In July 1732, he was appointed chaplain to the king; for which favour he was indebted to Dr. Sherlock, who having heard him preach at Bath, had conceived the highest opinion of his abilities, and thought them well worthy of being brought forward into public notice. From that time an intimacy commenced between them, and he received from that great prelate many folid proofs of efteem and friendship. His month of waiting at St. James's happened to be Auguft, and on Sunday the 27th of that month he preached before the queen, the king being then abroad. A few days after, her majefty fent for him into her clofet, and held a long and gracious converfation with him; in the courfe of which he took an opportunity of mentioning to her his friend. Mr. Butler. He alfo, not long after this, on Mr. Talbot's being made Lord Chancellor, found means to have Mr. Butler effectually recommended to him for his chaplain. The queen alfo appointed him clerk of her clofet; from whence he rofe, as his talents became more known, to thofe high dignities which he afterward attained. Mr. Secker now began to have a public character, and flood high in the estimation of thofe who were allowed to be the best judges of merit; he had already given proofs of abilities that plainly indicated the eminence to which he must one day rife, as a preacher and a divine; and it was not long before an opportunity offered of placing him in an advantageous point of view. Dr. Tyrrwhit, who fucceeded Dr. Clarke as rector of St. James's in 1729, found that preaching in fo large a church endangered his health. Bishop Gibfon, therefore, his father-in law, propofed to the crown that he fhould be made refidentiary of St. Paul's, and that Mr. Secker fhould fucceed him in the rectory. This arrangement was fo acceptable to thofe in power, that it took place without any difficulty. Mr. Secker was inftituted rector the 18th of May, 1733; and in the beginning of July went to Oxford to take his degree of doctor of laws, not being of fufficient ftanding for that of divinity. On this occafion it was that he preached his celebrated At-Sermon, on the advantages and duties of academical education, which was univerfally allowed to be a mafter-piece of found reafoning and juft compofition it was printed at the defire of the heads of houses, and quickly paffed through feveral editions. It is now to be found in the 2d collection of Occafional Sermons published by himself in 1766. It was thought that the reputation he acquired by this fermon contributed not a little toward that promotion which very foon followed its publication. For in December 1734, he received a very unexpected notice from bifhop Gibfon, that the king had fixed on him to be bishop of Briftol. Dr. Benfon was about the the fame time appointed to the fee of Gloucester, as was Dr., Fleming to that of Carlisle; and the three new Bishops were all confecrated together in Lambeth Chapel, Jan. 19, 1734-5. the Confecration-Sermon being preached by Dr. Thomas, now bishop of Winchefter. Having thus accompanied Dr. Secker to his attainment of the, epifcopal dignity, we fhall here close this first grand period of his life; referving our abridgment of the remainder of this very ample piece of biography for our next publication. ART. X. The Hiftory of Duelling; containing the Origin, Progrefs, Revolutions, and prefent State of Duelling in France and England, including many curious hiftorical Anecdotes. 3 s. bound. Dilly.' 1770. THE 12mo. HE Author has divided his work into two parts, and each part into feveral fections. The firft part is a translation from the French of M. Couftard de Maffi, one of the French king's mufqueteers, and confifts chiefly of extracts from history, fome of which are indeed curious, but most of them are ill applied. At the top of fome of the fections is a principle of the laws of fingle combat or duelling, in civil or criminal cafes, as it was formerly established in France; and the reft of the fection contains the recital of fome hiftorical fact as a proof and illu ftration of the principle. The fecond fection is as follows: Gontran XI. king of Burgundy, as he was hunting in the foreft on the mountains of Vofges, difcovering the tracks and remains of a buffalo that had been killed, ordered the ranger of the forest to undergo the question, to force his discovery of the culprit. He accufed Chandun, the king's chamberlain, who denying the charge, the trial by combat was ordered. Chandun being fick and unable to encounter his accufer himself, fubftituted a champion, one of his nephews, who was accepted. They fought before the king. Chandun's nephew mortally wounded his adverfary with a thruft of his lance, and felled him to the ground; but as he was going to cut the victim's throat with a dagger which he drew from his girdle, he gave himself a defperate wound, and dropt inftantly dead on his antagonist's body, who expired in a few moments after him. Chandun fuffered death in confequence.' The principle to be proved and illuftrated in this fection is, that the party whofe champion was conquered was put to death.' But the fact proves juft the contrary; for the ranger who fought in perfon was conquered, and Chandun, whofe Hh 2 champion champion conquered him, was put to death, because, after the conqueft, the unhappy victor received, by accident, a mortal wound. The following canons of duelling are curious: The challenger was obliged to appear in the lifts before mid-day, and the challenged before three in the afternoon. He who did not prefent himself according to the time appointed, incurred the charge of conviction, unless the judges prefent decreed otherwise. • The herald at arms proceeded on horfeback to the door of the lifts, fummoned the challenger to appear before him, and then ordered the challenged to prefent himself, when he thus addreffed them: "Now liften, Gentlemen, and all here prefent attend, to what our king commands fhould be ftrictly obferved on thefe folemn occafions. "I. It is forbidden all perfons whatfoever, excepting those who are appointed guards of the lifts, on the penalty of forfeit ing life and fortune, to be armed. II. It is forbidden to appear on horseback; to gentlemen, on the penalty of lofing the horfe; to plebeians, under that of lofing an ear. III. It is forbidden to all perfons whatsoever, excepting thofe efpecially appointed, to obtrude themselves into the lifts, on the penalty of lofing life and fortune. "IV. It is forbidden to fit on any bench, form, or even on the ground, on the penalty of lofing a hand. V. It is forbidden to cough, fpit, fpeak, or make any fign whatfoever, on pain of death." After the recital of these prohibitions, the combatants were to fwear that they had no charms or witchcraft about them. On a pillar erected before the fcaffold where the judges fat, ftood a crofs, on which, and the form of prayer that began with Te Igitur, the combatants folemnly fwore they had faid nothing but the truth. According to the established canon of duelling, the lifts were forty feet wide, and four and twenty long. The lift marfhal, who was charged with the conduct of all matters relating thereto, gave the fignal for the combatants to charge by throwing a glove. If, during the conteft, either of them went out of the lifts, his defeat was declared. The heralds at arms houghed or hamftrung the unfortu nate vanquifhed, whether alive or dead, ftript them of their armour, left them naked upon the ground, fcattered their weapons about the lifts, and left their bodies ftretched upon the ground until the fovereign's orders were given in what manner they fhould be difpofed of. All the poffeffions of the foiled hero fell by forfeiture to the king. The lift-marfhal's fhare of the vanquished party's fpoils extended no farther than to his arms, which he claimed by right.' It is impoffible to read fo horrid a memorial of the cruelty, abfurdity, and fuperftition of our ancestors, without a grateful fenfe of the benefits we have derived from learning. We are fometimes inclined to think that books have very little inAuence upon the morals of mankind, from the perpetual violation of all the precepts which they enforce; but though we cannot perceive the benefit as it gradually accrues, any more than the increase of a plant as it grows, yet by comparing the paft times with the prefent, we can as plainly perceive that benefit has accrued, as we can that a plant has grown. Among other ceremonies, mentioned in these canons of duelling, the combatants fwore they had no charm about them; upon which it may be remarked that the Garter, worn by our Knights of that Order, which fome have ignorantly imagined to have been given and infcribed as an enfign, in confequence of a garter dropped by the countess of Salisbury, and taken up by the founder Edward III. in a dance, was intended as a counter-charm, a talifmanic ligature, and bound on the legs of the knight as a token of the protection of God, the Virgin, and St. George: the infcription manifeftly relates to the hurtful contrivances of an enemy, which it imprecates back on himfelf. Honi foit qui mal y penfe; may evil be to him that defigns evil to the wearer; or, in other words, "let his travel come upon his own head, and his wickedness fall upon his own pate." When duelling was established by law, perfons of no higher degree than a burgefs were obliged to fight on foot and with fticks. In the time of Philip duke of Burgundy one Mahuot, a burgefs of Valenciennes, had killed the relation of another burgefs whofe name was Plouvier : Plouvier accufed him of the murder, and a trial by combat was ordered in this manner. A circular piece of ground was inclofed, with only one way to enter it. At this entrance two chairs, covered with black, were placed oppofite to each other, in which the challenger and the challenged were feated to wait for the fignal of combat. The mafs book was brought to them, and they feverally fwore that what they had alleged was true. Their drefs confifted only of boiled leather, very tightly fewed all over their bodies: they were bare-footed, and had their heads fhaved; the nails of their hands and feet were clofely pared, that they might not wound each other unfairly Hh 3 by by grappling: they had fhields, the points of which they carried upwards, the nobility only being permitted to carry them downward. Each combatant alfo was furnished with a large ftick or quarter-ftaff of equal dimenfions: two bafons of grease were brought them to anoint their bodies, and two pots of afhes to take the greafe from their hands. To each of them was alfo given a piece of fugar, under the notion that it would keep them in wind during the conflict. They fought in the prefence of the duke; and, at the onset, exchanged feveral violent blows with the quarter-ftaff. Mahuot, being lefs robust than Plouvier, took up fome fand and threw it into his eyes, at the fame time wounding him in the forehead; but Plouvier at length getting hold of Mahuot threw him upon the ground, jumped upon his body, thruft out both his eyes with a bodkin, and then dispatched him with a violent blow of his own quarter-ftaff upon his skull. It will certainly be thought ftrange that either of these combatants, after care had been taken even to pare their nails, fhould have been trufted with a bodkin: fuch, however, is the account here given, but whence it is extracted does not appear. Bodkin was at that time a name for a small poignard or dagger, and in this fenfe is probably used by Shakespeare in the well known foliloquy of Hamlet. The paffion for duelling was carried fo high in the reign of Louis XIII. that when acquaintances met, the ufual enquiry was not as it is at prefent, what news do you hear? but, who fought yesterday? Perhaps it was about this time that our petty gentlemen, and men of honour were called Blades. The French ufed the word lame and bonne épée in the fame fenfe. The first part of this work concludes with an apology for duelling, as it is at prefent practifed, which, according to the Author, is the principal prefervation of French courage and French politenefs. The fecond part contains Mandeville's apology for duelling, with which moft of our Readers are probably well acquainted. Mandeville, with a fpirit which his principles may be fuppofed naturally to produce, thinks it very well worth while to cut throats for the fake of good-breeding; and fays it is ftrange that the nation fhould grudge to fee half a dozen men facrificed in a twelvemonth, to fecure politeness of manners and the pleasure of conversation. Voltaire's fentiments of this practice are inferted next, which are diametrically oppofite to thofe of Mandeville. Some account is given of the prefent method of duelling in France, which is well known to be by rencountre; the parties who have fecretly agreed to fight give no challenge, nor take any fecond, but meeting in a place agreed upon, juftle each other and imme 7 diately |