Lords as Lord Morley in 1523. He was a man of literary attainments and translated some of the writings of Plutarch, Boccaccio, Petrarch, Seneca, Cicero and others into English. Most of these are only found in manuscript, but his Tryumphes of Fraunces Petrarcke was published a second time in 1887. His eldest son Henry (d. 1553) died during his father’s lifetime, leaving a son Henry (d. 1577) who became 11th Baron Morley on his grandfather’s death. His son Edward (d. 1618), one of the judges of Mary Queen of Scots, succeeded to the barony; and Edward’s son and successor was William Parker, 4th Lord Monteagle (q.v.). The barony of Morley remained united with that of Monteagle until the death of William’s grandson Thomas about 1686, when it fell into abeyance.
John Parker, 1st earl of Morley (1772–1840), only son of John Parker (1735–1788), who was created Baron Boringdon in 1784, but was no relation of the previous barons Morley, was a prominent supporter of Pitt and of Canning. In 1815 he was created earl of Morley. He was a public benefactor to Plymouth and its neighbourhood. He was succeeded by his son Edmund Henry Parker (1810–1864), whose son, Albert Edmund, the 3rd earl (1843–1905), was chairman of committees in the House of Lords from 1889 to 1905, after having been under-secretary for war and first commissioner of works. In 1905 his son, Edmund Robert (b. 1877), became 4th earl.
MORLEY, GEORGE (1597–1684), English bishop, was born in London and educated at Westminster and Oxford. In 1640 he was presented to the sinecure living of Hartfield, Sussex, and in the following year he was made canon of Christ Church and exchanged to the rectory of Mildenhall, Wiltshire. He preached before the Commons in 1642, but his sermon gave offence, and when in 1647 he took a prominent part in resisting the parliamentary visitation of Oxford University he was deprived of his canonry and living. Leaving England he joined the court of Charles II., and became one of the leading clergy at The Hague. Shortly before the Restoration he came to England on a highly successful mission to gain for Charles the support of the Presbyterians. In 1660 he regained his canonry, and soon became dean of Christ Church. In the same year he was consecrated bishop of Worcester. At the Savoy conference of 1661 he was chief representative of the bishops. He was translated to the see of Winchester in 1662. His works are few and chiefly polemical, e.g. The Bishop of Worcester’s Letter to a friend for Vindication of himself from the Calumnies of Mr Richard Baxter (London, 1662).
MORLEY, HENRY (1822–1894), British man of letters, was born in London on the 15th of September 1822. After unhappy experiences at English schools, he was sent to the Moravian school at Neuwied, whose system strongly influenced his subsequent theories of education. It was intended that he should follow his father’s profession of medicine, and in 1844 he bought a share in a practice at Madeley, Shropshire. Plunged into debt by his partner’s dishonesty, he set up a small school for young children at Liscard, near Liverpool. His principle was to abolish all punishment, to make his pupils regard their work as interesting instead of repellent, and to form their character by appealing exclusively to higher motives. This scheme, carried out with much ingenuity, proved a complete success. Meanwhile he had devoted his spare time to writing. His contributions to magazines attracted the notice of Charles Dickens, on whose invitation in 1851 he settled in London as a regular contributor to Household Words. He was also on the staff of the Examiner, which he edited from 1861 to 1867. Meanwhile he had devoted much research to a life of Palissy the Potter (1852), which was at the same time a picture of life in medieval France. Encouraged by its favourable reception, he followed it up with lives of Jerome Cardan (1854) and Cornelius Agrippa (1856), and subsequently of Clement Marot (1870). His dramatic criticisms were reprinted in 1866 under the title of The Journal of a London Playgoer, 1851–1866. In 1857 he was appointed evening lecturer in English literature at King’s College, and in 1865 became, in succession to David Masson, professor of English literature at University College, London. His First Sketch of English Literature (1873), a comprehensive and useful manual, reached its 34th thousand during the author’s lifetime. He published in 1864 the first volume of a monumental history of English literature entitled English Writers, which he eventually carried in eleven volumes down to the death of Shakespeare. He was indefatigable as a popularizer of good literature. After editing a standard text of Addison’s Spectator, he brought out a vast number of classics at low prices in Morley’s Universal Library, Cassell’s National Library, and the Carisbrooke Library. His ready speech, retentive memory, earnest purpose, and bright style made him perhaps the most popular lecturer of his day. His teaching work at University College was marked by equally extraordinary success. In 1882 he accepted a post that made great calls on his time and energy—the principalship of University Hall. This institution was partly a place of residence for students of University College, and partly the home of Manchester New College. During this time he rendered further services to the cause of education in London not only by his work on the council of University College, but by his advocacy of a teaching university for London. In 1889 he resigned the principalship of University Hall and his professorship at University College, and retired to Carisbrooke, Isle of Wight, intending to devote his leisure to the completion of the great task of his life, English Writers. But with his work only half achieved he died on the 14th of May 1894.
MORLEY [of Blackburn], JOHN MORLEY, Viscount (1838–), English statesman and author, was born at Blackburn on the 24th of December 1838, being the son of Jonathan Morley, surgeon. He matriculated at Lincoln College, Oxford, in 1856, and after taking his degree in 1859 came up to London with the determination of seeking distinction by literature. He almost immediately became editor of the moribund Literary Gazette, which not all his ability could preserve from extinction. Gradually, however, he became known as a philosopher and a Radical, and as one of the ablest and most incisive contributors to the literary and political press of the day. His sympathies as a thinker seem to have been at this time chiefly with Positivism, though he never embraced Comte’s doctrine in its hierarchical aspects; but he acquired a reputation as an agnostic, which became confirmed in the popular mind when he somewhat aggressively spelt God in one of his essays with a small “g.” In 1868 he was editor for a short time of the daily Morning Star, which came to an end in 1870. In 1867 he succeeded G. H. Lewes in the editorship of the Fortnightly Review, which he conducted with brilliant success until 1883, when he was elected to parliament; he then assumed in exchange, but not for long, the lighter duties of the editorship of Macmillan’s Magazine. He had been connected with Messrs Macmillan since the commencement under his editorship, in 1878, of the “English Men of Letters” series, a collection of biographies of various merit, in which nothing is better than the editor’s own contribution in his Life of Edmund Burke, itself an extension of his article in the 9th edition of this encyclopaedia (1876). Since 1880 he had also been editor of the Pall Mall Gazette, which had been turned into a Liberal paper (see Newspapers).
In 1883 Mr Morley, who had twice unsuccessfully attempted to enter parliament, was returned for Newcastle-upon-Tyne at a by-election. The prestige thus acquired led to his presiding over a great Liberal congress at Leeds in the same year; and, although the platform never seemed his natural element, the literary finish of his style and the transparent honesty of his reasoning rapidly gained him a prominent position in the House of Commons. When, in February 1886, Mr Gladstone returned to office as a Home Ruler, Mr Morley, who had never before held any public appointment, filled one of the most important posts in the cabinet as secretary for Ireland. He had always expressed his sympathy with the Irish Nationalist movement. He had no opinions to recant, no pledges to explain away. He is credited with an especial influence over Mr Gladstone in the matter of Home Rule, and in particular with having kept him steady in the Bill of 1886 to his original purpose of entirely separating the Irish from the British legislature, a provision which pressure
