Archbishop Whately died on Thursday. He was a good representative
of a school of theology now certainly not in the ascendant, which we may call the Hard Church. His mind was strong, genuinely liberal, masculine, shrewd, didac- tic—not very deep. He liked writing, or "preparing," little books, which decreed that words should mean this or that, and that thenceforth all they had sometimes been supposed to mean, not contained in the new definition, should be bidden to disappear and vanish from the earth. His " Evidences of Christianity" for children is all theological rind. Perhaps he thought too much of the shell which defends the kernel, as others may think too little of it. But he was a bold, common-sense, humorous thinker, and a good Archbishop, generous, disinterested, and full of shrewd and wise zeal for the cause of education. He is, we believe, the only example of a clergyman without ecclesiastical dignity elevated at once to an Archbishopric. He was consecrated when he was forty-four years old and President of St. Alban's Hall, Oxford. He was born in 1787, and was, therefore, in his 77th year. We hope to speak of him more at length next week.
