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 two theses directed against Roman catholic tenets was long remembered. He was so much alarmed by the attempts of James II to introduce catholicism as to fall into a dangerous fever. His protestantism and reputation for learning induced William III to confer upon him the bishopric of Peterborough. Going to a coffee-house on a fast day, according to his custom, he was astonished to read the first news of his preferment in a newspaper. He was consecrated on 5 July 1691, his predecessor, Thomas White, having been deprived for not taking the oaths. After his first book Cumberland devoted himself to the investigation of Jewish antiquities. In 1686 he published his ‘Essay on Jewish Weights and Measures,’ dedicated to his old friend Pepys as president of the Royal Society. He had begun to study the fragments of ‘Sanchoniatho,’ expecting to find in them a proof that all the heathen gods had been mortal men. He finished his first design about the time of the revolution, when his bookseller thought that readers would care even less than usual for Sanchoniatho. He thereupon gave up thoughts of publishing, but pursued his antiquarian investigations. The results of his prolonged labours appeared after his death, when his son-in-law and chaplain, Squier Payne, published ‘Sanchoniatho's Phœnician History, translated from the first book of Eusebius de Præparatione Evangelica, &c.’ with a preface giving a brief account of the life, &c. (1720), and ‘Origines Gentium Antiquissimæ; or attempts for discovering the times of the first planting of nations,’ 1724.

Cumberland died on 9 Oct. 1718, and was buried in his cathedral. A portrait is given in Cumberland's ‘Memoirs.’ From Payne's account he appears to have been a man of great simplicity and entire absence of vanity. He was slow and phlegmatic, and preferred the accumulation to the diffusion of knowledge. He received a copy of Wilkins's Coptic Testament at the age of eighty-three, and learned the language in order to examine the book. At the same age he was forced to give up the visitation of his diocese. He had previously discharged his duties conscientiously, saying often that ‘a man had better wear out than rust out.’ He was liberal, and at the end of every year gave all surplus revenue to the poor, reserving only 25l. to pay for his funeral. His book on the laws of nature was one of the innumerable treatises called out by opposition to Hobbes. It is rather cumbrous and discursive, but is ably written, and remarkable as laying down distinctly a utilitarian criterion of morality. The public good is the end of morality, and ‘universal benevolence’ the source of all virtues. Cumberland occupies an important place in English ethical speculation, and his influence seems to be traceable in the writings of Shaftesbury and Hutcheson. ‘A Brief Disquisition of the Law of Nature’ was published in 1692 by J. Tyrrell (a grandson of Archbishop Ussher), based upon Cumberland's treatise, translated, abridged, and rearranged with the approval of the author. The first edition of the book was very incorrectly printed, owing to the author's absence, and errors were subsequently multiplied. A translation by Meacock appeared in 1727, and another by John Towers, with the the and other documents, was published at Dublin in 1750.

Cumberland had an only son, Richard, archdeacon of Northampton and rector of Peakirk, who died on 24 Dec. 1737, aged 63. By his wife, Elizabeth Denison, the archdeacon had two sons, Richard (died unmarried) and Denison, bishop of Clonfert [see under CUMBERLAND, RICHARD, (1732–1811)], and one daughter, married to Waring Ashby.



CUMBERLAND, RICHARD (1732–1811), dramatist, was born on 19 Feb. 1732, in the master's lodge at Trinity College, Cambridge. His great-grandfather was, bishop of Peterborough [q. v.] The bishop's only son, Richard, was archdeacon of Northampton. Archdeacon Cumberland's second son, named Denison, after his mother, was born in 1705 or 1706, educated at Westminster, became a fellow-commoner of Trinity College, Cambridge, and in 1728 married Bentley's daughter, Joanna, who was adored by many young men at Cambridge (see, Bentley, ii. 113, 267), and when eleven years old was celebrated by [q. v.] in the ‘Spectator.’ Denison Cumberland was presented to the living of Stanwick in Northamptonshire by the Lord-chancellor King, and divided his time between Cambridge and Stanwick until Bentley's death (1742). Richard Cumberland spent much of his infancy in Bentley's lodge, and has left some curious reminiscences of his grandfather. When six years old he was sent to school under Arthur Kinsman, at Bury St. Edmunds. Before leaving this school he had written English verse, and compiled a cento called ‘Shakespeare in the Shades,’ specimens of which are given in his memoirs. When twelve years old he was sent to Westminster, where he lodged at first in the same house with Cowper, and was a