BERKELEY (GEORGE)

Autograph letter signed as Bishop of Cloyne, to his friend Isaac Gervais, Dean of Tuam, at Lismore, on the death of his niece, Cloyne, 24 February 1745/6

Footnotes

'SUCH IS THE HYPOCHONDRIAC MELANCHOLY COMPLEXION OF US ISLANDERS, THAT WE SEEM MADE OF BUTTER': A rediscovered letter from George Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne consoling his good friend Isaac Gervais on the death of his niece.

Letters by this major philosopher are uncommon and rarely appear at auction. According to the great authority on Berkeley, Arthur Aston Luce, some sixteen letters (including this one) have survived from Berkeley's correspondence to Isaac Gervais, Dean of Tuam, which dates from 1738-1752, and were lent by The Rev. Henry Gervais, Archdeacon of Cashel to the editor of the 1784 edition of Joseph Stock's Memoirs who published only an extract from the text. Since then the letter, and the letter in the following lot, apparently disappeared from view and editors of subsequent collections have therefore had to rely on Stock's shortened version rather than the full text, which can now be read for the first time. The letter is also included in Alexander Campbell Fraser's Works of 1871, A.A. Luce and T.E. Jessop Works (1956, Vol.VIII, no.231), and most recently Marc A. Hight's Correspondence (2013, no.337).

Isaac Gervais (1680-1756) fled to Ireland from France on the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, became Choral of Lismore in 1708, was later Prebendary there and became Dean of Tuam in 1743: '...a vivacious and every way pleasant clerical neighbour... who often visited Berkeley, and with whom he had much friendly correspondence in the remaining years of his life...' and someone who '...often enlivened the 'manse-house' at Cloyne by his wit and intercourse with the great world' (Campbell Fraser, The Works of George Berkeley, 1871, Vol.I, p.58, Vol.IV, p.260). A letter dated 6 February (Hight, no.331) indicates that Gervais' loss referred to here is the death of his niece. Berkeley writes again some two weeks later to reassure him that his naturally cheerful disposition and "elastic spirits" will help him recover.

Provenance: Private Collection, USA.