mons thereupon wrote to Kipling a ‘long and powerful letter’ of reproach, fifty copies of which were printed and distributed by Henry Gunning [q. v.] among members of the university. Under the apprehension that obstacles would be thrown in his way should he attempt to take the higher degree at Cambridge, Symmons was incorporated at Jesus College, Oxford, on 24 March 1794, and proceeded D.D. two days later. In the same year Windham secured for him, after considerable difficulty on account of the whig sermon, the rectory of Lampeter Velfrey in Pembrokeshire, which adjoined Narberth, where he was already beneficed. Narberth and Lampeter are two of the most valuable livings in the diocese of St. David's. Symmons retained these preferments, with his prebend at St. David's, until his death.
Symmons was a good scholar and a man of considerable attainments in literature. He expressed his political views at all times without reserve, and it was thought that but for this freedom he would have risen to a much higher position in the church. For many years he lived at Chiswick, passing his time from early morning in the literary pursuits that he loved. ‘Old age, disease, and death came on in the short space of two months.’ He died at Bath on 27 April 1826. He married in 1779 Elizabeth, daughter of John Foley of Ridgeway, Pembrokeshire, and sister of Sir Thomas Foley [q. v.] They had issue two sons and three daughters. The widow died at Penglan Park, Carmarthenshire, in July 1830.
His works comprise:
- ‘Inez,’ a tragedy [anon.], 1796; reissued in 1812 in No. 4 below. It was dedicated to Windham.
- ‘Constantia,’ a dramatic poem, 1800.
- ‘Life of Milton,’ prefixed to an edition of Milton's prose Works published in 1806, 7 vols.; the life occupied vol. vii. The second edition, with some fresh information supplied by James Bindley [q. v.], was published separately in 1810, and the third in 1822 (Gent. Mag. 1813, i. 25, 326).
- ‘Poems by Caroline [his daughter, who died of consumption on 1 June 1803] and Charles Symmons,’ 1812; two impressions, one on small and another on large paper.
- ‘The Æneis of Virgil translated,’ 1817. The fourth, sixth, and seventh books in this rhymed translation had been separately printed. A revised edition was published in two volumes in 1820.
- ‘Life of Shakespeare, with some remarks upon his dramatic writings,’ prefixed to the edition of Shakespeare in 1826 by Samuel Weller Singer [q. v.]
Symmons published several sermons, the most remarkable being preached in Richmond church on 12 Oct. 1806, on Charles James Fox. He is said to have been the editor of the ‘British Press,’ and to have contributed to the ‘Monthly Review’ (Biogr. Dict. 1816, p. 338).
His son, John Symmons (1781–1842), went to Westminster school, and matriculated from Christ Church, Oxford, 11 April 1799, aged 18, when he was elected to a studentship. He graduated B.A. in 1803, M.A. in 1806, and was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn on 24 Nov. 1807, going the Welsh circuit. He probably died at Deal in 1842. A translation by him of ‘The Agamemnon of Æschylus’ (1824) was much praised by Professor Wilson (Works, 1857, viii. 390–459). He assisted his father in the 1820 translation of Virgil, and some Greek lines by him, written as he was crossing to Paris, appear in the ‘Monumental Inscriptions, &c., on the Grace Family’ (pp. 10 and 26). Dr. Parr left mourning rings to both father and son, and lauded the son's ‘capacious and retentive memory, various and extensive learning, unassuming manners, and ingenuous temper.’
[Foster's Alumni Oxon.; Barker and Stenning's Westminster School Register; Gent. Mag. 1805 i. 584, 1826 i. 450, 552, 565–7, 1830 ii. 382; Le Neve's Fasti, i. 322; Gunning's Reminiscences, i. 311–16; Field's Parr, ii. 298–301; John Taylor's Records of my Life, ii. 367–70; Cradock's Memoirs, iv. 532; information from Rev. Dr. Atkinson, Clare College, Cambridge.]
SYMON SIMEONIS (fl. 1322), traveller and Franciscan. [See Simeonis.]
SYMONDS, JOHN (1729–1807), professor of modern history at Cambridge, born at Horningsheath in Suffolk on 23 Jan. 1728–9, was the eldest son of John Symonds (d. 1757), rector of Horningsheath, by his wife Mary (d. 1774), daughter of Sir Thomas Spring of Pakenham, bart.
Symonds was educated at St. John's College, Cambridge, graduating B.A. in 1752. In 1753 he was elected a fellow of Peterhouse, and he proceeded M.A. in 1754. In 1771 he was appointed professor of modern history on the death of Thomas Gray, the poet, and in the following year he was created LL.D. by royal mandate and migrated to Trinity College. He died, unmarried, on 18 Feb. 1807, at Bury St. Edmund's, where he filled the office of recorder, and was buried at Pakenham.
Symonds was the author of:
- ‘Remarks on an Essay on the History of Colonisation’ (by William Barron), London, 1778, 4to.
- ‘The Expediency of revising the Present Edition of the Gospels and Acts of the
