Francis Orpen Morris

Francis Orpen Morris

Francis Orpen Morris (born March 25, 1810 at Cobh , † February 10, 1893 in Nunburnholme ) was a clergyman of the Church of England and naturalist . Morris was committed to protecting birds and was an avowed opponent of vivisection . He witnessed the Huxley-Wilberforce debate at the meeting of the annual meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in 1860 and was a vehement opponent of the theory of evolution advocated by Charles Darwin .

Live and act

Francis Orpen Morris was the eldest son of the Royal Navy Admiral Henry Gage Morris († 1852) and his wife Rebecca Newenham Millerd. After his family moved to Worcester in 1824 , Morris became a student at Bromsgrove School , which he attended until 1828. There he began collecting birds and insects. For the next two years, Morris received private tuition from Vicar JM Butt, of East Garston , Berkshire . On June 17, 1829, he enrolled at Worcester College , Oxford . At the request of curator JL Duncan of the Ashmolean Museum , Morris rearranged the museum's insect collection while studying . At that time he became a member of the Ashmolean Society . Morris graduated in 1833 and was ordained on August 3, 1834. He was brief curator of Hanging Heaton at Dewsbury , Yorkshire and Taxal (Cheshire) before moving to Doncaster . There Morris was ordained a priest and from October 1835 held the office of deputy curator in Armthorpe .

On January 1, 1835, he married Anne († 1877), the second daughter of Charles Sanders from Bromsgrove . Her marriage resulted in six daughters and three sons.

1837 Morris has been the management of the Parish Ordsall near East Retford ( Nottinghamshire transmitted). In about May 1842 he became the chief curator of Crambe , a small parish between York and Malton . On November 22nd, 1844 he was awarded the living of Nafferton in Yorkshire by the Archbishop Vernon Harcourt . There he spent the next new years. In 1854, Morris was offered the small but more lucrative living at Nunburnholme , where he lived the rest of his life.

Morris was the author of numerous tracts and pamphlets, many of which were intended to provide moral and religious guidance, including Words of Wesley on Constant Communion (1869), Handbook of Hymns for the Sick Bedside (1877), The Darwin Craze (1880), and Experiments on Living Animals (1890). He also wrote numerous letters, newspaper articles and articles for magazines that dealt with various topics. As the successor to his brother Beverley R. Morris , he published the magazine The Naturalist from 1856 to 1860 . For the first edition of the magazine Animal World (1869) he wrote the contribution British Birds and published articles there regularly for the next three years. Morris published his numerous letters to the Times on bird protection in book form in 1880.

Morris wrote extensive, illustrated works on natural history. Together with the printer Benjamin Fawcett , Bible Natural History (1849–1850) was created. A History of British Birds followed, which was completed from June 1850 onwards in initially monthly editions for seven and a half years. He published the six-volume Natural History of the Nests and Eggs of British Birds (1853-1856) and A History of British Butterflies (1853) and County Seats of the Noblemen and Gentlemen of Great Britain and Ireland (1866-1880). After the collaboration with Fawcett ended, Morris published A Natural History of British Moths (1859-1870).

As an advocate of a natural theology , Morris was a vehement opponent of Charles Darwin 's theory of evolution . Morris presented his views on Darwin's theory in 1868 in a lecture entitled On the difficulties of Darwinism at the meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science .

Morris opposed vivisection . His commitment to bird protection led to the founding of the Plumage League in 1885 . In December of the same year he was one of the first members of the Selbourne League . In recognition of his work as a naturalist, the government awarded him an annual civil list pension of £ 100 in 1888.

Fonts (selection)

Plate 132 from A Natural History of the Nests and Eggs of British Birds

Francis Orpen Morris published the following works, among others:

• A Guide to an Arrangement of British Birds . London 1834 ( online ).
• An Essay on Scientific Nomenclature . A Paper read before the British Association. "York, 1844.
• Bible Natural History . 1850 ( online ).
• Book of Natural History . Groombridge & Sons, London 1852 ( online ).
• A Natural History of British Butterflies . Groombridge, London 1852 ( online ).
• National Adult Education . Read Before the British Association for the Advancement of Science, at Their Session at Hull, September 1853
• Comfort for the Contrite . 1854.
• The Precepts of the Bible . 1855.
• A Natural History of the Nests and Eggs of British Birds . 3 volumes, Groombridge & Sons, London 1853–1856 ( online ).
• A History of British Birds . 6 volumes, Groombridge & Sons, London 1850–1857 ( online ).
• The Yorkshire Hymn Book . 1860.
• Records of Animal Sagacity and Character . Longman, Green, Longman, & Roberts, London 1861 ( online ).
• A Catechism of the Catechism . London 1864.
• The County Seats of the Noblemen and Gentlemen of Great Britain and Ireland . 1866.
• The Difficulties of Darwinism . 1869.
• None but Christ . 1869.
• Dogs and their Doings . SW Partridge & Co, London 1870.
• A Natural History of British Moths . 4 volumes, HE Knox, London 1871 ( online ).
• Anecdotes in Natural History . London 1872.
• All the articles of the Darwin Faith . Moffatt, Paige & Co, London 1875 ( online ).

• The Gamekeeper's Museum . Reprinted from the Times with Additions.
• A Catalog of British Insects
• Plain Sermons for Plain People .
• An Essay on Baptismal Eegeneration.
• The Present System of Hiring Farm Servants. A paper read before the DriflBeld Farmer's Club .
• A Letter to Archdeacon Wrangham on Supremacy .
• A Family Prayer for Morning and Evening .
• Words of Wesley on Constant Communion .
• Illustrated Anecdotes in Natural History .

literature

• JFM Clark: Morris, Francis Orpen (1810-1893). In: Henry Colin Gray Matthew, Brian Harrison (Eds.): Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , from the earliest times to the year 2000 (ODNB). Volume 41: Norbury – Osborn. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004, ISBN 0-19-861391-1 , ( oxforddnb.com license required ), Last updated: 2004, accessed October 29, 2012.
• Charles A. Kofoid: Francis Orpen Morris: Ornithologist and Anti-Darwinist . In: The Auk . Volume 55, Number 3, 1938, pp. 496-500 ( doi: 10.2307 / 4078418 ).
• Marmaduke Charles Frederick Morris: Francis Orpen Morris. A memoir . John C. Nimmo, London 1897 ( online ).
• Frederick Ross: Celebrities of the Yorkshire Wolds . Trübner & Co., London 1878, pp. 106-108 ( online ).

Individual evidence

1. ^ Frederick Ross: Celebrities of the Yorkshire Wolds . Trübner & Co., London 1878, pp. 107-108 ( online ).