Bridgewater Francis Henry Egerton

Bridgewater, Francis Henry Egerton, Earl of (1758-1829), son of the Bishop of Durham, succeeded as eighth earl 1823, and died unmarried 1829. He is chiefly remembered as the originator of the Bridgewater treatises. He had left £8,000 for the author of the best treatise On the Power, Wisdom, and Goodness of God as manifested in the Creation. The money was, however, in the discretion of the executor of the bequest bestowed upon the eight writers of eight separate treatises, which with different degrees of merit carry out the designs of their founder. Among these the most notable are, perhaps, that of Sir Charles Bell on the Hand, and that of Dean Buckland on Geology and Mineralogy. They are all to be found in Bonn's Scientific Library.