DEATH OF THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2702, 5 December 1882, Page 3

DEATH OF THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.

Our telegrams this morning announce the death of the Most Rev. Dr. Tait, Archbishop of Canterbury. From “ Men of the Time” wo take the following biographical notice:—

Tait, the Most Rev. Archibald Campbell, D.D., Archbishop of Canterbury, and Primate of all England, is the youngest son of the late Craufurd Tait, Esq., W.S., of Harvieston co., Clackmannan, his mother being a daughter of the late Sir Islay Campbell, Bart., of Succoth, sometime Lord President of the Court of Session, born in Edinburgh, December 22nd, 1811, was educated at the High School and at the Academy at Edinburgh, under Archdeacon Williams; wont in 1527 to the University of Glasgow, where ho attended the lectures of the late Sir Daniel K. Sandford and Mr Buchanan; was elected in 1830 an Exhibitioner on Snell’s foundation, to Balliol College, Oxford, of which he became successively Scholar, Follow, and Tutor, and graduated B.A. in first-class honors. He subsequently became a Public Examiner of the University. Whilst residing at Oxford in his capacity as college tutor, he took a prominent part in opposing the spread of Traetarian principles, and was one of the four tutors who first drew the attention of the university authorities to the celebrated Tract No. 90, written by Mr Newman, for the purpose of showing that the Thirty-nine Articles of the Established Church could bo honestly subscribed by those who held Homan Catholic doctrines. His opposition, however, to this school of theology, always courteous and open, was marked by the most sincere respect for, and personal attachment to, those who held these peculiar views. The circumstance of Mr Tart’s being in holy orders proved, in the then state of the law, an obstacle to his appointment, in 1833, to succeeed the late Sir D. K. Sandford in the Greek chair at Glasgow ; but the death of Dr Arnold in 1542 opened to him a field of greater usefulness, as he was selected to fill the important office of head master of Eugby school, where he remained eight years. While there he married a daughter of the late Venerable Archdeacon Spooner,brother of the late Mr Richard Spooner, long one of the members for Warwickshire, and uncle to the then bishop of Oxford. She died December Ist, 1878. A severe illness, occasioned by over exertion in his arduous post, probably induced Dr. Tait to accept from Lord John Russell’s Government, in April, 1850, the deanery of Carlisle. But, to a man of his mental activity and conscientious devotion to his sacred calling, this could he no post of indolent retirement. He originated, and generally conducted himself, an additional pulpit service on Sundays, besides undertaking an amount of labor in visiting the poor, instructing the young and ignorant, and superintending the public charities of a large town, seldom equalled by the most hard working parish clergyman, and was at the same time an active member of the Oxford University Commission. The late Dr. Blomfield having resigned the see of London, under a special Act of Parliament, in August 1856, Dr. Tait was nominated to the vacancy. In 1863 he proposed, and by his zealous efforts powerfully contributed to the successful initiation of, an extensive scheme for supplying the deficiency of church accommodation in London, by raising a fund of .£1,000,000 in the course of ten years. On the death of the late Dr. Longley, in 1868, Dr. Tait was appointed his successor in the archi-episcopal see of Canterbury. The University of Glasgow conferred on him the degree of L.L.D. in 1869. Dr. Tait presided over the Pan-Anglican Synod held at Lambeth in 1867, the Church Congress at Croydon in 1877, and the Conference of Anglican Bishops at Lambeth in 1878. He has written two volumes of sermons, preached either at Oxford or in the school chapel at Eugby ; a work entitled “ The Dangers and Safeguards of Modern Theology,” with remarks on the celebrated “ Essays and Reviews,” published in 1861; “ The Word of God and the Ground of Faith,” in 1863; “ Charge to the Clergy,” in 1866; “Some Thoughts on Duties of the Church of England,” a charge to his clergy in 1876, and has contributed articles on education and on kindred topics to the “ Edinburgh and North British Review.”