CHURCH, RICHARD WILLIAM (1815-1890).—­Divine, historian, and biographer, was b. at Lisbon, and ed. at Oxf., where he became a friend of J.H.  Newman (q.v.).  He took orders, and became Rector of Whatley, Somerset, and in 1871 Dean of St. Paul’s.  He was a leading member of the High Church party, but was held in reverence by many who did not sympathise with his ecclesiastical views.  Among his writings are The Beginning of the Middle Ages (1877), and a memoir on The Oxford Movement (1891), pub. posthumously.  He also wrote Lives of Anselm, Dante, Spenser, and Bacon.

CHURCHILL, CHARLES (1731-1764).—­Satirist, s. of a clergyman, was ed. at Westminster School, and while still a schoolboy made a clandestine marriage.  He entered the Church, and on the death of his f. in 1758 succeeded him in the curacy and lectureship of St. John’s, Westminster.  In 1761 he pub. the Rosciad, in which he severely satirised the players and managers of the day.  It at once brought him both fame and money; but he fell into dissipated habits, separated from his wife, and outraged the proprieties of his profession to such an extent that he was compelled to resign his preferments.  He also incurred the enmity of those whom he had attacked, which led to the publication of two other satirical pieces, The Apology and Night.  He also attacked Dr. Johnson and his circle in The Ghost, and the Scotch in The Prophecy of Famine.  He attached himself to John Wilkes, on a visit to whom, at Boulogne, he d. of fever.

CHURCHYARD, THOMAS (1520?-1604).—­Poet and miscellaneous writer, began life as a page to the Earl of Surrey, and subsequently passed through many vicissitudes as a soldier in Scotland, Ireland, France, and the Low Countries.  He was latterly a hanger-on at Court, and had a pension of eighteenpence a day from Queen Elizabeth, which was not, however, regularly paid.  He wrote innumerable pamphlets and broadsides, and some poems, of which the best are Shore’s Wife (1563), The Worthiness of Wales (1587) repub. by the Spenser Society (1871), and Churchyard’s Chips (1575), an autobiographical piece.

CIBBER, COLLEY (1671-1757).—­Actor and dramatist, b. in London, s. of a Danish sculptor, and ed. at Grantham School.  Soon after his return to London he took to the stage.  Beginning with tragedy, in which he failed, he turned to comedy, and became popular in eccentric roles.  In 1696 he brought out his first play, Love’s Last Shift, and produced in all about 30 plays, some of which were very successful.  In 1730 he was made Poet Laureate, and wrote some forgotten odes of no merit, also an entertaining autobiography.  Pope made him the hero of the Dunciad.

Among other plays are The Nonjuror (1717), Woman’s Wit, She Would and She Would Not, The Provoked Husband (1728) (with Vanbrugh).