Ripley, George

, a chemist and poet in the time of Henry VII. was a canon of Bricllington, and accomplished in many branches of erudition; and still maintains his reputation as a learned chemist of the lower ages. He was a great traveller, and studied both in France and Italy. At his return from abroad, pope Innocent VIII. absolved him from the observance of the rules of his order, that he might prosecute his studies with more convenience and freedom. But his convent not concurring with this very liberal indulgence, he turned Carmelite at St. Botolph’s in Lincolnshire, and died in that fraternity in 1490. His chemical poems are nothing more than the doctrines of alchemy cloathed in plain language, and a very rugged versification. His capital performance is the “Compound of Alchemic,” written in 1471, in the octave metre, and dedicated to Edward IV. He has left a few other compositions on his favourite science, printed by Ashmole, who was an enthusiast in this abused species of philosophy; and some lives of saints in ms. ²