c1880 Essays (Reprinted from the Edinburgh Review)

Description

Fine Binding, Leather Binding

Bound in leather with gilt lettering and decoration. Dated from COPAC. Sydney Smith, 1771 –1845, was an English writer and Anglican clergyman. He was educated at Winchester and New College, Oxford. He planned to read for the bar, but his father disagreed, and he was reluctantly compelled to take holy orders. He was ordained at Oxford in 1796. In 1800 he published his first book, Six Sermons. After settled in Edinburgh, Smith proposed the Edinburgh Review, and edited the first edition. He continued to write for the Review for the next quarter of a century, and his brilliant articles were a main element in its success. He left Edinburgh for good in 1803, and settled in London, where he rapidly became known as a preacher, a lecturer and a society figure. His success as a preacher was such that there was often not standing-room in Berkeley Chapel, Mayfair, where he was morning preacher. His views were seen as radical but are now thought of as progressive, being in favour of the education of women, the abolition of slavery and the teaching of practical subjects rather than the classics. In 1831, Smith was appointed a residentiary canonry at St Paul’s Cathedral.