Thomas Barnard, Bishop of Limerick

Thomas Barnard (1728–1806) was an Irish churchman, successively Bishop of Killaloe and, from 1794, Bishop of Limerick. He belonged to the circle of Samuel Johnson and the Literary Club, and wrote occasional verse.

The poem here is the one printed under his name in Frederick Locker's Lyra Elegantiarum (London: E. Moxon, 1867), an anthology of vers de société and vers d'occasion by deceased authors; the texts follow that first edition.