, D. D. and a chaplain in ordinary to George II. was educated at Trinity college,
, D. D. and a chaplain in ordinary
to George II. was educated at Trinity college, Oxford,
where he took his bachelor’s degree, but appears to have
removed to King’s college, Cambridge, where he took his
master’s degree, in 1713. In 1723 we find him again at
Trinity college, Oxford, where he took the degrees of
B. and D. D. July 6 of that year. He became early in
life chaplain to bishop Gibson, to whose patronage he was
indebted for the following preferments; viz. the united
rectories of St. Austin and St. Faith, in London, with that
of Acton, in Middlesex, a prebend in St. Paul’s, another
at Lincoln, and the archdeaconry of London, in which last
he succeeded Dr. Tyrwhitt in July 1742. His whole works
were collected by himself, in 1757, under the title of
“Discourses and Essays, in prose and verse, by Edward
Cobden, D. D. archdeacon of London, and lately chaplain
to his majesty king George II. above twenty-two years, in
which time most of these discourses were preached before
him. Published chiefly for the use of his parishioners,
”
one large 4to volume, divided in two parts. Of this volume 250 copies only were printed, 50 of which were appropriated to a charitable use.
In 1748 he preached a sermon before the king at St.
James’s, entitled “A Persuasive to Chastity,
” which was
not a virtue exemplified at that time in the highest place,
and he is said to have lost his situation of chaplain by it.
Among his works is his “Concio ad Clerum, xi cal. Mail,
1752,
” and three sermons preached after the noted one
on “Chastity.
” The last time he preached hefore the
king was Dec. 8, 1751. He resigned his warrant for chaplain Nov. 23, 1752, after having delivered into his majesty’s hands his reasons in writing for so doing. His
income, he says, was hut moderate (all his preferments together not exceeding S50l. per annum clear, which, he added, was as much as he desired, and more than he deserved. This income, frugality and moderation converted into plenty, and contentment into happiness);
but about this time he met with losses amounting to above
2000l. which reduced his substance very low. In 1762,
Dr. Cobden lost his wife; whom he survived little more
than two years, dying April 22, 1764, aged more than
eighty. He appears to have been a good and conscientious man, but with a mixture of oddity in his character
as well as style, and not so wholly free from ambition as
"he would make us believe. His poetical talents, which
he was fond of gxercising, are not of the first rate.