124
NOTES AND QUERIES. [ii s. HI. FEB. is, 1911.
In The European Magazine for August
1789 (partii. p. 149), is recorded the marriage
of "Mr. Henry Richardson, jun., of Derby
to Miss Gould, daughter of the late Johr
Gould, Esq., of Macclesfield." No date is
given.
The Rev. Ralph Price (1715-79) married Sarah, dau. and coheir of Richard Richard on of Smalley, on 18 Feb., 1739, and was father of Sir Charles Price, 1st Bt. -See Burke's * Peerage ' under ' Rugge-Price.' ALEYN LYELL, READE.
Park Corner, Blundellsands, near Liverpool.
SAMUEL RICHARDSON AND THE METHOD-
ISTS. In the ' History of Sir Charles
Grandison ' Richardson avoided calling his
^works novels there are several interesting
references to the rising sect of the Method-
ists, who are, however, not mentioned at
all in either ' Pamela ' or ' Clarissa Har-
lowe.' During the fourteen years between
the publication of Richardson's first and
last novel (1740-54) the Methodists had
greatly increased in importance, a fact
-which explains their frequent mention in
' Sir Charles Grandison.'
In the letters of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu a similar change of attitude may be noted. On 15 February, 1741, she writes :
" The news I have heard from London is, Lady Mary Hastings having disposed of herself to a poor wandering Methodist." ' Letters,' vol. ii. p. 88, ed. 1893.
Eighteen years later (19 July, 1759) Lady Mary refers to the Methodists in a more friendly and sympathetic way :
" No mountain girl ever trembled more at one of Whitfield's pathetic lectures than I do at the word ' blindness.' " /&., ii, p. 362.
The references in 'Sir Charles Grandison ' to the Methodists are always in accordance with the characters of the persons in the novel. Lady G (Charlotte Grandison) is well disposed towards them, as may be seen in the way she writes about the newly converted Mrs. O'Hara, the mother of Emily Jervois :
" By the way, do you know that Mrs. O'Hara is turned Methodist ? True as you are alive. And she labours hard to convert her husband (Major O'Hara). Thank God she is anything that is serious ! These people have really great merit with me, in her conversion. I am sorry that our own clergy are not so zealously in earnest as they. They have, really, my dear, if we may believe aunt Eleanor, given a face of religion to subter- ranean colliers, tinners, and the most profligate of men, who hardly ever before heard of the word, or thing. But I am not turning Methodist, Harriet. No, you will not suspect me." ' Sir Charles Grandison,' vol. vi. p. 3, ed. 1902.
Lady G refers again to Mrs. O'Hara' s
conversion by the Methodists (ib,, vi. 150).
She also mentions in a letter that her maiden
aunt Eleanor has become a Methodist :
"Do you know that the good creature was a Methodist in Yorkshire ? "Ib., v., 59.
Mr. Selby is prejudiced against the Methodists :
" The Methodists, Sir Charles, what think you of Methodists ? Say you love them ; and, and, and, adds-dines, you shall not be my nephew." Ib., vi. 190.
' Sir Charles Grandison * contains much about the trading classes of London, and is not so restricted to country life and English country people as ' Pamela,' ard to a lesser extent ' Clarissa Harlowe.' Much that is interesting about ' Sir Charles Grandison ' may be found in an excellent work by a Dutch scholar, Jan ten Brink, ' De Roman in Brieven, 1740-1840.'
H. G. WARD. Aachen.
SIR JOHN DAVIES AND FRANCIS BACON. Sir John Davies in his 'Nosce Teipsum' (1599) writes:
Although they say, " Come let us eat and drinke"; Our life is but a sparke, which quickly dies ; Though thus they say, they know not what tc
think, But in their minds ten thousand doubts arise.
Therefore no heretikes desire to spread Their light opinions, like these Epicures ; For so the staggering thoughts are comforted, And other men's assent their doubt assures.
Yet though these men against their conscience
strive,
There are some sparkles in their flintie breasts Which cannot be extinct, but still revive ; That though they would, they cannot quite be
beasts.
These verses of an Irish Attorney-General are neatly paraphrased by the English Solicitor-General, who published in 1612 an essay containing the following words :
" It appeareth in nothing more, that atheisme s rather in the lip, then in the heart of man, hen by this ; that atheists will ever be talking if that their opinion, as if they fainted in it, vithin themselves, and would be glad to be trengthned, by the consent of others : Nay more, you shall have atheists strive to get dis- iples as it fareth with other sects .... Epicurus is harged. . . .They that deny a God, destroy man's nobility : For certainly, man is of kinne to the Beasts, by his body ; and if he be not of kinne to God, by his spirit, ho is a base and ignoble creature." Bacon, Essay XVI.
have both Davies and Bacon drawn their nspiration from a common fount ?
P. A. McELWAINE.
Dublin.
