Page:Dictionary of National Biography. Sup. Vol III (1901).djvu/290

. Plunket received his early education first at a day school in Dublin, afterwards at Seaforth rectory, near Liverpool, under the Rev. William Rawson, of whom W. E. Gladstone had earlier been a pupil. While there he narrowly escaped drowning. Ultimately, in 1842, he was sent to Cheltenham College, then recently opened under Dr. Dobson. Here his career was brilliant, and he rose to be head of the school. But early in his eighteenth year his health broke down from overwork, and when some years later he entered at Trinity College, Dublin, he was not able to read for honours; he graduated B.A. in 1853. This breakdown led Plunket to abandon an ambition for a political career, and to turn his thoughts to the church. It was not, however, until 1857, when in his thirtieth year, that his recovery was complete enough to enable him to seek ordination. He became chaplain and private secretary to his uncle Thomas, second Lord Plunket, then bishop of Tuam, and in the following year was appointed rector of the united parishes of Kilmoylan and Cummer in that diocese.

The early years of Plunket's ministerial life brought him into close contact with the evangelising movement in Connemara and Mayo, and fostered that sympathy with struggling protestant communities which was to be so strongly evinced during his episcopal career in his relation to the reformers in Spain, Portugal, and Italy. He became an active member of the Irish Church Missions Society, travelling through every district of West Connaught in aid of its work, and frequently visiting England to solicit financial support for the movement.

On 11 June 1863 Plunket was married to Anne, daughter of [q. v.], a lady whose philanthropic labours have left a permanent memorial in the valuable training institution known as the St. Patrick's Nursing Home in Dublin. The alliance was one in every way fortunate for Plunket, and led among other things to his nomination in 1864 to the treasurership of St. Patrick's Cathedral, then in course of restoration through the munificence of his father-in-law. Five years later he was appointed precentor, and his direct connection with the national cathedral lasted down to his election to the bishopric of Meath in 1876.

On the death in 1866 of his uncle, the second Lord Plunket, and the succession of his father to the title, Plunket became the direct heir to the peerage, and thenceforward his life was spent for the most part in or near Dublin, within a few miles of which the family seat is situate. His energy, earnestness, and administrative ability combined with his high social position to place him in the position of a leader among the evangelical party in the Irish church. Plunket's removal to Dublin was synchronous with the active revival of the long slumbering agitation against the Irish church establishment, and he threw himself with all his vigour into the task of resisting the attack. But he was among the first to recognise that the result of the general election of 1868 sealed the fate of the establishment, and at once turned his attention to the business of obtaining the best possible terms for the church and its clergy. In the subsequent task of reconstruction Plunket took a foremost part, and was looked on as the leader of those who, in the debates in the general synod of the church of Ireland upon the constitution and liturgy of the disestablished church, sought to procure a radical revision of the prayer-book in an evangelical direction. He had always been animated by a strong belief in the possibility of reunion between the Anglican churches and the other protestant communities; and, apart from his evangelical opinions, his action was prompted by the hope of smoothing the path to reunion. But, though thoroughly loyal to his own church, and enjoying the universal respect that his transparent sincerity compelled, he failed to persuade the synod to adopt his policy, save in relation to some important liturgical alterations, and more particularly to the ornaments rubric.

In 1871, on the death of his father, Plunket succeeded to the peerage. Five years later, on the death of Dr. Butcher, he was elected to the bishopric of Meath, a diocese which ranks in the Irish church next after the archbishopric of Dublin, and was consecrated in the cathedral at Armagh on 10 Dec. 1876. His tenure of this see lasted for exactly eight years, and during that period Plunket spent much time in Dublin, and devoted great attention to the question of religious education in the Irish national schools. The institution for providing trained teachers in connection with the church of Ireland, long known as the Kildare Place Schools, had fallen to a low standard of efficiency, and threatened to collapse for lack of funds. Mainly through the instrumentality of Plunket this institution was restored to complete efficiency, affiliated to the national board of education, placed, in common with analogous Roman catholic seminaries, on an equality with the chief government training colleges, and provided