Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 38.djvu/18

Milner as an invalid, and towards the end of his life rarely quitted his lodge. In the spring of 1820, while on a visit to Wilberforce at Kensington Gore, he had a more than usually severe attack. No danger was at first apprehended, but he grew gradually weaker, and passed away peacefully 1 April 1820. He was buried in Queens' College Chapel.

In person Milner was tall, with a frame that indicated great bodily strength, and regular features. In old age he became excessively corpulent. He was constitutionally gay; and his religious views, though they made him disapprove of amusements of various kinds, did not impose upon him gravity in society. He was ‘the life of the party’ (Life, p. 329), and if the official dinners which, as vice-chancellor, he gave on Sunday before the afternoon service at St. Mary's were very merry, his private parties were uproarious (, Reminiscences, i. 246). Sir James Stephen, who knew him well, says of his conversation: ‘He had looked into innumerable books, had dipped into most subjects, whether of vulgar or of learned inquiry, and talked with shrewdness, animation, and intrepidity on them all. Whatever the company or whatever the theme, his sonorous voice predominated over all other voices, even as his lofty stature, vast girth, and superincumbent wig, defied all competitors.’ He was a popular and effective preacher, and when he occupied the pulpit at Carlisle, ‘you might walk on the heads of the people’ (Life, p. 116). His thirst for knowledge prompted him to discourse affably with anybody from whom he could extract information or amusement. In charity he was profusely generous, and contributed annually to the distressed poor of Leeds. He delighted in the society of young people, and spared no pains to make their time with him amusing. In politics he was a staunch tory, and an equally staunch supporter of the established church as a state institution. His friendship with Wilberforce made him an abolitionist, but he nearly quarrelled with him over catholic emancipation. There is a portrait in oils of Milner by Opie, in the dining-room of Queens' College Lodge, and a second, by an unknown artist, in the combination-room. He was also drawn in chalk by the Rev. Thomas Kerrich [q. v.] in 1810.

He wrote: 1. ‘Reflections on the Communication of Motion by Impact and Gravity,’ 26 Feb. 1778, ‘Phil. Trans.’ lxviii. 344. 2. ‘Observations on the Limits of Algebraical Equations,’ 26 Feb. 1777, ib. p. 380. 3. ‘On the Precession of the Equinoxes produced by the Sun's Attraction,’ 24 June 1779, ib. lxix. 505. 4. ‘A Plan of a Course of Chemical Lectures,’ 8vo, Cambridge, 1784. 5. ‘A Plan of a Course of Experimental Lectures Introductory to the Study of Chemistry and other Branches of Natural Philosophy,’ 8vo, Cambridge, n.d. 6. ‘A Plan of a Course of Chemical Lectures,’ 8vo, Cambridge, 1788. 7. ‘On the Production of Nitrous Acid and Nitrous Air,’ 2 July 1789, ‘Phil. Trans.’ lxxix. 300. 8. ‘Animadversions on Dr. Haweis's Impartial and Succinct History of the Church of Christ; being the Preface to the 2nd edition of vol. i. of the late Rev. Jos. Milner's History of the Church of Christ,’ 8vo, Cambridge, 1800. 9. ‘Further Animadversions on Dr. Haweis's Misquotations and Misrepresentations of the Rev. Mr. Milner's History of the Church of Christ,’ 8vo, Cambridge, 1801. 10. ‘An Account of the Life and Character of the late Rev. Joseph Milner,’ 8vo, Cambridge,1801. 11. The same, enlarged and corrected, 2nd edit. 8vo, Cambridge, 1802. 12. ‘Strictures on some of the Publications of the Rev. Herbert Marsh,’ 8vo, London, 1813. 13. ‘The History of the Church of Christ, by the late Rev. Jos. Milner, A.M., with Additions and Corrections by the Rev. I. Milner, D.D.,’ 8vo, London, 1816. 14. ‘Sermons by the late Jos. Milner. Edited by I. Milner,’ 2 vols. 8vo, London, 1820. 15. ‘An Essay on Human Liberty, by the late I. Milner,’ 8vo, London, 1824.

[Life of Isaac Milner, D.D., by his niece, Mary Milner, 8vo, London, 1842; Essays in Ecclesiastical Biography, by Sir James Stephen, 1849, ii. 358-67; Life of Wilberforce, passim, see index; Gunning's Reminiscences, 1855, i. 83-5, 234-51, 255-84; the Missionary Secretariat of Henry Venn, by W. Knight, 1880, p. 10.] 

MILNER, JAMES (d. 1721), merchant of London, was extensively engaged in the trade with Portugal, and his commercial transactions with that country enabled him to render great service to the government in the remittance of money abroad. During the controversy on the eighth and ninth clauses of the commercial treaty with France (1713) he contributed to the ‘British Merchant’ several articles on the ‘Methuen Treaty and the Trade with Portugal,’ in which he combated the arguments advanced by Defoe in the ‘Mercator.’ He was returned to parliament for the borough of Minehead on 11 April 1717, and he voted for the repeal of the acts to prevent occasional conformity in January 1718-19. He died on 24 Nov. 1721.

Milner's articles on the trade with Portugal, which had first appeared in 1713-14,