of Lincoln, who in the last mentioned year gave him the rectory of Woolley, in Huntingdonshire, worth about 1201. a year. The circumstances attending this preferment are too highly honourable to the character of Mr. Southgate to be omitted in even a short sketch of his life. This living became vacant during the minority of a Mr. Peacock, who was the patron, and was himself intended for the church. His guardians, not being able to agree as to the person they should present, suffered it to lapse to the bishop; who mentioned these circumstances to Mr. Southgate when he presented him to the living; and although the bishop left him entirely clear of any promise or restraint respecting it; as soon as Mr. Peacock had taken orders, Mr. Southgate went to his lordship, and resigned the living. During the time that he held it, he had to rebuild a considerable part of the premises, and to make such repairs, that he may be said rather to have acted like a faithful steward to Mr. Peacock than the real rector of the parish; so that when he resigned it, after possession for more than five years, he had not saved out of the income one shilling. The bishop, on his resignation, said, "You have done, Richard, what I knew you would do; you have behaved like a Christian and a good man; and I have this additional motive for thinking myself bound to provide for you." This obligation, however, appears to have been forgotten, for although the bishop lived till 1766, and had various opportunities of fulfilling his promise, Mr. Southgate received no other promotion from him, and never shewed the least sign of disappointment, but on the contrary endeavoured to apologize for the bishop, which perhaps few of our readers will be inclined to do, as the only plea was "a constitutional weakness which too easily yielded to the incessant requests of the importunate, or the powerful solicitations of the great." Before Mr. Southgate settled in London, he successively served several curacies in the country, and was frequently in the habit of reading prayers and preaching at three dif ferent churches: and it appears from his journal that he not unfrequently served four different churches in one day. During this time he found the want of books, and of persons of literature to converse with, were insurmountable obstacles to his improvement in knowledge, and had to lament that small country villages could not supply these; on which account he formed the resolution of coming to In London. Accordingly, Jan. 2, 1763, having received a recommendation from bishop Thomas to Dr. Nicolls, rector of St. James's, Westminster, he came to London, and was immediately engaged by that gentleman as one of the subcurates of St. James's, and served this cure till 1766. In December of the preceding year he entered upon the curacy of St. Giles's, to which he was appointed by Dr. Gally, on the recommendation of Dr. Parker, the successor of Dr. Nicolls in St. James's, and this last cure he retained till the time of his death. In serving it, he is universally acknowledged to have exhibited the portraiture of a learned, pious, and most indefatigably conscientious parish priest, The duties of this extensive parish were not more urgent than the wants of its numerous poor, and in works of charity Mr. Southgate was eminently distinguished. "If," says one of his biographers, "in any parts of his pastoral office, more than in others, he was particularly laborious, it was in visiting, catechising, and exhorting the poor. the parish of St. Giles's, the baptisms at the font are daily, and very numerous; on which occasions, he constantly catechised, or lectured, the sponsors, awfully impressing upon them the high importance of au attention, not only to the charge there undertaken, but to the various obligations and privileges of the Christian life: and the good seed so judiciously and seasonably sown, at those times, could not but be eminently fruitful. In visiting the sick, and particularly the sick poor, he was almost every day engaged, as his intimate friends well know, and his journal testifies; praying with, and exhorting the afflicted to submit patiently to the chastising hand of God, counselling the profane, and inconsiderate, to reflect upon, and amend their ways, and admonishing all to flee from the wrath to come, and accept the salvation tendered in the gospel, on the terms it prescribes. When he became able, his prayers and exhortations were frequently accompanied with his alms, administering at once to the spiritual and bodily wants of his poor parishioners," &c. &c. From the time of Mr. Southgate's coming to London to 1783, though he had little more than the profits of his curacy (fifty guineas a year), yet so great was his œconomy, that he had made a very considerable collection of books, and had got together no inconsiderable number of coins and medals. But, in order to increase his income, and to assist him in this, he had several times young gentlemen under his care, with whom he read the Greek and Roman classics. Even when at college he began to be a collector of books and coins, and though what he then bought of the latter were of little value, yet so nice was his taste, that he never purchased any which were not in the highest preservation and perfection. It was not until a considerable time after he had been in London, that he was enabled to increase his library and museum, by purchasing articles of value and ornament. In May 1783 he received his first preferment since coming to London, the small rectory of Little Steeping in Lincolnshire, from the duke of Ancaster; and the following year he was appointed assistant librarian of the British Museum, on the death of Dr. Gifford. In 1786 he became, by the death of a near relation, possessor of an estate of 100l. a year in Whitechapel; and in 1790 his income was farther increased by the valuable living of Warsop, in the diocese of York, and county of Nottingham, to which he was presented by John Gally Knight, of Langold, esq. son of his old friend Dr. Gally. These promotions came late, but in time to afford him for a few years the only enjoyments he prized, that of exerting his benevolence among his poor parishioners, and that of adding to his library and collection of coins. In the same year he became a member of the society for propagating Christian knowledge; and of the society for the support of the widows and orphans of the clergy within the bills of mortality and the county of Middlesex. In 1791 he was elected a fellow of the society of Antiquaries, and was afterwards made a member of the Linnæan society. He died Jan. 25, 1795, in the sixtysixth year of his age, and was interred in St. Giles's church, where a marble tablet is inscribed to his memory. Mr. Southgate never committed any of his writings to the press, but had made preparations for a work much wanted, and for which he was thoroughly qualified; a new "History of the Saxons and Danes in this country," illustrating and illustrated by their coins. His general knowledge was very great, and in medallic science perhaps few were to be compared to him. He left a choice and valuable collection of books, coins, medals, shells, and other natural curiosities, which in April and May 1795, were sold by auction, by Messrs. Leigh and Sotheby, the sale continuing twenty-one days. Prefixed to the catalogue was a life of Mr. Southgate, written by Dr. Charles Combe, to which we must refer for many other interesting particulars and also to a biographical preface by Dr. Gaskin, prefixed to 2 vols. of Mr. Southgate's "Sermons," published by that divine in 1798.' SOUTHWELL (ROBERT), an English Jesuit and poet, was born in 1560, and is said to have descended from an ancient family, either in Norfolk or Suffolk. Being sent abroad for education, he became a Jesuit at Rome, Oct. 1578. In 1585, he was appointed prefect of studies in the English college there, and not long after was sent as a missionary into England. His chief residence was with Anne countess of Arundel, who died in the Tower of London. After carrying on his mission for some time, he was, in July 1592, apprehended and examined with the strictest rigour, but having evaded the questions put to him, was imprisoned for three years, and as he affirmed, underwent the torture several times. He owned that he was a priest and a Jesuit, that he came into England to preach the truths of the catholic religion, and was prepared to lay down his life for it. In Feb. 1595, he was tried at the bar of the King's Bench, Westminster, and executed the next day at Tyburn. He was a man of singular parts, says Dodd, and happy in a peculiar talent of expressing himself in the English language, both in prose and verse. Edmund Bolton, whom Warton calls a sensible critic, speaks of Southwell's works in the same strain of panegyric: "Never must be forgotten St. Peter's complaint, and those other serious poems said to be father Southwell's: the English whereof, as it is most proper, so the sharpness and light of wit is very rare in them." Mr. Headley seems first to have revived the memory of Southwell, as a poet, by some curious specimens, in which he has been followed by Mr. Ellis. "There is a moral charm," says Headley, "in the little pieces of Southwell, that will prejudice most readers of feeling in their favour." Unless, however, there were encouragement for republication, which is not very probable, Southwell's fame must principally rest on these specimens, as his works are rarely to be met with; yet Mr. Ellis remarks that the few copies known to exist, are the remnant of at least twenty-four different editions, of which eleven were printed between 1593 and 1600. The titles of his principal works, are, 1. "A consolation Lives as above.-Nichols's Bowyer. 4. for Catholicks imprisoned on account of religion." 2. “A SOUTHWELL. See SOTWELL. See FARIA. 7. SOZOMEN (HERMIAS), an ecclesiastical historian of the fifth century, was of a good family; and born at Bethelia, a town of Palestine. After being liberally educated, he studied the law at Berytus in Phoenicia; and then going to Constantinople, became a pleader at the bar. Afterwards he applied himself to the writing of ecclesiastical history; and first drew up a compendium of it in two books, from the ascension of Christ to the year 323; but this is lost. Then he continued his history in a more circumstantial and closer manner to the year 440; and this part is extant. He has many particulars relating to him in common with the ecclesiastical historian Socrates: he lived at the same time, was of the same profession, and undertook a work of the same nature, and comprised it within the same period for his history ends, as it nearly begins, at the same point with that of Socrates. His style is more florid and elegant, says Jortin, in his "Ecclesiastical Remarks," vol. III. than that of Socrates; but he is by no means so judicious an author. Being of a family which had excessively admired the monks, and himself educated among them, he contracted a superstitious turn of mind, and great credulity for monkish miracles: he speaks of the benefit which himself had received from the intercession of Michael the archangel. He gives an high commendation of a monastic life, and enlarges very much upon the actions and manners of those recluses: and this forms the greater part of what he has added to the "History of Socrates," who, it is universally agreed, wrote first, and whom he every where visibly copies. 1 Dodd's Ch. Hist.-Ath. Ox. vol. I. new edit.-Gent, Mag. vol. LXVIII. by Mr. Park. Headley's and Ellis's Specimens.-Phillips's Theatrum.-Warton's Hist. of Poetry.-Fuller's Worthies.-Tanner.-Censura Literaria, vol. VI. |