Dr Herbert, Bishop of Peterborough, was born in London in 1757. After receiving his education and gaining a fellowship at St John's College, Cambridge, he removed to Germany in 1783, and resided for several years at Göttingen. In a short time he had become sufficiently intimate with the language of that country to publish several German tracts in defence of the policy of Great Britain touching the continental wars. So successful were these pamphlets in effecting the purpose at which they aimed, that Marsh, on the recommendation of Mr Pitt, was rewarded with a pension, and was now started on the open road to preferment. On the invasion of Germany by the French he returned to England. Created D.D. by royal mandate in 1806, Marsh was appointed in 1807 Lady Margaret's professor of divinity at Cambridge. In teaching from this chair he abandoned the custom of lecturing in Latin followed by his predecessors, and lectured only in English. He was promoted to the see of Llandaff in 1816, but was translated to that of Peterborough in 1819. He died in 1839. Varied as well as profound, the learning of Bishop Marsh comprised an intimacy with theology, politics, and Greek, Latin, German, and oriental literature. He was the first who imported into this country the biblical criticism of Germany. In defence of his own church, he was an uncompromising foe of Calvinism on the one hand and Popery on the other. His translation of Michaelis's Introduction to the New Testament was reckoned a work of great value.

The chief of his other works are.—The Authenticity of the Five Books of Moses considered, 4to, Cambridge, 1792; The History of the Politics of Great Britain and France, from the time of the Conference at Potsdam to the Declaration of War against Great Britain, with Lectures on the Criticism and Interpretation of the Bible, with two Preliminary Lectures on Theological Study and Theological Arrangement, 8vo, London, 1838; Lectures on the Authenticity and Credibility of the New Testament; and on the Authority of the Old Testament, a new edition, 8vo, London, 1840; and The National Religion the Foundation of National Education, 8vo, London, 1811.