Croly, George
CROLY, GEORGE (1780-1860), British divine and auihor, son of a Dublin physician, was born on the 17th of August 1780. He was educated' at Trinity College, Dublin, and after ordination was appointed to a small curacy in the north of Ireland. About 1810 he came to London, and occupied himself with literary' work. A man of restless energy, he claims attention by his extraordinary versatility. He wrote dramatic criticisms for a short-lived periodical called the New Times ; he was one of the earliest contributors to Black-wood's Magazine; and to the Literary Gazette he contributed poems, reviews and essays on all kinds of subjects. In 1819 he married Margaret Helen Begbie. Efforts to secure an English living for Croly were frustrated, according to the Gentleman's Magazine (Jan. 1861), because Lord Eldon confounded him with a Roman Catholic of the same name. Excluding his contributions to the daily and weekly press his chief works were: Paris in 1815 (1817), a poem in imitation of Childe Harold; Catiline (1822), a tragedy lacking in dramatic force; Salathiel: A Story of the Past, the Present and the Future (1829), a successful romance of the " Wandering Jew " type; The Life and Times of his late Majesty George the Fourth (1830); Marston; or, The Soldier and Statesman (1846), a novel of modern life; The Modern Orlando (1846), a satire which owes something to Don Juan; and some biographies, sermons and theological works.
Croly was an effective preacher, and continued to hope for preferment from the Tory leaders, to whom he had rendered considerable services by his pen; but he eventually received, in 1835, the living of St Stephen's, Walbrook, London, from a Whig patron, Lord Brougham, with whose family he was connected. In 1847 he was made afternoon lecturer at the Foundling hospital, but this appointment proved unfortunate. He died suddenly on the 24th of November 1860, in London.
His Poetical Works (2 vols.) were collected in 1830. For a list of his works see Allibone's Critical Dictionary of English Literature.
Note - this article incorporates content from Encyclopaedia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, (1910-1911)
