Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 43.djvu/107

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Paley
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Paley
    face on the latest School of English Poetry,’ London, 1881, 8vo.
  1. ‘Bibliographia Græca: an Enquiry into the Date and Origin of Book-writing among the Greeks,’ London, 1881, 8vo.
  2. ‘A Short Treatise on Greek Particles and their Combinations,’ 1881, 8vo.
  3. ‘On Professor Mahaffy's “Epic Poetry” and “History of Classical Greek Literature,”’ 1881, 8vo.
  4. ‘Æschyli Fabulæ Ἱκετίδες, Χοηφόροι, cum scholiis Græcis et brevi adnotatione critica,’ Cambridge, 1883, 8vo.
  5. ‘The Truth about Homer, with Remarks on Professor Jebb's “Introduction,”’ London, 1887, 8vo.
  6. ‘The Gospel of St. John: a Verbatim Translation from the Vatican MS.; with the notable Variations of the Sinaitic and Beza MSS., and brief Notes,’ 1887, 8vo.
  7. ‘Fragments of the Comic Greek Poets, with Renderings in Verse,’ London, 1888, 8vo; 2nd ed. 1892.

Paley also contributed many articles and reviews of classical books to the ‘Edinburgh Review,’ the ‘American Catholic Quarterly,’ ‘Hermathena,’ the ‘Journal of Philology,’ the ‘Transactions of the Cambridge Philological Society,’ ‘Fraser's Magazine,’ the ‘Journal of Hellenic Studies,’ ‘Athenæum,’ ‘Academy,’ ‘Macmillan's Magazine,’ &c. He also edited in ‘Cambridge Greek Texts with Notes’ the greater part of the Greek tragedies separately, his work for this series being continued until his death. Every new edition of his books was practically a new work.

[The Catalogues of the British Museum and of the Cambridge University Library; information kindly communicated by Mrs. Paley, Apthorp, Boscombe, W. B. Paley, esq., Messrs. G. Bell & Sons, Professor J. E. B. Mayor, A. W. Spratt, esq., Rev. Thomas Field, Bigby Rectory, Brigg, Lincoln; Eagle, June 1889; Cambridge Chronicle, 31 Oct. 1846, 11 Nov. 1846, 4 June 1850, 26 July 1851; Times, 6 Oct. 1871, 12 Dec. 1888; The Ecclesiologist, vols. i.–iv.; Classical Review, iii. 80; Academy, 1888, p. 406; Athenæum, 15 Dec. 1888; Rev. S. S. Lewis in Bursian's Jahresbericht, xvi. 15.]

E. C. M.

PALEY, WILLIAM (1743–1805), archdeacon of Carlisle and author of the ‘Evidences of Christianity,’ born at Peterborough in July 1743, and baptised in the cathedral on 30 Aug. following, was the eldest child of William Paley. The elder Paley, son of Thomas Paley, owner of a small estate at Langcliffe in the parish of Giggleswick, Yorkshire, in which the Paleys had been settled for many generations (see Whitaker, Craven, pp. 140, 145), was a sizar at Christ's College, Cambridge, graduated B.A. in 1733–4, and in 1735 became vicar of Helpston, Northamptonshire. He was also a minor canon at Peterborough. On 10 July 1742 he married Elizabeth Clapham of Stackhouse in Giggleswick. In 1745 he was appointed headmaster of Giggleswick grammar school, with a salary of 80l., afterwards raised to 200l. He held this post until 1799, when he died on 29 Sept. at the age of 88; his wife having died on 9 March 1796, aged 83. The mother was a keen, thrifty woman of much intelligence. She had a fortune of 400l., which at the time of her death had been raised by good management to 2,200l. The father, a homely, sensible man, absorbed in his teaching, managed, with the help of a legacy of 1,500l., to ‘scrape together’ 7,000l. (E. Paley in Paley's Works, 1830, vol. i. p. xxiii). Their family consisted of William and three daughters. William Paley, the son, was educated at his father's school. He was a fair scholar, but specially interested in mechanics. He was too clumsy for boyish games, and his chief amusement from childhood was angling. Though very kind to animals, he also joined in the then universal sport of cockfighting. A visit to the assizes at Lancaster interested him so much that he afterwards played at judging his schoolfellows; and after the sight of a travelling quack, he tried to extract a sister's teeth. On 16 Nov. 1758 he was entered as a sizar at Christ's College, riding to Cambridge with his father. He fell off his pony seven times on the road, his father only turning his head on such occasions to say, ‘Take care of thy money, lad.’ He returned to his home, and was sent to learn mathematics under William Howarth at Topcliffe, near Ripon. On 3 Aug. 1759 he was present at the trial of Eugene Aram at York, in which he was profoundly interested, remarking that Aram got himself hanged by his own cleverness.

In October 1759 he began his residence at Christ's, his father prophesying that he would be a great man, ‘for he has by far the clearest head I ever met with in my life.’ On 5 Dec. he was elected to a scholarship appropriated to Giggleswick school; on the following day to a foundation scholarship and a Mildmay exhibition; and on 26 May 1761 to a scholarship founded by a Mr. Bunting. Anthony Shepherd, the college tutor, who became Plumian professor in 1760, thought him too good a mathematician to profit by the college lectures, but required his attendance at the Plumian lectures. Paley was very sociable, and joined in the laugh at blunders caused by his frequent absence of mind, and his uncouth country dress and manners. He said afterwards (according to Meadley) that he was idle, though not immoral, for his