Samuel Parr

Samuel Parr (26 January 1747 – 6 March 1825), was an English schoolmaster, writer, minister and Doctor of Law. He was known in his time for political writing, and (flatteringly) as "the Whig Johnson", though his reputation has lasted less well than Samuel Johnson's, and the resemblances were at a superficial level; Parr was no prose stylist, even if he was an influential literary figure. A prolific correspondent, he kept up with many of his pupils, and involved himself widely in intellectual and political life.

Life

Early life and education Parr was born at Harrow on the Hill to Samuel Parr, a surgeon, and his wife Ann. Samuel was a determined and educated man who taught his only son Latin grammar at the age of four. Less than a year later, his father married again, this time to Margaret Coxe, much to the displeasure of his son, who was sixteen at the time.

Samuel was eventually allowed to swap medicine for divinity. To this end, Parr entered the University of Cambridge, perhaps as a sizar as his stepmother had suggested where, as he wrote later, his "tutors were eminently able, and to me uniformly kind". Though his stay at the school was short – he left after only twelve or fourteen months, Towards the close of 1785, he decided to leave Norwich – principally because his post as headmaster did not pay well but required a great deal of his time. He was an adamant support of Charles James Fox, and vehemently disliked William Pitt the Younger. Godwin replied at length to Parr, noting critically that:It may appear at first sight a little surprising that all there is of gall, intolerance and contempt in Dr. Parr’s publication, is contained in that part of it which was delivered by him from the pulpit in the character of a Christian preacher, and that whatever is gentlemanlike, liberal or candid is thrown back into the Notes.

Parr wrote of his views in his memoirs:

My principles, I am sure, will never endanger the church [of England] – my studies, I hope, are such as do not disgrace it – and my actions, I can say with confidence, have ever tended to preserve it from open, and what I conceive to be unjust attacks.

In Parr 1813 he wrote the Latin inscription on King Richard's Well at the presumed site of the Battle of Bosworth, Shenton.

Memoirs There are two memoirs of his life, one by William Field (1828), the other, with his works and his letters, by John Johnstone (1828); and Edmund Henry Barker published in 1828–1829 two volumes of Parriana, a confused mass of information on Parr and his friends. An essay on his life, Dr. Samuel Parr: or, Whiggism in its relations to literature, is included in Thomas de Quincey's works, vol. v., and a little volume of the Aphorisms, Opinions and Reflections of the late Dr Parr appeared in 1826.