About the year 1687, or earlier, Dr. Stanley was chosen to be Chaplain to the Princess of Orange, at the Hague, upon the dismission of Dr. Covel; a clergyman of unexceptionable character being by express orders sent for from Holland, to attend upon her Highness, the Bishop of London had it in charge to recommend two persons to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who was to approve finally of one of them. The two thus recommended were Dr. Burnet, Master of the Charterhouse, and our Author; the latter of whom was appointed, and (as it is conjectured) was at the same time favoured by his Grace with his Faculty for a Doctor of Divinity's degree. He was much esteemed by the Princess, who, on her advancement to the throne, promoted him to be Clerk of the Closet, bestowed several other favours upon him, and made him one or two offers of episcopal dignity, which, however, he declined.

On the death of the learned Dr. Spencer he was elected (without his knowledge) to the Mastership of Corpus Christi College; which at first he refused; but on being strongly solicited by the unanimous voice of the College, for the sake of preventing dissentions in the society, he consented to accept it. On his being elected Vice-Chancellor, the University passed an extraordinary Grace to admit him to the Degree

of

of D.D. with all its academical privileges, to which the archiepiscopal Faculty could not entitle him.

In the year 1698, he resigned the Mastership of the College, finding it to be incompatible with his other duties. But during his continuance there, he employed himself in making a catalogue of the valuable Manuscript Library bequeathed to the College by Archbishop Parker, which he afterwards printed at his own expence, in folio, Lond. 1672, a very elaborate and important work. He also presented the College with a set of silver gilt Communion Plate, which had belonged to queen Mary's private chapel, when she was princess of Orange, and which she had given to Dr. S. on her coming to the Crown of England, as a memorial of her favour and esteem.

Many extensive and important benefactions are recorded of Dr. Stanley, and many excellent designs in which he was actively concerned. In the year 1692, he exerted himself to forward the printing of an Edition of the Councils with Protestant annotations, not only subscribing to the work, but obtaining, by his interest at court, a grant to import what paper should be wanting for it, Custom-free. The care and management of the work were committed to Dr. Allix; but it was afterwards laid aside. When Dean of St.

Asaph,

Asaph, Dr. S. procured, at his sole expence, an act of Parliament to annex certain prebends and sinecures to the bishopricks of Bangor, Llandaff, St. David's, and St. Asaph, in order to relieve the widows and orphans of the Welsh Clergy, from paying mortuaries to the bishops on the death of every incumbent within their respective dioceses and jurisdictions. He also rebuilt the larger part of his deanery house; settled a leasehold estate on a charity school in St. Asaph, and joined in augmenting the perpetual curacy of St. George in its neighbourhood. His gifts towards the augmentation of small livings, in aid of Queen Anne's Bounty, were extended to different parts of the kingdom, as may be seen in Ecton's List. Several other instances of his truly liberal and well-directed munificence might be mentioned; nor ought it to be omitted, that he was a zealous promoter of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, and first moved Archbishop Tenison and Bishop Compton to obtain for it the Royal Charter. See Humphrey's Historical Account of the Society, p. 12.

The foregoing account of Dean Stanley's life is little more than an abridged statement of what is related of him in Mr. Masters's History of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. It exhi bits to us, however, some striking features of a

man

man who may justly be said to have been an ornament to his profession; being constantly occupied in works of Piety, Charity, and Learning, peculiarly befitting his dignified station in the Church, and exemplifying in his conduct, no less than inculcating in his writings, the genuine principles of the Christian character, so well set forth in "Faith and Practice of a Church of England-Man.” From the same authority the following account of his literary labours is also extracted.

Dr. Stanley published but few things, He began early to take a share with the London Clergy in the Popish Controversy, but was probably prevented from going on with them, by his appointment in Holland. He was concerned also, before he went abroad, with several learned divines, in a scheme for printing an English Bible, with a plain and practical Commentary: The Minor Prophets were to have been assigned to him. But the plan was afterwards laid aside. Its failure is much to be regretted; a work of such a kind, executed on the pure and genuine principles of the Church of England, being still a most important desideratum.

Dr. Stanley published with his name, a Sermon on Coloss. ii. 5. preached Jan. 10, -1691-2, in Lambeth Chapel, on the Consecration of Dr. Tenison,

Tenison, Bp. of Lincoln, in which the necessity. of maintaining the true Faith, against all here tical opinions, and the Order of the Church, against Schismatics and Separatists, is insisted upon in a plain and forcible manner, and with sound discretion. He published also a Sermon on Matth. ix. 37, 38, preached Feb. 20, 1707-8, before the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel and is said to have printed another Sermon, to recommend a public Collection for the Redemption of Captives.

The Editors of the Bodleian Catalogue, have ascribed to him, says Mr. Masters, the Romish Horseleech, concerning the intolerable Charge of Popery to this Nation, which came out so early as 1674. But Mr. M. suspects this to be a mistake; and, indeed, the work is now universally given to Mr. Stavely.

Of two other anonymous publications he is known certainly to have been the Author: the one, concerning the Devotions of the Church of Rome, wherein they are compared with those of the Church of England, 4to. Lond. 1685; the other, intitled the Faith and Practice of a Church of England-Man,* a work so well received on its

* Mr. Masters assigns to this piece the date of 1706, evidently taking it from one of the latest Editions, for the fourth Edition, in Sion College, is dated 1692; and the third, from which the present is reprinted, bears the date of 1688.

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