On his return from his travels _our author was sent on the English
mission._ He {020} had long been engaged in his great work of the _Lives
of the Saints_, and was then bringing it to a conclusion. He naturally,
therefore, wished to be settled in London, for the convenience of its
public libraries, and the opportunities it affords of intercourse with
men of letters. But the vicar-apostolic of the middle district claimed
him as belonging to that district, and appointed him to a mission in
Staffordshire. This was a severe mortification to our author; he
respectfully remonstrated; but the vicar-apostolic was inexorable, and
required his immediate obedience. A gentleman who lived in the same
house with him at the time, has mentioned to the editor, that he was
with him when the summons came; and that on receiving it, he appeared
much hurt, retired for half an hour to his oratory, and soon after set
off for his country mission.
From Staffordshire he removed to Warkworth, the seat of Francis Eyre,
esquire, to whom these sheets are dedicated. He had the highest opinion
of a good missioner, and frequently declared that he knew of no
situation so much to be envied, while the missioner had a love of his
duties, and confined himself to them: none so miserable, when the
missioner had lost the love of them, and was fond of the pleasures of
life. "Such a one," he used to say, "would seldom have the means of
gratifying his taste for pleasure; he would frequently find that, in
company, if he met with outward civility, he was the object of silent
blame; and that if he gave pleasure as a companion, no one would resort
to him as a priest." He had a manuscript written by a Mr. Cox, an
English missioner, who lived in the beginning of the present century, in
which these sentiments were expressed forcibly and with great feeling:
he often mentioned it. But no person was less critical on the conduct of
others, none exacted less from them, than our author. He was always at
the command of a fellow-clergyman, and ready to do him every kind of
good office. To the poor, his door was always open. When he resided in
London, in quality of chaplain to the duke of Norfolk, he was under no
obligation, strictly speaking, of attending to any person except the
duke himself and his family; but he was at the call of every one who
wanted any spiritual or temporal assistance which it was in his power to
afford. The poor, at length, flocked to him in such numbers that, much
in opposition to his wishes, his brother, with whom he then lived, was
obliged to give general orders that none of them should be admitted to
him. He was ever ready to oblige. Moss. Olivet relates of Huet, the
bishop of Avranches, that he was so absorbed in his studies as sometimes
to neglect his pastoral duties; that once a poor peasant waited on him
respecting some matter of importance, and was refused admittance, "his
lordship being at his studies:" upon which the peasant retired,
muttering, with great indignation, "that he hoped they should ever have
another bishop who had not finished his studies before he came among
them;" but our author's "being at his studies," was never a reason with
him for refusing to see any one. It was often unpleasant to observe how
much his good-humor, in this respect, was abused.