WARBURTON, William, a learned and distinguished writer, descended from an ancient family in Cheshire, was the eldest son of George Warburton, an attorney at Newark in the county of Nottingham, and was born on the 24th of December 1698. He was first sent to school there under a Mr Twells, but had the chief part of his education at Okeham in Rutlandshire, where he continued till the beginning of the year 1714. He then returned to his native town, and for a short time was under the care of his cousin William Warburton, who had recently been appointed head master of Newark school. Being destined for the profession which had been followed by his father and grandfather, he was placed as a clerk to Mr Kirke, an attorney of East Markham in Nottinghamshire, with whom he continued till April 1719, when he was qualified to engage in business on his own account. Having been admitted as an attorney of one of the courts at Westminster, he settled at Newark, where he continued to practise for some years. His father had died about the year 1706, leaving a widow and five children. Warburton’s success as a country attorney does not appear to have been very considerable, but he was destined to reach an eminent station in another profession.

He had always expressed a strong inclination to take orders; and the love of letters, which tended to retard rather than forward his progress in the profession chosen for him by his friends, growing every day stronger in him, it was deemed expedient to give way to that inclination. He therefore devoted himself to the studies necessary to fit him for the church, and at length in 1723 he was ordained deacon, and priest in 1727. In 1728 he was presented by Sir Robert Sutton to the rectory of Brand-Broughton, in the diocese of Lincoln, where he spent the greater part of his life, and composed all the great works which will carry his fame down to posterity. During the same year he was put upon the king’s list of Masters of Arts, created on his majesty’s visit to the university of Cambridge. He had already published some juvenile performances, which displayed genius and reading, and attracted considerable notice; but it was not till the year 1736 that he may be said to have emerged from the obscurity of a private life into the notice of the world. The first publication which rendered him famous now appeared, under the title of “The Alliance between Church and State; or, the Necessity and Equity of an Established Religion and a Test Law; demonstrated from the Essence and End of Civil Society, upon the fundamental Principles of the Law of Nature and Nations.”

At the close of the Alliance was announced the scheme of the Divine Legation of Moses, in which he had then made considerable progress. The first volume of this work was published in January 1737-8, under the title of “The Divine Legation of Moses demonstrated on the Principles of a religious Deist, from the Omission of the Doctrine of a future State of Rewards and Punishments in the Jewish Dispensation, in six books.” The arrogance of the author was at least equal to his learning; and this work, as he afterwards observed, was fallen upon in so outrageous and brutal a manner as had been scarcely pardonable had it been “The Divine Legation of Mahomet.” It produced several answers, and so much abuse from the authors of “The Weckly Miscellany,” that in less than two months he was constrained to defend himself, in “A Vindication of the Author of the Divine Legation of Moses, from the Aspersions of the Country Clergyman’s Letter in the Weckly Miscellany of February 24, 1737-8.” His extraordinary merit had attracted the notice of the heir-apparent to the crown, in whose immediate service we find him in June 1738, when he published “Faith working by Charity to Christian Edification, a Sermon, preached at the last Episcopal Visitation for Confirmation in the Diocese of Lincoln; with a Preface, showing the Reason of its Publication; and a Postsβript, occasioned by some Letters lately published in the Weckly Miscellany; by William Warburton, M. A. Chaplain to his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales.”

The “Essay on Man” had now been published some years; and it has sometimes been supposed that the author had, in the composition of it, adopted the philosophy of Lord Bolingbroke, whom on this occasion he had followed as his guide, without understanding the tendency of his principles. In 1738, M. de Crousaz wrote some re- . marks on it, accusing the author of Spinozaism and naturalism; which falling into Warburton’s hands, he published a defence of the first epistle, and soon afterwards of the remaining three, in seven letters; of which six were printed in 1739, and the seventh in 1740, under the title of “A Vindication of Mr Pope’s Essay on Man, by the author of the Divine Legation.” The opinion which Pope conceived of these defences, as well as of their author, will be best seen in his letters. In consequence, a firm friendship was established between them, which continued with undiminished fervour until the death of Pope; who, during the remainder of his life, paid a deference and respect to his friend’s judgment and abilities, which will be considered by many as almost bordering on servility.

Towards the end of the year 1739, Warburton published a new and improved edition of the first volume of the Divine Legation; and in 1741 appeared the second part, which completed the argument, though not the entire plan of that work; “a work,” says Bishop Hurd, “in all views [7:21:771]of the most transcendant merit, whether we consider the invention or the execution. A plain simple argument, yet perfectly new, proving the divinity of the Mosaic law, and laying a sure foundation for the support of Christianity, is there drawn out to great length by a chain of reasoning so elegantly connected, that the reader is carried along it with ease and pleasure; while the matter presented to him is so striking for its own importance, so embellished by a lively fancy, and illustrated from all quarters by exquisite learning and the most ingenious disquisition, that in the whole compass of modern or ancient theology there is nothing equal or similar to this extraordinary performance.”^[1. Hurd’s Life of Warburton, prefixed to his Works. ]

This is the panegyric of a man reflecting with tenderness on the memory of his friend and benefactor; but it approaches much nearer to the truth than the censures of those cabalistic critics who, fastening upon some weak part of the Divine Legation, or perhaps never having looked into it, have ridiculously contended that the author was far from being eminent as a scholar, and that his work is inimical to the cause of Christianity. Putting partiality aside, there is in the Divine Legation of Moses abundant evidence of the malignant folly of this charge, as no man can read and understand that work without being convinced that its author was a Christian, not only sincere, but zealous; that he was what Johnson calls him, “a man of vigorous faculties, of a mind fervent and vehement, supplied, by unlimited and incessant inquiry, with a wonderful extent and variety of knowledge, which had neither depressed his imagination nor clouded his perspicacity; and that to every work, and this work in particular, he brought a memory full fraught, with a fancy fertile of original combinations, exerting at once the powers of the scholar, the reasoner, and the wit.” But we think it must be acknowledged, that his learning was too multifarious to be always exact, and his inquiries too eagerly pushed to be always cautious.

In the summer of 1741, Pope and Warburton, in a country ramble, took Oxford in their way. The university was naturally pleased at the arrival of two such strangers, and seemed desirous of enrolling their names among their graduates. The degree of D. D. was intended for the divine, and that of LL. D. for the poet: but intrigue and envy defeated this scheme; and the university lost the honour of decorating at the same time the two greatest geniuses of the age, by the fault of one or two of its members. Pope retired with some indignation to Twickenham, where he consoled himself and his friend with this sarcastic reflection: “We shall take our degree together in fame, whatever we do at the university.”

The friendship of this eminent poet was of service to Warburton in more respects than that of increasing his fame. He introduced and warmly recommended him to most of his friends, and among others to Mr Murray, afterwards earl of Mansfield, and Ralph Allen, Esq. of Prior Park. In consequence of this introduction, we find Warburton at Bath in 1742. There he printed a sermon which had been preached at the Abbey-church on the 24th of October, for the benefit of Mr Allen’s favourite charity, the General Hospital or Infirmary. During this year also he printed a Dissertation on the Origin of books of Chivalry, at the end of Jarvis’s preface to a translation of Don Quixote; of which Pope tells him he had not got over two paragraphs before he cried out, Aut Erasmus, aut Diabolus.

In 1742, Warburton published “A Critical and Philosophical Commentary on Mr Pope’s Essay on Man, in which is contained a Vindication of the said Essay from the Misrepresentation of M. de Resnel, the French Translator, and of Μ. de Crousaz, Professor of Philosophy and Mathematics in the Academy of Lausanne, the Commentator.” It was at this period, when he had the entire confidence of Pope, that he advised him to complete the Dunciad, by changing the hero, and adding to it a fourth book. This was accordingly executed in 1742, and the poem was published early in 1743, with notes by Warburton; who, in consequence of it, received his share of the abuse which Cibber liberally bestowed on both Pope and his annotator. In the latter end of the same year he published complete editions of “The Essay on Man,” and “The Essay on Criticism and from the specimen which he there exhibited of his abilities, it may be presumed Pope determined to commit to Warburton’s care the publication of those works which he should leave. At Pope’s desire, he about this time revised and corrected the “Essay on Homer,” as it now stands in the last edition of that translation.

The publication of the Dunciad was the last service which our author rendered Pope in his lifetime. After a lingering and tedious illness, the event of which had been long foreseen, this great poet died on the 30th of May 1744; and by his will, dated the 12th of the preceding December, bequeathed to Warburton one half of his library, and the property of all such of his works already printed as he had not otherwise disposed of or alienated, and all the profits which should arise from any edition to be printed after his death: but at the same time directed that they should be published without any future alterations.

In 1744, Warburton turned his attention to the several attacks which had been made on the Divine Legation, and defended himself in a manner which, if it did not prove him to be possessed of much humility or diffidence, at least demonstrated that he knew how to wield the weapons of controversy with the hand of a master. His first defence now appeared, under the title of “Remarks on several occasional Reflections, in answer to the Reverend Dr Middleton, Dr Pococke, the Master of the Charterhouse, Dr Richard Grey, and others; serving to explain and justify divers Passages in the Divine Legation, objected to by those learned Writers. To which is added, a genera) Review of the Argument of the Divine Legation, as far as it is yet advanced; wherein is considered the Relation the several Parts bear to each other and the whole. Together with an Appendix, in Answer to a late Pamphlet entitled An Examination of Mr W—’s second Pro position.” This was followed next year by “Remarks on several occasional Reflections, in Answer to the Reverend Doctors Stebbing and Sykes; serving to explain and justify the two Dissertations in the Divine Legation, concerning the command to Abraham to offer up his Son, and the Nature of the Jewish Theocracy, objected to by these learned Writers. Part II. and last.” Both these answers are couched in those high terms of confident superiority which marked almost every performance that fell from his pen during the remainder of his life.

On the 5th of September 1745, the friendship between him and Mr Allen was more closely cemented by his marriage with Miss Tucker. At that important crisis he preached and published three seasonable sermons: L “A faithful Portrait of Popery, by which it is seen to be the Reverse of Christianity, as it is the Destruction of Morality, Piety, and Civil Liberty. Preached at St James’s, Westminster, October 1745.” 2. “A Sermon occasioned by the present unnatural Rebellion, &c. Preached in Mr Allen’s chapel at Prior Park, near Bath, November 1745.” 3.

“The Nature of National Offences truly stated. Preached on the General Fast-day, December 18, 1745-6.” On account of the last of these sermons, he was again involved in a controversy with his former antagonist Dr Stebbing, [7:21:772]which occasioned “An Apologetical Dedication to the Reverend Dr Henry Stebbing, in Answer to his Censure and Misrepresentations of the Sermon preached on the General Fast,” &c.

Notwithstanding his great connections, his acknowledged abilities, and his established reputation, a reputation founded on the durable basis of learning, and upheld by the decent and attentive performance of every duty incident to his station, we do not find that he received any addition to the preferment given him in 1728 by Sir Robert Sutton (except the chaplainship to the prince of Wales), until April 1746, when he was unanimously called by the Society of Lincoln’s Inn to be their preacher. In November he published “A Sermon preached on the Thanksgiving appointed to be observed the 9th of October, for the Suppression of the late unnatural Rebellion.” In 1747 appeared his edition of Shakspeare and his Preface to Clarissa; and in the same year he published, 1. “A Letter from an Author to a Member of Parliament concerning Literary Property.” 2. “Preface to Mrs Cockburn’s Remarks upon the Principles and Reasonings of Dr Ruther-forth’s Essay on the Nature and Obligations of Virtue, &c.” 3. “Preface to a Critical Inquiry into the Opinions and Practice of the ancient Philosophers, concerning the Nature of a Future State, and their Method of teaching by double Doctrine,” (by Mr Towne) 1747, second edition.

“In 1749,” says Bishop Hurd, “a very extraordinary attack was made on the moral character of Mr Pope, from a quarter where it could be least expected. An insignificant pamphlet, under the name of A Patriot King, was that year published by Lord Bolingbroke, or by his direction, with a preface to it, reflecting highly on Mr Pope’s honour. The provocation was simply this: the manuscript of that trivial declamation had been intrusted to the care of Mr Pope, with the charge (as it was pretended) that only a certain number of copies should be printed. Mr Pope, in his excessive admiration of his guide, philosopher, and friend, took that opportunity, for fear so invaluable a treasure of patriot eloquence should be lost to the public, to exceed his commission, and to run off more copies, which were found, after his death, in the printer’s warehouse. This charge, however frivolous, was aggravated beyond measure, and, notwithstanding the proofs which Lord Bolingbroke had received of Pope’s devotion to him, envenomed with the utmost malignity. Mr Warburton thought it became him to vindicate his deceased friend; and he did it so effectually, as not only to silence his accuser, but to cover him with confusion.”

About this time the publication of Dr Middleton’s Inquiry concerning the Miraculous Powers of the Christian Church, gave rise to a controversy, which was managed with great warmth and asperity on both sides, and not much to the credit of either party. On this occasion Warburton published in 1750 an able performance, written with a degree of candour and temper which, it is to be lamented, he did not always exercise. The title of it is “Julian; or a Discourse concerning the Earthquake and fiery Eruption which defeated that Emperor’s attempt to rebuild the Temple at Jerusalem.” A second edition of this discourse, with additions, appeared in 1751. During this year, he gave the public his edition of Mr Pope’s Works, with notes, in nine volumes 8vo; and in the same year he printed “An Answer to a Letter to Dr Middleton, inserted in a Pamphlet entitled The Argument of the Divine Legation fairly stated,” &c.; and “An Account of the Prophecies of Arise Evans, the Welsh Prophet in the last century,” annexed to the first volume of Dr Jortin’s Remarks on Ecclesiastical History

In 1752, Warburton published the first volume of a course of Sermons, preached at Lincoln’s Inn, entitled “The Principles of Natural and Revealed Religion occasionally opened and explained and this was two years afterwards followed by a second. After the public had been some time promised, it may, from the alarm which was taken, be almost said threatened with, the appearance of Lord Bolingbroke’s Works, they were about this time printed. The known abilities and infidelity of this nobleman had created apprehensions in the minds of many people, of the pernicious effects of his doctrines; and nothing but the appearance of his whole force could have convinced his friends how little was to be dreaded from arguments against religion so weakly supported. Many answers were soon published, but none with more acuteness, solidity, and sprightliness, than “A View of Lord Bolingbroke’s Philosophy, in two Letters to a Friend.” The third and fourth letters were published in 1755, with another edition of the two former; and in the same year a smaller edition of the whole; which, though it came into the world without a name, was universally ascribed to Warburton, and was afterwards publicly owned by him. To some copies of this is prefixed an excellent complimentary epistle from the president Montesquieu, dated May 26, 1745.

At this advanced period of his life, that preferment which his abilities might have claimed, and which had hitherto been withheld, seemed to be approaching towards him. In September 1754, he was appointed one of his majesty’s chaplains in ordinary; and in the next year was presented to a prebend in the cathedral of Durham. About this time the degree of D. D. was conferred on him by Dr Herring, archbishop of Canterbury. A new impression of the Divine Legation being now called for, he printed a fourth edition of the first part of it, corrected and enlarged, divided into two volumes, with a dedication to the earl of Hardwicke. During the same year appeared “A Sermon preached before his Grace Charles Duke of Marlborough, President, and the Governors of the Hospital for the Smallpox and for Inoculation, at the Parish-church of St Andrew, Holborn, April the 24th, 1755.” And in 1756 he published “Natural and Civil Events the Instruments of God’s Moral Government; a Sermon preached on the last public Fast-day, at Lincoln’s Inn Chapel.”

In 1757, Dr Warburton meeting with Mr Hume’s tract entitled “The Natural History of Religion,” filled the margin of the book, as well as some interleaved slips of paper, with many severe and shrewd remarks on the infidelity and naturalism of the author. These he put into the hands of his friend Dr Hurd, who, making a few alterations of the style, added a short introduction and conclusion, and published them in a pamphlet, entitled “Remarks on Mr David Hume’s Natural History of Religion, by a Gentleman of Cambridge, in a Letter to the Reverend Dr Warburton.” This fierce attack upon Mr Hume gave him so much offence that he thought proper to vent his indignation on the supposed author in the posthumous discourse which he called his Life; and thus to do greater honour to Dr Hurd than to any other of his numerous antagonists.

Towards the end of the year 1757, Dr Warburton was promoted to the deanery of Bristol; and in the beginning of the year 1760, he was, through Mr Allen’s interest with Mr Pitt, afterwards earl of Chatham, advanced to the bishopric of Gloucester. That great minister is known to have declared, “that nothing of a private nature since he had been in office had given him so much pleasure as bringing our author on the bench.” There was however another minister who dreaded his promotion, and thought he saw a second Atterbury in the new bishop of Gloucester; but Warburton, says Bishop Hurd, had neither talents nor inclination for parliamentary intrigue or parliamentary eloquence: he had other instruments of fame in his hands, and was infinitely above the vanity of being caught

With the fine notion of a busy man.
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He was consecrated on the 20th of January 1760, and on the 30th of the same month preached before the House of Lords. In the next year he printed “A Rational Account of the Nature and End of the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.” In 1762 he published “The Doctrine of Grace; or the Office and Operations of the Holy Spirit vindicated from the Insults of Infidelity and the Abuses of Fanaticism,” 2 vols. 12mo; and in the succeeding year drew upon himself much illiberal abuse from some writers of the popular party, on occasion of his complaint in the House of Lords, on the 15th of November 1763, against Mr Wilkes, for putting his name to certain notes on the infamous “Essay on Woman.”

In 1765 he published a new edition of the second part of the Divine Legation, in three volumes; and as it had now received his last hand, he presented it to his great friend Lord Mansfield, in a dedication which deserves to be read. It was the appendix to this edition which produced the well-known controversy between him and Dr Lowth, which we have noticed elsewhere as doing no great honour, by the mode in which it was conducted, to either party. In the next year he gave a new and much improved edition of the Alliance between Church and State. This was followed, in 1767, by a third volume of Sermons, to which is added, his first triennial Charge to the Clergy of the Diocese of Gloucester; which may be safely pronounced one of the most valuable discourses of the kind that is to be found in our own or any other language. With this publication he closed his literary course; except that he made an effort towards publishing, and actually printed, the ninth and last book of the Divine Legation. This book, with one or two occasional sermons, and some valuable directions for the study of theology, has been given to the world in the splendid edition of his works by his friend and biographer the late bishop of Worcester. That prelate confesses that the ninth book of the Divine Legation displays little of that vigour of mind and fertility of invention which appear so conspicuous in the former volumes; but he adds, perhaps truly, that under all the disadvantages with which it papears, it is the noblest effort which has hitherto been made to give a rationale of Christianity.

While the bishop of Gloucester was thus exerting his last strength in the cause of religion, he projected a method by which he hoped to render it effectual service after his death. He transferred L.500 in trust to Lord Mansfield, Sir Eardley Wilmot, and Mr Charles Yorke, to found a lecture, in the form of a course of sermons, to prove the truth of revealed religion in general, and of the Christian in particular, from the completion of the prophecies in the Old and New Testament, which relate to the Christian church, especially to the apostasy of Papal Rome.

It is a melancholy reflection, that a life spent in the constant pursuit of knowledge frequently terminates in the loss of those powers, the cultivation and improvement of which are attended to with too strict and unabated a degree of ardour. This was the case with Dr Warburton; and it seems probable that the decline of intellectual vigour was aggravated by the loss of his only son, a promising young man, who died of a consumption but a short time before the bishop, who himself closed his career on the 7th of June 1779. In August 1781 his widow married John Stafford Smith, B. D., who had been his chaplain, and who in her right became owner of Prior Park. At her expense, and under the superintendence of Bishop Hurd, a collective edition of Warburton’s Works was published in 1788 in seven vols. 4to. In 1794 he added “A Discourse by way of general Preface to the quarto Edition of Bishop Warburton’s Works, containing some Account of the Life, Writings, and Character of the Author.” This biographical work is liable to many objections. It is not only meagre and unsatisfactory in many of its details, but is deeply tinctured with the narrow prejudices and cool malignity of the writer. He left for publication, after his own death, “Letters from a late eminent Prelate to one of his Friends.” This collection has no tendency to increase our reverence for either Warburton or Hurd. Here we must not entirely overlook the singular publication of Dr Parr, entitled “Tracts by Warburton and a Warburtonian, not admitted into the respective collections of their Works.” Lond. 1789, 8vo.