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JOHN SHUTE,

Afterwards Viscount Barrington, was born in 1678, at Theobalds, in Hertfordshire. He was the third son of Benjamin Shute, an eminent merchant, and was descended from an ancient family of considerable note, some of whom had in later years been more worthily distinguished by their attachment to the cause of civil and religious liberty. His immediate ancestors were connected with the Nonconformists in the period of their adversity, and he himself was trained up in an early adherence to the same cause. At sixteen, according to the custom which we have already seen was very prevalent among the more educated class of Dissenters of that period, he was sent to pursue his studies in the university of Utrecht, where he speedily distinguished himself by his proficiency in classical literature, and in the other prevailing studies of the place, particularly those of civil law and theology. Some of his academical disputations appear to have been printed at the time, and have since been cited with marked commendation by several writers of high name and authority on the subjects to which they related.

After studying four years at Utrecht, Mr. Shute returned to England, and entered himself a student of the Inner Temple, with a view to the legal profession. He was not, however, so absorbed in his preparations for this object as not

to take an interest in the affairs of the religious body to which he belonged. He soon began to take an active part in the controversy between the Church and the Dissenters, and in 1701 published a pamphlet, but without his name, entitled, "The Interest of England, in respect to Protestants dissenting from the established Church." In this pamphlet he dwelt on the rights of the Dissenters, to a full toleration; and argued the question on those enlarged and general principles which recommended him to the notice of Mr. Locke, with whose friendship, during the short remainder of that great man's life, he continued to be honoured. It is not improbable that to his intercourse with Mr. Locke we may in part ascribe the diligent attention to theological pursuits, scarcely met with in laymen, for which he afterwards became remarkable, and by the result of which he is now chiefly remembered.

It is also reasonable to conclude, that the early disciple of Locke was even at this period not averse to his theological views; a circumstance which when we consider how well known those views were, and in what light they were regarded by the orthodox-and that Mr. Shute was nevertheless, and continued to be, a man of great influence among the English Presbyterians, may afford us no unplausible ground for the belief that, so early as the very beginning of the last century, the most distinguished men of this denomination had already deviated materially from the standards of their forefathers. He is shortly after this time described by Swift, in a letter to Archbishop King, as "the shrewdest head in England," a leader of the Presbyterians, and the person in

whom they principally confided. He soon afterwards published another pamphlet entitled, “The Rights of Protestant Dissenters," which reached a second edition in 1705.

Mr. Shute, from his rising talents and intimate connexion with the most distinguished men of the party, was already considered as a leading man among the Dissenters, and was consulted on that ground by the most eminent statesmen of the day, in relation to various public measures by which the interests of the Dissenters were affected, or in which it was supposed that their influence could be brought into beneficial operation. One of the most important of these was the then projected union with Scotland. On this occasion he was sent for by Lord Somers to attend a meeting of the cabinet ministers, to whom, when his opinion was asked, he gave it most warmly in favour of the design. They replied, that the influence of the English Dissenters on the Presbyterians of Scotland would be most important in bringing it about; and proposed that he, as a representative of the former body, should proceed to Scotland for that purpose. After some consideration, he agreed to abandon, for the present, his professional views, in order to promote this great object; stating, at the same time, that the Dissenters were not likely to exert themselves in it, unless it was understood that the Corporation and Test Acts were to be repealed. An engagement to this effect was accordingly given, which, however, appears to have been forgotten when the object was accomplished.

In consequence of his services on this occasion, Mr. Shute, after his return from Scotland, was

appointed, in 1708, one of the Commissioners of the Customs. About the same time, Francis Barrington, Esq. of Tofts, in Essex, who had married a relation of Mr. Shute, left him his estate, on condition of his assuming the name and arms of Barrington. In 1710, he received another accession to his fortune, at the death of Mr. Wildman, of Becket, in Berkshire, who also left him his estate; declaring in his will, that he did so merely because he knew no man who was so worthy of it.

In 1711, the Whig administration being dismissed, Mr. Barrington lost his place as Commissioner of the Customs. In the course of the political contests of that period, which it is well known rose to a more than ordinary pitch of violence and animosity, he continued his connexion with the Whig party, in support of whose views he soon afterwards published a pamphlet entitled, "A Dissuasive from Jacobitism." This publication, from its connexion with the great question of primary national interest and importance at the period, had a very extensive circulation, and is described as "a specimen of clear and exact reasoning, and of a bold and intrepid exposition of the principles of civil liberty against popish superstition and arbitrary power.' We have little doubt that, on the whole, it deserved this commendation; though some of the extracts given by Mr. Townsend may, perhaps, lead to the suspicion, that the author was led by a prejudice, not at all unnatural in the defenders of civil liberty in those days, to mix up the political and the reli

*See Townsend's Life of Lord Barrington, prefixed to the last edition of his Theological Works, p. xxviii.

gious questions together. We cannot much wonder that, at that period, "popish superstitions and arbitrary power" were so closely associated in many men's minds as to be almost identified; but we have lived to see the cry of " no popery" pretty effectually separated from all more than ordinary pretensions to an attachment to civil freedom.

On the accession of George I. Mr. Barrington was among those who were immediately presented to the new sovereign; but he declined the offers of preferment that were made to him, so long as the Schism and Occasional Conformity Acts, which had been passed during the late administration, and by which the principles of the toleration previously enjoyed, imperfect and unsatisfactory as it was, were obviously violated, remained unrepealed. From this time they remained, it is true, nearly a dead letter; but they were not formally erased from the statute book till the year 1717: after which (in 1720), Mr. B. was raised to the Irish peerage by the titles of Baron Barrington, of Newcastle, and Viscount Barrington, of Ardglass; he received at the same time a reversionary grant of the office of Master of the Rolls in Ireland, which he resigned in 1731.

In the first parliament of George I. Mr. B. was returned to the House of Commons, as member for Berwick-upon-Tweed; and was again elected for the same place in 1722. He does not appear to have been a frequent or eloquent speaker in parliament; but from his reputation and connexions, was, doubtless, a man of considerable influence, and took an active part in support