Warwick. He there met Priestley, with whom he at once formed a friendship. The acquaintance, it seems, became dangerous in 1791, when the rioters were expected to attack Hatton parsonage after their outrages upon Priestley's supporters in Birmingham. Parr complains pathetically (Works, iii. 278) that his house was to be burnt, his family terribly alarmed, and his ‘very books,’ on which he had spent ‘more than half the produce of twenty years' labour,’ were to be exposed to destruction. Order was happily restored in time to save his books and his family. The disturbance gave rise to a small personal controversy with Charles Curtis, a Birmingham rector. It was apparently due to a practical joke of Parr's pupils, who sent him an anonymous letter, attributed by him to Curtis (Annual Obituary). Parr published a pamphlet called ‘Sequel to a Printed Paper,’ with voluminous notes, which was ridiculed in Cumberland's ‘Curtius rescued from the Gulph.’ In 1792 he published a ‘Letter from Irenopolis,’ in which he successfully dissuaded the Birmingham dissenters from a proposal to hold a second celebration of the fall of the Bastille. In these pamphlets Parr defined his politics as a good whig. He regarded Burke as a renegade, but was equally anxious to disavow the doctrines of Paine, and expressed his agreement with Mackintosh's ‘Vindiciæ Gallicæ.’ He was much affected by the disgraceful trial of his old pupil Joseph Gerrald [q. v.] in 1794; endeavoured to persuade him to fly the country, offering to indemnify him for damages; and, after the sentence, did his best to serve the unfortunate convict: sent him money, and wrote to him a letter, in which the absence of pomposity shows the real feeling of the writer. He was afterwards a kind guardian to Gerrald's son. Parr denounced the repressive measures of the ministry, promoted a county meeting at Warwick in 1797 to petition for their dismissal, and condemned the dominant war spirit in various sermons (quoted from the manuscript by Field, i. 396). His best-known utterance, however, was the spital sermon preached before the lord mayor of London at Christ Church, Newgate Street, on Easter Tuesday 1800. The mayor observed that he had heard four things in it which he disliked—namely, the quarters struck by the church clock. It was published, with voluminous notes, wandering over many topics and quoting many authors. The chief point, however, was an attack upon the theory of universal benevolence as expounded in Godwin's ‘Political Justice.’ Godwin replied forcibly, and a previous friendship, never very warm, expired. A lively review in the ‘Edinburgh’ is the first of Sydney Smith's collected essays, and gives a very fair account of the performance. After this period Parr published little. His only important work was the ‘Characters of Fox,’ which appeared in two volumes in 1809. The first volume contains a collection of articles upon Fox from newspapers and magazines, with a reprint of the character from ‘Bellendenus,’ and a letter upon Fox addressed by Parr to Coke of Holkham. The second is a mass of notes, notes upon notes, and additional notes. These are followed by a discursive review of Fox's ‘James II.’ The most remarkable note is one, long enough for a volume, upon the criminal law. Parr argues at great length, and with many quotations from his friend Bentham and others, on behalf of a reform of the old barbarities. Though cumbrous in style and diffuse in substance, it is very creditable to his generosity and good feeling.
This was Parr's last work. In 1810 he had much domestic trouble. He had been the father of three daughters. The second, Eliza Jane, born at Colchester on 26 May 1778, died at Norwich on 29 May 1779; the third, Catherine Jane, born at Norwich on 13 June 1722, died of consumption at Teignmouth on 22 Nov. 1805. She was buried at Hatton, and her father long afterwards directed that a lock of her hair, with other relics, should be placed on his own body at his funeral. In a short notice of her in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine’ (December 1805) he speaks with strong affection, and describes the grief of her ‘venerable father, whose attainments are exceeded only by the strength of his understanding and the warmth of his heart’—we may hope an editorial addition. His eldest daughter, Sarah Anne, born at Stanmore 31 Dec. 1772, had in 1797 eloped with a pupil, John, son of Robert Watkins Wynne of Plasnewydd, Denbigh. Parr had warned Wynne's parents of the danger, but they were indignant, and the elder Wynne threatened to disinherit his son. The match proved unhappy, and, after the birth of three daughters (the last in 1807), Mrs. Wynne was separated from her husband. She went to live at Shrewsbury, and began an action for maintenance. Her health broke down, and she was sent to Teignmouth, where she was nursed by her mother. The mother had to give evidence in the trial at Shrewsbury, was exhausted by the journey, and died at Teignmouth on 9 April 1810. Mrs. Wynne's youngest daughter died on 26 May, and Mrs. Wynne herself on 8 July at Hatton. Mrs. Wynne had been the cleverest of Parr's daughters, and showed some of her mother's sarcastic temper. Parr's son-in-law came to Hatton
