public prayers of the Primitive Church?’ I answered that if they had ever read the works of St. Basil the Great, they would have found a satisfactory answer . . . . all the public prayers were directed to the Father by the intercession of the Son in the Holy Spirit.” “I am sure the divines and ministers who were there and then present little thought that I had therein given any occasion for such a charge as Mr. Whiston has now, at the distance of twelve or thirteen years, publicly brought against me.” “I thought him a studious man, and had a respect for him as such; and he will do me the justice to acknowledge that I always spoke my mind to him very freely and sincerely; but that I never approved of the liberties he took.” “He again visited me since his professing himself an Arian, and he can witness that I exhorted him seriously to pay some deference to the advice of one of the most learned prelates of our church. . . . . I represented to him with some earnestness how ill it became a person of his age to be so positive as I had always found him, especially since he had spent so much of his time in mathematical studies, and therefore could not have sufficiently applied himself to the study of antiquity.” “Indeed, as I learned from one of his friends, he had never read Dallaeus’s book ‘De Pseudepigraphis Apostolicis,’ where that learned man had demonstrated the Book of the Apostolical Constitutions to be spurious; but, according to Mr. Whiston, that book is the most canonical book of the whole New Testament, because all the other books are only supported by its authority.” “It is very plain that Mr. Whiston has not read the ecclesiastical writers with much judgment or attention; nay, and that he has made little use of that sort of learning which he best understands, I mean the mathematics.” “It seems Mr. Whiston is ashamed of Arius’s person, since he complains that I have represented him as one of his followers. But I must own that he has confirmed me in that opinion of him, by the propositions he has published in his appendix to his reply, and it is my custom that I call scapham ‘scapham.’”
“He enjoyed,” says Dr. Campbell (in the Biographica Britannica), “a very uncommon share of health and spirits, as appears by his latest writings, in which there is not only all the erudition but all the quickness and vivacity that appeared in his earliest pieces. Those who knew him found the same pleasure in his conversation that the learned will always find in his productions; for with a prodigious share of learning he had a wonderful liveliness of temper, and expressed himself on the driest subjects with so much sprightliness, and in a manner so out of the common road, that it was impossible to flag or lose one’s attention to what was the subject of his discourse. He continued his application to the last, and died at London, 21st February 1717, in the seventy-sixth year of his age, leaving behind him the reputation of a man equally assiduous in the right discharge of all the offices of public and private life, and every way as amiable lor his virtues and social qualities, as venerable for his uprightness and integrity, and famous for his various and profound learning.”
His will was dated 18th February 1717, and proved on the 27th by his widow, Mrs. Margaret Allix; it was translated from the French by Pet. S. Eloy, N.P., and was as follows:—
“I, under-written, Peter Allix, living in London, have made my will as follows:— I recommend my soul to God, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and I order my body to be buried privately, and without expense. I was minister of the church of Paris when, by the persecution made in France to those of the reformed religion, all the ministers were drove out of the kingdom by an Edict. I came for refuge into England with my wife and three children, where I found a happy asylum. The universities of Oxford and Cambridge did of their own accord confer on me the degree of Doctor in Divinity. I exercised the ministerial functions two years or thereabouts in London among the French refugees, until I was named Treasurer and Prebendary of Salisbury by the bishop of the diocese. I have endeavoured to edify the faithful by my ministry, my works, and my example. I bequeath to my eldest son, Peter Allix, my manuscripts, to make such use thereof as I have mentioned to him. I have always wished the welfare of this nation, and of the Church of England, and I have sought for the opportunities of contributing thereto. I have made fervent wishes for the Act of Succession of these kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland in the House of Hanover. I have taken part in the public joy upon the accession of King George to the crown, and to my death I will put forth my fervent prayers to God that He will please to give him a long and happy reign, and to continue the same, till time is no more, in his illustrious house. I die full of gratitude for the kindness of that good king, which he hath showed lately towards my family, in granting it a pension for its subsistence, upon the entreaty of my Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, and my Lord Bishop of Norwich. I thank these worthy prelates for having bestowed on me their generous offices, and I pray God to reward them.
“I have left the best part of my estate in France, whereof my relations have taken possession by virtue of the Edicts; and I have brought little into England. The revenue of my Prebend and Treasurership hath supplied me for to live on, to educate my family, and to be at the expense of one to copy who had been given to me to work on The Councils. The small remainder which I leave is not sufficient to fulfil my Marriage Articles with my wife. There-