The Collected Writing of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. IIDe Quincey, Thomas
History
The Collected Writing of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II
De Quincey, Thomas
De Quincey, Thomas, 1785-1859; English literature -- 19th century
However, for once the world was wrong in its malicious anticipations:
the successor to Lord Lonsdale's titles and Cumberland estates was
made aware of the entire case, in all its circumstances; and he very
honourably gave directions for full restitution being made. This
was done; and in one respect the result was more fortunate for the
children than if they had been trained from youth to rely upon their
expectations: for, by the time this repayment was made, three out of
the five children were already settled in life, with the very amplest
prospects opening before them--_so_ ample as to make their private
patrimonial fortunes of inconsiderable importance in their eyes; and
very probably the withholding of their inheritance it was, however
unjust, and however little contemplated as an occasion of any such
effect, that urged these three persons to the exertions requisite
for their present success. Two only of the children remained to whom
the restoration of their patrimony was a matter of grave importance;
but it was precisely those two whom no circumstances could have made
independent of their hereditary means by personal exertions--viz.
William Wordsworth, the poet, and Dorothy, the sole daughter of the
house. The three others were:--Richard, the eldest: he had become a
thriving solicitor, at one of the inns of court in London; and, if
he died only moderately rich, and much below the expectations of his
acquaintance, in the final result of his laborious life, it was because
he was moderate in his desires, and, in his later years, reverting
to the pastoral region of his infancy and boyhood, chose rather to
sit down by a hearth of his own amongst the Cumberland mountains, and
wisely to woo the deities of domestic pleasures and health, than to
follow the chase after wealth in the feverish crowds of the capital.
The third son (I believe) was Christopher (Dr. Wordsworth), who, at an
early age, became a man of importance in the English Church, being made
one of the chaplains and librarians of the Archbishop of Canterbury
(Dr. Manners Sutton, father of the late Speaker, Lord Canterbury). He
has since risen to the important and dignified station--once held by
Barrow, and afterwards by Bentley--of Master of Trinity in Cambridge.
Trinity in Oxford is not a first-rate college; but Trinity, Cambridge,
answers in rank and authority to Christ Church in Oxford; and to be the
head of that college is rightly considered a very splendid distinction.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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