Butler, Joseph

, a prelate of the most distinguished character and abilities, was born at Wantage in Berkshire, in 1692. His father, Mr. Thomas Butler, who was a reputable shopkeeper in that town, observing in his son Joseph an excellent genius and inclination for learning, determined to educate him for the ministry, among the protestant dissenters of the presbyterian denomination. For this purpose, after he had gone through a proper course of grammatical literature, at the free grammarschool of his native place, under the care of the rev. Mr. Philip Barton, a clergyman of the church of England, he was sent to a dissenting academy, then kept at Gloucester, but which was soon afterwards removed to Tewkesbury, the principal tutor of which was Mr. Jones, a man of uncommon abilities and knowledge. At Tewkesbury, Mr. Butler made an extraordinary progress in the study of divinity; of which he gave a remarkable proof in the letters addressed by him, whilst he resided at Tewkesbury, to Dr. Samuel Clarke, laying before him the doubts that had arisen in his mind concerning the conclusiveness of some arguments in the doctor’s “Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God.” The first of these letters was dated November the 4th, 1713; and the sagacity and depth of thought displayed in it immediately excited Dr. Clarke’s particular notice. This condescension encouraged Mr. Butler to address the doctor again upon the same subject, which, ^likewise, was answered by him; and the correspondence being carried on in three other letters, the whole was annexed to the celebrated treatise before mentioned, and the collection has been retained in all the subsequent editions of that work. The management of this correspondence was entrusted by Mr. Butler to his friend and fellow-pupil Mr. Seeker, who, in order to conceal the affair, undertook to convey the letters to the | post-office at Gloucester, and to bring back Dr. Clarke’s answers. When Mr. Butler’s name was discovered to the doctor, the candour, modesty, and good sense with which he had written, immediately procured him his friendship. Our young student was not, however, during his continuance at Tewkesbury, solely employed in metaphysical speculations and inquiries. Another subject of his serious consideration was, the propriety of his becoming a dissenting minister. Accordingly, he entered into an examination of the principles of non-conformity; the result of which was, such a dissatisfaction with them, as determined him to conform to the established church. This intention was at first very disagreeable to his father, who endeavoured to divert him from his purpose; and with that view called in the assistance of some eminent presbyterian divines; but finding his son’s resolution to be fixed, heat length suffered him to be removed to Oxford, where he was admitted a commoner of Oriel college, on the 17th of March, 1714. At what time he took orders is uncertain, but it must have been soon after his admission at Oxford, if it be true, as is asserted, that he sometimes assisted Mr. Edward Talbot in the divine service, at his living of Hendred near Wantage. With this gentleman, who was the. second son of Dr. William Talbot, successively bishop of Oxford, Salisbury, and Durham, Mr. Butler formed an intimate friendship at Oriel college, which laid the foundation of all his subsequent preferments, and procured for him a very honourable situation when he was only twentysix years of age. In 1718, at the recommendation of Mr. Talbot and Dr. Clarke, he was appointed by sir Joseph Jekyll to be preacher at the Rolls. This was three years before he had taken any degree at the university, where he did not go out bachelor of law till the 10th of June, 1721, which, however, was as soon as that degree could statutably be conferred upon him. Mr. Butler continued at the Rolls till 1726, in the beginning of which year he published, in one volume 8vo, “Fifteen Sermons preached at that Chapel.” In the mean time, by the patronage of Dr. Talbot, bishop of Durham, to whose notice he had been recommended (together with Mr. Benson and Mr. Seeker) by Mr. Edward Talbot on his death-bed, our author had been presented first to the rectory of Haughton, near Darlington, in 1722, and afterwards to that of Stanhope in the same diocese, in 1725, At Haughton there | was a necessity for rebuilding a great part of the parsonagehouse, and Mr. Butler had neither money nor talents for that work. Mr. Seeker, therefore, who had always the interest of his friends at heart, and had acquired a very considerable influence with bishop Talbot, persuaded that prelate to give Mr. Butler, in exchange for Haughton, the rectory of Stanhope, which was not only free from any such incumbrance, but was likewise of much superior value, being indeed one of the richest parsonages in England. Whilst our author continued preacher at the Rolls chapel, he divided his time between his duty in town and country; but when he quitted the Rolls, he resided, during seven years, wholly at Stanhope, in the conscientious discharge of every obligation appertaining to a good parish priest. This retirement, however^ was too solitary for his disposition, which had in it a natural cast of gloominess: and though his recluse hours were by no means lost either to private improvement or public utility, yet he felt at times very painfully the want of that select society of friends to which he had been accustomed, and which could inspire him with the greatest chearfulness. Mr. Seeker, therefore, who knew this, was extremely anxious to draw him out into a more active and conspicuous scene, and omitted no opportunity of expressing this desire to such as he thought capable of promoting it. Having himself been, appointed king’s chaplain in 1732, he took occasion, in a conversation which he had the honour of holding with queen Caroline, to mention to her his friend Mr. Butler. The queen said she thought he had been dead. Mr. Seeker assured her he was not. Yet her majesty afterwards asked archbishop Blackburne if he was not dead? His answer was, “No, madam, but he is buried.” Mr. Seeker, continuing his purpose of endeavouring to bring his friend out of his retirement, found means, upon Mr. Charles Talbot’ s being made lord chancellor, to have Mr. Butler recommended to him for his chaplain. His lordship accepted and sent for him; and this promotion calling him to town, he took Oxford in his way, and was admitted there to the degree of doctor of law, on the 8th of December, 1733. The lord chancellor, who gave him also a prebend in the church of Rochester, had consented that he should reside at his parish of Stanhope one half of the year.

Dr. Butler being thus brought back into the world, his | merit and talents soon introduced him to particular notice, and paved the way for his rising to those high dignities which he afterwards enjoyed. In 1736, he was appointed clerk of the closet to queen Caroline; and, in the same year, he presented to her majesty a copy of his celebrated treatise, entitled “The Analogy of Religion, natural and revealed, to the constitution and course of Nature.” His attendance upon his royal mistress, by her especial command, was from seven to nine in the evening every day; and though this was interrupted by her death in 1737, yet he had been so effectually recommended by her, as well as by the late lord chancellor Talbot, to his majesty’s favour, that, in the next year, he was raised to the highest order of the church, by a nomination to the bishopric of Bristol; to which see he was consecrated on the 3d of December, 1738. King George II. not being satisfied with this proof of his regard to Dr. Butler, promoted him, in 1740, to the deanry of St. Paul’s London; into which he was installed on the 24th of May in that year, and finding the demands of this dignity to be incompatible with his parish duty at Stanhope, he immediately resigned that rich benefice. Besides our prelate’s unremitted attention to his peculiar obligations, he was called on to preach several discourses on public occasions, which were afterwards separately printed, and have since been annexed to the later editions of the Sermons at the Rolls chapel. In 1746, upon the death of Dr. Egerton, bishop of Hereford, Dr. But> ler was made clerk of the closet to the king; and in 1750, he received another distinguished mark of his majesty’s favour, by being translated to the see of Durham on the 16th of October in that year, upon the decease of Dr. Edward Chandler. Our prelate, being thus appointed to preside over a diocese with which he had long been connected, delivered his first, and indeed his last charge to his clergy, at his primary visitation in 1751. The principal subject of it was, “External Religion.” The bishop having observed, with deep concern, the great and growing neglect of serious piety in the kingdom, insisted strongly on the usefulness of outward forms and institutions, in fixing and preserving a sense of devotion and duty in the minds of men. In doing this, he was thought by several persons to speak too favourably of pagan and popish ceremonies, and to countenance, in a certain degree, the cause of superstition. ‘Under that apprehension, an able and spirited | writer, who was understood to be a clergyman of the church of England, published in 1752, a pamphlet, entitled “A serious inquiry into the use and importance of External Religion: occasioned by some passages in the right reverend the lord bishop of Durham’s Charge to the Clergy of that diocese; humbly addressed to his lordship.” Many persons, however, and, we believe, the greater part of the clergy of the diocese, did not think our prelate’s charge so exceptionable as it appeared to this author. The charge, which was first printed at Durham, was afterwards annexed to Dr. Butler’s other works, by Dr. Halifax. By his promotion to the see of Durham, our worthy bishop was furnished with ample means of exerting the virtue of charity, the exercise of which was his highest delight. But this gratification he did not long enjoy. He had been but a short time seated in his new bishopric, when his health began visibly to decline; and having been complimented, during his indisposition, upon account of his great resignation to the divine will, he is said to have expressed some regret, that he should be taken from the present world so soon after he had been rendered capable of becoming much more useful in it. In his last illness, he was carried to Bristol, to try the waters of that place; but, these proving ineffectual, he removed to Bath, where, being past recovery, he died on the 16th of June, 1752. His corpse was conveyed to Bristol, and interred in the cathedral there, where a monument, with an inscription, is erected to his memory. On the greatness of bishop Butler’s intellectual character we need not enlarge; for his profound knowledge, and the prodigious strength of his mind, are amply displayed in his incomparable writings. His piety was of the most serious and fervent, and perhaps somewhat of the ascetic kind. His benevolence was warm, generous, and diffusive. Whilst he was bishop of Bristol, he expended, in repairing and improving the episcopal palace, four thousand pounds, which is said to have been more than the whole revenues of the bishopric amounted to, during his continuance in that see. Indeed he used to say that the deanery of St. Paul’s paid for it. Besides his private benefactions, he was a contributor to the’ Infirmary at Bristol, and a subscriber to three of the Hospitals at London. He was, likewise, a principal promoter, though not the first founder, of the Infirmary at Newcastle, in Northumberland. lu supporting the hospitality and | dignity of the rich and powerful diocese of Durham, he was desirous of imitating the spirit of his patron, bishop Talbot. In this spirit, he set apart three clays every week for the reception and entertainment of the principal gentry of the country. Nor were even the clergy who had the poorest benefices neglected by him. He not only occasionally invited them to dine with him, but condescended to visit them at their respective parishes. By his will, he left five hundred pounds to the society for propagating the gospel in foreign parts, and some legacies to his friends and domestics. His executor was his chaplain, the rev. Dr. Nathaniel Forster, a divine of distinguished literature, who was especially charged to destroy all his manuscript sermons, letters, and papers. Bishop Butler was never married. The bishop’s disposition, which had in it a natural ca’st of gloominess, was supposed to give a tincture to his devotion. As a proof of this, and that he had even acquired somewhat of a superstitious turn of mind, it was alleged, that he had put a. cross in his chapel at Bristol. The cross was a plain piece of marble inlaid. This circumstance, together with the offence which some persons had taken at his charge delivered at Durham, might possibly give rise to a calumny, that, almost fifteen years after his death, was advanced concerning him, in an obscure and anonymous pamphlet, entitled “The Root of Protestant Errors examined.” It was there said, that our prelate died in the communion of the church of Rome. Of this absurd and groundless charge, we shall take no other notice, than to transcribe what the worthy and learned Dr. Porteus has written concerning it, in his Life of Archbishop Seeker. “This strange slander, founded on the weakest pretences and most trivial circumstances that can be imagined, no one was better qualified to confute than the archbishop; as well from his long and intimate knowledge of bishop Butler, as from the information given him at the time by those who attended his lordship in his last illness, and were with him when he died. Accordingly, by an article in a newspaper, signed Misopseudes, his grace challenged the author of that pamphlet to produce his authority for what he had advanced; and in a second article defended the bishop against him; and in a third (all with the same signature) confuted another writer, who, under the name of ‘A real Protestant,’ still maintained that ridiculous calumy. His antagonists were effectually subdued, and | his superiority to them was publicly acknowledged by a sensible and candid man, who signed himself, and who really was ‘A dissenting Minister.’ Surely, it is a very unwise piece of policy, in those who profess themselves enemies to popery, to take so much pains to bring the most respectable names within its pale; and to give it the merit of having gained over those who were the brightest ornaments and firmest supports of the protestant cause.”

His deep learning and comprehensive mind appear sufficiently in his writings, particularly in his work entitled “The Analogy of Religion,” in praise of which too much cannot be said. The purity of the intention, the force of reasoning, and the copiousness of illustration, render it one of the greatest performances that the combination of virtue with intelligence ever gave rise to. It is, however, occasionally obscure from the nature of the subject, as well as from the extreme pains its ingenious author took to prevent its being so; the endeavouring (as he used to tell a friend of his) to answer, as he went along, every possible objection that might occur to any one against any position of his in this book 5 so that, perhaps, “inopem ilium copia fecit.” The world have great obligations to the bishop of St. Asaph (Dr. Halifax) for an analysis of it, which must be of great use to young persons, and to men not much inured to abstruse reasoning. It has, appended to it, a very elegantly written account of his life, in which he very ably defends him against the charge of popery above mentioned. In the volumes of sermons published by Butler himself, there are three that have a particular relation to his larger work. These are analysed by Dr. Halifax in his account of his life and writings, 1786. ¹