the Tower, and in the following year was admitted to the degree of B.D. In 1662 he was presented by his college to the living of St. Sepulchre's, London, which he seems to have filled in a way that secured the respect and affection of his parishioners. Three years later, Dr. Henchman, bishop of London, made him prebendary of Reculversland in St. Paul's Cathedral. In 1667 he was made chaplain to the king, and in 1671 archdeacon of St. Albans. To these preferments was also added a lectureship at the Temple. He died 19 July 1683, aged 58, and was buried in St. Sepulchre's Church.
He published the following sermons: 1. 'City Security,' 1660. 2. 'Joshua's Resolution to serve God,' 1672. 3. 'Sermon at the Funeral of Mr. Anthony Hinton,' 1679. There is an 'Elegy on the Death of the reverend, learned, and pious William Bell, D.D.' amongst the Luttrell collection of broadsides, in which he is pronounced 'a mighty loyalist and truth's defendant.'
[Wood's Athenæ (Bliss), iv. 94, and Fasti, ii. 103, 254, 302; Kennett's Register and Chronicle, Ecclesiastical and Civil, 1728, p. 796; Newcourt's Repertorium Eccles. Paroch. 1708, i. 96, 205, 534; Le Neve's Fasti, ed. Hardy, 1854, ii. 431; Stowe's Survey, ed. Strype, 1720, iii. 243; Ackerman's Hist. of Univ. of Oxford, 1814, ii. 128.]
BELL, WILLIAM (1740?–1804?), portrait painter, was born at Newcastle-upon-Tyne about the year 1740. He came to London about 1768 and entered as a student the schools of the Royal Academy, which had just then been founded, and in 1771 he carried off the gold medal for his picture of 'Venus entreating Vulcan to forge arms for her son Æneas.' Being patronised by Lord Delaval, he painted several full-length portraits of members of that nobleman's family, and in 1775 he exhibited at the Royal Academy two views of Seaton Delaval, his lordship's seat. Still he did not make any further progress, but returned to Newcastle, where he maintained himself by portrait painting until his death, which took place about 1804.
[Redgrave's Dictionary of Artists, 1878.]
BELL, WILLIAM, D.D. (1731–1816), divine, was educated at Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he took the degree of B.A. in 1753 with considerable distinction, being the eighth wrangler of his year. In 1755 he gained one of the members' prizes, and proceeded M.A. in 1756, in which year he obtained one of Lord Townshend's prizes by a dissertation on the causes of the populousness of nations, and the effect of populousness on trade. The dissertation was translated into German in 1762, under the title of ‘Quellen und Folgen einer starken Bevölkerung,’ and was replied to by ‘A Vindication of Commerce and the Arts,’ proving them the source of the greatness, power, riches, and populousness of a state, wherein ‘Mr. Bell's calumnies on trade are answered, his arguments refuted, his system exploded, and the principal causes of populosity assigned,’ by I—— B——, M.D., 1758. A fancy that he had detected an argument of the divine origin of christianity in the evangelic writings, in a circumstance hitherto overlooked or slightly mentioned, produced in 1761 Bell's ‘Enquiry into the Divine Mission.’
After remaining for some time at Magdalen, he became domestic chaplain and secretary to the Princess Amelia, daughter of George III, with whom he became domesticated at Gunnersbury House. By her interest he obtained a prebend of Westminster in 1765, and in 1767 he proceeded S.T.P. per literas regias. In 1776 he was presented by the dean and chapter of Westminster to the vicarage of St. Bridget's, London, but vacated it in 1780. It was in this year that he dedicated to the princess an elaborate essay upon the sacrament. Dr. Lewis Bagot, dean of Christ Church, controverted Bell's argument in his Warburtonian lectures in an excellent note, pp. 210–13, and published in 1781 a letter addressed to the author on the subject. Bell's opinions on this question agreed with those of Hoadly and John Taylor of Norwich. A second edition of Bell's tract appeared, and he continued the discussion in another tract published in 1790. Bell also published his ‘Attempt to ascertain the Nature of the Communion,’ including only the main argument, in the simple form of question and answer. After quitting St. Bridget's, Bell was presented to the rectory of Christ Church, London, which he resigned in 1799. He also enjoyed the treasurer's valuable stall in St. Paul's Cathedral, and administered the office with becoming disinterestedness. He, in fact, rendered himself conspicuous through life for acts of discerning liberality.
In 1787 Bell published a curious tract, entitled ‘Déclaration de mes derniers Sentimens sur les différens Dogmes de la Religion,’ by Pierre François le Courayer, D.D., the courageous, learned, and intelligent champion of English ordinations to a French public bent upon questioning their validity. The manuscript of this work had been given by Dr. Courayer himself to the Princess Amelia, with a request that it might not be published till after his death. It proved, says Bell, that its author was firmly convinced that
