Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 53.djvu/317

 his death, 16 Nov. 1859. By his wife Agnes, born Frier (married 22 March 1838), he left a daughter Mary.

In early life Spalding travelled in Italy (cf. Blackwood's Magazine, November 1835), of the history of which country he contributed to the ‘Edinburgh Cabinet Library’ an admirable compendium, entitled ‘Italy and the Italian Islands,’ 1841, 3 vols. 12mo; New York, 1843, 3 vols. No less meritorious was his ‘History of English Literature, with an Outline of the Origin and Growth of the English Language,’ Edinburgh, 1853, 8vo; 13th edit. 1875; new edit. continued to 1876, 1877; German translations, Halle and Breslau, 1854. To the ‘Penny Cyclopædia’ Supplements, 1846 and 1858, Spalding contributed biographical memoirs; to the ‘Encyclopædia Britannica’ (7th and 8th edits.) the articles on Addison, Bacon, Demosthenes, fable, fallacy, logic, rhetoric, Sir Walter Scott, slavery, and Tasso. A reprint of the article on logic, entitled ‘An Introduction to Logical Science,’ appeared in 1857, Edinburgh, 8vo, and that on rhetoric in a volume of contributions by George Moir [q. v.]

[Life by John Hill Burton, LL.D., prefixed to the New Shakspere Society's reprint of the Letter above mentioned; Information from the librarian of the University of Aberdeen; Gent. Mag. 1860, i. 191; Scotsman, 19 Nov. 1859; Irving's Book of Scotsmen; Allibone's Dictionary of English Literature.]

 SPARK, THOMAS, D.D. (1655–1692), classical scholar, born in 1655, was son of Archibald Spark, minister of Northop, Flintshire. He was admitted into Westminster school in 1668, and was elected in 1672 to a scholarship at Christ Church, Oxford, where he graduated B.A. in 1676 and M.A. in 1679. He became chaplain to Sir George (afterwards Lord) Jeffreys [q. v.], to whom he owed his advancement in the church. On 18 Nov. 1682 he delivered the oration on Sir Thomas Bodley, being the first person nominated to a benefaction left for that purpose by Dr. John Morris (1594–1648), canon of Christ Church (, Letters written by Eminent Persons, ii. 112). He was admitted to the prebend of Offley in the church of Lichfield, 9 April 1686. He graduated B.D. 18 Feb. 1687–8, and was created D.D. 8 July 1691. He was instituted to the rectory of Ewhurst, Surrey, 1 March 1687–8, and he also obtained the rectory of Hog's Norton, Leicestershire. On 2 June 1688 he was admitted to a prebend in the church of Rochester. He died on 7 Sept. 1692 at Bath, whither he had gone to drink the waters, and was buried in the abbey church. Wood, while characterising him as a learned man, says he was ‘confident and forward without measure,’ and given to ‘excesses and too much agitation in obtaining spiritualities.’

His works are: 1. ‘Zosimi Comitis et Ex-advocati Fisci Historiæ novæ libri sex, notis illustrati,’ Greek and Latin, Oxford, 1679, 8vo; dedicated to his former master, Dr. Richard Busby [q. v.] An English translation appeared in London, 1684, 8vo. 2. ‘Lucii Cœlii Lactantii Firmiani Opera quæ extant, ad fidem MSS. recognita et Commentario illustrata,’ Oxford, 1684, 8vo.

He was also the author of two sets of Latin verses in the ‘Musæ Anglicanæ’—one on the recasting of the ‘Great Tom’ of Christ Church—and he contributed to the collection of poems, published at Oxford in 1685, on the death of Charles II.

[Brüggemann's Engl. Editions of Greek and Latin Authors, pp. 435, 733; Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714, iv. 1394; Hearne's Remarks and Collections, ii. 71; Le Neve's Fasti, ed. Hardy, i. 617, ii. 582; Manning and Bray's Surrey, i. 504; Notes and Queries, 2nd ser iv. 151, 215; Welch's Alumni Westmon. ed. Phillimore, pp. 161, 165, 172; Willis's Cathedral Surveys, ii. 454; Wood's Life, ed. Bliss, p. 96; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. iv. 368, and Fasti, ii. 353, 369, 401.]

 SPARKE, EDWARD (d. 1692), divine, a native of Kent, was educated at Clare Hall, Cambridge, graduating B.A. 1630, M.A. 1633, and B.D. 1640. He was incorporated at Oxford on 12 July 1653 (, Fasti Oxon. i. 178–9). He was presented to the rectory of St. Martin, Ironmonger Lane, London, 28 Sept. 1639, but was ejected from his living and his church sequestered about 1645. In 1650 he was vicar of Isle of Grain, Kent. At the Restoration he regained his rectory, but resigned it before 5 June 1661. He became minister of St. James's, Clerkenwell, resigned it in 1666, and on 23 Jan. 1665–6 was instituted to the vicarage of Tottenham. He was also vicar of Walthamstow, December 1662 to May 1666, and was chaplain to Charles II. He died in 1692. Sparke wrote: ‘Scintillula Altaris, or a Pious Reflection on Primitive Devotion: as to the Feasts and Fasts of the Christian Church orthodoxally Revived’ (London, 1652, 8vo). The second edition, published in 1660, was entitled ‘Θυσιατήριον vel scintilla altaris.’ The book was long held in great esteem, and six editions appeared between 1663 and 1700. The later editions contain an engraved portrait. He also edited Shute's ‘Sarah and Hagar,’ 1649, and, according to Walker, wrote much besides.