Note 125 — Chapter VIII

Bishop Newton, after describing him as “the not unworthy successor of Secker,” says, “When he was a young man at the University he had the misfortune of a paralytic stroke on his right side, from which he has never recovered the full use of his right hand, and is obliged to write with his left; but, this notwithstanding, he has hitherto enjoyed uncommon good health, and never fails in his attendance on the multifarious business of his station. He has greatly improved Lambeth House, he keeps a hospitable and elegant table, has not a grain of pride in his composition, is easy of access, receives every one with affability and good nature, is courteous, obliging, condescending, and as a proof of it he has not often been made the subject of censure, even in this censorious age.”—(Memoirs, p. 121.)—This description might lead one to fear that the good Bishop’s standard of Metropolitan merit was not very elevated. Archbishop Cornwallis deserved still higher commendation. He seems to have had a true sense of his religious duties. When a party in the East India Company raised an outcry against the missionary Schwarts, then a friendless and obscure foreigner, he came forward with his public testimony on his behalf. The Archbishop died in 1783, aged 70.—E.