Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 56.djvu/132

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Theodore
126
Therry

this ‘Penitential’ be described as the work of Theodore. It consists of a number of answers given by him to various inquirers, and chiefly to a priest named Eoda, and it was compiled by some one who calls himself ‘Discipulus Umbrensium,’ that is, probably a man born in the south of England who had studied under northern scholars (ib.) One manuscript states that it was written with Theodore's advice, but this may merely mean that he approved of such a compilation being made, for certainly on two points it differs from what Theodore thought (Bright, p. 406). In more than twenty places reference is made to the customs of the Greek church. The character of the sentences is austere. More than once amid the dry enumeration of penances there appears some evidence of a lofty soul and of spirituality of mind (i. c. 8 sec. 5, c. 12 sec. 7, ii. c. 12 secs. 16–21), and once a sentence full of poetic feeling (ii. c. 1 sec. 9). Certain other compilations erroneously edited as the ‘Penitential’ of Theodore may contain some of those judgments of his which the compiler of the genuine work says in his epilogue were widely known and existed in a confused form. Theodore's ‘Penitential,’ though, in common with other works of same kind, not binding on the church, gave it a standard and rule of discipline much needed at the time, and holds an important place among the materials on which was based the later canon law (Stubbs, Lectures, No. xiii). He established in the English church the observance of the twelve days before Christmas as a period of repentance and good works in preparation for the holy communion on Christmas day (Egbert's Dialogue ap. Eccles. Doc. iii. 413).

[All information concerning Archbishop Theodore may be found in Canon Bright's Early English Church History, passim, 3rd edit. 1897; Haddan and Stubbs's Eccles. Docs. iii. 114–213, which see for the Penitential, and Bishop Stubbs's art. ‘Theodorus’ (7) in Dict. Chr. Biogr. here referred to as ‘Stubbs,’ to all of which this art. is largely indebted. Little can be added except by way of comment to the account in Bede's Eccles. Hist. (see Plummer's edition of Bedæ Opera Hist. with valuable notes in tom. ii.), and Eddi's Vita Wilfridi in Hist. of York, vol. i. (Rolls Ser.), for Theodore's dealings with Wilfrid, which must be used with caution as the work of a strong partisan; see also Anglo-Saxon Chron. ann. 668–90; Flor. Wig. vol. i. App. (Engl. Hist. Soc.); Will. Malmesbury's Gesta Pontificum, Gervase of Cant. i. 69, ii. 30, 338–43; Elmham's Hist. Mon. S. Augustini, passim (all three in Rolls Ser.); Green's Making of England, pp. 330–6, 375, 380; Hook's Archbishops of Canterbury, i. 145–75.]

W. H.

THEODORE, ANTHONY (d. 1756), adventurer. [See under Frederick, Colonel, 1725?-1797.]

THERRY, JOHN JOSEPH (1791–1864), ‘the patriarch of the Roman catholic church’ in New South Wales, was born at Cork in 1791 and entered Carlow College in 1807; there he originated a society bound to devote itself if need be to foreign mission work. He was trained for the priesthood under Dr. Doyle, and ordained at Dublin in April 1815 to a curacy at Cork.

Therry was one of the priests sent out by the government to New South Wales in December 1819. He reached Sydney in May 1820, and ministered at first in a temporary chapel in Pitt Street, and at Paramatta often in the open air. For several years he was the only Roman catholic priest in the colony; but he was a devoted pastor, travelling great distances to his services. He came into collision with the governor, Sir Ralph Darling [q. v.], in 1827, and was for a time deprived of his salary as chaplain, but his work was continued with unabated vigour. On 29 Oct. 1829 he laid the foundation stone of St. Joseph's Chapel, which is now part of Sydney Roman catholic cathedral. In 1833 he was made subordinate to William Bernard Ullathorne [q. v.] and then to John Bede Polding [q. v.], and was sent by the latter in 1838 to Tasmania. Having returned to Sydney, he became priest at St. Augustine's, Balmain, where he died rather suddenly on 25 May 1864.

[Heaton's Australian Dictionary of Dates, &c.; Mennell's Dict. of Austral. Biogr.; Sydney Morning Herald, 26 May 1864; Ullathorne's Catholic Mission in Australasia (pamphlet), London, 1838.]

C. A. H.

THERRY, Sir ROGER (1800–1874), judge in New South Wales, born in Ireland on 22 April 1800, was third son of John Therry of Dublin, barrister-at-law. He was admitted student at Gray's Inn on 25 Nov. 1822 (Foster, Reg. p. 426), was called to the Irish bar in 1824, and to the English bar in 1827. He found his chief employment in politics, actively connecting himself with the agitation for Roman catholic emancipation. At this time he made the acquaintance of George Canning, whose speeches he edited.

Through Canning's influence Therry was appointed commissioner of the court of requests of New South Wales, and went out to the colony in July 1829, arriving in November. In April 1830 he became a magistrate; but his path was not smooth, partly because of his active intervention in