1,000l. to build a granite spire to St. Patrick's Cathedral, in addition to 1,500l. or 2,000l., at the discretion of his executors, towards finishing the cathedral of Clogher. He left 50l. per annum in exhibitions to Trinity College, Dublin, poor scholars of the diocese of Clogher to have the preference. The rarer books in his library he gave to Archbishop Marsh's library in Dublin. The remainder of his books (many of them purchased at John Dunton's auction in Dublin) were packed in oaken chests, and distributed by lot among the poor curates of the diocese. His manuscripts, of which he had a most valuable collection, he bequeathed to Trinity College, Dublin; among them are the well-known depositions of the sufferers in the rebellion of 1641.
Sterne's only work of importance was his admirable ‘Tractatus de Visitatione Infirmorum’ (Dublin, 1697, 12mo; London, 1700, several editions). This was translated in 1840 as ‘The Curate's Manual’ (London, 8vo). The ‘Tractatus’ was reprinted in the ‘Clergyman's Instructor’ of 1807 and 1813; but in the 1843 edition it was replaced by Bishop Wilson's ‘Parochialia’ (cf. Darling, Cyclop. Bibl. p. 2827).
A portrait of the bishop by the Dublin artist, Thomas Carlton, is in the provost's house at Trinity College, and a replica is at Clogher. A mezzotint engraving was executed by Beard (Evans, Cat. of Engraved Portraits, No. 9940).
[Cotton's Fasti Eccles. Hibern. iii. 80–1; Taylor's Univ. of Dublin, p. 380; Stubbs's Hist. of Dublin University, pp. 178, 180; Monck Mason's Hist. of St. Patrick's; Mant's Church of Ireland, ii. 245, 315, 545, 587; Ware's Irish Bishops, ed. Harris, p. 191; Ware's Irish Writers, ii. 263; Wills's Irish Nation; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. iv. 170; Dunton's Life and Errors, p. 517; Burdy's Life of Skelton, 1792; Noble's Contin. of Granger, iii. 94; Craik's Life of Swift, p. 149; Swift's Journal to Stella, ed. Ryland, passim.]
STERNE, LAURENCE (1713–1768), humourist and sentimentalist, was great-grandson of Richard Sterne [q. v.], archbishop of York, and grandson of Simon Sterne, the archbishop's third son. Laurence's grandfather married Mary, a Yorkshire heiress, daughter of Sir Roger Jaques, and she inherited her father's estate of Elvington. She bore her husband, who died at Halifax in 1703, three sons and three daughters (Thoresby, Ducatus Leodiensis, ed. Whitaker, p. 214). The eldest son, Richard (1680–1732), succeeded to Elvington, married twice, and left a son Richard and many daughters. The third son, Jaques (the humourist's uncle), pursued a successful career in the church.
Roger, the humourist's father, was the second son, and, despite the wealth of his mother, was left to make his own way in the world. He entered the army, but never rose to high rank. His son described him in an autobiographic fragment as ‘a little smart man, active to the last degree in all exercises—most patient of fatigue and disappointments, of which it pleased God to give him full measure; he was in his temper somewhat rapid and hasty, but of kindly disposition, void of all design, and so innocent in his own intentions that he suspected no one.’ About 1710 he was appointed ensign in the regiment (now the 34th foot) which, at the date of his joining it, was known as Colonel Hans Hamilton's, and next year as Colonel Chudleigh's. With it Roger Sterne served in Flanders. On 25 Sept. 1711, when he was quartered at Dunkirk, he married Agnes, widow of a brother officer, Captain Hebert, ‘of a good family.’ She was herself of humble Irish origin, and either daughter or stepdaughter of one Nuttle, ‘a noted sutler in Flanders in Queen Anne's wars.’ Ensign Roger owed Nuttle money when he took her off his hands, and ‘she brought not one sixpence into the family’ (Fitzgerald, i. 78–9). Her husband's kindred regarded her as of inferior social station, and she failed to inspire her son with respect or affection. Her first child—a daughter Mary—was born at Lille on 10 July 1712. Late in the autumn of
