Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 20.djvu/569

Rh R I D R I D 549 was led to make designs of his own, founded upon his study of old examples ; and, when a large grant of money was made by the Government to build new churches, he sent in a design of his own which was successful in an open competition; thus he was fairly launched upon the profession of an architect, for which his natural gifts strongly fitted him. Rickman then moved to Birmingham, and at first worked at his new profession with Mr H. Hutchinson as managing clerk ; and when he died in 1830 Rickman entered into partnership with Mr Hussey, having become one of the most successful architects of his time. He built an immense number of churches, chapels, and other buildings, among which some of the chief are churches at Hampton Lucy, Ombersley, and Stretton-on- Dunsmore, St George's at Birmingham, St Philip's and St Matthew's both in Bristol, two in Carlisle, St Peter's and St Paul's at Preston, St David's in Glasgow, Grey Friars at Coventry, and many others. He also designed the new court of St John's College, Cambridge, a palace for the bishop of Carlisle, and several large country houses. These are all in the Gothic style, but, though superior perhaps to the buildings of his predecessors, they show more know- ledge of the outward form of the mediaeval style than any real acquaintance with its spirit, and are little better than dull copies of old work, disfigured by much poverty of detail. Rickmann nevertheless was an important stage in the revival of taste for mediae valism, perhaps in that respect only second to Pugin. His book entitled An Attempt to Discriminate the Styles of Architecture in England is a work which deserves great credit for its painstaking research ; a great many editions of it were published, and it was eventually much improved and enlarged. Rickman died in 1841. RIDDLES are probably the oldest extant form of humour. They spring from man's earliest perception that there are such things as analogies in nature. Man observes an example of analogy, puts his observations in the form of a question, and there is the riddle ready made. Some Boeotian humorist, for example, detected the ana- logy between the life of humanity the child on all fours, the man erect on two legs, old age with its staff on one side, and on the other the conception of an animal with a varying number of limbs. Put this in a question, and it is the riddle of the Sphinx. Another instance is the ques- tion " What we caught we threw away, what we could not catch we kept. " Homer is said to have died of vexation at not being able to discover the answer to this riddle, still current on the coast of Brittany, in Germany, and in Gascony. After inventing the riddle, men began to use it in a kind of game ; bets were staked on the answer, and sides were made, each side backing its champion. These sports in Marriner's time were common in Tonga ; they are no lass popular among the African Woloffs. The example of Samson's riddle set to the Philistines is an instance of the sport in a Semitic country. In mahrchen and ballads, the hero's chance of winning his beloved, or of escaping threatened punishment, is often made to turn on his power of answering riddles. It follows from the artbss and primitive character of the riddle that regular popular riddles (Devinettes) are widely distributed, like popular tales, popular songs, and popular customs. The Woloffs ask, " What flies for ever and rests never?" Answer, The Wind. The Basutos put this riddle " What is wing- less and legless, yet flies fast and cannot be imprisoned 1 " Answer, The Voice. The German riddle runs "What can go in face of the sun yet leave no shadow 1 " Answer, The Wind. In riddles may perhaps be noticed the ani- mistic or personalizing tendency of early human thought, just beginning to be conscious of itself. The person who asked these riddles had the old sense of wind, for example, as a person, yet probably, unlike the Bushmen, he would never expect to see the personal wind. He knew the distinction between the personal and impersonal well enough to be sure that his enigma would present some difficulty. The riddle, to be brief, is an interrogatory form of the fable, and like the fable originates among rude people, and is perpetuated in the folklore of peasantry. Probably the best book on the riddle (a subject less frequently studied than the mahrchen or the myth) is Eugene Rolland, Devinettes ou finigmes Populaires, with a preface by M. Gaston Paris. The power of answering riddles among the people who invented the legend of Solomon and the queen of Sheba seems to have been regarded as a proof of great sagacity. The riddle proper is all but extinct outside folklore and savage life, and has been replaced by the conundrum, which is a pun in the interrogative form. RIDING. See HORSEMANSHIP, vol. xii. p. 195. RIDLEY, NICHOLAS (c. 1500-1555), bishop of London, and a martyr to the Reformation, was descended from a family long seated in Northumberland. The second son of Nicholas Ridley of Unthank near Willimoteswick in that county, he was born in the beginning of the 16th cen- tury. From the grammar school of Newcastle-upon-Tyne he was sent to Pembroke College, Cambridge, about 1518, being supported there by his uncle, Dr Robert Ridley, fellow of Queen's College. At the university he specially distin- guished himself in Greek. He proceeded B.A. 1522-23, became a fellow of his college, and, having taken orders, was sent about 1527 at the expense of his uncle to study on the Continent, first at the Sorbonne, Paris, and afterwards at Louvain. On his return to Cambridge he was in 1530 chosen under-treasurer of the university; and in 1534 he was senior proctor, when along with the vice-chancellor and the other proctor Richard Wilkes he signed the decree of the university against the jurisdiction of the pope in England. About this time he began to dis- tinguish himself as an orator and disputant, and was chosen chaplain of the university, and " Magister Glo- meriae," an office in which most probably (for its duties have been much disputed) he had to instruct the university entrants in Latin. Cranmer, archbishop of Canterbury, after Ridley had proceeded B.D. in 1537, appointed him one of his chaplains, and in April 1538 collated him to the vicarage of Herne, Kent, where he began to preach the doctrines of the Reformation. In 1540, having commenced doctor of divinity, he was made king's chaplain ; and in the same year he was elected master of his college in Cambridge. Soon after he was appointed a canon of Canterbury. At the instigation of Bishop Gardiner he was accused in the bishop's court of preaching against the doctrine of the Six Articles, but after the matter had been referred to com- missioners specially appointed by the king he was acquitted. In 1545 he renounced the doctrine of tran- substantiation, and was made, a canon of Westminster. In 1547 he was presented by the fellows of Pembroke Hall to the living of Soham, Cambridgeshire, and the same year was consecrated bishop of Rochester. In 1550 he was one of the commissioners for examining Bishops Gardiner and Bonner. He concurred in their deprivation, and succeeded the latter in the see of London. In 1552, returning from Cambridge, he paid a visit to the princess, afterwards Queen Mary, at Hunsdon, Hertfordshire. On account of her unqualified condemnation of the Reformed doctrines, he from this time concurred in the proposals to exclude her from the throne, and he signed the will of Edward VI. settling the crown on Lady Jane Grey. On the death of the king, he, in a sermon at St Paul's Cross, 16th July