88

CHAP. VI.

The Waberer.

BLANCO WHITE.

"You may be apt to talk yourselves, and to hear others talk, of the difficulties of Revelation; but let me assure you that the real difficulty lies not in the Scriptures of truth, but in your own deceitful hearts. Little as you may yourselves suspect it, some ruling passion, some leading object of desire, is still striving to get the mastery over you; and as long as your wills are thus permitted to tyrannize over you, and to hold you in thraldom, so long will the Gospel appeal to you in vain.” -REV. ROBERT ANDERSON, Trinity Chapel, Brighton.

JOSEPH BLANCO WHITE was born at Seville in 1775. "Of the excellence of my parents' hearts, of their benevolence, of their sincere piety," he says, "it is impossible to speak too highly." His childhood was a solitary one; and, in his diary, he recollects how, while his two sisters were receiving their education

at a convent, and he was left alone, he looked on the children of the poor who were playing in the streets, and envied their happiness in being allowed to associate with their equals. An ardent, affectionate temper, a fastidious taste, a busy intellect, a sceptical fancy, a dislike of mental restraint, marked his boyhood and infancy as well as manhood. At fifteen he had a quarrel with the Dominican professor at college. The friar was an adherent of the old Aristotelian school of Logic; and one day gave Blanco White a reprimand before the class for neglecting his studies. The pupil rose from his seat and told the professor plainly those studies were not worth his attention, and should never have it. The friar was enraged; and the recusant narrowly escaped personal chastisement from the other students. The Belles Lettres engage more and more of his attention, and he is in very early life elected to a fellowship in the Collegio Mayor, a secular and aristocratic foundation, which gives him an independent position, and

furnishes him with an unfailing passport into the best-informed and most brilliant part of Spanish society. The history of Blanco White's theological course in Spain is short and summary. An intense disgust at the Romish system seized him. His feelings were severely tried at his last parting with his only surviving sister on her entrance into a nunnery, "a nunnery where the rule of St. Francis was observed with the greatest rigour; where the nuns were not allowed a bed, and were obliged to sleep on a few planks raised about a foot from the ground; where the use of linen near the body was forbidden; where the nuns wore coarse open sandals, through which the bare foot was exposed to cold and wet; where the nearest relations were not allowed to see the face of the recluse, or to have any communication with her, except on certain days, when, in the presence of another nun, and with a thick curtain close behind the double iron railing which separated the visitors from the inmates

of the convent, the parent, sister, or brother, exchanged a few unmeaning sentences with the dear relative whom they had lost for ever."

He ruminated on;-his glowing and affectionate feelings the while dwelling on the severity of the Church of Rome till his mind was wholly alienated from her discipline and ritual. But, with his allegiance to the Romish Church, went Christianity altogether! A period of several years followed, in which he officiated as a priest, while inwardly he was all but an Atheist. For some time conscience would not let him do this smoothly, and he lived in a fever. In 1808 the French entered Spain; and the general confusion and dismay allowed him to look out for himself, and decide on his future prospects. He resolved to quit Spain for ever-effected his purpose, and, in March, 1810, landed at Falmouth. The next five years of his life passed in literary political occupations. He set up the Español, a Spanish Journal; a publication which faithfully supported the

English interests in Spain; this was carried on with infinite spirit till the total expulsion of the French troops from the Peninsula, and the return of Ferdinand VII.: for the ability and earnestness displayed in it, the English Government rewarded Blanco with a pension of 250l. per annum.

Meanwhile his detestation of Romish doctrine, and his determination to expose the practices of the Romish priesthood, remain unabated. Each is displayed in his two successive works entitled "Evidence against Catholicism," and "The Poor Man's Preservative against Popery;" both of which attracted considerable attention, and procured for the author the honour of a diploma of M. A. from Oxford. He now signs the Thirty-nine Articles, and is admitted as a clergyman in the Establishment; takes up his residence at Oxford; and ere long is on terms of intimacy with the Whateleys, Dr. Hampden, Newman of Oriel, Mr. Baden Powell, Professor Nassau Senior, -a highly intellectual circle, whose attention and kindness he gratefully commemorates.