Mr. Lucre, possessing high political connection, and withal affecting to be very religious, presented singular points of character for observation.  He was a great disciplinarian in theory, and rendered it imperative on his poor overworn curate to be so in practice; but being always engaged in the pursuit of some ecclesiastical windfall, he consequently spent most of his time, and of his money, either in our own metropolis or London—­but principally in the latter.  He did not, however, leave either his discipline or his devotion as a public man behind him.  In Dublin, he was practical in worshipping the Lord Lieutenant—­and in London, the King; whilst his curate was only worshipping God in the country.  The result of his better sense and more seasonable piety soon became evident, on his part, in the shape of an appointment to a second living; and that of his curate, in obscurity, poverty, and that useless gift, a good conscience.

We have said that Mr. Lucre was not Pious; yet we are far from saying that he had not all the credit of piety.  His name, in fact, was always conspicuous among the most bountiful contributors to the religious societies.  Indeed he looked upon most of them as excellent auxiliaries to the cold and scanty labors of those worldly-minded or indolent pastors, who think, when they have furnished every family in the parish with a Bible and a sheaf of tracts, that they have done their duty.  Mr. Lucre, consequently, bore an excellent character everywhere but among the poor, sick, and indigent of his two large parishes; and if a eulogium had been called for on him, he would have received an admirable one from the societies to whose funds he contributed, from the gentry of his respective parishes, and from the grand juries of the two counties in which they we’re situated.

What more than this could be expected?  Here was ample testimony for those who required it, to establish the zeal, efficiency, talents, integrity, charity and piety of that worthy and useful minister of God—­the Rev. Phineas Lucre, D.D.

Such were a few of the virtues which belonged to this gentleman.  His claims for preferment were, indeed, peculiarly strong; and when we mention the political influence of himself and his friends, his wife’s powerful connections, added to his able pamphlets, and the great mass of sound information regarding the state of the country, which in the discharge of his religious duties, he communicated from time to time to the government of the day—­we think we have said enough to satisfy our readers that he ought not to be overlooked in the wealthy and pious Establishment, which the Irish Church then was.  Still, in fact, we cannot stop here, for in good truth Mr. Lucre had yet stronger claims for preferment than any we have yet mentioned.  He did not stand in need of it.  In addition to a large dowry received with his wife, he possessed a private fortune of fourteen hundred pounds per annum, with which, joined to his two large livings, he was enabled to turn out a very primitive and apostolic equipage, such as would have made the hearts of the Apostles rejoice in reflecting, that so many new virtues were to spring up in the progress of society from the lowly-religion they established.