Page:Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Vol 4.djvu/198

Rh Caius College in 1787, and was elected to a fellowship in 1793 and to the mastership in 1803, the late illustrious Dr. Wollaston being one of his competitors. One of the first acts of his administration was to open his College to a more large and liberal competition, by the abolition of some mischievous and unstatutable restrictions, which had been sanctioned by long custom, and also by making acade- mical merit and honours the sole avenue to college preferment : and he lived to witness the complete success of this wise and liberal measure, in the rapid increase of the number of high academical honours which were gained by members of his College, and by the subsequent advancement of many of them to the highest pro- fessional rank and eminence.

Some years after his accession to the mastership, he took holy orders and commuted the degree of Doctor in Medicine for that of Theology, and in later life he was collated to some considerable ec- clesiastical preferments. Dr. Davy had no great acquaintance with the details of accurate science, but he was remarkable for the extent and variety of his attainments in classical and general literature ; his conversation was eminently lively and original, and not less agree- able from its occasional tendency to somewhat paradoxical, though generally harmless speculations. He died in May last, after a long illness, deeply lamented by a large circle of friends, to whom he was endeared by his many social and other virtues.

Dr. Herbert Marsh, Bishop of Peterborough, and one of the most acute and learned theologians of his age, became a member of St. John's College in the University of Cambridge in the year 1775 and took his B.A. degree in 1779, being second in the list of Wranglers, which was headed by his friend and relation Mr. Thomas Jones, a man whose intellectual powers were of the highest order, and who for many years filled the office of tutor of Trinity College with unequalled success and reputation. Soon after his election to a fellowship, he went to Germany, where he devoted himself during many years to theological and general studies, and first became known to the public as the translator and learned commentator of Michaelis's Introduction to the New Testament. It was during his residence abroad that he published in the German language various tracts in defence of the policy of his own country in the continental wars, and more particularly a very elaborate "History of the Politics of Great Britain and France, from the time of the Conference at Pilnitz to the Declaration of War," a work which produced a marked impression on the state of public opinion in Germany, and for which he received a very considerable pension on the recommendation of Mr. Pitt. In 1807, he was elected Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity in the University of Cambridge, an appointment of great value and importance, which he retained for the remainder of his life. On the resumption of his residence in the University, he devoted himself with great diligence to the preparation of his lectures on various important branches of Divinity, interposing a great number of occasional publications on the Catholic Question, the Bible Society, and various other subjects of political and theological contro-