R. F. Littledale
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Richard Frederick Littledale (1833–1890) was an Anglo-Irish clergyman and writer.


Life

The fourth son of John Littledale, an auctioneer, he was born in
Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 c ...
on 14 September 1833. On 15 October 1850 he entered
Trinity College Dublin , name_Latin = Collegium Sanctae et Individuae Trinitatis Reginae Elizabethae juxta Dublin , motto = ''Perpetuis futuris temporibus duraturam'' (Latin) , motto_lang = la , motto_English = It will last i ...
, was elected a Scholar in 1852, graduated B.A. as a first class in classics, and in 1855 obtained the senior Berkeley gold medal and the first divinity prize. He proceeded at Dublin M.A. in 1858, and LL.B. and LL.D. in 1862, and at Oxford on 5 July 1862 D.C.L. ''comitatis causa''. He was curate of St. Matthew in
Thorpe Hamlet Thorpe Hamlet is a suburb of Norwich, to the east of the city centre, in the Norwich District, in the English county of Norfolk. It was constituted a separate ecclesiastical parish on 9 March 1852, from the civil parish of Old Thorpe, and in 19 ...
,
Norfolk Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the No ...
, from 1856 to 1857. From 1857 to 1861 he was curate of St Mary the Virgin, Crown Street, Soho, London, where he took an interest in the House of Charity. Throughout the remainder of his life he suffered from chronic ill-health, took little part in any parochial duties, and devoted himself mainly to writing. Until his death he continued to act as a father confessor, and next to
Edward Pusey Edward Bouverie Pusey (; 22 August 180016 September 1882) was an English Anglican cleric, for more than fifty years Regius Professor of Hebrew at the University of Oxford. He was one of the leading figures in the Oxford Movement. Early years ...
is said to have heard more confessions than any other priest of the church of England. Through
William Bell Scott William Bell Scott (1811–1890) was a Scottish artist in oils and watercolour and occasionally printmaking. He was also a poet and art teacher, and his posthumously published reminiscences give a chatty and often vivid picture of life in the ...
he came to know and influence
Christina Rossetti Christina Georgina Rossetti (5 December 1830 – 29 December 1894) was an English writer of romantic, devotional and children's poems, including " Goblin Market" and "Remember". She also wrote the words of two Christmas carols well known in Bri ...
. He died at 9
Red Lion Square Red Lion Square is a small square in Holborn, London. The square was laid out in 1684 by Nicholas Barbon, taking its name from the Red Lion Inn. According to some sources, the bodies of three regicides—Oliver Cromwell, John Bradshaw and He ...
, London, on 11 January 1890. A reredos to his memory was erected in the chapel at St. Katharine's, 32 Queen Square, London, in March 1891.


Works

Littledale was a contributor to periodicals: ''
Kottabos Kottabos ( grc, κότταβος) was a game of skill played at Ancient Greek and Etruscan symposia (drinking parties), especially in the 6th and 5th centuries BC. It involved flinging wine-lees (sediment) at a target in the middle of the ro ...
'' (a college miscellany, published at Trinity in Dublin),Littledale's contribution to ''Kottabos'', entitled "Oxford Solar Myth. A Contribution to Comparative Mythology" gets a special mention in ''Echoes from Kottabos'' by
Robert Yelverton Tyrrell Robert Yelverton Tyrrell, FBA (January 21, 1844 – September 19, 1914) was an Irish classical scholar who was Regius Professor of Greek at Trinity College, Dublin. Biography He was educated at Trinity College where he subsequently became a fe ...
and Edward Sullivan, 2nd Baronet (1906), and is published in this anthology a
p. 279
€“290.
''
Notes and Queries ''Notes and Queries'', also styled ''Notes & Queries'', is a long-running quarterly scholarly journal that publishes short articles related to " English language and literature, lexicography, history, and scholarly antiquarianism".From the inne ...
'', the '' Daily Telegraph'', the ''
Church Quarterly Review ''The Church Quarterly Review'' (now abbreviated ''CQR'') was an English journal published by the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. It existed independently from 1875 until 1968; in that year it merged with the ''London Quarterly and Hol ...
'', and '' The Academy''. He was the author of books and pamphlets in support of Anglicanism, in opposition to Roman Catholicism. In conjunction with the Rev. James Edward Vaux, Littledale wrote: ''The Priest's Prayer Book,'' 1864 (seven editions), ''The People's Hymnal,'' 1867 (eight editions), ''The Christian Passover,'' 1873 (four editions), and ''The Altar Manual,'' of which forty-six thousand copies were circulated. ''The People's Hymnal'' contained the hymn ''
Come Down, O Love Divine "Come Down, O Love Divine" is a Christian hymn usually sung for the festival of Pentecost. It makes reference to the descent of the Holy Spirit as an invocation to God to come to into the soul of the believer. It is a popular piece of Anglica ...
'', for which the words were translated by Littledale from the Italian of
Bianco da Siena Bianco di Santi alias Bianco da Siena or Bianco da Lanciolina (Anciolina, 1350 circa - Venice, 1399) was an Italian mystic poet and an imitator of Jacopone da Todi. He wrote several religiously-inspired poems ( lauda) that were popular in the Mid ...
. The original poem was included in the ''Laudi Spirituali del Bianco da Siena'' of Telesforo Bini, of 1851. He completed after the death in 1866 of the author,
John Mason Neale John Mason Neale (24 January 1818 – 6 August 1866) was an English Anglican priest, scholar and hymnwriter. He worked and wrote on a wide range of holy Christian texts, including obscure medieval hymns, both Western and Eastern. Among his most ...
, who was a close friend, Neale's ''Commentary on the Psalms from Primitive and Mediæval Writers,'' vols. ii. iii. and iv., 1868–74, and later edited two other editions of the entire work. He was also joint author with Neale of ''Liturgy of SS. Mark, James, Clement, Chrysostom, Basil,'' 1868–9. Littledale's ''Plain Reasons for not joining the Church of Rome,'' a volume of which thirty-six thousand copies were issued in 1880 and following years, evoked replies from the Rev. W. Horsfall, the Rev. A. Mills, Oxoniensis, and H. I. D. Ryder. In 1874 Littledale edited a work entitled ''The Church of England in presence of Official Anglicanism, Evangelicanism, Rationalism, and the Church of Rome. By Gervase.'' Littledale wrote the article
"Jesuits"
an

for the Ninth and Tenth Editions (1875-89; 1902-03) of the '' Encyclopaedia Britannica''. Other works were: * ‘On the Application of Colour to the Decoration of Churches,’ 1857. * ‘Religious Communities of Women in the early Church,’ 1862. * ‘Carols for Christmas and other Seasons,’ 1863. * ‘The North Side of the Altar,’ 1864; 3rd edit. 1865. * ‘Catholic Ritual in the Church of England, Scriptural, Reasonable, Lawful,’ 1865, thirteen editions. * ‘The Elevation of the Host,’ 1865, two editions. * ‘Incense: a Liturgical Essay,’ 1866. * ‘The Mixed Chalice,’ 1867, four editions. * ‘The Christian Priesthood,’ 1867. * ‘Prayers for the Dead,’ 1867. * ‘Catholic Revision of the Book of Common Prayer: a Letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury,’ 1867. * ‘Early Christian Ritual,’ 1867, four editions. * ‘What is Ritualism? And why ought it to be supported?’ 1867.
‘A commentary on the Psalms’
John Mason Neale John Mason Neale (24 January 1818 – 6 August 1866) was an English Anglican priest, scholar and hymnwriter. He worked and wrote on a wide range of holy Christian texts, including obscure medieval hymns, both Western and Eastern. Among his most ...
and Richard Frederick Littledale (1868) * ‘The Children's Bread, or Communion Office for the Young,’ 1868, four editions. * ‘Additional Services: a second Letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury,’ 1868. * ‘A Commentary on the Song of Songs,’ 1869. * ‘Church Reform,’ 1870. * ‘The Crisis of Disestablishment,’ 1870. * ‘Pharisaic Proselytism, a forgotten Chapter of early Church History,’ 1870. * ‘Tradition,’ 1870. * ‘The Two Religions,’ 1870. * ‘Misapplied Texts of Scripture: a Lecture,’ 1870. * ‘Church and Dissent,’ 1871. * ‘Secular Studies of the Clergy,’ 1871. * ‘Rationale of Prayer,’ 1872. Answered by John Tyndall and others. * ‘At the Old Catholic Congress,’ 1872. * ‘Children at Calvary,’ 1872. * ‘The Religious Education of Women,’ 1873; new edition, 1874. * ‘The Relation of the Clergy to Politics,’ 1873. * ‘Church Parties,’ 1874. * ‘Papers on Sisterhoods,’ 1874–8. * ‘Dean Stanley on Ecclesiastical Vestments,’ 1875, three editions. * ‘Last Attempt to Reform the Church of Rome from within,’ 1875. * ‘Apostolical Succession,’ 1876. * ‘Ritualistic Practices (1), what they are; (2) what they mean,’ 1876. * ‘Ritualists and Romanists,’ 1876. * ‘Ultramontane Popular Literature,’ 1876. * ‘An Inner View of the Vatican Council,’ 1877. * ‘Christianity and Patriotism,’ 1877. * ‘The Pantheistic Factor in Christian Thought,’ 1877. * ‘Why Ritualists do not become Roman Catholics,’ 1878. Replied to by the Rev.
Orby Shipley Orby Shipley (July 1, 1832 - July 5, 1916) was an English clergyman, editor, liturgist, translator, publisher, and hymn-writer. An Anglo-Catholic convert to Roman Catholicism from the Church of England, he had been a priest of the Society of the Ho ...
, 1879. * ‘Future Probation,’ 1886. * ‘A Short History of the Council of Trent,’ 1888. * ‘Words for Truth; Replies to Roman Cavils against the Church of England,’ 1888. * ‘The Petrine Claims: a Critical Inquiry,’ 1889. * ''Controversy on the Constitutions of the Jesuits'' (Winnipeg, 1889). Involved Lewis Henry Drummond.


Notes


External links


Bibliographic directory
from Project Canterbury {{DEFAULTSORT:Littledale, Richard Frederick 1833 births 1890 deaths Anglican clergy in Ireland Scholars of Trinity College Dublin