Life
Wordsworth was born in London, the youngest son of the Rev. Dr. Christopher Wordsworth, Master of Trinity and a nephew of the poet William Wordsworth. He was the younger brother of the classical scholar John Wordsworth and Charles Wordsworth, Bishop of Saint Andrews, Dunkeld and Dunblane. He was educated at Winchester and Trinity, Cambridge. Like his brother Charles, he was distinguished as an athlete as well as for scholarship. He won the Chancellor's Gold Medal for poetry in 1827 and 1828.
He became senior classic, and was elected a fellow and tutor of Trinity in 1830; shortly afterwards he took holy orders. He went for a tour in Greece in 1832-1833, and published various works on its topography and archaeology, the most famous of which is "Wordsworth's" Greece (1839). In 1836 he became Public Orator at Cambridge, and in the same year was appointed Headmaster of Harrow, a post he resigned in 1844. In 1844 Sir Robert Peel appointed him as a Canon of Westminster (1844–1869). He was Vicar of Stanford in the Vale, Berkshire (1850–1869) and Archdeacon of Westminster (1864–1869). In 1869 Benjamin Disraeli appointed him Bishop of Lincoln which he retained until his death in 1885.
He was a man of fine character, with a high ideal of ecclesiastical duty, and he spent his money generously on church objects.
Read more about this topic: Christopher Wordsworth
Famous quotes containing the word life:
“The child begins life as a pleasure-seeking animal; his infantile personality is organized around his own appetites and his own body. In the course of his rearing the goal of exclusive pleasure seeking must be modified drastically, the fundamental urges must be subject to the dictates of conscience and society, urges must be capable of postponement and in some instances of renunciation completely.”
—Selma H. Fraiberg (20th century)
“I cannot and do not live in the world of discretion, not as a writer, anyway. I would prefer to, I assure you—it would make life easier. But discretion is, unfortunately, not for novelists.”
—Philip Roth (b. 1933)
“man’s life is thought,
And he, despite his terror, cannot cease
Ravening through century after century,
Ravening, raging, and uprooting that he may come
Into the desolation of reality....”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)