Foston was worth L500 a year, and Dr.
Markham, Archbishop of York, allowed the new Rector to be non-resident,
accepting his duties at the Foundling Hospital as a sufficient
justification for absence from his parish. Early in 1807 he preached at the
Temple Church, and published by request, a sermon on Toleration, which drew
this testimony from a scandalized peer:[35]--
"Sydney Smith preached yesterday a sermon on the Catholic question....
It would have made an admirable party speech in Parliament, but as a
sermon, the author deserved the Star Chamber, if it still existed."
During the summer of 1807, the Smiths lived in a hired house at Sonning on
the Thames; and one of their neighbours was the great civilian Sir William
Scott,[36] afterwards Lord Stowell (who deserves to be honoured for having
coined the phrase--"The elegant simplicity of the Three per cents"). The
old judge took a fancy to the young clergyman, and pointed out, in a
friendly spirit, how much he had lost by his devotion to Whiggism. In later
life, Sydney Smith wrote to Lord John Russell[37]--"I remember with
pleasure, thirty years ago, old Lord Stowell saying to me, 'Mr. Smith, you
would have been a much richer man if you had joined us.'"
But the Tory table-talk of Earley[38] was powerless to seduce this staunch
partisan from his political allegiance; and, just at this period, he was
meditating the most skilful and the most resounding blow which he ever
struck for freedom and justice.
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