He Was Not Fond of Classical Studies
HE WAS NOT SKILLED IN PROSODY;
And used to declare he could read no Latin author with pleasure but Virgil: yet when the members’ prize was awarded to him for a Latin prose essay, in 1765, which he had illustrated with English notes, he was, strange enough, though his disregard of the classics was well known, suspected of being the author of the Latin only. The reverse was probably nearer the truth. It is notorious that And when, in 1795, he proceeded to D.D., after being made Sub-Dean of Lincoln, he, in the delivery of his Clerum, pronounced profŭgus profūgus, which gave some Cambridge wag occasion to fire at him the following epigram:—
“Italiam fato profugus, Lavinaque venit
Litora; * * * * *
Errat Virgilius, forte profugus erat.”
A SPICE OF CUTTING HUMOUR
He had In his composition, and some time after the Bishop of Durham so honourably and unsolicited presented him to the valuable living of Bishop Wearmouth, dining with his lordship in company with an aged divine, the latter observed in conversation, “that although he had been married about forty years, he had never had the slightest difference with his wife.” The prelate was pleased at so rare an instance of connubial felicity, and was about to compliment his guest thereon, when Paley, with an arch “Quid?” observed, “Don’t you think it must have been very flat, my Lord?”
A RULE OF HIS
HE WAS UNLIKE DR. PARR
A writer, recording his on dits, in the New Monthly Magazine, says, in Paley’s own words, he made it a rule never to buy a book that he wanted to read but once. In more than one respect, The latter had a great admiration for the canonical dress of his order, and freely censured the practice of clergymen not generally appearing in it. When on a visit to his friend, the celebrated Mr. Roscoe, at that gentleman’s residence near Liverpool, Parr used to ride through the village in full costume, including his famous wig, to the no small amusement of the rustics, and chagrin of his companion, the present amiable and learned Thomas Roscoe, originator and editor of “The Landscape Annual,” &c. Paley wore a white wig, and a coat cut in the close court style: but could never be brought to patronise, at least in the country, that becoming part of the dress of a dignitary of the church, a cassock, which he used to call a black apron, such as the master tailors wear in Durham.
HE WAS NEVER A GOOD HORSEMAN
“When I followed my father,” he says, “on a pony of my own, on my first journey to Cambridge, I fell off seven times. My father, on hearing a thump, would turn his head half aside, and say, ‘Take care of thy money, lad!’” This defect he never overcame: for when advanced in years, he acknowledged he was still so bad a horseman, “that if any man on horseback were to come near me when I am riding,” he would say, “I should certainly have a fall; company would take off my attention, and I have need of all I can command to manage my horse, the quietest creature that ever lived; one that, at Carlisle, used to be covered with children from the ears to the tail.”