Charles Seager (orientalist)

Charles Seager (1808–1878) was an English orientalist. A Catholic convert of 1842, he spent over 30 years as an independent scholar and author.[1]

Early life

Born in 1808, he was the second son of John Seager (1776–1849) of Evesbatch, Worcestershire, rector of Welsh Bicknor, Herefordshire, from 1808 until his death.[2][3] John Seager published editions of works on Ancient Greek by Lambert Bos, Hendrik Hoogeveen, Gottfried Hermann, Michael Maittaire and François Viger.[2]

Charles Seager matriculated as a member of Magdalen Hall, Oxford, on 30 November 1832;[3] and obtained the Pusey and Ellerton scholarship in 1834. In that year he was elected a scholar of Worcester College, He graduated B.A. on 25 May 1836, and M.A. on 24 April 1839.[2]

Seager was ordained deacon in the Church of England, in June 1836 by Richard Bagot, Bishop of Oxford;[4] That year he gained a Kennicott Hebrew scholarship, given by public examination and open to Oxford B.A.s. The maximum tenure was four years.[5] and was ordained priest in 1837.[6] For some time he had been a pupil of Edward Pusey, under whom he gave public lectures in Hebrew, acting as Pusey's assistant for four years.[2][7]

Catholic convert

Edmund Jackson, writing in 1899 in the Dublin Review, called Seager "one of the type, growing extinct, of quaint, old-world scholars, full of out-of-the-way learning".[8]

Seager was in Oxford during the rise of the Tractarians. He became associated with the movement, and assisted in the publication of the literature connected with it.[2] He excited comment by wearing a distinctive black stole while assisting at services at St Thomas the Martyr's Church. He was attacked for the ritualism of its added crosses, and supposed crosses on the surplice, by George Townsend.[9]

From 1838 Seager lived in a shared house on St Aldate's, Oxford for "young writers" set up by Pusey and John Henry Newman, with Mark Pattison and James Bowling Mozley.[1] By summer 1841, the Seagers had a daughter, and were living at 28 St John Street, Oxford.[10] It was there, with the Seagers, that Marian Hughes in 1841 took the three vows as an Anglican nun, before Pusey; her cousin Thomas Chamberlain was a friend of Seager's.[11][12] The Seagers then travelled in France with Hughes, visiting convents in Normandy.[13] As did John Rouse Bloxam, a Tractarian colleague who shared his interest in liturgy, Seager visited the new Catholic chapel opened by Ambrose Phillipps De Lisle at Grace-Dieu.[14]

With William George Ward and John Dobree Dalgairns following, Seager was in the earliest group of Tractarian converts to Catholicism.[15] In January 1842 Pusey wrote to Newman asking him to correct Seager's romanising tendencies; Newman's efforts were in vain.[2]

Seager was received into the Catholic Church on 12 October 1843 at St Mary's College, Oscott. The following day, Newman noted in his diary that Seager had written to him, asking Newman to break the news to his wife. Newman's supporter Charles Crawley (1788–1871) pronounced Seager "mad", "positively mad".[16] His conversion grieved Pusey.[2] Seager found Nicholas Wiseman's orientalist knowledge sympathetic, and it was Wiseman who received him as a Catholic.[17]

Seager then began a long itinerant period as an independent scholar. In 1847 the Seagers' daughter Marian died in Paris, aged six.[10] In 1850 Seager and his wife were living in Brussels.[18] In the early 1870s he tutored E. A. Wallis Budge in Biblical Hebrew and Syriac.[1] He provided Budge with an introduction to Samuel Birch of the British Museum; and began to teach him cuneiform.[19]

Academic orientalist

When the Catholic University College, Kensington was founded in 1875, Seager was appointed to the chair of Hebrew and comparative philology.[1] His knowledge of oriental languages was extensive, but his special forte lay in the Semitic branch, Hebrew, Arabic, and Syriac being his chief study. During the latter part of his life, however, he devoted considerable attention to the languages of Assyria and Egypt, and he was a regular attendant at the classes instituted by the Society of Biblical Archæology for instruction in those tongues. He came to be on good terms with Archibald Sayce and Peter le Page Renouf, lecturers at the classes.[2]

Death

Charles Seager died suddenly at the Hôtel de La Ville in Florence, while attending the 4th International Congress of Orientalists on 18 September 1878. Shortly before his death he had been re-admitted a member of the University of Oxford.[2]

Works

Seager's works are:[2]

  • Græcorum casuum analysis. De vera casuum verborum, inflectionumque in genere, natura et origine … brevis disputatio, London, 1833. "...an enquiry that turns upon the affinity of Greek and Sanscrit".[20]
  • A Hebrew ode for the inauguration of His Grace the Duke of Wellington as Chancellor of the University of Oxford, 1834[21]
  • The Daily Service of the Anglo-Catholic Church, adapted to family or private worship. By a Priest, Banbury, 1838. Stanley Morison called this "a neat quasi-liturgical piece".[14]
  • Auricular Confession. Six letters in answer to the attacks of one of the city lecturers, on the Catholic principle of private confession to a priest … By Academicus, Oxford, 1842. Reply to the Rev. William Simcox Bricknell.
  • Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ Officia Antiqua: Portiforii seu Breviarii Sarisburiensis, annotatione perpetua illustrati, et cum Breviariis Eboracensi, Herefordensi, et Romano comparati, Fasciculus Primus, London, 1843; 2nd part, London, 1855. The first portion of the fasciculus primus had been separately published, London, 1842.[22] For the Use of Sarum, attributed to Saint Osmund, Seager published ultimately two fascicles making up the Commune of the Salisbury Breviary.[23] The first part was published in Brussels in 1843, the second in Treves in 1856.[24]
  • The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola, translated from the authorised Latin, preface by Nicholas Wiseman, London, 1847. One of a number of English translations of the Spiritual Exercises.
  • Faithfulness to Grace. On the Position of Anglicans holding the Real Presence; with considerations on the sin of unlawful obedience, London, 1850. "In Letter to a Friend."[25]
  • The Female Jesuit abroad; a true and romantic Narrative of True Life: including some account, with historical reminiscences, of Bonn and the Middle Rhine, London, 1853. On the imposter Marie Garside. Jemima Luke had written a novel, The Female Jesuit, a loosely-based satire about Garside, and a sequel. Seager, who had encountered Garside in Brussels, added a third novel mixing fiction and autobiography.[18]
  • The Cumulative Vote, as a moderative of State oscillations, London (3 editions), 1867. Letter to the Editor of The Times.[26]
  • Plutocracy as a Principle; or, does the possession of property involve, as a moral right, that of political power? A letter in which are impartially presented both sides of the question, 2nd edit. London, 1867.
  • The Suffrage as a Moral Right: what are its grounds?, London, 1867.

Seager was also a contributor to the Classical Museum and to the Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archæology.[2] He translated:

Family

Seager married in 1837, Anna Smith, daughter of the late Rev. Walter Smith (died 1821).[1][30] She also became a Catholic. Their children included Ignatius Seager (1845–1870), a priest, and Osmund Seager of the Admiralty.[31] Anna Seager died at Ramsgate on 27 March 1893.[2]

Notes

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Murphy, G. Martin. "Seager, Charles (1808–1878)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/24981. (Subscription, Wikipedia Library access or UK public library membership required.)
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Lee, Sidney, ed. (1897). "Seager, Charles" . Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 51. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
  3. 1 2 Foster, Joseph (1888–1891). "Seager, Charles" . Alumni Oxonienses: the Members of the University of Oxford, 1715–1886. Oxford: James Parker – via Wikisource.
  4. ↑ "Ordinations". Berkshire Chronicle. 11 June 1836. p. 4.
  5. ↑ University of Oxford (1838). Oxford University Calendar. University of Oxford. pp. 90–92.
  6. ↑ Brown, Stewart J.; Nockles, Peter B. (28 June 2012). The Oxford Movement: Europe and the Wider World 1830-1930 (192 note 22 ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-107-01644-6.
  7. ↑ Withey, D. (1 January 1992). John Henry Newman: Liturgy and the Breviary - Their Influence on His Life as an Anglican. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc. p. 71. ISBN 978-0-7220-4611-1.
  8. ↑ The Dublin Review. Tablet Publishing Company. 1899. p. 286.
  9. ↑ Ollard, Sidney Leslie (1915). A short history of the Oxford movement. London and Milwaukee: A. R. Mowbray. pp. 163–164.
  10. 1 2 "Marian Hughes: St Sepulchre's Cemetery, Oxford". www.oxfordhistory.org.uk.
  11. ↑ Bonham, Valerie. "Hughes, Marian Rebecca (1817–1912)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/39553. (Subscription, Wikipedia Library access or UK public library membership required.)
  12. ↑ Foster, Joseph (1888–1891). "Chamberlain, Thomas" . Alumni Oxonienses: the Members of the University of Oxford, 1715–1886. Oxford: James Parker – via Wikisource.
  13. ↑ Meacock, Joanna (2001). "Saintly ecstasies: the appropriation and secularisation of saintly imagery in the paintings and poems of Dante Gabriel Rossetti". University of Glasgow. p. 82.
  14. 1 2 Morison, Stanley (19 November 2009). English Prayer Books: An Introduction to the Literature of Christian Public Worship. Cambridge University Press. p. 145. ISBN 978-0-521-14252-6.
  15. ↑ Jones, H. S. (7 June 2007). Intellect and Character in Victorian England: Mark Pattison and the Invention of the Don. Cambridge University Press. p. 32. ISBN 978-0-521-87605-6.
  16. ↑ Newman, John Henry (1961). Letters and Diaries of John Henry Newman: Littlemore and the parting of friends May 1842-October 1843. Vol. IX. T. Nelson. p. 567. ISBN 978-0-19-925458-3. {{cite book}}: ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
  17. ↑ Gwynn, Denis (1950). Cardinal Wiseman. Browne & Nolan. p. 90.
  18. 1 2 Luke, Jemima Thompson (1852). A Sequel to The Female Jesuit: Containing Her Previous History and Recent Discovery. Partridge & Oakey. p. 65.
  19. ↑ Fagan, Brian M. (2007). Return to Babylon: Travelers, Archaeologists, and Monuments in Mesopotamia. University Press of Colorado. p. 212. ISBN 978-0-87081-867-7.
  20. ↑ Cave, Edward; Henry, David; Nichols, John; Nichols, John Bowyer; Mitford, John; Nichols, John Gough; Parker, John Henry; Hatton, Joseph; Knight, Joseph; Bullen, Arthur Henry (1833). The Gentleman's Magazine. F. Jefferies. p. 539.
  21. ↑ "A Hebrew ode for the inauguration of His Grace the Duke of Wellington as Chancellor of the University of Oxford, 1834". www.nli.org.il.
  22. ↑ Church, Catholic (1843). Portiforii seu breviarii Sarisburiensis annotatione illustrati et cum breviariis Eboracensi, etc: comparati fasciculus primus [and secundus paged contin (in Latin). J. Leslie.
  23. ↑ The Ecclesiastic. 1856. p. 243.
  24. ↑ Wordsworth, Christopher; Littlehales, Henry (1904). The old service-books of the English Church. London: Methuen. p. 99.
  25. ↑ Seager, Charles (1850). Faithfulness to Grace: On the Position of Anglicans Holding the Real Presence; with Considerations on the Sin of Unlawful Obedience, and on Other Connected Matters: in a Letter to a Friend. C. Dolman.
  26. ↑ Seager, Charles (1867). The Cumulative Vote.
  27. ↑ Horne, Thomas Hartwell (1851). An Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures. Vol. II. R. Carter & Bros. p. 90.
  28. ↑ Newman, John Henry (1961). Letters and Diaries of John Henry Newman: Littlemore and the parting of friends May 1842-October 1843. Vol. IX. T. Nelson. p. 269 note 3. ISBN 978-0-19-925458-3. {{cite book}}: ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
  29. ↑ Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1911). "Gustave Xavier Lacroix de Ravignan" . Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 12. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
  30. ↑ "Smith, Walter (SMT785W)". A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.
  31. ↑ Gordon-Gorman, William James (1910). Converts to Rome: a biographical list of the more notable converts to the Catholic Church in the United Kingdom during the last sixty years. London: Sands. p. 246.

Attribution

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Lee, Sidney, ed. (1897). "Seager, Charles". Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 51. London: Smith, Elder & Co.

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