Page:Biographia Hibernica volume 2.djvu/173

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FRYE
169

and consequently formal in their delivery; but they were no less studied by him than they were worthy of being studied by others, for the soundness of the principles and the excellence of the matter.

He died at his house in St. James's-square, after having been reduced to a state of extreme debility by an excruciating disease, with which he had been for several years afflicted, and from which his age precluded all chance of recovery, on the 22nd Dec. 1818, in the seventy ninth year of his age.



THOMAS FRYE,

The original inventor and first manufacturer of porcelain in England, was born in or near Dublin, in 1710. He received a scanty education in the land of his nativity, and afterwards applied himself to the art of portrait painting, which he studied under a master neither eminent nor skilful, as he is stated to have been wholly indebted to a strong natural genius for the knowledge he possessed of it. At an early period of his life, he repaired to London, in the company of Stoppelaer, (who, to the similar occupation of a painter, joined that of an actor, and was equally contemptible in each,) and in 1734, had the honour of painting a full length portrait of his Royal Highness Frederick, Prince of Wales, which is preserved in Sadler's Hall, Cheapside. From this circumstance we may conclude, that he had already attained some celebrity as an artist, and he continued to practise that particular branch in oil, crayons, and miniature, for some years. A scheme, however, which was soon after engaged in by several men of considerable property, for the manufacture of porcelain, induced him to forego the profession he had originally undertaken, and he was appointed to the entire management of a manufactory for that purpose at Bow, near London. He engaged in this concern with great alacrity, and devoted himself with much assiduity to perfecting it. The undertaking, however, did not succeed,