ee of
London. He was also appointed a member of the Privy Council, and
entrusted with the education of the two princesses--Mary and Anne. He
showed a liberality most unusual at the time to Protestant dissenters,
whom he wished to reunite with the established church. He held several
conferences on the subject with the clergy of his diocese; and in the
hope of influencing candid minds by means of the opinions of unbiassed
foreigners, he obtained letters treating of the question (since printed
at the end of Stillingfleet's _Unreasonableness of Separation_) from Le
Moyne; professor of divinity at Leiden, and the famous French Protestant
divine, Jean Claude. But to Roman Catholicism he was strongly opposed.
On the accession of James II. he consequently lost his seat in the
council and his deanery in the Chapel Royal; and for his firmness in
refusing to suspend John Sharp, rector of St Giles's-in-the-Fields,
whose anti-papal writings had rendered him obnoxious to the king, he was
himself suspended. At the Revolution Compton embraced the cause of
William and Mary; he performed the ceremony of their coronation; his old
position was restored to him; and among other appointments, he was
chosen as one of the commissioners for revising the liturgy. During the
reign of Anne he remained a member of the privy council, and was one of
the commissioners appointed to arrange the terms of the union of England
and Scotland; but, to his bitter disappointment, his claims to the
primacy were twice passed over. He died at Fulham on the 7th of July
1713. He had conspicuous defects both in spirit and intellect, but was
benevolent and philanthropic. He was a successful botanist. He
published, besides several theological works, _A Translation from the
Italian of the Life of Donna Olympia Maladichini, who governed the
Church during the time of Pope Innocent X., which was from the year 1644
to 1655_ (1667), and _A Translation from the French of the Jesuits'
Intrigues_ (1669).

COMPTROLLER, the title of an official whose business primarily was to
examine and take charge of accounts, hence to direct or control, e.g.
the English comptroller of the household, comptroller and
auditor-general (head of the exchequer and audit department),
comptroller-general of patents, &c., comptroller-general (head of the
national debt office). On the other hand, the word is frequently spelt
_controller_, as in controller of the navy, controller or head of the
stat