Walton died, at the house of his son-in-law, Dr. Hawkins, in Winchester,
on Dec. 15, 1683: he is buried in the south aisle of the Cathedral. The
Cathedral library possesses many of Walton's books, with his name written
in them. {5} His _Eusebius_ (1636) contains, on the fly-leaf,
repetitions, in various forms, of one of his studied passages. Simple as
he seems, he is a careful artist in language.

Such are the scanty records, and scantier relics, of a very long life.
Circumstances and inclination combined to make Walpole choose the
_fallentis semita vitae_. Without ambition, save to be in the society of
good men, he passed through turmoil, ever companioned by content. For
him existence had its trials: he saw all that he held most sacred
overthrown; laws broken up; his king publicly murdered; his friends
outcasts; his worship proscribed; he himself suffered in property from
the raid of the Kirk into England. He underwent many bereavements: child
after child he lost, but content he did not lose, nor sweetness of heart,
nor belief. His was one of those happy characters which are never found
disassociated from unquestioning faith. Of old he might have been the
ancient religious Athenian in the opening of Plato's _Republic_, or
Virgil's aged gardener. The happiness of such natures would be
incomplete without religion, but only by such tranquil and blessed souls
can religion be accepted with no doubt or scruple, no dread, and no
misgiving. In his Preface to _Thealma and Clearchus_ Walton writes, and
we may use his own words about his own works: 'The Reader will here find
such various events and rewards of innocent Truth and undissembled
Honesty, as is like to leave in him (if he be a good-natured reader) more
sympathising and virtuous impressions, than ten times so much time spent
in impertinent, critical, and needless disputes about religion.' Walton
relied on authority; on 'a plain, unperplexed catechism.' In an age of