Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 10.djvu/433

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Clarke
425
Clarke

that threw out the bill against occasional conformity in Queen Anne's time, and not only 80, but canvassed the court to lay the bill aside ... for which reason he was afterwards put by for that borough' of East Looe. This extract displays the depth of the animosity of the Jacobites against Clarke, but the reason given for his rejection from his Cornish seat could not have been correct, as the struggle over occasional conformity took place in the previous parliament. Clarke acted as judge advocate-general from 1684 to 1705, and as secretary at war from 1692 to 1704. For several years he was secretary to Prince George of Denmark, the husband of Queen Anne, and from May 1702 to October 1705 he held the post of joint secretary to the admiralty, but in the last-mentioned year he was deprived, as already stated, of all his preferments. On the return of his party to power he obtained the position of lord of the admiralty, and held it until the death of Queen Anne, when he retired from official life and devoted himself to his parliamentary duties and the improvement of his university. He died on 22 Oct. 1736 in his seventy-sixth year, and was buried in the chapel of All Souls College. His epitaph was placed on the south wall of that edifice; his bust is in the college library, with the busts of twenty-three other fellows. Clarke was universally recognised by his contemporaries as a virtuoso and man of taste. Pope, in a letter to Jervas (29 Nov. 1716), speaks of his good fortune at Oxford in being 'often in the conversation of Dr. Clarke,' and Horace Walpole preserves the fact that through the sale to Clarke of some small copies of Raphael's cartoons Jervas obtained the means of visiting Paris and Italy. At Oxford the influence of Clarke's energy and taste was felt in all directions. He gave to Brasenose College in 1727 a statue-group of Cain and Abel, a leaden replica of an Italian group, which he purchased in London, and it remained in the centre of the Quadrangle until about 1880. He assisted Dr. Charlett in placing statues of Queens Mary and Anne in front of University College, and over the gateway next the second court of the last college his arms may still be seen. To Queen's he gave portraits of six English queens, for Christ Church he designed their new library, and in 1732 he erected in the cathedral a memorial of Dean Aldrich. A gift of books was made by him to the Bodleian Library in 1721, and between 1721 and 1730 he presented numerous pictures to the picture gallery, including portraits of Montaigne, Grotius Dryden, and Ben Jonson. But the foundations of All Souls and Worcester were those which he chiefly aided. He took a leading part in the restoration of the chapel of the former college, enriching it with a 'costly marble entablature,' and he built at his own cost new lodgings for its warden, on condition that he might occupy them himself until his death, when it turned out that he had left the furniture and pictures in the rooms for the use of the warden for the time being. The hall of the same college was built under his direction from a plan which he had approved, and he gave the wainscot and the chimneypiece. The arched roof of stone in the buttery of All Souls was erected from his designs. In consequence of the intestine quarrels in this college he left a large share of his wealth to Worcester College. With Clarke's gifts to that institution nine sets of rooms were constructed, six fellowships and three scholarships were founded, and its new library and chapel were completed. He also enriched it with a choice collection of books and manuscripts, including the original designs of Inigo Jones for the erection of Whitehall. Of the sixty manuscripts belonging to Worcester College which are described in H. O. Coxe's 'Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Oxford Colleges,' ii. 17, nearly all belonged to Clarke. Many of them relate to the civil war, and were collected by his father while secretary to Monck and his council. To All Souls he also left the sum of 1,000l. for the restoration of the college front, and to Stone's Hospital, an institution which has recently been demolished, he gave a similar amount. Several of his letters are included in the Ballard MSS. and among the manuscripts of the Marquis of Ormonde (Hist. MSS, Com. 7th Rep.), and for further particulars of him ' A true copy of the last will and testament of George Clarke,' 1737, should be consulted.

[Burrows's All Souls, pp. 267-394; Wood's Antiquities of Oxford (Gutch), ii. pt. ii. 946-69; Wood's College« and Halls (Gutch), 157-639, and appendix, 195-9; Hearne's Collections (ed. Doble), i. 60; Pope's Letters (ed. 1872) viii. 23; Rel. Hearnianæ (1857), ii. 481-3, 770; Luttrell's State Affairs (1857). v. 176. 605, vi. 633, 666; Faulkner's Fulham. pp. 82-5. 156; Historical Reg. for 1736, diary, p. 66.]

W. P. C.

CLARKE, GEORGE (1796–1842), sculptor, was a native of Birmingham, where he enjoyed a large practice as a sculptor and modeller. In 1821 he exhibited for the first time at the Royal Academy, sending a bust of Samuel Parr. He continued to exhibit at intervals up to 1839, among the busts sent by him being those of Macready, Rev. Dr. Maltby, Sir Charles Cockerell. Raminohun Roy, the Earl of Guilford, John Spottiswoode, Lady Burrell, Colonel Thompson, M.P.