Cambridge, where on the decease of Dr. Hale, master of Peterhouse, in 1663 he was presented by his kind patron to the headship of that college, a situation which of all others he had most desired, and in which, indeed, he acquired the love and veneration of all within the influence of his authority; for he lost no opportunity of rewarding merit, especially when labouring under the disadvantages of obscure birth or confined circumstances; and so revolting, in fact, to his benevolent heart was the spectacle of learning and piety suffering under the pressure of want or cold neglect, that whenever such an instance occurred in the society over which he presided, he immediately hastened to alleviate it, by admitting the person or persons so circumstanced into his family, under the denomination of his sizars, where, until they took their Bachelor's degree, he supplied them not only with the necessaries, but the comforts of life, allowing them free access to his library, and not seldom to the still greater benefits resulting from his conversation and advice.

Preferment still followed the footsteps of our learned divine. In the year of his admission to

the mastership of Peterhouse, he was instituted to the rectory of Feversham, near Cambridge; and in 1664 to that of Barley, in Hertfordshire, where he alternately resided, we are told, in the vacation months every summer, feeding the indigent, instructing the ignorant, and faithfully discharging all the offices of the pastoral charge."

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The ensuing year saw him involved in a controversy with Dr. Henry More, who, having broached some doctrines in his " Mystery of Godliness," which our author deemed not only subversive of our excellent constitution, but injurious to the cause of Christianity, he privately communicated his objections to the Doctor, who thinking proper to reply through the medium of the press, compelled Dr. Beaumont to have recourse to the same public vehicle, and so effectually did he refute the positions of his antagonist, that he received the thanks of the university for his services in behalf of religion.

The reputation, indeed, of Dr. Beaumont, for the depth and soundness of his theological knowledge, had now become so great, that in the year 1670, without any solicitation on his

part, or any competition on that of others, he was called, by the united voice of the university, to fill the divinity chair, and in this very important situation he passed the residue of his life, a period of twenty-nine years, delivering lectures regularly twice a week in every term; in the course of which he went through the two Epistles to the Romans and Colossians, in order to set at rest the numerous heresies and controversies which had arisen from a mistaken interpretation of them.

The success which had attended his efforts in this arduous attempt at Cambridge, led to his appointment in 1689, as one of the commissioners for the comprehension, as it was termed, or the union of churchmen and dissenters under one form of public worship, but not entertaining any expectation that such a plan could be carried into effect, he declined taking his place at the board.

Blessed with an uncommon share of health and strength, he continued to discharge all the duties of his office, even to his eighty-fourth year, with an unbroken spirit; but, relying too much, at length, on the vigour of his constitu

tion, he exerted himself with such energy in preaching in his turn before the university on the 5th of November 1699, as to bring on, after the service of the day was concluded, symptoms of alarming debility. These ushered in at night a high fever, which being followed in a few days by an attack of the gout in his stomach, he expired on the 23d of the same month.

"Thus," says the friendly memorialist of his life, with whose summary of his character I cannot do better than close this brief sketch; "thus, after a life full of as much virtue and reputation as ever fell to the share of one man, died the great and excellent Professor BEAUMONT; regretted by all good men, and the whole university; but most of all by the members of that society over which he had so long, and so worthily presided; who lost in him the guide of their lives, the director of their studies, the witness and encourager of their virtues.

"He was religious without bigotry, devout without superstition, learned without pedantry, judicious without censoriousness, eloquent without vanity, charitable without ostentation, generous without profusion, friendly without dis

simulation, courteous without flattery, prudent without cunning, and humble without meanness. In short, whoever shall hereafter deserve the reputation of having filled with credit the several stations which he so eminently adorned, will have reason to believe full justice done to his character, if for learning, piety, judgment, humanity, and good breeding, it may be thought worthy to be compared with that of Dr. BEAUMONT."*

Of the numerous works of Dr. Beaumont, with the exception of his " Observations upon the Apology of Dr. Henry More," none have issued from the press but his Psyche, and his Minor Poems; an injunction having been found in his will against the publication of his critical and polemical writings.

Psyche, as we have already related, was written during the author's residence at Hadleigh in 1647, and published in 1648, in twenty cantos;

Highly-coloured as this character of our author may be deemed, it seems to be borne out by the opinion of his contemporaries; for in his epitaph in the antichapel at Peter-house he is styled "Poeta, Orator, Theologus præstantissimus ; quovis nomine Hæreticorum Malleus, et Veritatis Vindex."