Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 04.djvu/272

 , this was perhaps one of the cheapest books ever published in England. The work was sent to the press in 1704, and was delivered to the subscribers in 1771. It was printed at Cambridge in a quarto volume by Joseph Bentham, a brother of the historian, and alderman of Cambridge, who for many years was printer to the university. It was the last work that Joseph jirinted, a fact attested by these words on the last page of the book, 'Finis hic officii atque labris.' Bentham survived both this brother and his elder brother, Mr. Edward Bentham, regius professor of divinity at Oxford. In the introduction to the history an interesting and valuable account is given of Saxon, Norman, and Gothic architecture (see Quarterly Review, v. 2, 1809, pp. 126-145), which, by some strange mistake, was attributed by one S. E. to the pen of the poet Gray (see Gent. Mag. May 1783, p. 370). A letter vindicating Bentham's own claim to the essay appeared in the same journal, signed by the venerable author, in the following April, and produced a handsome apology from S. E., which was published in the July number of 1784 (p. 505). Notwithstanding this rectification the writer of the article 'Gothic Architecture' in Rees's 'New Cyclopedia' (1811) repeats the assertion that 'the poet Gray drew up the architectural part of the work.'

In 1767 Bentham was presented by Bishop Mawson to the vicarage of Wymondham in Norfolk, and upon his resignation of that living in the following year to the rectory of Feltwell St. Nicholas in the same county. This preferment he held till 1774, when Bishop Keene presented him to the rectory of Northwold, which, after five years' tenure, he was induced to give up for a prebendal stall in Ely Cathedral. The same prebend had some fifty years before been held by Bishop Tanner, the noted writer on ecclesiastical antiquities. To this was added in 1783, on the presentation of the Rev. Edward Guellaume, the rectory of Bowbrick Hill, Buckinghamshire. During the later period of his life he collected, with great pains, materials for illustrating the 'Ancient Architecture of this Kingdom,' a work which he was unable to complete.

He gained the respect of those who knew him, not only by his talents and pursuits, but by his modest and unassuming manners. He died at his prebendal house, Ely, on 17 Nov. 1794, at the age of eighty-six. He was twice married, and his second wife, Miss Mary Dickens of Ely, bore him a son and a daughter. The former survived his father, and became vicar of West Bradenham in Norfolk. He also published at Norwich a second edition of the 'History of Ely Cathedral,' with a memoir of his father prefixed, 2 vols. 4to, 1812-17. A large quarto supplement to the first edition was published by W. Stevenson at Norwich in 1817, as well as a supplement to the second edition of the same size and date. Cole's notes on Bentham's important work will be found in Davis's 'Olio.'

 BENTHAM, JEREMY (1748–1882), writer on jurisprudence, was born in Red Lion Street, Houndsditch, on 15 Feb. 1747-8. His great grandfather was a prosperous pawnbroker in the city of London, and there his grandfather and father practised as attorneys. His mother, Alicia Grove, was the daughter of a shopkeeper at Andover. A grand uncle on the mother's side, named Woodward, was the publisher of Tindal's 'Christianity as old as the Creation.' Bentham's father had no large practice, but he made a considerable fortune by the purchase and sale of land. He was, according to one description of him, 'authoritative, restless, aspiring, and shabby' (Empson in Edinburgh Review). He believed that 'pushing was the one thing needful' in life, and he much regretted that his clever son would not act on this maxim. He was fond in a dilettante fashion of literature, and proud of owning Milton's house, chiefly, perhaps, because a friend happened to own Cowley's. Young Bentham was remarkably precocious, and his father delighted to show off his acquirements. In his fourth year he had begun to study Latin. 'I remember,' says Dr. Bowring, 'that he mentioned to me that he learned the Latin grammar and the Greek alphabet on his father's knee.' Even as a child he was fond of books, and at the age of five he was known as 'the philosopher.' There is a story that when in petticoats he was found seated at a reading-desk a lighted candle on each side, absorbed in the study of a folio copy of Rapin's 'History of England.' Much of his youth was spent with his two grandmothers at Browning Hill near Reading, and at a country house at Barking. To the end of his life he retained recollections of the pleasant days passed far away from the city. 'At Browning Hill everybody and everything had a charm; even the old rusty sword in the granary which we used to brandish against the rats was an historical and sacred sword, for one of my ancestors had used it at Oxford against the parliamentary forces.' At six or seven he began to learn French. Telemachus was an unending delight to him: in old age he had a vivid recollection of the feelings with which 