Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 52.djvu/395

 together with Archbishop Sharp, Bishop Robinson, and Jablonski, he subsequently took a keen interest in the restoration of episcopacy in Prussia and the approximation of the Lutheran and Anglican forms of ritual. Upon Jane's death in February 1707, Smalridge was strongly recommended for the professorship, of which he had performed the duties for six years, but his avowed Jacobitism and the influence of Marlborough caused Dr. John Potter, much against the queen's personal inclination, to be preferred (cf., Collect. ed. Doble, ii. 88). Next January, however, Smalridge, who had the reputation in London of being an excellent preacher, was chosen lecturer of St. Dunstan's-in-the-West. Upon the tory reaction in 1710 he was made one of the queen's chaplains, and, in the same year, in a Latin oration, presented Atterbury as prolocutor to the upper house of convocation. His speech was subsequently printed, together with two speeches in the Sheldonian and a poem on the death of Queen Anne, in Latin and English, as ‘Miscellanies by Dr. Smalridge’ (2nd ed. London, 1714). In September 1711 he was made a canon of Christ Church at the same time that Atterbury was made dean. ‘The House,’ wrote Swift, ‘would have rather had it the other way about.’ When, however, Atterbury became a bishop, Smalridge obtained the deanery, 11 July 1713, and thereupon resigned the deanery of Carlisle, to which he had been admitted (likewise in succession to Atterbury) on 3 Nov. 1711. ‘Atterbury goes before,’ wrote the new dean, ‘and sets everything on fire. I come after him with a bucket of water.’

In succession to Robinson (translated to London), Smalridge was consecrated bishop of Bristol on 4 April 1714 (, Episcopal Succession in England, p. 133), and held the deanery in commendam with the see, the emoluments of which were at that time very small. His promotion to Bristol was highly popular, and shortly afterwards he was appointed lord almoner, but was removed from this post in the following year. His views had in no way altered since, in 1701, he declared in a sermon before the House of Commons that ‘whosoever did not abhor the execution of Charles I was so ill a man that no good man could converse with him;’ and, together with Atterbury, he refused to sign the declaration against the Pretender on 3 Nov. following the insurrection of 1715. Their ‘Reasons for not signing the Declaration’ were published in quarto in 1715, and were reprinted in Somers' ‘Tracts,’ vol. xii. Similarly, in 1717, he resisted the attempt to procure a loyal address from Oxford to George I on his return from Hanover, and opposed the repeal of the Occasional Conformity and Schism Acts; and in the following year he delivered his sentiments freely in ‘a very animated speech’ in the House of Lords in support of the Test and Corporation Acts. But, although he was removed from the almonership, he was highly esteemed by the princess (afterwards Queen Caroline) and her circle, his reputation as a scholar (though he did little to justify it) being almost as high as that as a preacher. He died suddenly of apoplexy on 27 Sept. 1719, and was buried in the north aisle of Christ Church Cathedral, where there was until 1870 a monument with an inscription by his old schoolfellow and brother-in-law, Dr. Robert Freind (the inscription was printed after the title-page of the Oxford edition of Smalridge's ‘Sermons’). His will was proved at Oxford on 10 Oct. 1719. He married, about 1697, Mary, daughter of Dr. Samuel de l'Angle, who was left in poor circumstances at his death, but was granted a pension of 300l. by the princess until her death on 7 June 1729. By her he left issue, with two daughters, a son Philip, who was also educated at Westminster and Christ Church, Oxford, graduating M.A. in 1723 and D.D. in 1742, was rector of Christleton, Cheshire (1727), and chancellor of the diocese of Worcester from 1742 until his death on 23 Oct. 1751 (Gent. Mag. 1751, p. 477;, Alumni Westmon. p. 270).

Smalridge, ‘the famous Dr. Smalridge’ as Swift called him, was a well-known figure in London in Queen Anne's day. Bishop Newton speaks of the veneration which his appearance inspired at the Westminster school elections. Subsequently Addison wrote to Swift that he was the most candid and agreeable of the bishops. In the ‘Tatler’ (Nos. 73 and 114) Steele spoke of him [‘Favonius’] as ‘abounding in that sort of virtue and knowledge which makes religion beautiful,’ and the frequent references to his winning manner in the letters and periodicals of the day may well justify Macaulay's epithets of ‘humane and accomplished.’ He was much beloved by Robert Nelson, whose epitaph he wrote for St. George's-in-the-Fields; and Nelson, with whom he was associated in many works of benevolence, left him a ‘Madonna’ by Correggio. Whiston acknowledged Smalridge to be one of the most learned and excellent persons in the kingdom, and said that if any one could have convinced him that he was in error, it would be he. Whiston rather flattered himself that he had convinced the bishop of some ‘emendanda’ in the Athanasian creed; but of any ten-