Littleton, Edward

, LL. D. an English divine and poet, was educated upon the royal foundation at Etonschool, where, under the care of that learned and excellent master. Dr. Snape, his school-exercises were much admired, and when his turn came, he was elected to King’s college, Cambridge, in 1716, with equal applause. Here he took his degrees of A. B. 1720, A.M. 1724, and LL.D. 1728. Having some talent for poetry, he had not been long at the university, before he diverted a school-fellow, whom he had left at Eton, with a humourous poem on the subject of his various studies, and the progress he had made in academical learning, which was followed by his more celebrated one “on a spider.” Dr. Morell, the editor of his “Discourses,” and his biographer, procured a genuine copy of them, as transcribed by a gentleman then at Eton school from the author’s own writing, with such remains as could be found of a Pastoral Elegy, written about the same time by Mr. Littleton, on the death of R. Banks, scholar of the same college. The two former are now correctly printed in the edition of Dodsley’s Poems of 1782, edited by Isaac Reed. Dr. Morell found also a poetical | epistle sent from school to Penyston Powney, esq.; but as this was scarcely intelligible to any but those who were then at Eton, he has not printed it. In 1720 Mr. Littleton was recalled to Eton as an assistant in the school; in which office he was honoured and beloved by his pupils, and so esteemed by the provost and fellows, that on the death of the rev. Mr. Malcher, in 1727, they elected him a fellow, and presented him to the living of Mapledurham, in Oxfordshire. He then married a very amiable woman, Frances, one of the daughters of Barnham Goode, who was under-master of Eton school. In June 1730, he was appointed chaplain in ordinary to their majesties. Though an admired preacher and an excellent scholar, he seems to have been little ambitious of appearing in print. He died of a fever in 1734, and was buried in his own parish church of Mapledurham, leaving behind him a widow and three daughters; for whose benefit, under the favour and encouragement of queen Caroline, his “Discourses” were first printed by Dr. Morell, with an account of the author, from which the above particulars are taken. Dr. Burton, Mr. Littleton’s successor in the living of Mapledurham, afterwards married his widow, as we have noticed in his Jife. 1 -.;.¹