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, the first translator into English verse of all the tragedies and fragments of Euripides which are extant, was born Aug. 15, 1740, at Then ford, in Northamptonshire, and was sent first to Twyford, in Buckinghamshire, to the school of the rev. William Cleaver. This preceptor had three sons, William, bishop of St. Asaph, Eusebius, archbishop of Dublin, and John, student of Christ Church, Oxford, who were all attached to Mr. Wodhull with the sincerest friendship through life. To John, one of his poetical epistles (the ninth) is addressed, in which honourable mention is made of the father.

From Twyford he was removed to Winchester school, and afterwards to Brasennose college, Oxford. He inherited from his father, who died while he was at school, a large fortune, of which the first use that he made was to build a handsome mansion on his patrimonial inheritance. In 1761 he married a lady of great personal accomplishments, and universally loved and respected, Miss Catherine Milcah Ingram, of an ancient family situated at WoK ford, in Warwickshire, who left him a widower without family in 1808. In 1803 he took advantage of the short peace to gratify his curiosity in the libraries of Paris, and was one of the English detained by Bonaparte, but was afterward released on account of his age. He returned home an invalid and alone, and it was a source of great distress to him to be compelled to leave behind him in France his faithful servant. From that period his bodily infirmities gradually increased, his sight at length failed, and his voice became scarcely audible, but his senses and his memory, which was most singularly retentive, continued unimpaired to the last. He died without a struggle or groan, Nov. 10, 1816, in the seventy-seventh year of his age.

Of his politics, Mr. Wodhtill says they were c< those of a British whig, not run away with by national prejudices;" but he never entered into public life; his chief occupation and amusement being the study of books, of which he was celebrated as a collector. He disposed during his life of many which he had purchased, but left behind him above 4000 volumes, consisting principally of first editions and rare specimens of early printing. The duties 6f private and social life no man discharged with more fidelity or exactness. As a son, a husband, a friend, a master, a landlord, few could excel him, and his charities, which were numerous, were known generally to those only whom he benefited.

As to his religious sentiments, although he was an advocate for toleration, he invariably asserted the principle of conformity to the sound and apostolic establishments of the land. His practice, even when very infirm, was to attend divine service in his parish church, to read or pro-? cure some friend to read a sermon and prayers to his family and domestics every Sunday evening. He never spoke an unkind word to his servants, and there was hardly an instance known of any one quitting his service for that of another master. He never complained, nor uttered a peevish expression under the greatest privations and the most severe pain. His funeral was, by his own desire,' as his life had been, without parade or ostentation, and the monumental stone declares no more than the name and age of him whose mortal reliques lie near it.

Mr.Wodhuli’s poetical fame, however, does not rest merely on translations; he was the author of several poems published at different periods, which he collected in 1804, and printed with several alterations for the use of his friends in an elegant octavo volume, to which his portrait was prefixed. The poems consist of five odes, two songs, “The Equality of Mankind;” “On Mr. Hollis’s print of Dr. Mayhew;” “The Use of Poetry,” and thirteen epistles addressed to different friends. When a very young man he wrote an “Ode to Criticism,” which is not found in this collection. It was intended as an attack on certain peculiarities in the writings of Thomas Warton. Warton took a singular mode of avenging himself, by inserting the ode in “The Oxford Sausage” among poems of a very different sort. This proceeding may perhaps be considered as a proof of humour in the laureate; but it is to be regretted that it has been the means of perpetuating a composition which its author would long ago have consigned to oblivion.

, a Scotch ecclesiastical historian, son to the rev. James Wodrow, professor of divinity in the university of Glasgow, was born there in 1679, and after passing through his academic course, was chosen in 1698 librarian to the university. He held this office for four years, during which he had many valuable opportunities for indulging his taste in the history and antiquities of the church of Scotland. In 1703 he was ordained minister of the parish of Eastwood, in which humble station he continued all his life, although he had encouraging offers of greater preferment in Glasgow and Stirling. He died in 1734, at the age of fifty-five. He published in 1721, in 2 vols. folio., a “History of the singular sufferings of the Church of Scotland, during the twenty-eight years immediately preceding the Revolution,” written with a fidelity which has seldom been disputed, and confirmed, at the end of each volume, by a large mass of public and private records. In England this work has been little known, except perhaps by an abridgment in 2 vols. 8vo. by the Rev. Mr. Cruickshanks, but since the publication of the historical work of the Hop. Charles James Fox, as well as by the writings of Messrs. Sommerville and Laing, it has greatly risen in reputation as well as price. “No historical facts,” Mr. Fox says, “are better ascertained than the accounts which are to be found in Wodrow. In every instance where there has been an opportunity of comparing these accounts with the records and authentic monuments, they appear to be quite correct.” Mr. Wodrow also left a greafc many biographical memoirs of the Scotch reformers and presbyterian divines, which are preserved in the university library of Glasgow.

, a name worthy to be preserved on account of his valuable edition of the Alexandrine ms. of the New Testament, was a native of Holland, but of his early history we have no account. His first preferment in this country was to the preachership of the Dutch chapel-royal at St. James’s, about 1770, to which he was afterwar4s appointed reader also. At the time of his death he was reader and chaplain at the Dutch chapel in the Savoy. In 1778 he was elected a fellow of the society of antiquaries, and in that year distinguished himself by revising, through the Clarendon press, Scholtz’s “Egyptian Grammar,” written in 1750, in 2 vols. 4to, and also La Croze’s 5* Lexicon Egyptiaco-Latinum." It had long been the wish of the learned that both these works, left in ms. by their respective authors, might be published, but they could not find a printer furnished with Egyptian types, or who would hazard the undertaking, until at last the university of Oxford, with its usual munificent spirit, determined to t>ear the expense. When the Lexicon was printing, Mr. Woide was desired to make some additions to it, but this not being proposed till more than half the work was printed, he could extend his remarks to three letters only, and to render the undertaking more useful, he added an index. It was intended to print Scholtz’s Grammar in 2 quarto yols. immediately after the Dictionary, which consists of one vol. quarto; but it being found too voluminous, Woide very properly abridged it, and has improved it by carefully examining and correcting it by means of Mss. unknown to Scholtz. The Sahidic part was entirely supplied by Dr. Woide.

In 1782 Dr. Woide was appointed an assistant librarian at the British Museum, at first in the department of natural history, but soon after in one more congenial to his studies, that of printed books. He had before obtained the degree of D. D. from the university of Copenhagen, and in 1786 was created doctor of laws at Oxford. In this year appeared his truly valuable work, the “Novum Tes^ tamentum Graecum, e codice ms. Alexandrino, qui Londini in Bibl. Musei Britannici asservatur, &c. Ex prelo Joannis Nichols, 'Ty pis Jacksonianis,” fol. The history of this ms. thus preserved and perpetuated by an accurate fac-simile, is contained in the editor’s learned preface, which was reprinted at Leipsic in 1790,'in an octavo volume, with notes by Gottliebb Leberecht Spohn. Dr. Woide was seized with an apoplectic fit, May 6, 1790, while at sir Joseph Banks’s converzatione, of which he died next day at his apartments in the British Museum.

, baron of the Roman empire, privy-counsellor to the king of Prussia, and chancellor of the university of Hall in Saxony, was born at Breslau, Jan. 24, 1679. To the college of this city he was indebted for his first studies: after having passed his lessons in philosophy, he applied himself assiduously to the mathematics. The “Elementa Arithmeticse, vulgaris et literalis,” by Henry Horch, were his earliest guides; by a frequent perusal of these, he was at length enabled to enrieh them with additional propositions of his own. So rapid a progress did him great honour; whilst the different disputes, in which he was engaged with the canons of Breslau, laid the permanent foundation of his increasing fame. In 1699, he repaired to the university of Jena, and chose John Philip Treuner for his master in philosophy, and George Albert Hamberger for the mathematics; whose lessons he received with so happy a mixture of attention and advantage, that he became afterwards the able instructor of his fellow-students.

From Philip Muller, and Frederic Beckman, he received his knowledge of theology: a treatise written by Tschirnhausen, entitled “Medicina Mentis & Corporis, 17 engaged him for some time; in consequence of which, in 1702, he had a conference with the author, to clear up some doubts concerning particular passages. The detail into which Tschirnhausen had the complaisance to enter with this’ young philosopher, enabled him to model the whole on a more extensive plan. Having finished that part of his education which he was destined to receive at Jena, he went to Leipsic in 1702; and, having obtained a permission to give lectures, he began his new employment, and, in 1703, opened with a dissertation called” Philosophia practica universalis, methodo mathematica conscripta;“which first attempt served greatly to enhance the reputation of his talents. Wolfe chose, for the foundation of his lessons, the method followed by Tschirnhausen, His philosophy bore as yet a very strong resemblance to that of Descartes, as may be seen in his dissertation” De loquela," which he published in 1703. Leibnitz, to whom he sent it, told him, that he plainly perceived, that his hypothesis concerning the union of the soul and body was not hitherto sufficiently just and explicit. These objections made him review the whole, which afterwards went through several material alterations.

Two dissertations which he published at the end of 1703^ the first, “De rods dentatis,” and the second, “De Algorithmo infinitesimali differential!,” obtained him the honourable appellation of assistant to the faculty of philosophy at Leipsic. The universities of Giessen and Hall having invited him to be their professor in mathematics, he accepted of the offer of the last, and went thither in 1707. The same year he was admitted into the society at Leipsic, which was at that time engaged in the publication of the “Acta eruditorum.” After having inserted in this work many important pieces relating to physic and the mathematics, he undertook, in 1709, to teach all the various branches of philosophy, and began with a little logical Latin treatise, which made its appearance afterwards in the German language, under the title of * Thoughts on the Powers of the human Understanding." While he was carrying on these great pursuits with assiduity and ardour, the king of Prussia rewarded him with the post of counsellor to the court on the decease qf Bodinus in 1721, and augmented the profits of that office by very considerable appointments: he was also chosen a member of the Royal Society of London and Prussia.

In the midst of this prosperity he raised a storm against himself. He had, on the 12th of July, 1721, delivered a Latin oration, the subject of which was the morality of the Chinese: he loaded their philosophy with applause, an-d endeavoured to prove how similar its principles were to those which he, had advanced in. doctrines of his own. The divines at Hall were so exasperated at this attempt to undervalue their tenets, that on the day following every pulpit resounded with censures of Wolfe, and^the opposition to him continued till 1722, when the faculty of theology were determined strictly to examine each production of our extraordinary philosopher. Daniel Strathler, whose province was to scrutinize the “Essay on Metaphysics,” published a refutation of it. Wolfe made his complaints to the academic council, who issued out an order, that no one should presume to write against him: but the facultyhaving sent their representation to the court, which were all backed by the most strenuous assertions, that the doctrine which Wolfe taught, particularly on the subject of liberty and necessity, was dangerous to the last degree, an order at length arrived, Nov. 18, 1723, not only displacing Wolfe, but commanding him (under pain of being severely punished if he presumed to disobey) to leave Hall and the States in twenty-four hours at the farthest.

Wolfe retired now to Cassel, where he obtained the professorship of mathematics and philosophy in the university of Marbourg, with the title of counsellor to the court ^f the landgrave of Hesse, to which a profitable pension was annexed. Here he reassumed his labours with redoubled ardour; and it was in this retreat that he published the best parts of his numerous works. In 1725 he was declared an honorary professor of the academy of sciences at St. Petersburgh, and, in 1733, was admitted into “that at Paris. The king of Sweden also declared him one of the council of regency: the pleasing situation of his new abode, and the multitude of honours which he had received, were too alluring to permit him to accept of many advantageous offers; amongst which was the post of president 6f the academy at St. Petersburgh. The king of Prussia, who was now recovered from the prejudices he had been made to conceive against Wolfe, wished to re-establish him in the university of Hall in 1733, and made another attempt to effect it in 173.9. Wolfe met these advances with all that respectful deference which became him, but took the liberty to insinuate, that he did not then believe it right for him to comply. At last, however, he submitted; and the prince offered him, in 1741, an employment which threw every objection that he could make aside. Wolfe, still mindful of his benefactors, took a gracious leave of the king of Sweden; and returned to Hall, invested with the characters of privy-counsellor, vice-chancellor,” and professor of the law of nature and of nations. After the death of Ludwig, the king raised him to the dignity of chancellor of the university, and the elector of Bavaria created him a baron of the empire (whilst he was exercising the vicarship of it), from his own free unbiassed inclination.

Brucker says, that Wolfe “possessed a clear and methodical understanding, which by long exercise in mathematical investigations was particularly fitted for the employment of digesting the several branches of knowledge into regular systems; and his fertile powers of invention enabled him to enrich almost every field of science, in which he laboured, with some valuable additions. The lucid order which appears in all his writings enables his reader to follow his conceptions, with ease and certainty, through the longest trains of reasoning. But the close connection of the several parts of his works, together with the vast variety and extent of the subjects on which he treats, renders it impracticable to give a summary of his doctrines.” A French critic remarks that all the German works of this author are “extremely well written, and he has also been very happy in finding words, in that language, answering to the Latin philosophical terms which had till then been adopted; and as this renders a small dictionary necessary for understanding his phrases, he has placed one at the end of such books as require it. As to his Latin works, they are very ill written; his words are ill chosen, and frequently used in a wrong sense; his phrases too perplexed and obscure, and his style in general too diffuse.” An abridgment of his great Latin work, “On the Law of Nature and Nations,” has been published in French, three small vols. 12mo, by Formey; to which is prefixed, a life of Wolfe, and a chronological list of all his writings. He was, doubtless, one of the most learned philosophers and mathematicians Germany has produced; but his eulogy seems to us to be carried too far, when he is compared to Descartes and Leibnitz for his genius and writings, in both which he was certainly much inferior to them.

, a brave English officer, was the son of lieutenant-general Edward Wolfe, and was born at Westerham, in the county of Kent, where he was baptised the 11th of Jan. 1726. He seemed by nature formed for military greatness his memory was retentive, his judgment deep, and his comprehension amazingly quick and clear: his constitutional courage was not only uniform and daring, perhaps to an extreme, but he possessed that higher species of it, that strength, steadiness, and activity, of mind, which no difficulties could obstruct, or dangers deter. With an universal liveliness, almost to impetuosity of temper, he was not subject to passion; with the greatest independence of spirit, free from pride. Generous, almost to profusion, he contemned every little art for the acquisition of wealth; whilst he searched after objects for his charity and beneficence, the deserving soldier never went unrewarded, and even the needy inferior officer frequently tasted of his bounty: constant and distinguishing in his attachment, manly and unreserved, yet gentle, kind, and conciliating in his manners. He enjoyed a large share of the friendship, and almost the universal good-will, of mankind; and, to crown all, sincerity and candour, a true sense of honour, justice, and public liberty, seemed the inherent principles of his nature, and the uniform rule of his conduct. He betook himself, when very young, to the profession of arms; and with such talents, joined to the most unwearied assiduity, he was soon singled out as a most rising military genius. Even so early as the battle of Lafeldt, when scardely twenty, he exerted himself in so masterly a manner, at a very critical juncture, that it drew the highest encomiums from the great officer then at the head of the army. During the whole war, he went on, without interruption, forming his military character; was present at every engagement, and never passed undistinguished. Even after the peace, whilst others lolled on pleasure’s downy lap, he was cultivating the arts of war. He introduced (without one act of inhumanity) such regularity and exactness of discipline into his corps, that, as long as the six British battalions on the plains of Minden are recorded in the annals of Europe, so long, will Kingsley’s stand amongst the foremost of that day. Of that regiment he continued lieutenant-colonel, till Mr. Pitt, afterwards lord Chatham, who roused the sleeping genius of his country, called him forth into higher spheres of action. He was early in the most secret consultations for the attack upon Rochfort: and what he would have done there, and what he afterwards did at Louisbourg, are recorded in history, with due approbation. He was scarcely returned thence, when he was appointed to command the important expedition against Quebec. There his abilities shone out in their brightest lustre: in spite of many unforeseen diifiaulties, from the nature of the situation, from great superiority of numbers, the strength of the place itself, and his own bad state of health, he persevered with unwearied diligence, practising every stratagem of war to effect his purpose. At last, singly, and alone in opinion, he formed and executed that great, that dangerous, yet necessary, plan which drewout the French to their defeat, and will for ever denominate him the conqueror of Canada. When, however, within the grasp of victory, he received a ball through his wrist, which immediately wrapping up, he went on, with the same alacrity, animating his troops by precept and example: but, in a few minutes after, a second ball, through his body, obliged him to be carried off to a small distance in the rear. There, roused from fainting, in the last agonies, by the sound of “They run,” he eagerly asked, “Who run?” and being told the French, and that they were defeated, he said, “then I thank God; I die contented;” and almost instantly expired, Sept. 13, 1759.

He was brought to England, and interred at Greenwich in the same grave with his father, who was buried on the second of April preceding. There is no memorial for him. at Greenwich, but a cenotaph has been put up to his memory in Westminster Abbey at the public expence, and there is another at Westerham, the place of his nativity.

, a learned compiler, was born Aug. 10, 1537, at Bergzabern in the duchy of Deux Fonts, and was educated in law and philosophy at Strasburgli, Wirtemberg, Tubingen, and other celebrated academies, and afterwards was entrusted with the education of some noblemen’s sons, with whom he travelled in France, &c. from 1564 to 1567. Returning then to Dol, he took the degree of licentiate in civil law, and settled in practice at Spire, where two years after he was admitted into the number of assessors. In 1569 he attended Wolfgang, the elector Palatine, who came with an army to the assistance of the French protestants, and his highness dying a few months afterwards, Wolfe conducted his corpse back to Germany by sea, and it was interred at Meisenheim. For this melancholy duty and his other faithful services he grew in esteem with Philip Lewis and John, the electors Palatine, who thought him worthy of being sent twice on important'business to queen Elizabeth of England, and once to the king of Poland. In 1573 Charles marquis of Baden made him one of his counsellors, and in 1575 appointed him governor of Mundlesheim, which office he held for twenty years, and received many honours and marks of favour from the Baden family. In 1594, finding his health exhausted by official fatigues, he retired to Hailbrun, where he passed the remainder of his days in study, and died of a very short illness, as had always been his wish, May 23, 1600, in the sixty-third year of his age. He wrote “Clavis Historiarum;” and a larger work entitled “Lectionum memorabilium et reconditarum Centuriae XVI.” 2 vols. fol. printed first in the year he died, but there is an edition of 1671, which is not so much valued. Mr. Dibdin has accurately described this curious work in his “Bibliomania,” to which the reader is referred.

, a learned scholar, hitherto strangely overlooked by most foreign biographers, was a native of Germany, born in 1683, but removed in his youth to Hamburgh, where he was educated under Fabricius, and assisted him in his “Bibliotheca Graeca,” as appears by vol. XIII. of that laborious work. He was a Lutheran divine, and preached at Hamburgh, where he was also professor of the Oriental languages, and where he died in 1739. Many of his works are known in this country, and have been often quoted with approbation by biblical scholars and critics. Among them are, 1. “Historia Lexicorum Hebraicorum,” Wittem. 1705, 8vo. 2. “Dissertatio de Zabiis,” ibid. 1706, 4to. 3. “Origenis Philosophumena recognita et nods illustrata,” Hamb. 1706, Sto. 4. An edition of Pbsedrus, 1709. 5. “Dissertatio de Atheism! falso suspectis,” Wittem. 1710, 4to. 6. “Casauboniana, sive Isaaci Casauboni varia de Scriptoribus, librisque judicia,” Hamb. 1710, 8vo. 7. “Libanii epist. adhuc non editarum centuria selecta Gr. cum versione et nods,” Leipsic, 1711, 8vo. 8. “Anecdota Gneca sacra et profana,” Hamb. 1722, &c. 3 vols. 8vo. 9. “Curse philologicae et criticae in omnes libros N. T.” Hamb. 1725 1735, but the best edition is that of Basil, 1741, 3 vols. 4to. This work, says bishop Watson, has some resemblance, in the manner of its composition, to Pool’s “Synopsis,” but is written with more judgment, and contains the opinions of many expositors who have lived since the publication of Pool’s work. Wolfe, moreover, has not followed Pool in simply relating the sentiments of others, but has frequently animadverted on them with great critical discernment. Wolfe published other works, and new editions, all which display great learning and critical acumen. His brother John Christian, who died in 1770, was the author of the “Monumenta typographies,” Hamburgh, 1740, 8vo, an edition of the fragments of Sappho, and other works.

, a learned and ingenious" writer, was born March 26, 1659, at Colon Clanford, in Staffordshire, where his father then resided, a private gentleman of small fortune, being descended from an ancient and considerable family in that county, where the elder branch always continued; but the second, in process of time, was transplanted into other counties. The head of it flourished formerly at Oncot, in the county of Stafford, though afterwards at Shenton, in Leicestershire; and was possessed of a large estate lying in those and other counties. Our author was a second son of a third son of a second son of a second son, yet notwithstanding this remarkable series of younger brothers, his grandfather, who stands in the midst of it, had a considerable estate both real and personal, together with an office of 700l. per annum. And from a younger brother of the same branch sprang sir John Wollaston,lord- mayor of London, well known in that city at the time of the grand rebellion.

At nine years old, Mr. Wollaston was sent to a master, who had opened a Latin school, at Shenstone in Stafford^ shire, where his father then resided. Here he continued near two years, and then removed to Lichfield; but had not been long at this school, when the magistrates of the city, in consequence of some dispute, turned the master out of the school-house. Mr. Wollaston, however, with many of the scholars, followed the ejected master, and re^ inained with him till he quitted school, which was about three years, after which, the schism being ended, he returned into the free-school, and continued there about a year. The rudeness of a great school was particularly disagreeable to his natural disposition; and what was still worse, he began now to be much troubled with the headach, which seems to have been constitutional in him; yethis uncommon attention to his book, and eagerness to improve, had now rendered him fit for the university. Accordingly he was sent to Cambridge, and admitted a pensioner at Sidney-college, June 18, 1674, in the sixteenthyear of his age. Here he laboured under some discouragements. He was come up a country lad from a countryschool; had no acquaintance in his college^ nor even in the university; few books or materials to work with; his allowance being by no means more than sufficient for bare necessaries; neither had he sufficient confidence to supply that defect by applying to others. Add to this that his state of health was not quite firm. However, under all these disadvantages, he acquired much reputation, and having taken his degree of B. A. at the regular time, he offered himself a candidate for a fellowship in his college, but missed of that preferment. In July 1681 he commenced M. A. and about this time seems to have entered into deacon’s orders.

On Michaelmas-day following, he left the university, and having made a visit to the then head of this branch of the family, his cousin Wollaston of Shenton in Leicestershire, he went to pay his duty to his father and mother at Bloxwyche, where they then lived, and remained with them till May or June 1682. But seeing no prospect of preferment, he so far conformed himself to the circumstances of his family, as about this time to become assistant at Birmingham school to the head master, who readily embraced the opportunity of such a coadjutor, and considered Mr. Wollaston as one who had prudentially stooped to an employment beyond what he might reasonably have pretended to. This instance, however, of his humble industry was far from being displeasing to his cousin of Shenton, who had a great esteem for the head master, and in a short time, he got a small lecture at the distance of about two miles from Birmingham; but as he performed there the whole Sunday’s duty, that fatigue, added to the business of a great freeschool for about four years, began to break his constitution. But the old master being now turned out, in order to make way for a particular person to succeed him, our author was chosen second master only, under a pretence that he was too young to be at the head of so great a school, but some of the governors themselves owned that he was not well used in this affair.

However that may be, it is certain upon this occasion he took priest’s orders in pursuance to the charter of that school, which being interpreted likewise so as to oblige the masters to take no church-preferment, he resigned his lecture. This happened in 1686, and was a considerable relief to him, while his new post was worth about TOl. per annum, which afforded him a tolerable subsistence. In the mean time the late chief master after his expulsion retired to his brother’s house, which lying in the neighbourhood of Shenton, he once or twice waited upon Mr. Wollaston, of Shenton, and undoubtedly informed him of the character, learning, conversation, and conduct of our author, which he was very capable of doing, because they lived together, till the time of this old gentleman’s leaving Birmingham. Mr. Woliaston, of Shenton, having now lately lost his only son. and never intending (as appears from his whole conduct) to give his estate to his daughters, pursued his father’s design of continuing it in the male line of his family, and resolved to settle it upon our author’s uncle and father, his own first cousins, and his nearest male-relations, in the same proportions and manner exactly as it had been entailed on them by his father. And accordingly he made such a settlement, subject however to a revocation.

Our author all this while applied himself to his business; and never waited upon his cousin, or employed any one tospeak or act in his behalf (though many then blamed him for neglecting to do it); only one visit he made him in the November before his death, which was upon a Saturday in the afternoon. He gave him a sermon the next day, received his hearty thanks, and the next morning desired leave to return to the duties of his station; without speaking or even insinuating any thing respecting his estate. His cousin dismissed him with great kindness; and by his looks and manner seemed to have a particular regard for him, but discovered nothing of his intention by words. However, he used to employ persons privately to observe our author’s behaviour (who little suspected any such matter), and his behaviour was found to be such, that the stricter the observations were upon it, the more they turned to his advantage. In fine, Mr. Woliaston, of Shenton, became so thoroughly satisfied of our author’s merit, that he revoked the above-mentioned settlement, and made a will in his favour. In August following, that gentleman fell sick, and sending secretly toour author to come over to him, as of his own accord, without any notice of his illness, be complied with the message, and staid some days at Shenton. But while he was gone home, under a promise of returning, his cousin died, August 19, 1688.

By his relation’s will, Mr. Woliaston found himself intitled to a very ample estate; but this change, sudden, and advantageous as it was to his affairs, wrought no change in his temper. The same firmness of mind, which had supported him under the pressure of a more adverse fortune, enabled him to bear his prosperity with moderation. In November following he came to London, and about a year after, on the 26th of that month, 1689, he married miss Catherine Charlton, daughter of Mr. Nicholas Charlton, an eminent citizen of London, a fine woman with a good fortune, and an excellent character. With this lady he settled in Charter- house square, in a private, retired, and studious life. His carriage was nevertheless free and open. He aimed at solid and real content, rather than show and grandeur, and manifested his dislike of power and dignity, by refusing one of the highest preferments in the church, when it was offered to him.

He had now books and leisure, and he was resolved to make use of them, He was perfectly acquainted with the elementary parts of learning, and with the learned languages, Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, &c. He thought it necessary to add to these such a degree of philology and criticism as seemed likely to be useful to him: and also mathematical sciences, or at least the fundamentals of them; the general philosophy of nature the history and antiquities of the more known and noted states and kingdoms; and in order to attain the knowledge of true religion, and the discovery of truth, the points which he always had particularly in view, and to which he chiefly directed all his studies, he diligently inquired into the idolatries of the heathens; and made himself master of the sentiments, rites, and learning of the Jews; the history of tjie first settlement of Christianity, and the opinions and practice introduced into it since. In the mean time he exercised and improved his mind by using himself to clear images, observing the influence and extent of axioms, the nature and force of consequences, and the method of investigating truth. In general, he accustomed himself to much thinking as well as much reading. He likewise delighted in method and regularity: and chose to have his labours and refreshments periodical, and that his family and friends should observe the proper seasons of their revolution. He was most remarkably cheerful and lively in conversation, which rendered his company agreeable, and himself worthy to be courted by the learned and virtuous. But a general acquaintance was what he never cultivated, and it grew (as is mostly the case) more and more his aversion, so that he passed his days principally at home, with a few friends, with whom he could enjoy an agreeable relaxation of mind, and receive all the advantages of a sincere and open friendship. Having thus fixed his resolution to deserve honours, but not to wear them, it was not long before he published a piece entitled, “The Design of Part of the Book of Ecclesiastes, or the Unreasonableness of Man’s restless Contentions for the present Enjoyments, represented in an English poem,” in 8vo. But as he had never made poetry his study, he was very sensible of the defects of this attempt, and was afterward very desirous to suppress it. Ttiis poem was printed in 1690. Notwithstanding he declined to accept of any public employment, yet his studies were designed to be of public use, and his solitude was far from being employed in vain and trifling amusements, terminating in himself alone. But neither in this last view, could his retirement be without some inconveniences. His intimates were dropping off, and their places remained unsupplied; his own infirmities were increasing; the frequent remission of study, growing more and more necessary; and his solitude at the same time becoming less and less agreeable, for want of that conversation which had hitherto supported it.

It was but a short time before his death that he published his celebrated treatise, entitled “The Religion of Nature delineated.” He appears at first to have doubted the success of this work, and in 1722 printed only a few copies for the use of his friends, but when prevailed upon to publish it, it was so much approved that upwards of 10,000 copies were sold in a few years; and it has in all passed through eight or nine editions, five of which were in quarto.

Of the ingenuity of this work as a composition no doubts have been entertained, but its tendency was soon thought liable to suspicion. Some objected that he had injured Christianity by laying too much stress upon the obligations of truth, reason, and virtue; and by making no mention of revealed religion, nor even so much as dropping the least and most distant hints in its favour. This made him pass for an unbeliever with some; and the late lord Bolingbroke supposes Dr. Clarke to have had him in his eye when he described his fourth sort of theists. Wollaston held and has asserted the being and attributes of God, natural and moral a providence, general and particular; the obligations to morality the immateriality and immortality of the soul a future state and Clarke’s fourth sort of theists held and asserted the same. But whether Wollaston, like those theists, rejected all above this in the system of revelation, cannot with any certainty be concluded, though at the same time the contrary perhaps may not appear; because, whatever might have been thought necessary to prevent offence from being taken, it was not essential to Wollaston’s design to meddle with revealed religion. In the mean time, lord Bolingbroke has treated “The Religion of Nature delineated,” as a system of theism; which it certainly is, whether Wollaston was a believer or not. His lordship calls it “strange theism, as dogmatical and absurd as artificial theology,” and has spent several pages to prove it so; yet allows the author of it to have been “a man of parts, of learning, a philosopher, and a geometrician.” The seventh edition of this work was printed in 1750 in 8vo, to which are added an account of the author, and also a translation of the notes into English. There is prefixed an advertisement by Dr. John Clarke, late dean of Salisbury, which informs us, that this work was in great esteem with her late majesty queen Caroline, who commanded him to translate the notes into English for her own use. Pope, who has taken some thoughts from it into his “Essay on Man,” informs Mr. Bethel in one of his letters how much this work was a favourite with the ladies, but accompanies his information with a sneer at the sex, which we dare not transcribe.

Immediately after he had completed the revisal and publication of his “Religion of Nature delineated,” Mr. Wollaston had the misfortune to break his arm; and as his health was before in a very infirm state, this accident accelerated his death, which happened Oct. 29, 1724. He was interred in Great Finborough church, Suffolk, in the same grave with his wife, who died in 1720.

, a celebrated cardinal and statesman, but to be remembered with more respect as a benefactor to learning, was so obscure in his origin that scarcely any historian mentions the names of his father and mother. Their names, however, are preserved by Rymer (Feed. vol. XIV. p. 355), in the pope’s bull of favours to those who came to Cardinal college in Oxford, and prayed for the safety of the said cardinal, and after his decease for the souls of him, his father Robert, and his mother Joan. This partly confirms the discovery of his zealous biographer, Dr. Fiddes, that he was the son of one Robert Wolsey, a butcher of Ipswich, where he was born in March 1471. Fiddes says that this Robert had a son whose early history corresponds with that of the cardinal, and that he was a man of considerable landed property. We may from other evidence conclude that his parents were either not poor, or not friendless, since they were able to give him the best education his native, town afforded, and afterwards to send him to Magdalen college. But in whatever way he was introduced here, it is certain that his progress in academical studies was so rapid that he was admitted to the degree of bachelor of arts at the age of fifteen, and from this extraordinary instance of precocity, was usually named the boy bachelor.

No proofs are indeed wanting of his uncommon reputation as a scholar, for he was elected fellow of his college soon after taking his bachelor’s degree, and proceeding to that of master, he was appointed teacher of Magdalen grammar school. In 1498, he was made bursar of the college, about which time he has the credit of building Magdalen tower. It is yet more in proof of his learning having been of the most liberal kind, and accompanied with a corresponding liberality of sentiment, that he became acquainted with Erasmus, then at Oxford, and joined that illustrious scholar in promoting classical studies, which were peculiarly obnoxious to the bigotry of the times. The letters which passed between Wolsey and Erasmus for some years imply mutual respect and union of sentiment on all matters in which literature was concerned; and their love of learning, and contempt for the monks, although this last was excited by different motives, are points in which we perceive no great disagreement. Yet as Erasmus continued to live the life of a mere scholar, precarious and dependent, and Wolsey was rapidly advancing to rank and honours, too many and too high for a subject, a distance was placed between them which Wolsey would not shorten, and Erasmus could not pass. Hence, while a courteous familiarity was preserved in Wolsey’s correspondence, Erasmus could not help betraying the feelings of a client who has received little more than promises from his patron, and when Wolsey fell from his high state, Erasmus joined in the opinion that he was unworthy of it. For this he is severely censured by Fiddes, and ably defended by Knight and Jortin.

Wolsey’s first ecclesiastical preferment was the rectory of Lymington in Somersetshire, conferred upon him in 1500, by the marquis of Dorset, to whose three sons he had acted as tutor, when in Magdalen college. On receiving this presentation he left the university, and resided for some time on his cure, when a singular circumstance induced, or perhaps rendered it absolutely necessary for him to leave it. At a merry meeting at Lymington he either passed the bounds of sobriety, or was otherwise accessary in promoting a riot, for which sir Amyas Pauiet, a justice of peace, set him in the stocks. This indignity Wolsey remembered when it would have been honourable as well as prudent to have forgot it. After he had arrived at the high rank of chancellor, he ordered sir Amyas to be confined within the bounds of the Temple, and kept him in that place for five or six years.

On his quitting Lymington, though without resigning the living, Henry Dean, archbishop of Canterbury, made him one of his domestic chaplains, and in 1503, the pope, Alexander, gave him a dispensation to hold two benefices. On the death of the archbishop, in the same year, he was appointed chaplain to sir John Nan fan of Worcestershire, treasurer of Calais, which was then in the possession of the English, and by him recommended to Renry VII. who made him one of his chaplains. About the end of 1504, he obtained from pope Julius II. a dispensation to hold a third living, the rectory of Redgrave in Norfolk. In the mean time he was improving his interest at court by an affable and plausible address, and by a display of political talent, and quick and judicious dispatch in business, which rendered him very useful and acceptable to his sovereign. In February 1508, the king gave him the deanery of Lincoln, and two prebends in the same church, and would probably have added to these preferments had he not been prevented by his death in the following year.

This event, important as it was to the kingdom, was of no disadvantage to Wolsey, who saw in the young king, Henry VIII. a disposition that might be rendered more favourable to his lofty views; yet what his talents might have afterwards procured, he owed at this time to a court intrigue. Fox, bishop of Winchester and founder of Corpus Christi college, introduced him to Henry, in order to counteract the influence of the earl of Surrey (afterwards duke of Norfolk), and had probably no worse intention than to preserve a balance in the council; but Wolsey, who was not destined to play a subordinate part, soon rose higher in influence than either his patron or his opponent. He studied, with perfect knowledge of the human heart, to please the young king, by joining in indulgencies which, however suitable to the gaiety of a court, were ill becoming the character of an ecclesiastic. Yet amidst the luxuries which he promoted in his royal master, he did not neglect to inculcate maxims of state, and, above all, to insinuate, in a manner that appeared equally dutiful and disinterested, the advantages of a system of favouritism, which he secretly hoped would one day center in his own person. Nor was he disappointed, as for some time after this, his history, apart from what share he had in the public councils, is little more than a list of promotions following each other with a rapidity that alarmed the courtiers, and inclined the people, always jealous of sudden elevations, to look back on his origin.

In this rise, he was successively made almoner to the king, a privy counsellor, and reporter of the proceedings of the Star-chamber; rector of Turrington in the diocese of Exeter, canon of Windsor, registrar of the order of the garter, and prebendary and dean of York. From these he passed on to become dean of Hereford, and precentor of St. Paul’s, both of which he resigned on being preferred to the bishopric of Lincoln; chancellor of the order of the garter, and bishop of Tournay in Flanders, which ne held until 1518, when that city was delivered up to the French, but he derived from it afterwards an annual pension of twelve thousand livres. In 1514, he was consecrated bishop of Lincoln, in the room of Smyth, founder of Brasen-nose college, and was chosen chancellor of the university of Cambridge. The same year he was promoted to the archbishopric of York, and created cardin-al of St. Cecilia.

Yet in the plenitude of that political influence which he now maintained to the exclusion of the ancient nobility and courtiers, it appears that for some time he preserved the peace of the country, by a strict administration of justice, and by a punctuality in matters of finance, which admitted no very unfavourable comparisons between him and his predecessors. Perhaps the splendour and festivities which he encouraged in the court might, by a diffusion of the royal wealth among the public, contribute to a certain degree of popularity, especially when contrasted with the more economical habits encouraged by Henry VII. It was not until he established his legantine court, a species of English popedom, that the people had reason to complain of a vast and rapacious power, unknown to the constitution, boundless in its capricious decrees, and against which there was no redress. This court, however, could not have inflicted many public injuries, as it formed no part of the complaints of parliament against him, when complaints mi<rht have been preferred with safety, and would have been welcomed from any quarter. At that time, the legality of the power was called in question, but, not the exercise of it.

In the private conduct of this extraordinary man, while in the height of his prosperity, we find a singular mixture of personal pride and public munificence. While his train of servants rivalled that of the king, and was composed of many persons of rank and distinction, his house was a school where their sons were usefully educated, and initiated in public life. And while he was dazzling the eyes, or insulting the feelings of the people by an ostentation of gorgeous furniture and equipage, such as exceeded the royal establishment itself, he was a general ancj liberal patron of literature, a man of consummate taste in works of art, elegant in his plans, and bpundless in his expences to execute them; and, in the midst of luxurious pleasures and pompous revellings, he was meditating the advancement of science by a munificent use of those riches which he seemed to accumulate only for selfish purposes.

In the mean time, there was no intermission in his preferments. His influence was courted by the pope, who had made him a cardinal, and, in 1516, his legate in England, with powers not inferior to his own; and by the king of Spain, who granted him a pension of three thousand livres, while the duchy of Milan bestowed on him a yearly grant often thousand ducats. On the resignation of archbishop Warham, he was appointed lord high chancellor. “If this new accumulation of dignity,” says Hume, “increased his enemies, it also served to exalt his personal character and prove the extent of his capacity. A strict administration of justice took place during his enjoyment of this high office; and no chancellor ever discovered greater impartiality in his decisions, deeper penetration of judgment, or more enlarged knowledge of law or equity.”

In 1518, he attended queen Catherine to Oxford, and intimated to the university his intention of founding lectures on theology, civil law, physic, philosophy, mathematics, rhetoric, Greek, and Latin; and in the following year three of these, viz. for Greek, Latin, and rhetoric, were founded and endowed with ample salaries, and read in the hall of Corpus Christi college. He appointed for his lectures the ablest scholars whom the university afforded, or whom he could invite from the continent. The members of the convocation, about this time, conferred upon him the highest mark of their esteem by a solemn decree that he should have the revisal and correction of the university statutes in the most extensive sense, and it does not appear that they had any reason to repent of this extraordinary instance of their confidence. The same power was conferred upon him by the university of Cambridge, and in both cases, was accompanied by documents which proved the very high opinion entertained by these learned bodies of his fitness to reform what was amiss in the republic of letters.

In the same year the pope granted him the administration of the bishopric of Bath and Wells, and the king bestowed on him its temporalities. This see, with those of Worcester and Hereford, which the cardinal likewise farmed, were filled by foreigners who were allowed nonresidence, and compounded for this indulgence by yielding a share of the revenues. The cardinal’s aid, about this time, in establishing the College of Physicians of London, is to be recorded among the many instances of the very liberal views he entertained of every improvement connected with literature. In 1521, he evinced his zeal against the reformation' which Luther had begun, by procuring his doctrines to be condemned in an assembly of divines held at his own house, published pope Leo’s bull against him, and endeavoured to suppress his writings in this kingdom; but there is no favourable part of his character so fully established as his moderation towards the English Lutherans, for one article of his impeachment was his being remiss in punishing heretics, and showing a disposition rather to screen them.

In the same year he received the rich abbey of St. Alban’s to hold in commendam, and soon after went abroad on an embassy. About this time also, he became a candidate for the papal chair, on the demise of Leo X. but was not successful. This disappointment, however, was compensated in some degree by the emperor, who settled a pension on him of nine thousand crowns of gold, and by the bishopric of Durham, to which he was appointed in 1523. On this he resigned the administration of Bath and Wells. The same year he issued a mandate to remove the convocation of the province of Canterbury from St. Paul’s to Westminster, one of his most unpopular acts, but which appears to have been speedily reversed. On the death of pope Adrian he made a second unsuccessful attempt to be elected pope; but while he failed in this, he received from his rival a confirmation of the whole papal authority in England.

Of the immense riches which he derived from his various preferments, some were no doubt spent in luxuries which left only a sorrowful remembrance, but the greater part was employed in" those magnificent edifices which have immortalized his genius and spirit. In 1514 he began to build the palace at Hampton Court, and having finished it, with all its sumptuous furniture, in 1528, he presented it to the king, who in return gave him the palace of Richmond for a residence. In this last mentioned year, he acceded to the bishopric of Winchester by the death of Fox, and resigned that of Durham. To Winchester, however, he never went. That reverse of fortune which has exhibited him as an example of terror to the ambitious, was now approaching, and was accelerated by events, the consequences of which he foresaw, without the power of averting them. Henry was now agitated by a passion not to be controuled by the whispers of friendship, or the counsels of statesmen, and when the cardinal, whom he had appointed to forward his divorce from queen Catherine and his marriage with Anne Boleyn, appeared tardily to adhere to forms, or scrupulously to interpose advice, he determined to make him feel the weight of his resentment. It happened unfortunately for the cardinal that both the queen and her rival were his enemies, the queen from a suspicion that she never had a cordial friend in him, and Anne from a knowledge that he had secretly endeavoured to prevent her match with the king. But a minute detail of these transactions and intrigues belongs to history, in which they occupy a large space. It may suffice here to notice that the cardinal’s ruin, when once determined, was effected in the most sudden and rigorous manner, and probably without his previous knowledge of the violent measures that were to be taken.

On the first day of term, Oct. 9, 1529, while he was opening the Court of Chancery at Westminster, the attorney-general indicted him in the Court of King’s Bench, on the statute of provisors, 16 Richard II. for procuring a bull from Rome appointing him legate, contrary to the statute, by which he had incurred a prtemunire^ and forfeited all his goods to the king, and might be imprisoned. Before he could give in any reply to this indictment, the king sent to demand the great seal from him, which was given to sir Thomas More. He was then ordered to leave York-place, a palace which had for some centuries been the residence of the archbishops of York, and which he had adorned with furniture of great value and magnificence: it now became a royal residence under the name of Whitehall. Before leaving this place to go to Esher, near Hampton Court, a seat belonging to the bishopric of Winchester, he made an inventory of the furniture, plate, &c. of York-place, which is said to have amounted to the incredible sum of five hundred thousand crowns, or pounds of our money. He then went to Putney by water, and set out on the rest of his journey on his mule, but he had not gone far before he was met by a messenger from the king, with a gracious message, assuring him that he stood as high as ever in the royal favour, and this accompanied by a ring, which the king had been accustomed to send, as a token to give credit to the bearer. Wolsey received these testimonials with the humblest expression of gratitude, but proceeded on his way to Esher, which he found quite unfurnished. The king’s design by this solemn mockery is not easily conjectured. It is most probable that it was a trick to inspire the cardinal with hopes of being restored to favour, and consequently to prevent his defending himself in the prosecution upon the statute of provisors, which Henry knew he could do by producing his letters patent authorising him to accept the pope’s bulls. And this certainly was the consequence, for the Cardinal merely instructed his attorney to protest in his name that he was quite ignorant of the above statute; but that he acknowledged other particulars with which he was charged to be true, and submitted himself to the king’s mercy. The sentence of the court was, that “he was out of the protection, and his lands, goods, and chattels forfeit, and his person might be seized.”

The next step to complete his ruin was taken by the duke of Norfolk and the privy counsellors, who drew up articles against him, and presented them to the king; but he still affecting to take no personal concern in the matter, remained silent. Yet these probably formed the basis of the forty-four articles presented December 1, to the House of Lords, as by some asserted, or, according to other accounts, by the lords of the council to the House of Commons. Many of them are evidently frivolous or false, and others, although true, were not within the jurisdiction of the House. The cardinal had, in fact, already suffered, as his goods had been seized by the king; he was now in a prtemunire, and the House could not go much farther than to recommend what had already taken place. The cardinal, however, found one friend amidst all his distresses, who was not to be alarmed either at the terrors of the court or of the people. This was Thomas Cromwell, formerly Wolsey’s steward (afterwards earl of Essex), who now refuted the articles with so much spirit, eloquence, and argument, that although a very opposite effect might have been expected, his speech is supposed to have laid the foundation of that favour which the king afterwards extended to him, but which, at no very distant period, proved as fatal to him as it had been to his master. His eloquence had a yet more powerful effect, for the address founded on these articles was rejected by the Commons, and the Lords could not proceed farther without their concurrence.

During the cardinal’s residence at Esher the king sent several messages to him, “some good and some bad,” says Cavendish, “but more ill than good,” until this tantalizing correspondence, operating on a mind of strong passions, brought on, about the end of the year, a sickness which was represented to the king as being apparently fatal. The king ordered his physician, Dr. Butts, to visit him, who confirmed what had been reported of the dangerous state of his health, but intimated that as his disease affected his mind rather than his body, a kind word from his majesty might prove more effectual -than the best skill of the faculty. On this the king sent him a ring, with a gracious message that he was not offended with him in his heart; and Anne Boleyn sent him a tablet of gold that usually hung at her side, with many kind expressions. The cardinal received these testimonies of returning favour with joy and gratitude, and in a few days was pronounced ut of danger.

Nor can we blame Wolsey for his credulity, since Henry, although he had stripped the cardinal of all his property, and the income arising from all his preferments, actually granted him, Feb. 12, 1530, a free pardon for all crimes and misdemeanors, and a few days after restored to him the revenues, &c. of the archbishopric of York, except York place, before-mentioned, and one thousand marks yearly from the bishopric of Winchester. He also sent him a present of 3000l. in money, and a quantity of plate and furniture exceeding that sum, and allowed him to remove from Esher to Richmond, where he resided for some time in the lodge in the old park, and afterwards in the priory. His enemies at court, however, who appear to have influenced the king beyond his usual arbitrary disposition, dreaded Wolsey’s being so near his majesty, and prevailed on him to order him to reside in his archbishopric. In obedience to this mandate, which was softened by another gracious message from Henry, he first went to the archbishop’s seat at Southwell, and about the end of September fixed his residence at Cawood castle, which he began to repair, and was acquiring popularity by his hospitable manners and bounty, when his capricious master was persuaded to arrest him for high treason, and order him to be conducted to London. Accordingly, on the first of November he set out, but on the road he was seized with a disorder of the dysenteric kind, brought on by fatigue and anxiety, which put a period to his life at Leicester abbey on the 28th of that mouth, in the fifty-ninth year of his age . Some of his last words implied the awful and just reflection, that if he had served his God as diligently as he had served his king, he would not have given him over to his enemies. Two days after he was interred in the abbey church of Leicester, but the spot is not now known. As to the report of his having poisoned himself, founded on an expression in the printed work of Cavendish, it has been amply refuted by a late eminent antiquary, who examined the whole of the evidence with much acuteness. Modern historians have formed a more favourable estimate of Wolsey’s character than their predecessors, yet it had that mixture of good and evil which admits of great variety of opinion, and gives to ingenious party-colouring all the appearance of truth. Perhaps Shakspeare, borrowing from Holinshed and Hall, has drawn a more just and comprehensive sketch of his perfections and failings than is to be found in any other writer.

Was fashioned to much honour. From his cradle

He was a scholar, and a ripe and good one;

And though he was unsatisfy'd in getting,

(Which was a sin) yet in bestowing, madam,

He was most princely: Ever witness for him

The cardinal’s biographers, in treating of the founda.­tion of his college, begin with a very laboured defence of his seizing the property and revenues of many priories and nunneries, which were to serve as a fund for building and endowment; and the zeal they display on this subject, if it cannot now enforce conviction, at least proves the historical fact that the rights of property even at that time were not to be violated with impunity, and that the cardinal’s conduct was highly unpopular. At first it was objected to even by the king himself, although he soon afterwards converted it into a precedent for a more general dissolution of religious houses. Wolsey, however; ought not to be deprived of such defence as has been set up. It has been urged, that h.e procured bulls from the pope empowering him to seize on these priories; and that the pope, according to the notions then entertained of his supremacy, could grant a power by which religious houses might be converted into societies for secular priests, and for the advancement of learning. It has been also pleaded, that the cardinal did not alienate the revenues from religious service, but only made a change in the application of them; that the appropriation of the alien priories by Chichele and Waynriete was in some respects a precedentj and that the suppression of the Templers in the fourteenth century, might also be quoted. Bishop Tanner likewise, in one of his letters to Dr. Charlett, quotes as precedents., bishops Fisher, Alcock, and Beckington. But perhaps the best excuse is that hinted by lord Cherbury, namely, that Wolsey persuaded the king to abolish unnecessary monasteries that necessary colleges might be erected, and the progress of the reformation impeded by the learning of the clergy and scholars educated in them. Tbe same writer suggests, that as Wolsey pleaded for the dissolution of only the small and superfluous houses, the king might not dislike this as a fair experiment how far the project of a general dissolution would be relished. On the other hand, by two letters still extant, written by the king, it appears that he was fully aware of the unpopularity of the measure, although we cannot infer from them that he had any remedy to prescribe.

Whatever weight these apologies had with one part of the public, we are assured that they had very little with another, and that the progress of the college was accompanied by frequent expressions of popular dislike in the shape of lampoons. The kitchen having been first finished, one of the satirists of the day exclaimed, Egregium opus! Cardinalis iste instituit Collegium et absolvit popinam. Other mock inscriptions were placed on the walls, one of which at least, proved prophetic:

By two bulls, the one dated 1524, the other 1525, Wolsoy obtained of pope Clement VII. leave to enrich his college by suppressing twenty-two priories and nunneries, the revenues of which were estimated at nearly 2000l.; but on his disgrace some of these were given by the king for other purposes. The king’s patent, after a preface paying high compliments to the cardinal’s administration, enables him to build his college principally on the site of the priory of St. Frideswide and the name, originally intended to be “The College of Secular Priests,” was now changed to Cardinal College. The secular clergy in it were to be denominated the “dean and canons secular of the cardinal of York,” and to be incorporated into one body, and subsist by perpetual succession. He was also authorised to settle upon it 2000l. a year clear revenue. By other patents and grants to the dean and canons, various church livings were bestowed upon them, and the college was to be dedicated to the praise, glory, and honour of the Holy Trinity, the Virgin Mary, St. Frideswide, and All Saints.

With respect to the constitution of this college, there is a considerable variation between the account given by the historian of Oxford, and that by Leonard Hutten, canon of Christ Church, in 1599, and many years sub-dean. His manuscript, now in the possession of the college, and quoted in the Monasticon, states that, according to Wolsey’s design, it was to be a perpetual foundation for the study of the sciences, divinity, canon and civil law, also the arts, physic, and polite literature, and for the continual performance of divine service. The members were to be, a dean, and sixty regular canous, but no canons of the second order, as Wood asserts.

Of these Wolsey himself named the dean and eighteen of the canons. The dean was Dr. John Hygden, president of Magdalen college, and the canons first nominated were all taken from the other colleges in Oxford, and were men of acknowledged reputation in their day. He afterwards added others, deliberately, and according as he was able to supply the vacancies by men of talents, whom he determined to seek wherever they could be found. Among his lattfic appointments frcrr Cambridge, we find the names of Tyndal and Frith, the translators of the Bible, and who had certainly discovered some symptoms of heresy before this time. Cranmer and Parker, afterwards the first and second protestant archbishops of Canterbury, were also invited, bat declined; and the cardinal went on to complete his number, reserving all nominations to himself during his life, but intending to bequeath that power to the dean and canons at his death. In this, however, he was as much disappointed as in his hopes to embody a force of learned men sufficient to cope with Luther and the foreign reformers, whose advantage in argument he conceived to proceed from the ignorance which prevailed among the monastic clergy.

The society, as he planned it, was to consist of one hundred and sixty persons, according to Wood, or omitting the forty canons of the second order, in the enumeration of whom Wood was mistaken, one hundred and forty-six; but no mention could yet be made of the scholars who were to proceed from his school at Ipswich, although, had he lived, these would doubtless have formed a part of the society, as the school was established two years before his fall. This constitution continued from 1525 to 1529-30, when he was deprived of his power and property, and for two years after it appears to have been interrupted, if not dissolved. It is to his honour that in his last correspondence with secretary Cromwell and with the king, when all worldly prospects were about to close upon him, he pleaded with great earnestness, and for nothing so earnestly, as that his majesty would be pleased to suffer his college at Oxford to go on. What effect this had, we know not, but the urgent entreaties of the members of the society, and of the university at large, were at length successful, while at the same time the king determined to deprive Wolsey of all merit in the establishment, and transfer the whole to himself. The subsequent history of Christ church it would be unnecessary to detail in this place.

An impartial life of cardinal Wolsey is perhaps still a desideratum in English biography. Cavendish is minute and interesting in what he relates of the cardinal’s domestic history, but defective in dates and arrangement, and not altogether free from partiality; which, however, in one so near to the cardinal, may perhaps be pardoned. Fiddes is elaborate, argumentative, and upon the whole useful, as arc extensive collector of facts and authorities; but he wrote for a special purpose, and has attempted, what no man can effect, a portrait of his hero free from those vices and failings of which it is impossible to acquit him. Grove, with all the aid of Cavendish, Fiddes, and even Shakspeare, whose drama he regularly presses into the service, is a heavy and injudicious compiler, although he gives so much of the cardinal’s contemporaries, that his volumes may be consulted with advantage as a series of general annals of the time. But Cavendish, on whom all who have written on the actions of Wolsey, especially our modern historians, have relied, has been the innocent cause of some of their principal errors. Cavendish’s work remained in manuscript, of which several copies are still extant, until the civil wars, when it was first printed under the title of “The Negociations of Thomas Wolsey, &c.” 1641, 4to, and the chief object of the publication was a parallel between the cardinal and archbishop Laud, in order to reconcile the public to the murder of that prelate. That this object might be the better accomplished, the manuscript was mutilated and interpolated without shame or scruple, and no pains having been taken to compare the printed edition with the original, the former passed for genuine above a century, nor until very lately has the work been presented to the public as the author left it, in Dr. Wordsworth’s "Ecclesiastical Biography.

, an English prelate, was a native of Norfolk, born in 1612, and the son of Lawrence Womock, B. D. rector of Lopham and Fersfield in that county. He was admitted pensioner of Corpus Christi, Cambridge, July 4, 1629, and in October following was chosen a scholar of sir Nich. Bacon’s foundation. He took the degree of A. B. in 1632, was ordained deacon Sept. 21, 1634, and proceeded A.M. in 1639. He is supposed to have succeeded his father in the living of Lopham upcfi his diocese in 1642, but was ejected by the Norfolk committee for the examination of those who were deemed scandalous ministers, and appears to have been afterwards imprisoned for his principles of religion and loyalty, and to have suffered extreme hardships. After the restoration v however, he was promoted by letters mandate to the degree of D. D. and made both archdeacon of Suffolk, Sept. 8, 1660, and a prebendary of Ely. In 1662 he was presented to the rectory of Horningsheath in Suffolk, and in 1663 to that of Boxford in the same county. He was at length promoted, but late in life, to the bishopric of St. David’s, Nov. 11, 1683, a preferment which, owing to his short continuance in it, was detrimental to his relations. He died March 12, 1685, aged seventy-three, and was buried near the remains of his only daughter in the south aile of the church of St. Margaret, Westminster, where, on a small compartment affixed to the pillar next the west end, is an inscription to his memory.

He is said to have been a man of wit and learning, and possessed of a very noble library. He was attached with much firmness to the constitution in church and state, and rejected all compromise with the principles of the dissenters. He took an active part in the controversies of the times, and was esteemed an antagonist worth contending with. His chief publications, besides some single serrrmns, were, “Beaten Oyle for the lamps of the Sanctuarie,” Jtond. 1641, 4to, in defence of the liturgy. “The Examination of Tilenus before the Triers/' London, 1.658, 8vo.” Arcana Dogmatum Anti-Remonstrantium,“1659, against Baxter, Hickman, and the Calvinists.” The Result of False Principles/' in several dialogues, published anonymously, 1661, 4to. “Uniformity re-asserted,” 1661. “The Solemn League and Covenant arraigned and condemned,” Lond. 1661, 4to. “An Antidote to cure the Calamities of their trembling for fear of the Arke,” Lond. 1663, 4to. “The Verdict upon the Dissenters’ plot,” 1681, 8vo. “Two Letters containing a farther justification of the Church of England,” Lond. 1682. “Suffragium Protestantium, wherein our governors are justified in their impositions and proceedings against dissenters. Meisner also, and the verdict rescued from the cavils and seditious sophistry of Dr, Whitby’s Protestant Reconciler,” Lond. 1683, 8vo.

, an eminent English antiquary and biographer, was the son of Thomas Wood, bachelor of arts and of the civil law; and was born at Oxford, December 17, 1632. He was sent to New-college school in that city in 1641; and three years after removed to the free-school at Thame in Oxfordshire, where he continued till his admission at Merton, 1647. His mother in Tain endeavoured to prevail on him to follow some trade or profession; his prevailing turn was to antiquity: “heraldry, music, and painting, he says, did so much crowd upon him, that he could not avoid them; and he could never give a reason why he should delight in those studies more than others; so prevalent was nature, mixed with a generosity of mind, and a hatred to all that was servile, sneaking, or advantatageous, for lucre-sake.” He took the degree of B.A. 1652, and M.A. in 1655, As he resided altogether at Oxford, he perused all the evidences of the several colleges and churches, from which he compiled his two great worts, and assisted all who were engaged in the like designs; at the same time digesting and arranging all the papers he perused; thus doing the cause of antiquity a double service. His drawings preserved many things which soon after were destroyed. In 1665, he began to lay the foundation of “Historia & Antiquitates Universitatis Oxoniensis;” which was published in 1674, in 2 vols. folio. The first contains the antiquities of the university in general, and the second those of the particular colleges. This work was written by the author in English, and so well esteemed that the university procured it to be translated into Latin, the language in which it was published. The author spent eight years about it, and was, as we are told, at the pains to extract it from the bowels of antiquity. Of the Latin translation, Wood himself has given an account. He tells us, that Dr. Fell, having provided one Peers, a bachelor of arts of Christ-church, to translate it, sent to him for some of the English copy, and set the translator to work; who, however, was some time before he could make a version to his mind. “But at length having obtained the knack,” says Wood, “he went forward with the work; yet all the proofs, that came from the press, went through the doctor’s hands, which he would correct, alter, or dash out, or put in what he pleased; which created a great deal of trouble to the composer and author, but there was no help. He was a great man, and carried all things at his pleasure so much, that many looked upon the copy as spoiled and vitiated by him. Peers was a sullen, dogged, clownish, and perverse, fellow; and when he saw the author concerned at the altering of his copy, he would alter it the more, and study to put things in that might vex him, and yet please his dean, Dr. Fell.” And he afterwards complains, how “Dr. Fell, who printed the book at his own charge, took so much liberty of putting in and out what he pleased, that the author was so far from dedicating or presenting the book to any one, that he would scarcely own it.” Among the “Genuine Remains of Barlow, bishop of Lincoln, published by sir Peter Pett in 1693,” 8vo, are two letters of that prelate, relating to this work. In the first letter we have the following passage: “What you say of our late antiquities is too true. We are alarmed by many letters, not only of false Latin, but false English too, and many bad characters cast on good men; especially on the Anti-Arminians, who are all made seditious persons, schismatics, if not heretics: nay, our first reformers are made fanatics. This they tell me; and our judges of assize, now in town, say no less^. I have not read one leaf of the book yet; but I see I shajl be necessitated to read it over, that I may with my own eyes see the faults, and (so far as I am able) endeavour the mending of them. Nor do I know any other way but a new edition, with a real correction of all faults; and a declaration, that those miscarriages cannot justly be imputed to the university, as indeed they cannot, but to the passion and imprudence, if not impiety, of one or two, who betrayed the trust reposed in them in the managing the edition of that book.” In the second letter, after taking notice that the translation was made by the order and authority of the dean of Christ-church; that not only the Latin, but the history itself, is in many things ridiculously false; and then producing passages as proofs of both; he concludes thus: “Mr. Wood, the compiler of those antiquities, was himself too favourable to papists; and has often complained to me, that at Christ-church some things were put in which neither were in his original copy nor approved by him. The truth is, not only th Latin, but also the matter of those antiquities, being erroneous in several things, may prove scandalous, and give our adversaries some occasion to censure, not only the university, but the church of England and our reformation. Sure I am, that the university had no hand in composing or approving those antiquities; and therefore the errors which are in them cannot de jure be imputed to the university, but must lie upon Christ-church and the composer of them.” This work, however, is now in a great measure rescued from misapprehension by the publication of Wood’s ms. in English by the rev. John Gutch, 3 vols. 4to.

Mr. Wood afterwards undertook his more important work, which was published in 1691, folio; and a second edition in 1721. folio, with this title: “Athenæ Oxonienses. An exact history of all the writers and bishops who have had their education in the most ancient and famous university of Oxford, from the fifteenth year of king Henry the seventh, A.D. 1500, to the author’s death in November, 1695; representing the birth, fortune, preferment, and death of all those authors and prelates, the great accidents of their lives, and the fate and character of their writings. To which are added, the Fasti, or annals of the skid university. In two volumes. The second edition, very much corrected and enlarged; with the addition of above 500 new lives from the author’s original manuscript.” Impartiality and veracity being qualities so essential in an historian, that all other qualities without them cannot make a history good for any thing, Wood has taken some pains to prove, that these great qualities were not wanting in him; and for that purpose thought it expedient to prefix to his work the following curious account of himself. “As to the author himself,” says he, “he is a person who delights to converse more with the dead than with the living, and has neither interest with, nor inclination to flatter or disgrace, any man, or any community of men, of whatever denomination. He is such a universal lover of all mankind, that he could wish there was such a standing measure of merit and honour agreed upon among them all, that there might be no cheat put upon readers and writers in the business of commendations. But, since every one will have a double balance herein, one for himself and his own party, and another for his adversary and dissenters, all he can do is, to, amass and bring together what every side thinks will make best weight for themselves. Let posterity hold the scales and judge accordingly; suu m cuique decus. posteritas rependat. To conclude: the reader is desired to know, that this Herculean labour had been more proper for a head or fellow of a college, or for a public professor or officer of the most noble university of Oxford to have undertaken and consummated, than the author, who never enjoyed any place or office therein, or can justly say that he hath eaten the bread of any founder. Also, that it had been a great deal more fit for one who pretends to be a virtuoso, and to know all men, and all things that are transacted; or for one who frequents much society in common rooms, at public fires, in coffee-houses, assignations, clubs, &c. where the characters of men and their works are frequently discussed; but the author, alas! is so far from frequenting such company and topics, that he is as it were dead to the world, and utterly unknown in person to the generality of scholars in Oxon. He is likewise so great an admirer of a solitary and retired life, that he frequents no assemblies of the said university, hath no companion in bed or at board, in his studies, walks, or journeys; nor holds communication with any, unless with some, and those very few, of generous and noble spirits, that have in some measure been promoters and encouragers of this work: and, indeed, all things considered, he is but a degree different from an ascetic, as spending all or most of his time, whether by day or night, in reading, writing, and divine contemplation. However, l>e presumes, that, the less his company and acquaintance is, the more impartial his endeavours -will appear to the ingenious and learned, to whose judgments only he submits them and himself.”

But, as unconnected as Wood represents himself with all human things and persons, it is certain that he had his prejudices and attachments, and strong ones too, for certain notions and systems; and these prejudices and attachments will always be attended with partialities for or against those who shall be found to favour or oppose such notions or systems. They had their influence upon Wood, who, though he always spoke to the best of his judgment, and often with great truth and exactness, yet sometimes gave way to prejudice and prepossession. Among other, freedoms, he took some with the earl of Clarendon, their late chancellor, which exposed him to the censure of the university. He had observed in the life of judge Glynne, that “after the restoration of Charles II. he was made his eldest serjeant at law, by the corrupt dealing of the then chancellor,” who was the earl of Clarendon: for which expression, chiefty, the succeeding earl preferred an action in the vice-chancellor’s court against him for defamation of his deceased father. The issue of the process was a hard judgement given against the defendant; which, to be made the more public, was put into the Gazette in these words: “Oxford, July 31, 1693. On the-29th instant, Anthony Wood was condemned in the vice-chancellor’s court of the university of Oxford, for having written and published, in the second volume of his book, entitled `Athense Oxonienses,' divers infamous libels against the right honourable Edward late earl of Clarendon, lord high chancellor of England, and chancellor of the said university; and was therefore banished the said university, until such time as he shall subscribe such a public recantation as the judge of the court shall approve of, and give security not to offend in the like nature for the future: and his said book was therefore also decreed to be burnt before the public theatre; and on this day it was burnt accordingly, and public programmas of his expulsion are already affixed in the three usual places.” An historian who has recorded this censure says, that it was the more grievous to the blunt author, because it seemed to come from a party of men whom he had the least disobliged. His bitterness had been against the Dissenters; but of all the zealous Churchmen he had given characters with a singular turn of esteem and affection. Nay, of the Jacobites, and even of Papists themselves, he had always t spoken the most favourable things; and therefore it was really the greater mortification to him, to feel the storm coming from a quarter where he thought he least deserved, and might least expect it. For the same reason, adds the historian, this correction was some pleasure to the Presbyterians, who believed there was a rebuke due to him, which they themselves were not able to pay. Wood was animadverted upon likewise by Burnet, in his “Letter to the bishop of Litchfield and Coventry, concerning a book of Anthony Harmer (alias Henry Wharton), called `A Specimen of some Errors and Defects in the History of the Reformation,' &c.” upon which, in 1693, he published a vindication of himself, which is reprinted before the second edition of his “Athenæ Oxonienses.”

Mr. Wood died at Oxford Nov. 29, 1695, of a retention of urine, under which he lingered above a fortnight. The circumstances of his death are recorded in a letter of Dr. Arthur Charlett, rector of University-college, to archbishop Tenison: this letter, which was published by Hearne, in the appendix to his edition of “Johannis Confratris et Monachi Glastoniensis Chronica,” Oxon. 1726, illustrates the character of this extraordinary person, by minutely describing his behaviour at the most important and critical of all seasons. He left his papers and books to the charge of Dr. Charlett, Mr. Bisse, and Mr. (afterwards bishop) Tanner, to be placed in the Ashmolean library.

, a polite scholar, and under-secretary of state in 1764, has a right to a place here, for his very curious “Essay on the original Genius of Homer.” Of the particulars of his life, the proper subject for our pages, we reluctantly confess ourselves ignorant; but shall observe, that in 1751, he made the tour of Greece, Egypt, and Palestine, in company with Mr. Dawkins and Mr. Bouverie; and at his return published a splendid work, in folio, entitled “The Ruins of Palmyra, otherwise Tedmor in the Desert,” being an account of the ancient and modern state of that place; with a great number of elegant engravings of its ruins by Fourdrinier, from drawings made on the spot. This was followed by a similar work respecting Balbec. Speaking of the abovementioned friends, he says, “Had I been so fortunate as to have enjoyed their assistance in arranging and preparing for the public the substance of our many friendly conversations on this subject (Homer) I should be less anxious about the fate of the following work: but, whatever my success may be in an attempt to contribute to the amusement of a vacant hour, I am happy to think, that, though I should fail to answer the expectations of public curiosity, I am sure to satisfy the demands of private friendship; and that, acting as the only sur^ vivor and trustee for the literary concerns of my late fellow-r travellers, I am, to the best of my judgment, carrying into execution the purpose of men for whose memory I shall ever retain the greatest veneration; and though I may do injustice to those honest feelings which urge me to this pious task, by mixing -an air of compliment in an act of duty, yet I must not disown a private, perhaps an idle consolation, which, if it be vanity to indulge, it would be ingratitude to suppress, viz. that, as long as my imperfect descriptions shall preserve from oblivion the present state of the Troade, and the remains of Balbec and Palmyra, so long will it be known that Dawkins and Bouverie were my friends.”

Mr. Wood was meditating future publications relating to other parts of his tour, especially Greece, when he was called upon to serve his country in a more important station, being appointed under-secretary of state in 1759, by the earl of Chatham; during the whole of whose prosperous administration, as well as in those of his two immediate successors, he continued in that situation.

Mr. Wood had drawn up a great part of his “Essay on Homer” in the life-time of Mr. Dawkins, who wished it to be made public. “But,” says Mr. Wood, “while I was preparing it for the press, I had the honour of being called to a station, which for some years fixed my whole attention upon objects of so very different a nature, that it hecame necessary to lay Homer aside, and to reserve the farther consideration of my subject for a time of more leisure. However, in the course of that active period, the duties of my situation engaged me in an occasional attendance upon a nobleman (the late earl Granville), who, though he presided at his majesty’s councils, reserved some moments for literary amusement. His lordship was so partial to this subject, that I seldom had the honour of receiving his commands on business, that he did not lead the conversation to Greece and Homer. Being directed to wait upon his lordship a few days before he died, with the preliminary articles of the treaty of Paris, I found him so languid, that I proposed postponing my business for another time^ but he insisted that I should stay, saying,” it could not prolong his life, to neglect his duty:“and, repeating a passage out of Sarpedon’s speech, dwelt with particular emphasis on a line which recalled to his mind the distinguishing part he had taken in public affairs. His lordship then repeated the last word several times with a calm and determined resignation; and, after a serious pause of some minutes, he desired to hear the treaty read; to which he listened with great attention; and recovered spirits enough to declare the approbation of a dying statesman (1 use his own words) on the most glorious war, and most honourable peace, this country ever saw.” Mr. Wood also left behind him several Mss. relating to his travels, but not sufficiently arranged to afford any hopes of their being given to the public. The house in which he lived in Putney is situated between the roads which lead to Wandswprth and Wimbledon, and became the residence of his widow. Mr. Wood purchased it of the executors of Edward Gibbon, esq. whose son, the celebrated historian, was born there. The farm and pleasuregrounds which adjoin the house are very spacious, containing near fourscore acres, and surrounded by a gravel-walk, which commands a beautiful prospect of London and the adjacent country. Mr. Wood was buried in the cemetery near the upper road to Richmond. On his monument is the following inscription, drawn up by the hon. Horace Walpole, earl of Orford, at the request of his widow:

“To the beloved memory of Robert Wood, a man of supreme benevolence, who was born at the castle of Riverstown near Trim, in the county of Meath, and died Sept. 9, 1771, in the fifty-fifth year of his age; and of Thomas Wood his son, who died August 25th, 1772, in his ninth year; Ann, their once happy wife and mother, now dedicates this melancholy and inadequate memorial of her affection and grief. The beautiful editions of Balbec and Palmyra, illustrated by the classic pen of Robert Wood, supply a nobler and more lasting monument, and will survive those august remains.”

, a divine and poet, eldest son of Robert Woodford, of Northampton, gent, was born in the parish of All-hallows on the Wall, London, April 15, 1636; became a commoner of Waclham college in 1653; took one degree in arts in 1656; and in 1658 returned to the Inner Temple, where he was chamber-fellow with the poet Flatman. In 1660, he published a poem “On the return of king Charles II.” After that period, he lived first at Aldbrook, and afterwards at Bensted in Hampshire, ift^i married and secular condition, and was elected F. R. S. in Nov. 1664. He took orders from bishop Morley, and was soon after presented by sir Nicolas Stuart, bart. to the rectory of Hartley-Maudet in Hampshire. He was installed prebend of Chichester May 27, 1676; made D. D. by the diploma of archbishop Sancroft in 1677; and prebendary of Winchester, Nov. 8, 1680, by the favour of his great patron, the bishop of that diocese. He died in 1700. His poems, which have some merit, are numerous. His “Paraphrase on the Psalms, in five books,” was published in 1667, 4to, and again in 1678, 8vo. This “Paraphrase,” which was written in the Pindaric and other various sorts of verse, is commended by R. Baxter in the preface to his “Poetical Fragments,” 1681 and is called by others “an incomparable version,” especially by his friend Flatman, who wrote a Pindaric ode on it, and a copy of verses on Woodford’s “Paraphrase on the Canticles,” 1679, 8vo. With this latter paraphrase are printed, 1. “The Legend of Love, in three cantos.'. 12.” To the Muse,“a Pindaric ode. 3.” A Paraphrase upon some select Hymns of the New and Old Testament.“4.” Occasional compositions in English rhymes," with some translations out, of Latin, Greek, and Italian, but chiefly out of the last;. some of which compositions and translations were before falsely published by a too-curious collector of them, from very erroneous copies, against the will and knowledge of their author. Dr. Woodford complains, that several of his translations of some of the moral odes had been printed after the same incorrect manner.

, whom Dr. Whitby pronounces “the most ingenious and solid writer of the Roman (catholic) party,” and who merits some notice from his name occurring so frequently in the popish controversy at the latter end of the seventeenth century, was the son of John Woodhead of Thornhill in Yorkshire, and was born in 1608 at Meltham in the parish of Abbersbury, or Ambury, in that county. He had his academical education in University college, Oxford, where he took his degrees in arts, was elected fellow in 1633, and soon after entered into holy orders. In 1641 he served the office of proctor, and then set out for the continent as travelling tutor to some young gentlemen of family who had been his pupils in college. While at Rome he lodged with the duke of Buckingham, whom he taught mathematics, and is supposed about the same time to have embraced the communion of the church of Rome, although for a long time he kept this a profound secret. On his return to England he had an apartment in the duke of Buckingham’s house in the Strand, and was afterwards entertained in lord Capel’s family. In 1648 he was deprived of his fellowship by the parliamentary visitors, but merely on the score of absence, aod non-appearance, when called. After the restoration he was reinstated in his fellowship, but rinding it impossible any longer to conform, he obtained leave to travel, with the allowance of a travelling fellowship. Instead, Kbwever, of going abroad, he retired to an obscure residence at Hoxton near London, where he spent several years, partly in instructing some young gentlemen of popish families, and partly in composing his works. Here he remained almost undiscovered, until a little while before his death, which happened at Hoxton, May 4, 1678. He was buried in St. Pancras church-yard, where there is a monument to his memory.

Woodhead was considered as one of the ablest controversial writers, on the popish side, in his time, aqd some protestants have paid respect to his abilities and candour. Most of his works were printed at Mr. Obadiah Walker’s private press, and some of them have been attributed to him. Wood gives a long list of about twenty-three articles, some of which are translations. The principal of his original writings is his “Guide in controversies,” or more fully, “A rational account of the doctrine of catholics, concerning the ecclesiastical guide in controversies of religion: reflecting on the late writings of protestants, particularly of archbishop Laud, and doctor Stillingfleet, on this subject; in four discourses” under the initials R. H. 1666, 1667, and 1673, 4to. Wood adds, “Many stick not to say, which is a wonder to me^ that he was the author of” The Whole Duty of Man“and of all that goes under the name of that author.” The protestant writers with whom he was involved in controversy, and in whose lives or writings his name occurs, were, Peter Heylyn, Stillingfleet, archbishop Wake, Drs. Aldrich, Smalridge, Harrington, Tully, Hooper, and Whitby.

, an eminent natural philosopher, was descended from a good family, originally of Gloucestershire, and was born in Derbyshire, May 1, 1665. He received the first part of his education at a school in the country, where he made a considerable progress in the Latin and Greek languages; but his father designing him for trade, he was taken from school, before he was sixteen years old, and put apprentice, as is said, to a linen-draper jr> London. This way of life, however, was so contrary to his natural thirst for knowledge and love of books, that he quitted it in a few years, and devoted himself entirely to literary pursuits. His studies were directed to philosophical objects, and the progress he made soon attracted the notice of some persons of eminence in the learned world. Amongst others he was honoured with the particular friendship of that distinguished scholar and physician Dr. Peter Barwick, who was so pleased with his ingenuity and industrious application, that he took him under his immediate tuition in his own family. In this advantageous situation he prosecuted his studies in philosophy, anatomy, and physic, with the utmost ardour.

During his residence here, sir Ralph Dutton, who was Dr. Barwick' s son-in-law, invited Mr. Woodward to accompany the doctor on a visit to his seat at Sherborne, in Gloucestershire. He probably made some stay here, for we are told that he was now first led to inquire into that branch of natural philosophy, which became afterwards the favourite object of his studies, and the foundation of the fame which he acquired. The country about Sherborne, and the neighbouring parts of Gloucestershire, to which he made frequent excursions, abounded with stone; and there being quarries laid open almost every where, he was induced to visit them, and to examine the nature and condition of the stone. In these visits he was struck with the great variety of sea-shells, and other marine productions, with which the sand of most of this stone was incorporated; and being encouraged by the novelty, and as he judged, the singular importance of this speculation, he resolved to pursue it through the remote parts of the kingdom. In consequence of this resolution, he travelled throughout almost all England, in order to inform himself of the present condition of the earth, and all bodies contained in it, as far as either grottoes, caverns, mines, quarries, &c. led him into a knowledge of the interior, and as far as his best observations could extend in respect to the exterior surface, and such productions as any where occurred, plants, insects, sea, river, and land-shells. He directed his attention likewise to the fluids; as well those within the surface of the earth, the water of mines, grottoes, caverns, &c. as those upon the surface, the sea, rivers, and springs; and in making these observations, he entered every curious circumstance, with great care$ in a journal. When he had finished these researches, and had returned to London, he would gladly have gone to the continent on the same pursuit, hut was prevented by the war which at that time disturbed the quiet of Europe. In order, however, to supply this defect as far as possible, he applied to gentlemen who had travelled, and were likely to give him information on the subject of his inquiries; and he also drew up a list of questions upon this subject, which he sent off to all parts of the world, whereever either himself, or any of his acquaintance, had any friends resident; the result of which was, that in time he was abundantly satisfied, that the circumstances after which he inquired, were much the same every where. Being now prepared with information, and, as it will appear, not unprovided with a theory, he published in 1695, in 1 vol. 6vo, “An Essay towards a natural history of the Earth and terrestrial bodies, especially minerals; as also of the sesj rivers, and springs. With an account of the universal deluge, and of the effects that it had upon the earth.' 1 He called it an” Essay," because it was designed, as, he said, to be followed by a large work upon the same subject, of whi-ch this was but a specimen.

Not only the account of the deluge in Genesis, and the traditions to the same effect preserved by all ancient nations, but the abundant remains of sea-shells and coral, found at great distances from the sea, at great heights, and intermixed with various rocks, have induced mineralogists, without exception, to agree that at some former period the whole of this earth was covered with the sea. Various hypothetical explanations of the Way in which* this deluge took place have been from time to time published, and several of these are to be found in the Philosophical Transactions. It is not necessary to take notice of the old hypothesis of Burnel, who conceived that the ante-diluvian world consisted of a thin, smooth crust spread over the whole sea, and that this crust breaking occasioned the deluge, and the j|reWnt uneven surface of the earth; nor of Whiston, who ascribed the deluge to the effect of the tail of a comet; because those opinions have many years ago lost all their supporters. Nor is any attention at present paid to the hypothesis of Buffon, who conceived the earth to have been splintered from the sun by the blow of a comet, and accounted for the deluge by suppositions equally arbitrary, and inconsistent with the phenomena. Dr. Woodward was the first writer who acquired a splendid reputation by his theory; and his opinions, though not always correct, generally prevailed in his time, and after. In the work above mentioned, which he afterwards considerably augmented and improved, after refuting the hypotheses of his predecessors, he proceeds to shew, that the present slate of the earth is the consequence of the universal deluge; that the waters took up and dissolved all the minerals and rocks, and gradually deposited them along with the sea-shells; and he affirms that all rocks lie in the order of their specific gravity. Although this theory has long lost its authority, several of the positions which he laid down continue still to find a place in every theory which has succeeded him.

In the mean time Woodward’s “Essay” occasioned no small controversy. Some of its errors were pointed out by Dr. Martin Lister, in three distinct pieces; and Mr. Robinson, a clergyman of Cumberland, soon after published some “Observations on the natural history of the world of matter, and the world of life,” in which he accused Woodward of plagiarism, and mentioned the authors from whom, as he said, he had borrowed most of his notions. But these different works received an answer in a single treatise published by Mr. Harris, in 1697; and the dispute was compromised that same year, in a pamphlet written by Dr. Arbuthnot, in which, after an impartial examination of Woodward’s hypothesis, he decided that though it seemed liable to many just exceptions, yet the whole was not to be exploded. Hitherto the author himself had made no reply to any of the objections against his “Essay;” but in 1704, a Latin translation of it being published at Zurich, he was led into a controversy, by letters on the subject, with some of his learned correspondents abroad, and particularly with the celebrated Leibnitz. This controversy continued some years, and when ended, a fresh attack was made on our author’s hypothesis, by Elias Camerarius, professor of physic at Tubingen, in some Latin dissertations printed in 1712. On this Dr. Woodward published in 1714, “Naturalis historia telluris illustrata et aucta,” in the preface to which he declares, that what had been urged by his antagonists, before Camerarius, was not of such force as to deserve a distinct reply; that every thing considerable in their objections was now proposed by Camerarius, with some additions of his own entirely new, and that the present might be considered as a general answer. In this work, therefore, he supplied the main defects and omissions of his Essay, and endeavoured to vindicate his hypothesis. The dispute with Catnerarius was closed in a very friendly address from that learned professor, which was published in the German Ephemerides in 1717, though not without some intimation of his continuing still in his first sentiments. In 1726, Mr. Benjamin Holloway, F. R. S. having translated the “Naturalis Historia telluris” into English, doctor Woodward readily embraced this opportunity of strengthening his opinion by some additional papers with which he furnished the translator.

The connexion of all the circumstances of Dr. Woodward’s publication with each other, rendered it necessary to give the above account of the whole in succession; but we must now return to other transactions in his progress towards the reputation he had acquired, and which was not altogether unmixed. In the interval between his visit to sir Ralph Button, and the publication of his first “Essay,” he had been elected professor of physic in Gresham college, to which place he was recommended by some persons of consequence in the learned world, and particularly by Dr. Barwick. This preferment, which he obtained in 1692, was soon followed by other honours. In 1693 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society, and was frequently afterwards one of their council. In 1695 he was created M. D. by archbishop Tenison, and in the following year he was admitted of Pembroke-hall, Cambridge, and honoured with the same degree in that university. In 1698 he was admitted a candidate of the college of physicians, and was chosen a fellow in 1702.

In 1699 he published, in the Philosophical Transactions, “Some thoughts and experiments concerning Vegetation.” These experiments have acquired great celebrity, and are constantly referred to by all writers on vegetable physiology. They consist in putting sprigs of vegetables into the mouths of phials filled with water, allowing them to vegetate for some time, and then determining the quantity of water which they have imbibed, and the quantity of weight which they have gained. The difference obviously indicates the quantity of moisture exhaled by the plant. About 1693, Dr. Woodward’s attention was directed to an object of a very different kind. He had purchased from the museum of a deceased friend, a small, but very curious icon shield of a round form; on the concave side of which were represented, in the upper part, the ruins of Rome when burnt by the Gauls; and below, the weighing out the gold to purchase their retreat, together with the arrival of Camillus, and flight of the Gauls; and in the centre appeared a grotesque mask with horns very large and prominent; the figures all executed in a spirited and beautiful manner. Mr. Conyers, in whose collection this curiosity was, had purchased it of a brazier, who bought it among some brass and iron fragments which came out of the armoury in the Tower of London, near the end of Charles II.'s reign. As soon as it came into the possession of Dr. Woodward, many inquisitive persons came to see it, and in order to enable others, who had not that opportunity, to form a judgment of it, he not only had several casts made of it, but also, in 1705, had it engravenat Amsterdam, on a copper-plate of the size of the original copies of which were transmitted to many learned foreigners, for their opinion. Antiquaries, however, could not agree as to its age. The professors and other critics in Holland, in general, pronounced it antique; but those in France thought otherwise, and Woodward wrote against their opinion a letter to the abbe Bignon, which is published by Dr. Ward in the appendix to his “'Lives of the Gresham Professors.” Dodwell wrote a “Dissertatio de Parma equestri Woodwardiana,” which was published by Hearne (See Hearne) in 1713. Dodwell supposed this shield came out of some public collection; such as the Shield Walk in Whitehall-­palace, from Henry VIII.'s time to Charles I. Theophilus Downes, fellow of Baliol college, differed from him as to the antiquity of this monument; and after his death were published, in two leaves, 8vo, his “De clypeo Woodwardiano stricturae breves.” Ainsworth abridged Dodwell’s dissertation, and inserted it at the end of the “Museum Woodwardianum,” or catalogue of the doctor’s library and curiosities, sold by auction at Covent-garden in 1728. He afterwards enlarged the piece, considered the objections, and reprinted it with the title, “De Clypeo Camilli antique,” &c. 1734, 8vo. Spanheim and Abr. Seller had both begun to write dissertations on it, but were prevented by death. Ward was the last who made any remarks on it, and those in favour of its antiquity; but Moyle’s objection to its antiquity from the ruins of an amphitheatre has not been removed by Dr. Ward. No ancient artist, Mr. Gough observes, could be so ignorant as to ascribe such buildings to that period. At Dr. Woodward’s sale, this shield was purchased by Col. King, one of his executors, for 100l., and at the sale of the colonel’s effects, in 1768, it was sold to Dr. Wilkinson for forty guineas, along with the letters, &c. relating to it.

In 1707, Dr. Woodward published “An account of some Roman urns, and other antiquities, lately digged up near Bishopsgate; with brief reflections upon the ancient and present state of London, in a letter to sir C. Wren,” &c. This was reprinted at London and Oxford, 1713 and 1723, 8vo, with a letter from the doctor to the editor. It was printed first at the desire of sir Christopher, whose observations have since appeared in the “Parentalia.” Wren could not be persuaded that the temple of Diana stood on the scite of St. Paul’s, though Woodward had prepared a dissertation on her image dug up near that cathedral. This dissertation, never printed, is now in the possession of the editor of this Dictionary.

In the midst of those researches into antiquity, Dr. Woodward did not neglect his medical profession, although it cannot be said that he was eminently successful. In 1718 we find him involved in a controversy with two of the greatest physicians of his time, Dr. Freind and Dr. Mead. In a learned work which Dr. Freind published, about this time, he had advanced several arguments in favour of purging upon the access of the second fever, in some dangerous cases of the confluent small-pox. This practice was warmly Opposed by Dr. Woodward, who, on the contrary, strenuously recommended the use of emetics in such cases; and in the following year printed his “State of Physic and of Diseases, with an Inquiry into the Causes of the late increase of them; but more particularly of the Small-pox. With some considerations upon the new practice of purging in that disease” &c. in 8vo. This laid the foundation of a bitter controversy and Dr. Mead retained a sense of the injury, as he thought it, for many years after, as appears from the preface to his treatise on the small-pox; where he gives a short history of the affair, and also throws some personal reflections on Dr. Woodward, which would have been inexcusable in the heat of the controversy, and were certainly much more so near thirty years after. Pope, Arbuthnot, and other wits, attempted also to turn Dr. Woodward into ridicule, and there appears to have been something of irascibility in his temper, which afforded his enemies considerable advantage io this way.

Dr. Woodward declined in his health a considerable time before he died; and though he had all along continued to prepare materials for his large work, relating to the Natural History of the Earth, yet it was never finished; but only some collections, said to have been detached frooi it, were printed at different times, as enlargements upon particular topics in his essay. He was confined first to his house, and afterwards to his bed, many months before his death. During this time, he not only drew up instructions for the disposal of his books and other collections, but alsocompleted and sent to the press his “Method of Fossils,” in English; and lived to see the whole of it printed, except the last sheet. He died in Gresham-college April 25, 1728; and was buried in Westminster-abbey, where is a monument to his memory. After his death, the two following* works were published, 1. “Fossils of all kinds, digested into a Method suitable to their mutual relation and affinity,” &c. 8vo. 2. “A Catalogue of Fossils in the Collection of John Woodward, M. D.” in 2 vols. 8vo. By his last will, he founded a lecture in the university of Cambridge, to be read there upon his “Essay towards the Na-r tural History of the Earth, his Defence of it, his Discourse of Vegetation, and his State of Physic;” for which he ordered lands of 150l. per annum in South-Britain to be purchased and conveyed to that university, and out of this a hundred pounds per annum to the lecturer, who, after the death of his executors Dixie Windsor, Hugh Bethel, Richard Graham, esqrs. and colonel Richard King, is to be chosen by the archbishop of the province, the bishop of the diocese, the presidents of the College of Physicians and of the Royal Society, the two members of parliament, and the whole senate of the university. This lecturer to be a bachelor; to have no other preferment to read four lectures a year in English or Latin, of which one is to be printed; to have the custody of the two cabinets of fossils given by the doctor to the university, to shew them three days in ach week gratis; and to be allowed ten pounds per annum for making experiments and observations, and keeping correspondence with learned men. Some of these conditions it would not be easy to fulfil, yet the professorship continues, and has been held by men of talents. Dr. Conyers Middleton was the first appointed to the office, who opened the lectures with an elegant Latin oration in praise of the founder, and upon the usefulness of his institution.

Dr. Woodward left a great many manuscripts, enumerated by Dr. Ward, some of which he ordered to be burnt, but others came into the possession of his executor, colonel Richard King, and were sold in 1768 with the rest of the colonel’s collection. Dr. Woodward was in many respects a visionary and an enthusiast, but the extent of his ingenuity and learning cannot well be called in question, and it ought not to be forgot that the circumstances of his youth were discouraging, and that he had no help in his progress from academical instruction.

, one of the most eminent of modern engravers in England, was born at Maidstone, in Kent, Aug. 27, 1735. Of his early history few particulars have been preserved, and those mostly traditionary. His father was a thread-maker, and long time a foreman to Mr. Robert Pope. The family is said to have come originally from Holland; and there is a tradition that Woollett’s great grandfather escaped from the battle fought by the parliamentary forces against the royalists near Maidstone. Our artist was educated at Maidstone under Mr. Simon Goodwin, who used to notice his graphic talents. Once having taken on a slate the likeness of a schoolfellow named Burtenshaw, who had a prominent nose, his master desired him to finish it on paper, and preserved the drawing. He was also in the habit of drawing the likenesses of his father’s acquaintances. His earliest production on copper was a portrait of a Mr. Scott, of Maidstone, with a pipe in his mouth. These are perhaps trifles, but they compose all that is now remembered of Woollett’s younger days. His first attempts having been seen by Mr. Tinney, an engraver, he took him as an apprentice at the same time with Mr. Anthony Walker and Mr. Brown. His rise in his profession was rapid, and much distinguished, for he brought the art of landscape engraving to great perfection. With respect to the grand and sublime, says Strutt, “if 1 may be allowed the term in landscapes, the whole world cannot produce his equal.” Woollett, however, did not confine himself to landscapes, he engraved historical subjects and portraits with the greatest success. The world has done ample justice to his memory, and the highest prices still continue to be given for good impressions of all his prints, but particularly of his “Niobe” and its companion “Phaeton,? ' his” Celadon and Amelia,“and” Ceyx and Alcyone;“and” The Fishery,“all from Wilson, whose peculiar happiness it was that his best pictures were put into the hands of Woollett, who so perfectly well understood and expressed the very spirit of his ideas upon thecopper. To these we may add the portrait of Rubens, from Vandyke, and, what are in every collection of taste, his justly celebrated prints from the venerable president of the academy,” The Death of General Wolfe,“and The Battle of the Boyne.”

Mr. Woollett died at his house, Upper Charlotte-street, Rathbone-place, May 23, 1785, aged fifty and the record of his death is given in these words “To say he was the first artist in his profession would be giving him his least praise, for he was a good nian. Naturally modest and amiable in his disposition, he never censured the works of others, or omitted pointing out their merits; his patience under the continual torments of a most dreadful disorder upwards of nine months was truly exemplary; and he died as he had lived, at peace with all the world, in vtfhich he never had an enemy. He has left his family inconsolable for his death, and the public to lament the loss of a man whose works (of which his unassuming temper never boasted) are an honour to his country.” An elegant monument was afterwards put up to his memory in the cloisters, Westminster abbey.

, an English divine, very notorious in his day for the pertinacity with which he published the most dangerous opinions, was born in 1669, at Northampton, where his father was a reputable tradesman. After a proper education at a grammar-school, he was entered of Sidney college, in Cambridge, in 1685, where he took both the degrees in arts, and that of bachelor of divinity, and was chosen fellow of his college. From this time, in conformity to the statutes of that society, he applied himself to the study of divinity and entering into holy orders, soon, we are told, became distinguished and esteemed for his learning and piety. Of what sort the latter was, his life will shew. It appears that he had very early conceived some of those notions which afterwards so much degraded his character. His first appearance as an author was in 1705, when he printed at Cambridge a work entitled “The old Apology of the Truth for the Christian Religion against the Jews and Gentiles revived,” 8vo. The design of this work, which is an octavo of near 400 pages, is to prove that all the actions of Moses were typical of Christ, and to shew-tljat some of the fathers did not think them real, but typical relations of what was to come. This allegorical way of interpreting the scriptures of the Old Testament our author is said to have adopted from Origen, whose works, however, he must have studied very injudiciously; yet he became so enamoured of this methocf of interpretation, that he not only thought it had been unjustly neglected by the moderns, but that it might be useful, as an additional proof of the truth of Christianity. He preached this doctrine first in the college chapel, and afterwards before the university at St. Mary’s, to the great surprise of his audience. Yet, as his intentions seemed to be good, and his character respected, and as he had not yet begun to make use of the indecent language which disgraced his subsequent works, no opposition was raised; and when the volume appeared in print, though there were some singular notions advanced, and a new manner of defending Christianity proposed, yet there was nothing that gave particular offence, and many things which shewed great ingenuity and learning. He still continued to reside at Cambridge, applying himself indefatigably to his studies, in a quiet and retired way, until 1720, ^hen he published a Latin dissertation entitled “De Pontii Pilati ad Tiberium Epistola circa res Jesu Christi gestas; per Mystagogum,” 8vo, in which he endeavours to prove that Pontius Pilate wrote a letter to Tiberius Caesar concerning the works of Christ; bwt that the epistle delivered down to us under that name among the writings of the fathers, was forged. The same year he published another pamphlet in Latin, with the title of “Origenis Adamantii Renati Epistola ad Doctores Whitbeium, Waterlandium, Whistonium, aliosque literates hujus saeculi disputatores, circa fidem vere orthodoxam et scripturarum interpretationem;” and, soon after, a second epistle with the same title. The rage of allegorizing the letter of the holy scriptures into mystery, with which this writer was incurably infected, began now to shew itself more openly to the world than it had hitherto done. In 1720 and 1721, he published two letters to Dr. Bennet, rector of St. Giles’s, Cripplegate, London; one upon this question, “Whether the people called quakers do not the nearest of any other sect of religion resemble the primitive Christians in principles and practice?” by Aristobulus; the other, “In defence of the Apostles and Primitive Fathers of the Church, for their allegorical interpretation of the law of Moses, against the ministers of the letter and literal commentators of this age;” and, soon after, he himself published an answer to these two letters; in all which his view appears to have been rather to be severe upon the clergy th,an to defend either apostles, fathers, or quakers. At what time he left college does not appear, but he had about this time absented himself from it beyond the time limited by the statutes. The society and his friends, however, compassionating his case, and judging it to be in some degree the effect of a bodily distemper, allowed him the revenues of his fellowship for a support. The supposition hurt his pride, and he went directly to Cambridge to convince the gentlemen of his college that he laboured under no disorder, and as he at the same time refused to reside, he lost his fellowship.

After this his brother, an alderman of Northampton, allowed him thirty pounds a year, besides other occasional assistance, and on this he supported himself, being a man of great temperance, in London. In 1722 he published a piece entitled “The exact fitness of the time in which Christ was manifested in the Flesh, demonstrated by reason, against the objections of the old Gentiles, and of modern Unbelievers.” This was well enough received, as shewing much learning displayed in a temperate manner, and having in it some valuable remarks. It was written twenty years before its publication, and delivered as a public exercise both in Sidney college chapel, and in St. Mary’s church, as Woolston himself observes in his dedication of it to Dr. Fisher, master of Sidney college. But he did not long abstain from his intended attack on the clergy and religion. In 1723 and 1724 came out his four “Free Gifts to the Clergy,” and his own “Answer” to them, in five separate pamphlets; in which he attacks the clergy with the greatest contempt, and, as it would appear, without any provocation. Yet, though he treated them in this manner, he expressed a very great regard for religion; and did what some thought more than necessary to defend it, when in 1726 he published “A Defence of the Thundering Legion, against Mr. Moyle’s Dissertations.”

The “Four free gifts” were scarcely published, when, the controversy with Collins going on at this time, Mr. Woolstou, under pretence of acting the part of an impartial inquirer, published his “Moderator between an Infidel and Apostate,” and two “Supplements to the Moderator.” In these pieces, he pursued his allegorical scheme, to the exclusion of the letter; and, with regard to the miracles of Christ, not only contended for sublime and mystical interpretations of them, but also asserted that they were not real, or ever actually wrought. As he conducted this attempt with greater rudeness and insolence than any of those that had appeared before him, his presumption was not likely to be unnoticed in a Christian country, and he was prosecuted by the attorney-general; but the prosecution was stopped at the intercession of Mr. Whision*. In 1727, 1728, 1729, and 1730, were published his “Six Discourses on the Miracles of Christ,” and his two “Defences” of them. The six discourses are dedicated to six bishops: Gibson, of London; Chandler, of Litchfield; Smalbroke, of St. David’s Hare, of Chichester; Sherlock, of Bangor; and Potter, of Oxford, who are all treated with the utmost rudeness. What he undertakes to prove is, that the miracles of our Saviour, as we find them in the Evangelists, however related by them as historical truths, were not real, but merely allegorical; and that they are to be interpreted, not in literal but only in mystical senses. His pretence is, that the fathers of the church considered our Saviour’s miracles in the same allegorical way that he does; that is, as merely allegorical, and excluding the letter: but this is not so. Some of the fathers, indeed, and Origen in particular, did not confine themselves to the bare letter, but endeavoured, upon the

* It does not appear very clearly Clarke, to persuade him to go with me whether this was at the intercession of to lord Townsend (th‘e secretary of Wbiston. Winston informs us of his state) but he refused, alledging that having applied sto theattorney-gene- the report would then go abroad, that ral, sir Philip Yorke, who said that he the kmij supported blasphemy. Howwould not’ proceed unless the secretary ever, no farther progress was made i of state sent himan order so to do. Mr. Woolston’s trial. “1 then,” addsWhiston, “went to Dr. foundation of the letter, to raise spiritual meanings, and to allegorize by way of moral application; and they did this,­not only upon the miracles of Christ, but upon almost all the historical facts of the Old and New Testament: but they never denied the miracles or the facts. This strange and enthusiastic scheme of Woolston was offensive enough of itself, but infinitely more so from his manner of conducting it; for he not 'only argues against the miracles of Christ, but treats them in a most ludicrous and outrageous way: expressing himself in terms of astonishing insolence and scurrility. Such conduct raised a general disgust: and many books and. pamphlets, berth from bishops and inferior clergy, appeared against his discourses; and a second prosecution was commenced and carried on with vigour, against which there seemed to be now little or no opposition, he having by his disingenuity of argument and scurrility of manner, excluded himself from all the privileges of a fair reasoner. At his trial in Guildhall before the lord chief-justice Raymond, he spoke several times himself; and among other things urged, that” he thought it very bard to be tried by a set of men, who, though otherwise very learned and worthy persons, were yet no morejudges of the subjects on which he wrote than he himself was a judge of the most crabbed points of law.“He was sentenced to a year’s imprisonment, and to pay a fine of Iool He purchased the liberty of the rules of the King’s Bench, where he continued after the expiration of the year, being unable to pay the fine. Dr. Samuel Clarke had begun his solicitations at court for the releasement of Woolston, declaring that he did not undertake it as an approver of his doctrines, but as an advocate for that liberty which he himself had always contended for; but he was hindered from effecting it by his death, which happened soon after Woolston’s commitment. The greatest obstruction to his deliverance from confinement was the obligation of giving security not to offend by any future writings, he being resolved to write again as freely as before. While some supposed this author not in earnest, but meaning to subvert Christianity under a pretence of defending it; others believed him disordered, and not perfectly in his right mind; and many circumstances concurred to persuade to the latter of these opinions; but how, in either case, a prosecu-r tion for blasphemy comes to* be considered as persecution for religion, remains yet to be explained. Such a construction, however, appears to have been put upon it by the Clarkes and Lardners of those days, and by their successors in our own. As the sale of Woolston’s books was very great (for such blasphemies will find readers as well as advocates for the publication of them), his gains arising from them must have been proportionable; but he defrayed all the expences, and those not inconsiderable, to which his publishers were subjected by selling. He died January 27, 1732-3, after an illness of four days; and, a few minutes before his death, uttered these words:” This is a struggle which all men must go through, and which I bear not only patiently, but with willingness." His body was interred in St. George’s church-yard, Southwark.

, bishop of Exeter in queen Elizabeth’s reign', was born at Wigan in Lancashire, in 1535; he was nephew to the celebrated dean Nowell. He entered a student of Brasen-nose college, Oxford, in 1553, whence in 1555 he fled to his uncle and the other exiles in Germany. On Iris return in the- beginning of queen Elizabeth’s reign, he was made canon residentiary of Exeter, where he read a divinity lecture twice a week, and preached twice every Lord’s day; and in the time of the great plague, he only with one more remained in the city, preaching publicly as before, and comforting privately such as were infected with the disease. Besides his residentiaryship, he had the living of Spaxton in the diocese of Wells, and in 1575 became Warden of Manchester college. In 1579 he was consecrated bishop of Exeter, and, as he had been before esteemed a pious, painful, and skilful divine, he was now a vigilant and exemplary prelate. His character in this last respect excited some animosity, and a long string of accusations was presented against him to archbishop Parker, which Strype has recorded at length in his appendix to the life of that celebrated primate, all which bishop Woolton satisfactorily answered.

Bishop Godwin, the biographer, who married one of his daughters, and seems to have been with him in his last moments, says, he dictated letters, not two hours before his death, on subjects of importance, full of the piety and prudence of a man in health and vigour; and being reminded to consult his health, he repeated and applied the saying of Vespasian, that “a bishop ought to die upon his legs;” which in him, as before in the emperor, was verified, for as he was supported across the room (his complaint being an asthma) he sunk, and expired almost before he touched the ground, in the fifty-ninth year of his age. He was interred in Exeter cathedral, with a Latin inscription by his son. He composed many theological tracts, monitory and practical, which were all printed and published in the space of about twelve months, in the years 1576 and 1577. 1. “Anatornie of the whole man.” 2. “Christian manual.” 3. “Of Conscience.” 4. “Armour of proofe.” 5. < Immortalitie of the soule.“6.” Fortresse of the Faithfull,“and 7.” David’s Chain," which last is not mentioned by Wood or Ames.

, an artist of considerable merit, was a native of England, born in 1700, and for the greater part of his life painted portraits in miniature: he afterwards, with worse success, performed them in oil; but at last acquired reputation and money by etchings, in the manner of Rembrandt, which proved to be a very easy task, by the numbers of men who have counterfeited that master so as to deceive all those who did not know his works. Worlidge’s imitations and his heads in black-lead have grown astonishingly into fashion. His best, piece is the whole-length of sir John Astley, copied from Rembrandt, and his copy of the hundred Guilder print; but his print of the theatre at Oxford and the act there, and his statue of lady Pomfret’s Cicero, are very poor performances. His last work was a book of gems from the antique. He died at Hammersmith, Sept. 23, 1766, aged sixty-six.

, a learned physician of Denmark, was born May 13, 1588, at Arhusen, a city of Jutland, where his father was a burgomaster of an ancient family. He began his studies in his native place; but was sent, when very young, to the college of Lunenburg; and thence to Emmeric, in the duchy of Cleves. Having spent four years at these places, he was removed to Marpurg in 1605; and two years after to Strasburg, where he applied himself to physic, to which profession he had now given the preference, and going to Basil studied some time with advantage under Platerus and others. In 1608, he went to Italy, and during a residence of some months at Padua, his uncommon parts and learning procured him singular honours. He visited other cities of Italy, and passed thence into France, remaining three months at Sienna, and four at Montpelier; after which his design was, to make along abode at Paris; but the assassination of Henry IV. in 1610, about two months after his arrival, obliging him as well as other strangers to retire from that city, he went to Holland, and thence to Denmark. He had not yet visited the university of Copenhagen, so that his first care was to repair thither, and to be admitted a member of it. ‘He was earnestly entreated to continue there; but his passion for travelling was not yet satiated, and he resolved to see England first. The chemical experiments that were then carrying on at Marpurg made a great noise; and he went thither in 1611, with a view of perfecting himself in a science of great importance to a physician. Thence he journeyed to Basil, where he took the degree of doctor in physic; and from Basil to London, in which city he resided a year and a half. His friends grew now impatient to have him at home, where he arrived in 1613: and was scarcely settled, when he was made professor of the belles-lettres in the university of Copenhagen. In 1615, he was translated to the chair of the Greek professor; and, in 1624-, to the professorship of physic, in the room of Caspar Bartholin, which he held to his death. These occupations did not hinder him from practising in his profession, and from being the fashionable physician. ’The king and, court of Denmark always employed him; and Christian IV. as a recompence for his services, conferred on him the canonry of Lunden. He died Aug. 31, 1654, aged sixty-six.

, an excellent divine of the church of England, was born at Manchester, in the beginning of Feb. 1617-18, and was the son of Roger Worthington, a person of “chief note and esteem” in that town. His mother was Mary, the daughter of Christopher Whichcote, esq. and niece to sir Jeremy Whichcote, bart. He was educated at Emanuel college, Cambridge, of which he became a fellow, was created B.D. in 1646, and D. D. in 1655. He was afterwards chosen master of Jesus college, vacant by the ejectment of Dr. Richard Sterne, afterwards archbishop of York, but was with some difficulty prevailed upon to submit to the choice and request of the fellows, his inclination being to a more private and retired life; and soon after the restoration be resigned that mastership to Dr. Sterne. In the mean time he was successively rector of Horton in Buckinghamshire, Gravely and Fen Ditton in the county of Cambridge, Barking, with Needham, in the county of Suffolk, and Ingoldsby in Lincolnshire. During the years 1660 and 1661 he cultivated a frequent correspondence by letters with that great promoter of all useful learning, Mr. Samuel Hartlib; four and twenty of Dr. Worthington’s being published at the end of his Miscellanies; and several others by bishop Kennet in his Register and Chronicle. In 1663, he was collated to the sinecure rectory of Moulton All Saints, in Norfolk. He entered upon the cure of St. Bene't Fink in June 1664, under Dr. George Evans, canon of Windsor, who held a lease from that college of the rectory; and he continued to preach there during the plague-year 1665, coming thither weekly from Hackney, where he had placed his family: and from February 18, 1665-6, till the fire in September, he preached the lecture of that church, upon the death of the former lecturer. Soon after that calamity, he was presented by Dr. Henry More> of Christ’s college in Cambridge, to the living of Ingoldsby, before mentioned, and to the prebend of Asgarby in the church of Lincoln, procured him by archbishop Sheldon, who had a great esteem for him. From Ingoldsby he removed to Hackney, being chosen lecturer of that church with a subscription commencing from Lady-day 1670; and, the church of St. Bene't Fink being then rebuilding, he made suit to the church of Windsor to have his lease of the cure renewed to him, being recommended by the archbishop to Dr. Ryves, dean of that church. This was granted him; but some difficulties arising about the form of the lease, with regard to the parsonage house, agreed to be rebuilt, he did not live to execute it, dying at Hackney Nov. 26, 1671. He was interred in the church there.

His funeral-sermon was preached by Dr. Tillotson at Hackney, on the 30th of Nov. 1671, on John ix. 4. printed, as it was preached on another occasion, in the third volume of his posthumous sermons, published by Dr. Barker. But the character of Dr.Worthington, which was the conclusion of that sermon, and omitted in that edition, is inserted in the preface to that learned man’s “Miscellanies,” published at London in 1704 in 8vo, by Dr. Fowler, bishop of Gloucester, and prefixed to Dr. Worthington’s “Select Discourses,” revised and published by his son John Worthington, M.A. at London, 1725, in 8vo.

, a learned English divine, was born in Merionethshire in 1703, and educated at Oswestry-school, whence he came to Jesus-college, Oxford, where he made great proficiency in learning. From college he returned to Oswestry, and became usher in that school. He took the degree of M. A. at Cambridge in 1742; was afterwards incorporated at Jesus-college, Oxford, July 3, 1758; and proceeded B. and D. D.July 10, in that year. He was early taken notice of by that great encourager of learning bishop Hare, then bishop of St. Asaph, who presented him first to the vicarage of Llanyblodwell, in the county of Salop, and afterwards removed him to Llanrhayader, or Llanrhadra, in Denbighshire, where he lived much beloved, and died Oct. 6, 1778, much lamented. As he could never be prevailed upon to take two livings, bishop Hare gave him a stall at St. Asaph, and a sinecure, “to enable him,” he said, “to support his chanties” (for charitable he was in an eminent degree). Afterwards archbishop Drummond (to whom he had been chaplain for several years) presented him to a stall in the cathedral of York. These were all his preferments. He was a studious man, and wrote several books, of which the principal are here enumerated. I. “An Essay on the Scheme and Conduct, Procedure and Extent, of Man’s Redemption; designed for the honour and illustration of Christianity. To which is annexed, a Dissertation on the Design and Argumentation of the Book of Job,” by William Worthington, M. A. vicar of Blodwel in Shropshire, London, 1743, 8vo. 2. “The historical Sense of the Mosaic Account of the Fall proved and vindicated,” 17. . , 8vo. 3. “Instructions concerning Confirmation,” 17.,. , 8va. 4. “A Disquisition concerning the Lord’s-Supper,” 17. . , 8vo. 5. “The Use, Value, and Improvement, of various Readings shewn and illustrated, in a Sermon preached before the University of Oxford, at St. Mary’s, on Sunday Oct. 18, 1761,” Oxford, 1764, 8vo. 6. “A Sermon preached in the parish-church of Christchurch, London, on Thursday April the 21st, 1768; being the time of the yearly meeting of tl^e children educated in the charityschools in and about the cities of London and Westminster,” 1768, 4to. 7. “The Evidences of Christianity, deduced from Facts, and the Testimony of Sense, throughout all Ages of the Church, to the present Time. In a series of discourses, preached for the lecture founded by the hon. Robert Boyle, esq. in the parish-church of St. James, Westminster, in the years 1766, 1767, 1768; wherein is shewn, that, upon the whole, this is not a decaying, but a growing, Evidence,” 1769, 2 vols. 8vo. 8. “The Scripture Theory of the Earth, throughout all its Revolutions, and all the periods of its existence, from the creation to the final renovation of all things; being a sequel to the Essay on Redemption, and an illustration of the principles on which it is written,” 1773, 8vo. 9. “Irenicum; or, the Importance of Unity in the Church of Christ considered, and applied towards the healing of our unhappy differences and divisions,” 1775, 8vo. 10. “An Impartial Enquiry into the Case of the Gospel-Demoniacs with an appendix, consisting of an Essay on Scripture-­Demonology,” 1777, 8vo. This last was a warm attack on the opinion held out by the Rev. Hugh Farmer, in. his “Essay on the Demoniacs,” 1775, 8vo. and, having produced a spirited reply in 1778, Dr. Worthington prepared for the press (what by the express directions of his will was given to the public after his death) “A farther Enquiry into the case of the Gospel-Demoniacs, occasioned by Mr. Farmer’s on the subject,” 1779, 8vo.

, ranked by Fuller among the learned writers of JCing’s-college, Cambridge, was born in London, about the latter part of the sixteenth century, and educated at Eton, whence, being elected to King’scollege, he was entered, Oct. 1, 1579, commenced B. A. in 1583, M. A. in 1587, and B. D. in 1594. He was also fellow of that college, and some time chaplain to Robert earl of Essex. On the death of Dr. Whitaker in 1596 he stood candidate for the king’s professorship of divinity in Cambridge, with Dr. John Overall of Trinity-college; but failed, by the superior interest of the latter, although he performed his probationary exercises with general applause. In March 1596 he was chosen professor of divinity in Gresham-college, upon the first settlement of that foundation, and in 1598 quitted his fellowship at Cambridge, and marrying soon after, resigned also his professorship. He was then chosen lecturer of Allhallows Barking; but in 1604 was silenced by Dr. Bancroft, bishop of London, for some expressions used either in a prayer or sermon, which were considered as disrespectful to the king; but it does not appear that he remained long under suspension; at least, in a volume of sermons printed in 1609 he styles himself minister of Allhallows.

His next trouble arose from his brethren in London, of the puritan stamp, with which he is usually classed. He was accused of holding an erroneous opinion concerning the doctrine of justification, which, according to him, consisted in the forgiveness of sins. His principal accuser was the Rev. George Walker, minister of St. John the Evangelist in Watling-street, who went so far as to bring forward a charge of Socinianism, heresy, and blasphemy. This produced a conference between eight divines of eminence, four for each party; and the result was, that although these judges differed from Mr, Wotton “in some points of the former doctrine of justification, contained in his expositions,” yet they held “not the difference to be so great and weighty, as that they are to be justly condemned of heresy and blasphemy.” In 1624, as Mr. Wotton had promised to explain himself more fully on the subject in dispute, he published his Latin treatise “De reconciliatione peccatoris,” thinking it more advisable to discuss the question in a learned language, than to hazard differences among common Christians by printing his opinion in English. In this work he professed to agree with the Church of England, the generality ofr the first reformers, and particularly Calvin, and to oppose only the opinion of Flaccus III} ricus, Hemmingius, c. and that of the Church of Rome, as declared in the Council of Trent. Walker, however, returned to the charge, but did not publish any thing until after Mr. Wotton’s death. This obliged his friend Mr. Gataker, one of the eight divines who sat in judgement on him, to write a narrative of the conference, which was published by Mr. Wotton’s son in 1641.

As Mr. Wotton was a zealous advocate for the reformation, he published several books in defence of it, which exposed him to the resentmeni of a different party. He entered particularly into the controversy with Dr. Montague, afterwards bishop of Chichester, whose work entitled “Appello Csesarem” met with a host of opponents, on account of its leaning towards Arminianism and popery. Wotton did not long survive this performance. Though a man acknowledged by all parties to be learned and able, it does not appear he had any other preferment than the lectureship of Allhallows, where, according to the register, he was buried Dec. 11, 1626.

His writings are, 1. “An answer to a popish pamphlet, &c. entitled ‘Certain Articles,’ &c.” Lond. 1605, 4to. 2. “A defence of Mr. Perkins’ booke called A Reformed Catholike, &c.” ibid. 1606, 4to. 3. “The tryal of the Roman Clergy’s title to the Church,” ibid. 1608, 4to. 4. “Sermons on part of chapter first of St. John’s Gospel,” ibid. 1609, 4to. 5. “Run from Rome; or, The necessity of separating from that Church,” ibid. 1624, 4to. 6. “De reconciliatione peccatoris, &c.” Basil. 1624, 4to. 7. “An answer to a book, entitled Appello Coesarem, written by Mr. Richard Mountague,” ibid. 1626. 8. “The art of Logick,” ibid. 1626, 8vo. This is an English translation of Ramus’s logic, made by his son, and with a dedication by our author. This son, Samuel, who died in 1680, was rector of East and West Wretham in Norfolk.

, an eminent physician, celebrated by Leland in his “Encomia,” by the name of Ododunus, was the son of Richard Wotton, superior beadle of divinity in the university of Oxford, and was born there in 1492, and educated at the school near Magdalen-college, of which college he became demy, and took a bachelor’s degree in 1513. Bishop Fox, founder of Corpus Christi college, was his patron, by whose interest he was appointed socius compar and Greek lecturer of that new foundation, and continued there till 1520, when he obtained leave to travel into Italy for three years. It appears that he studied physic on the continent, for he had a doctor’s degree conferred upon him at Padua. After his return he resumed his lectureship, and was incorporated doctor of physic tor wards the end of 1525. He became very eminent in his profession, first about Oxford, and then in London; and was a member of the college of pny^icians, and physician to Henry VIII. He died October 5, 1555, and lies buried in St. Alban’s church, London. He was the first of our English physicians who particularly applied to the study of natural history. He made himself famous at home and abroad by his book, entitled “De Differentiis Animaiium, lib. X.” Paris, 1552; on which Gesner and Possevin have bestowed much praise. It was afterwards considerably improved by Moufet in his “Minim; rum Animaiium Theatrum,” Loud. 1634. Wotton left many children, of whom his son Henry became also a physician of eminence.

, an Englishman, eminent for learning and politics, was descended from a gentleman’s family by both parents, and was born at Boughton-hall in Kent, March ^0, 1568. The Wottons were of no inconsiderable distinction, having possessed this lordship for nearly three centuries. Sir Edward Wotton,“our statesman’s grandfather, was treasurer of Calais, and of the privycouncil to king Henry VIII. and was elder brother to the celebrated Dr. Nicholas Wotton, dean of Canterbury, the subject of our next article. Sir Robert Wotton, the father of these, was entrusted by king Edward i V. with the lieutenancy of Guisnes, and was knight-porter and comptroller of Calais; where he died and lies buried. Sir Henry’s elder brother, who was afterwards raised by king James J. to the peerage by the title of lore) Wotton, was in 1585 sent by queen Elizabeth ambassador to that monarch in Scotland; and Dr. Robertson speaks of him, as” a man, gay, well-bred, and entertaining; who excelled in all the exercises, for which James had a passion, amused the young king by relating the adventures which he had met with, and the'obseYvations h,e had made during a long residence in foreign countries; but under the veil of these superficial qualities,“Dr. Robertson adds, that” he concealed a dangerous and intriguing spirit. He soon grew in favour with James, and while he was seemingly attentive only to pleasure and diversions, he acquired influence over the public councils, to a degree, which was indecent for strangers to possess."

Sir Henry was the only son of the second marriage of his father Thomas Wotton, esq. with Eleanora, daughter of sir William Finch, of Eastwell in Kent (ancestor to lord Winchelsea), and widow of Robert Morton, of the same county, esq. He was educated first under private tutors, and then sent to Winchester-school whence, in 1584, he was removed to New- college in Oxford. Here he was entered as a gentleman-commoner, and had his chamber in Hart-hall adjoining; and, for his chamber-fellow, Richard Baker, his countryman, afterwards a knight, and author of the well known “Chronicle” which goes by his name. Wotton did not continue long there, but went to Queen’s-college, where he became well versed in logic Uid philosophy-, and, being distinguished for his wit, was solicited to write a tragedy for private acting in that society, The name of it was “Tancredo” and Walton relates, “that it was so interwoven with sentences, and for the method and exact personating those humours, passions, and dispositions, which he proposed to represent, so performed, that the gravest of the society declared^ he had in a slight employment given an early and solid testimony of his future abilities.” In 1588 he supplicated the congregation of regents, that he might be admitted to the reading of any of the books of Aristotle’s logic, that is, be admitted to the degree of bachelor of arts; but “whether he was admitted to that or any other degree doth not appear,” says Wood, ^from the university registers;“although Walton tells us, that about his 20th year he proceeded master of arts, and at that time read in Latin three lectures de oculo, on the blessing of sight, which he illustrated by some beautiful passages aud apt reflexions. In 1589 he lost his father, and was left with no other provision than a rent-charge of 100 marks a-year. Soon after, he left Oxford, betook himself to travel, and went into France, Germany, and Italy. He stayed but one year in France, and part of that at Geneva; where he became acquainted with Beza and Isaac Casaubon. Three years he spent in Germany, and five in Italy, where both in Rome, Venice, and Florence, he cultivated acquaintance with the most eminent men for learning and all manner of fine arts; for painting, sculpture, chemistry, and architecture; of all which he was an amateur and an excellent judge. After having spent nine years abroad, he returned to England highly accomplished, and with a great accumulation of knowledge of the countries through which he had passed. His wit and politeness so effectually recommended him to the earl of Essex that he first admitted him into his friendship, and afterwards made him one of his secretaries, the celebrated Mr. Henry Cuff being the other. (See Cuff.) He personally attended all the councils and employments of the earl, and continued with him till he was apprehended for high treason. Fearing now lest he might, from his intimate connexion, be involved in his patron’s ruin, he thought proper to retire, and was scarcely landed in France, when he heard that his master Essex was beheaded, and his friend Cuff hanged. He proceeded to Florence, and was received into great confidence by the grand duke of Tuscany. This place became the more agreeable to him, from his meeting with signor Vietta, a gentleman of Venice, with whom he had been formerly intimately acquainted, and who was now the grand duke’s secretary. It was during this retreat that Mr. Wotton drew up his” State of Christendom, or a most exact and curious discovery of many secret passages, and hidden myteries of the times." This was first printed, a thin fol. in 1657, and afterwards in 1677, with a small alteration in the title. It was here also that the grand duke having intercepted letters which discovered a design to take away the life of James VI. of Scotland, dispatched Wouon thither to give him notice of it. Wotton was on this account, as well as according to his instructions, to manage this affair with all possible secrecy: and therefore, having parted from the duke, he took the name and language of an Italian; and to avoid the line of English intelligence and danger, he posted into Norway, and from that country to Scotland, He found the king at Stirling, and was admitted to him under the name of Octavio Baldi. He delivered his message and his letters to the king in Italian: then, stepping up and whis^ pering to his majesty, he told him he was an Englishman, requested a more private conference with him, and that he might be concealed during his stay in Scotland. He spent about three months with the king, who was highly entertained with him, and then returned to Florence, where, after a few months, the news of queen Elizabeth’s death, and of king James’s accession to the crown of England, arriyep!.

Sir Henry Wotton then returned to England, and, as it seems, not sooner than welcome, for king James, finding, among other officers of the late queen, sir Edward, who was afterwards lord Wotton, asked him, “if _he knew one Henry Wotton, who had spent much time in foreign travel?” Sir Edward replied, that “he knew him well, and that he was his brother.” Then the king asking, “Where he then was” was answered, “at Venice, or Florence; but would soon be at Paris.” The king ordered him to be sent for, and to be brought privately to him; which being done, the king took him into his arms, and saluted him by the nanie of Octavio Baldi. Then he knighted him, and nominated him ambassador to the republic of Venice; whither he went, accompanied by sir Albertus Morton, his nephew, who was his secretary, and Mr. William Bedel, a man of great learning and wisdom, and afterwards bishop of Kilrnore in Ireland, who was his chaplain. He continued many years in king James’s favour, and indeed never entirely forfeited it, although he had once the misfortune to displease his majesty, by an apparently trifling circumstance. In proceeding as ambassador to Venice, he passed through Germany, and stayed some days at Augsburg; where, happening to spend a social evening with some ingenious and learned men, whom he had before known in his travels, one Christopher Flecamore requested him to write some sentence in his Album, a paper book which the German gentry used to carry about with them for that purpose. Sir Henry Wotton, consenting to the motion, took occasion from some incidental discourse of the company, to write a definition of an ambassador in these words: “Legatus est vir bonus peregre missus ad memiendum Reipublicae causa:” which Walton says he would have interpreted thus; “An ambassador is an honest man sent to lie abroad for the good of his country.” The word lie was the hinge on which this conceit turned, yet it was no conceit at all in Latin, and therefore could not bear the construction sir Henry, according to Walton, wished to have put upon it: so that when the Album fell afterwards into the hands of Caspar Scioppius (See Sciop­pjus), he printed it in his famous hook against king James, as a principle of the religion professed by that king, and his ambassador sir Henry Wotton; and in Venice it was presently after written in several glass windows, and spitefully declared to be sir Henry’s. This coming to the knowledge of king James, he apprehended it to be such an oversight, such weakness, or worse, that he expressed much anger against him; which caused sir Henry to write two apologies in Latin; one to Velserus at Augsburg, which was dispersed into the cities of Germany, and another to the king “de Gaspare Scioppio.” These gave such satisfaction that the king entirely forgave sir Henry, declaring publicly, that “he had commuted sufficiently for a greater offence.”

After this embassy, he was sent twice more to Venice, once to the States of the United Provinces, twice to Charles Emanuel duke of Savoy, once to the united princes of Upper Germany; also to the archduke Leopold, to the duke of Wittemberg, to the imperial cities of Strasburgh and Ulm, and lastly to the emperor Ferdinand II. He returned to England the year before king James died; and brought with him many servants, of which some were German and Italian artists, and who became rather burthensome to him; for notwithstanding the many public services in which he had been employed, he had by no means improved his private fortune, which was also impaired by his liberality and want of ceconomy. As some recompense, which may at first appear rather a singular one for a man who had spent his days as a courtier and ambassador, he was in 1623 appointed provost of Eton-college. But in fact this situation was very agreeable to him, for he was now desirous of retiring from the bustle of life, and passing the evening of his days in studious pursuits. Whoever peruses his “Remains,” must perceive that he had much of the literary character, and finding now that the statutes of the college required the provost to be io holy orders, he was ordained deacon, and seemed to begin a new life. His usual course now was, after his customary public devotions, to retire into his study, and there daily spend some hours in reading the Bible, and works of divinity, closing those studies with a private prayer. His afternoons he spent partly in philosophical studies, and partly in conversation with his friends, or in some recreation, particularly angling. His sentiments and temper during his latter days will best appear by what he said, on one occasion, when visited by the learned John Hales, then a fellow of Eton. “I have in my passage to my grave met with most of those joys of which a discursive soul is capable and have been entertained with more inferior pleasures than the souls of men are usually made partakers of. Nevertheless, in this voyage I have not always floated on the calm sea of content; but have often met with cross winds and storms, and with many troubles of mind and temptations to evil. And yet though I have been, and am a man compassed about with human frailties, Almighty God has by his grace prevented me from making shipwreck of faith and a good conscience; the thought of which is now the joy of my heart, and I most humbly praise him for it. And I humbly acknowledge, that it was not myself, but he that hath kept me to this gr^at age, and let him take the glory of his great mercy. And, my dear friend, I now see that I draw near my harbour of death; that harbour will secure me from all the future storms and waves of this restless world; and I praise God I am willing to leave it, and expect a better; that world wherein dwelleth righteousness; and I long for it.”

Sir Henry Wotton died in December 1639, and was buried in the chapel belonging to the college. In his will he appointed this epitaph to be put over his grave: “Hie jacet hujus sententine primus auctor, Disputandi Pruritus Ecclesite Scabies. Nomen alias quasre:” that is, “Here lies the first author of this sentence: ‘ The itch of disputation is the scab of the church.’ Seek his name elsewhere.”

Sir Henry Wotton was a man of eminent learning and abilities, and greatly esteemed by his contemporaries. His knowledge was very extensive, and his taste perhaps not inferior to that of any man of his time. Among other proofs of it, he was among the first who were delighted with Milton’s mask of Comus; and although Mr. Warton has pronounced him to be “on the whole a mixed and desultory character,” he has found an able defender in a living author of equal taste and judgment, who observes on Mr. Warton’s expression, that “this in a strict sense may be true, but surely not in the way of censure. He mingled the character of an active statesman with that of a recluse scholar; and he wandered from the crooked and thorny intrigues of diplomacy into the flowery paths of the muses. But is it not high praise to have been thus desultory?” The same writer says of sir Henry as a poet, “It may be true, that sir Henry’s genius was not suited to the” higher conceptions of Milton. His mind was subtle and elegant rather than sublime. In truth the habits of a diplomatist, and of a great poet, are altogether incompatible,“but” for moral and didactic poetry, the experience of a statesman does not disqualify him," and of this species, sir Henry has left some exquisite specimens. He seems to have lived in a perpetual struggle between his curiosity respecting the world, fomented by his ambition, and his love of books, contemplation, and quiet. His letters to sir Edmund Bacon, who married his niece, prove his strong family affections. His heart appears to have been moulded with a high degree of moral tenderness. This, both the sentiments attributed to him by Walton, and the cast of his poems, sufficiently evince.

He was a great enemy to wrangling and disputes about religion and used to cut inquiries short by witticisms. To one who asked him, “Whether a Papist may be saved” he replied, “You may be saved without knowing that look to yourself.” To another, who was railing at the papists with more zeal than knowledge, he gave this advice: “Pray, Sir, forbear, till you have studied the points better; for, the wise Italians have this proverb, c He that understands amiss concludes worse;' and beware of thinking, that, the farther you go from the church of Rome, the nearer you are to God.” One or two more of his bons mots are preserved. A pleasant priest of his acquaintance at Rome invited him one evening to hear their vespermusic, and seeing him standing in an obscure corner of the church, sent a boy to him with this question, writ upon a scrap of paper, “Where was your religion to be found before Luther?” To which sir Henry sent back underwritten, “Where yours is not to be found, in the written word of God.” Another evening, sir Henry sent a boy of the choir with this question to his friend: “Do you believe those many thousands of poor Christians damned who were excommunicated because the popeand the duke of Venice could not agree about their temporalities?” To which the priest underwrit in French, “Excusez moi, Monsieur.”

Sir Henry Wotton had proposed, after he was settled at Eton, to write the “Life of Martin Luther, 7 ' and in it” The History of the Reformation,“as it was carried on in Germany. Ho had made some progress in this work, when Charles I. prevailed with him to iay.that aside, and to apply himself to the writing of a history of England He proceeded to sketch out some short characters as materials, which are in his” Reliquiae," but proceeded no farther.

His works separately or collectively published were, I. “Epistola de Gaspare Scioppio,” Amberg, 1613, 8vo. 2. “Epistola ad Marcum Vc-lserum duuaivirum Augustas Vindelic. arm. 1612.” 3. “The Elements of Architecture,” Lond. 1624, 4to, a treatise still held in estimation. It was translated into Latin, and annexed to the works of Vitruvius, and to Freart’s “Parallel of the ancient architecture with the modern.” 4. “Plausus et Vota ad regem e Scotia reducem,” Lond. 1633, small folio, reprinted in Lamphire’s “Monarchia Britannica,” Oxtord, 1681, 8vo. 5. “Parallel bttween Robert earl of Essex and George late duke.,of Bucks,” London, 1641, 4to, not remarkable for the judgment displayed. There were scarcely any parallelisms in the two characters. 6, “Short View of the life and death of George Duke of Bucks,” London, 1642, 4to. 7. “Difference and disparity between the estates and conditions of George duke of Bucks and Robert earl of Essex.” 8. “Characters of, and observations on some kings of England.” 9. “The election of the new duke of Venice after the death of Giovanni Bembo.” 10. “Philosophical Survey of Education, or moral Architecture.” 11. “Aphorisms of Education.” 12. “The great Action between Pompey and Caesar extracted out of the Roman and Greek writers.” 13. “Meditations on the 22d chapter of Genesis.” 14. “Meditations on Christmas day.” 15. “Letters to and characters of certain personages.” 16. “Various Poems.” All or most of these pieces are published together in a volume entitled “Reliquiae Wotton ianae,” at London, 1651, 1654, 1672, and 1685, in 8vo. 17. “Letters to sir Edmund Bacon,” London, 1661, 8vo, reprinted with some editions of “Reliquiae Wottonianae.” 18. “Letters to the Lord Zouch,” printed at the end of “Reliquiae Wottonianae” in the edition of 1685, 19. “The State of Christendom; or a more exact and curious discovery of many secret passages and hidden mysteries of the times,” Loridon, 1657, folio, reprinted at London in 1667, folio, with this title; “The State of Christendom, giving a perfect and exact discovery of many political intrigues and secret mysteries of state practised in most of the courts of Europe, with an account of their several claims, interests, and pretensions.” 20. He hath also several letters to George duke of Bucks in the “Cabala, Mysteries of State,” London, 1654, 4to, and in “Cabala, or Scrinia sacra,” London, 1663, folio. 21. “Journal of his Embassies to Venice,” a manuscript fairly written, formerly in the library of Edward lord Conway. 22. “Three propositions to the Count d'Angosciola in matter of duel, comprehending (as it seems) the latitude of that subject;” a manuscript some time in the library of Ralph Sheldon, esq.; and since in that of the college of arms.

, an eminent statesman and dean of Canterbury, was, as we have already noticed, grand uncle to the preceding sir Henry. He was the fourth son of sir Robert Wotton, knt. by Anne Belknapp, daughter of sir Henry Belknapp, knt. and was born about 1497. He was educated in the university of Oxford, where he studied the canon and civil law, his skill in which recommended him to the notice of Tunstall, bishop of London, to whom he became official in 1528, being at that time doctor of laws. Having entered into the church, he was collated by archbishop Warham to the rectory of Ivychurch in the county of Kent. But this benefice he resigned in 1555, reserving to himself a pension of twenty-two marks, one third of its reputed value, during his life. He continued to act as a civilian; and in 1536, when sentence was pronounced upon Anne Boleyn, he appeared in court as her proctor.

In 1538 archbishop Cranmer constituted him commissary of his faculties for the term of his natural life. About the same time he became chaplain to the king, who in 1.539 nominated him to the archdeaconry of Gloucester, then vacant by the promotion of archdeacon Bell to the see of Worcester. His next promotion was to the deanery of Canterbury in 1541; in addition to which he obtained in 1544 the deanery of York, and was the only person who ever possessed at the same time the deaneries of the two metropolitan churches. In 1545 he was presented to the prebend of Osbaldwick in York cathedral. In 1553 he resigned the archdeaconry of Gloucester, and was presented in 1557 to the treasuryship of the church of Exeter, which he also relinquished the succeeding year.

Such were the appointments which Wotton obtained, but in 1539 he had refused a bishopric, and it is said that he refused the see of Canterbury, so that whatever he might be as a courtier, he was an unambitious ecclesiastic. His talents indeed were better suited to political negociation, and accordingly he was often employed on foreign embassies. His first service abroad is thought to have been his embassy to Cleves in 1539, in order to carry on the treaty of marriage between Henry and the lady Anne; and it fell to his lot afterwards to acquaint the duke of Cleves with Henry’s repudiation of his sister. In 1546 he was one of the commissioners who met at Campe, a small place between Ardres and Guisnes, in order to negociate peace between England, Scotland, and France. In September following he obtained the royal dispensation for non-residence on his preferments, being then the king’s ambassador in France, and was there at the death of Henry, by whose will he was appointed one of the executors to whom, during the minority of his son Edward VI. he entrusted the government of the kingdom.

During the reign of Edward, the abilities of Wotton were exercised not only abroad, but also in his own country; as he held, for a short time, the distinguished office of principal secretary of state, to which he was appointed in 1549, but resigned it in 1550 to Cecil. He was one of the council who, on Oct. 6, 1549, seceded from the protector, and who addressed a memorial to the young king on the encroachments of that unfortunate nobleman. In 1551, he was sent ambassador to the emperor, in order to explain that no absolute assurance had ever been made to the lady Mary, in respect to the exercise of her religion, but that only a temporary connivance had been granted under the hope of her amendment. Mary had been threatened, as well as pressed, on the point of conformity, and she did not fail to represent in the most odious lights these proceedings to her kinsman Charles, who, by his ambassador, remonstrated to the English court on her behalf, and Edward, prevailed upon by his council, sent Wotton to continue a good correspondence with his imperial majesty. At the death of Edward, Wotton, sir William Pickering, and sir Thomas Chaloner, were ambassadors ifi France, whence they wrote to Mary on her accession to the throne, acknowledging her queen, and ceasing to act any further in their public character. But in this capacity she thought proper to continue Wotton, with whom she joined sir Anthony St. Leger.

From France the dean is said to have written to the queen in 1553, on the following subject. He dreamed that his nephew Thomas Wotton was inclined to be a party in such a project, as, if he were not suddenly prevented, would turn out both to the loss of his life, and the ruin of his family. Accordingly he resolved to use such a preventive, as might be of no inconvenience either to himself or his nephew. He therefore wrote to Mary, requesting that his nephew might be sent for out of Kent, and that he might be interrogated by the lords of the council in some such feigned speeches, as would give a colour to his commitment to a favourable prison. He added, that he would acquaint her majesty with the true reason of his request, when he should next become so happy as to see and speak to her. It was accordingly done as he desired, but whether he gave her majesty “the true reason,” we are not informed. The subject dwelling much on the dean’s mind, he might have had a dream, yet the whole was probably an ingenious precaution to prevent his nephew from being involved in Wyat’s rebellion (which broke out soon after), and which he was afraid might be the case, from the ancient friendship that had subsisted between the families of Wotton and Wyat.

The last important service Wotton performed in the reign of queen Mary was in 1557, when he detected the rebellious plot of Thomas Stafford, the, consequence of which was Stafford’s defeat and execution, and a declaration of war against France. At the queen’s death he was acting as one of the commissioners to treat of a peace between England, Spain, and France, and in this station queen Elizabeth retained him (having also appointed him a privy-counsellor), and after much negociation peace was concluded at Chateaif-Camhresis April 2, 1559. He was afterwards commissioned with lord Howard and sir Nicholas Throgmorton to receive from the French king the confirmation of the treaty. This peace, however, was of short duration. The ambitious proceedings of the French court in 1559, and the success of their arms against the Scotch protestants, were sufficient to excite the vigilance of Elizabeth. Her indignation at the claim of Mary (queen of Scots) to the English crown, a claim which the French hoped to establish, and the declining affairs of the reformers who solicited her assistance, at length determined her to send a powerful force to Scotland. In the event of this quarrel the French were obliged to capitulate, and commissioners were appointed to treat of peace. Those on the part of England were dean Wotton and sir William Cecil; on that of France, Mouluc bishop of Valence, and the Sieur de Randan. The interests of the English and French courts were soon adjusted; but to a formal treaty with the Scots, the French ambassador considered it derogatory from the dignity of their sovereign to accede. The redress of their grievances was, however, granted in the name of Francis and Mary, and accepted by the Scots, as an act of royal indulgence. And whatever concessions they obtained, whether in respect to their personal safety, or their public demands, the French ambassadors agreed to insert in the treaty with Elizabeth; so that they were sanctioned, though not with the name, yet with all the security of the most solemn negociation. The treaty was signed at Edinburgh, July 6, 1560.

The public services of Wotton were afterwards employed in regard to the trade of the English merchants, who had been ill-treated not only in Spain, but more particularly in the Netherlands, upon pretence of civil differences, but in fact out of hatred to the protestant religion. They therefore removed their mart to Embden in East Friesland, But Guzman de Sylva (canon of Toledo), then the Spanish ambassador in England, endeavoured to compose these differences, which he. found materially to affect the interests of the Netherlands. At length Elizabeth, and the duchess of Parma, regent of the Low Countries, exchanged in Dec. 1564, a mutual agreement, by which the commerce between the two countries was restored, and viscount Montague, dean Wotton, and Dr. Haddon, were sent commissioners to Bruges in order to a full discussion of the subject. But, in the following year, the troubles in the Netherlands put a stop to their farther conference, after it had been agreed, that there should be an open trade, till one prince denounced war against the other; and in that case, the merchants should have forty days notice to dispose of themselves and their effects.

This was probably the last employment of the dean, which indeed he did not long survive. He died at his house in Warwick-lane, Jan. 25, 1566, aged about seventy, and was interred in Canterbury cathedral, in the chapel of the Holy Trinity, where is a beautiful and much admired monument, part, if not the whole of which, was executed at Rome. He is represented kneeling at his devotions; the head is said to have been carved by his own order, while living. Over his figure is a very long Latin inscription, containing many particulars of his life. As he died unmarried, he left his nephew Thomas Wotton his heir.

The dean’s life, we have seen, was chiefly devoted to political affairs, yet he was not wholly unemployed as a divine. In 1537, the more learned ecclesiastics of that period were called together in order to the composition of the book entitled “The godly and pious institution of a Christian man;” among these was Dr. Wotton. To their discussion and judgment many of the principal points of religion were submitted. From his compliance under the differing reigns of Henry, Edward, Mary, and Elizabeth, he has been concluded to be a time-server, and a man of no decided religious principle; and he certainly is rather to be considered as a politician than an ecclesiastic, for it was in the former character principally that his services were required by his respective sovereigns. His learning is said to have been profound and extensive, and to have been displayed to the greatest advantage in the force of his arguments, and in the easiness of his elocution. In council his sentiments were delivered with admirable discretion, and maintained with undaunted resolution. The vigilance of his political conduct, both at home and abroad, distinguished him as an exemplary statesman; and the facility with which he could discuss the merits of a cause (his method being exact, and his memory tenacious), marked him as an acute civilian. His knowledge of trade ^nd commerce was no less conspicuous, and in an acquaintance with the polity of nations he was inferior to none. To the greatness of his character Holinshed and Camden have bequeathed their testimonies ^ and Henry VIII. is said to have thus addressed him, when he was about to depart on an embassy> “Sir, I have sent a head by Cromwell, a purse by Wolsey, a sword by Brandon, and I must now send the law by you to treat with enemies.”

, an English divine of uncommon parts and learning, was the son of Mr. Henry Wotton, rector of Wrentham, in Suffolk, a man of considerable learning also, and well skilled in the Oriental tongues. He was born at Wrentham the 13th of August, 1666, and was educated by his father. He discovered a most extraordinary genius for learning languages; and, though what is related of him upon this head may appear wonderful, yet it is so well attested that we know not how to refuse it credit. Sir Philip Skippon, who lived at Wrentham, in a letter to Mr. John Ray, Sept. Is, 1671, writes thus of him: “I shall somewhat surprise you with what I have seen in a little boy, William Wotton, five years old the last month, the son of Mr. Wotton, minister of this parish, who hath instructed his child within the last three quarters of a year in the reading the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew languages, which he can read almost as well as English; and that tongue he could read at four years and three months old as well as most lads of twice his age. I could send you many particulars about his rendering chapters and psalms out of the three learned languages into English,” &c. Among sir Philip’s papers was found a draught of a longer letter to Mr. Ray, in which these farther particulars are added to the above: “He is not yet able to parse any language, but what he performs in turning the three learned tongues into English is done by strength of memory; so that he is ready to mistake when some words of different signification have near the same sound. His father hath taught him by no rules, but only uses the child’s memory in remembering words: some other children of his age seem to have as good a fancy and as quick apprehension.” He was admitted of Catharine Hall, Cambridge, in April 1676, some months before he was ten years old; and upon his admission Dr. John Eachard, then master of the college, gave him this remarkable testimony: Gulidmns Wottonus infra decem annos nee Ilammondo nee Grotio secundus. His progress in learning was answerable to the expectations conceived of him; and Dr. Duport, the master of Magdalen-college, and dean of Peterborough, has described it in an elegant copy of verses; “In Gulielmum Wottanum stupendi ingenii et incomparabilis spei puerum vixdum duodecim annorum.” He then goes on to celebrate his skill in the languages, not only in the Greek and Latin, which he understood perfectly, but also in the Hebrew, Arabic, Syriac, Chaldee; his skill too in arts and sciences, in geography, logic, philosophy, mathematics^ chronology.

In 1679 he took the degree of B. A. when he was but twelve years and five months old; and, the winter following, was invited to London by Dr. Gilbert Burner, then preacher at the Rolls, who introduced him to almost all the learned; and among the rest to Dr. William Llovd, bishopi of St. Asaph, who was so highly pleased with him, that he took him a an assistant in making the catalogue of his library, and carried him the summer following to St. Asaph. Upon his return, Dr. Turner, afterwards bishop of Ely^ procured him by his interest a fellowship in St. John’s colege, where he took his degree of ML A. in 1683, and iri 1691 he commenced bachelor of divinity. The same year bishop Lloyd gave him the sinecure of LlandriUo, in Denbighshire. He was afterwards made chaplain to the earl of Nottingham, then secretary of state, who in 1693 presented him to the rectory of Middleton Keynes, in Buckinghamshire. In 1694- he published “Reflections upon Ancient and modern Learning” and dedicated his book to his patron the earl of Nottingham^ To settle the bounds of all branches of literature, and all arts and sciences, as they have been extended by both ancients and moderns, and thus to make a comparison between each, was a work too vast, one should think, for any one man, even for a whole life spent in study; yet it was executed with very considerable ability by Mr. Wotton at twenty-eight years of age; and if it did involve him somewhat in the controversy between Boyle and Bentley, that was rather owing to his connections with Bentley, whose “Dissertations upon Phalaris,” &c. were printed at the end of the 2d edition of his book in 1697, than to any intermeddling of his own. Boyle himself acknowledged that “Mr. Wotton is modest and decent, speaks generally with respect of those he differs from, and with a due distrust of his own opinion. His book has a vein of learning running through it, where there is no ostentation of it.” This and much more is true of Wotton’s performance yet it must not be dissembled, that this,as it stands in Boyle’s hook, appears to have been said rather for the sake of reflecting on Bentley than to commend Wotton. Wotton suffered, as is well known, under the satirical pen of Swift; and this induced him to write “A Defence of the Reflections upon Ancient and Modern Learning, in answer to the objections of sir William Temple and others;” with “Observations upon the Tale of a Tub;” reprinted with a third corrected edition of the “Reflections,” &c. in 1705, 8vo. He says that this “Tale is of a very irreligious nature, and a crude banter upon all that is esteemed as sacred among all sects and religions among men;” and his judgment of that famous piece is confirmed by that of Mr. Moyle, in the following passage: “I have read over the * Tale of a Tub.' There is a good deal of wild wit in it, which pleases by its extravagance and uncommonness; but I think it, upon the whole, the profanest piece of ribaldry which has appeared since the days of Rabelais, the great original of banter and ridicule.”

His “Reflections” were published, as already noticed, in 1694. In 1695 he published, in the “Philosophical Transactions,” an “Abstract” of Agostino Scilla’s book concerning marine bodies which are found petrified in several places at land; and in 1697, a “Vindication” of that abstract, which was subjoined to Dr. John Arbuthnot’s “Examination of Dr. Woodward’s Account of the Deluge,” &c. In 1701, he published “The History of Rome from the death of Antoninus Pius to the death of Severus Alexander,” in 8vo. He paid great deference to the authority of medals in illustrating this history, and prefixed several tables of them to his book, taken chiefly from the collections of Angeloni, Morell, and Vailiant. This work was undertaken at the direction of bishop Burnet, and intended for the use of his lordship’s royal pupil, the duke of Gloucester, who, however, did not live to see it finished. It was therefore dedicated to the bishop, to whom Wotton had been greatly obliged in his youth, and who afterwards, in 1705, gave him a prebend in the church of Salisbury. This history was esteemed no inconsiderable performance: M. Leibnitz immediately recommended it to George II. his late majesty, then electoral prince of Hanover; and it was the first piece of Roman history which he read in our language.

In 1706 Wotton preached a visitation- sermon, at Newport-Pagnel in Bucks, against Tindal’s bookof “The Rights of the Christian Church,” and printed it. This was the first answer that was written to that memorable performance; and it was also the first piece which Wotton published as a divine. In 1707, archbishop Tenison presented him with the degree of doctor of divinity. In 1708 he drew up a short view of Dr. Hickes’s “Thesaurus;” but the appendix and notes are Hickes’s own. In 1714 the difficulties he was under in his private fortune, for he had not a grain of ceconomy, obliged him to retire into South Wales, where, though he had much leisure, he had few books. Yet, being too active in his nature to be idle, he drew up, at the request of Browne Willis, esq v who afterwards published them, the “Memoirs of the Cathedral Churqh of St. David/' in 1717, and of” Landaff“in 1719. Here he also wrote his” Miscellaneous discourses relating to the traditions and usages of the Scribes and Pharisees,“&c. which was printed 1718, in 2 vols. 8vo. Le Clerc tells us that” great advantage may be made by reading the writings of the Rabbins; and that the public is highly obliged to Mr. Selden, for instance, and to Dr. Lightfoot, for the assistances which they have drawn thence, and communicated to those who study the holy scripture. Those who do not read their works, which are not adapted to the capacity of every person, will be greatly obliged to Dr. Wotton for the introduction which he has given them into that kind of learning." In 1719 he published a sermon upon Mark xiii. 32, to prove the divinity of the Son of God from his omniscience.

After his return from Wales he preached a sermon in Welsh before the British Society in 1722; and was, perhaps, the only Englishman who ever attempted to preach in that language. The same year, his account of the life and writings of Mr. Thomas Stanley was published at Eysenach, at the end of Scaevola Sammartbanus’s “Elogia Gallorum.” In 1723 he printed in the “Bibliotheca Literaria” an account of the “Caernarvon Record, 7 ' a manuscript in the Harleian library. This manuscript is an account of several ancient Welsh tenures, and had some relation to the Welsh laws, which he was busy in translating. He undertook that laborious work at the instance of Wake, who knew that the trouble of learning a new and very difficult language would be no discouragemen t to Dr. Wotton. It was published in 1730, under this title,” Cysreithjeu Hywel Dda, ac erail; ceu, Leges Wallicae Ecclesiasticae et Civiles Hoeli Boni, et aliorum Walliae princjpum, quas ex variis Codicibus Manuscriptis eruit, interpretatione Latina, notis et glossario illustravit Gulielmus Wottonus,“in foijo. But this way a posthumous work, for he died at Buxted, in Essex, Feb. 13,1726. He left a daughter, who was the wife of the late Mr. William Clarke, canon-residentiary of Chichester. After his death came out his” Discourse concerning the Confusion of Languages at Babel,“1730, 8vo; as did the same year his” Advice to a young Student, with a method of study. for the four first years.“He was likewise the author of five anonymous pamphlets: 1.” A Letter to Eusebia,“1707. 2.” The case of the present Convocation considered,“1711. 3.” Reflections on the present posture of Affairs, 1712. 4. “Observations on the State of the Nation,” 1713. 5. “A Vindication of the Earl of Nottingham,” 1714.

What distinguished him from other men chiefly was his memory: his superiority seems to have lain in the strength pf that faculty; for, by never forgetting any thing, he became immensely learned and knowing; and, what is more, his learning (as one expresses it) was all in ready cash, which he was able to produce at sight. When he was very young he remembered the whole of- almost any discourse he had heard, and often surprised a preacher with repeating his sermon to him. This first recommended him to bishop Lloyd, to whom he repeated one of his own sermons, as Dr. Burnet had engaged that he should. But above all, he had great humanity and friendliness of temper. His time and abilities were at the service of any person who was making advances in real learning. The narrowness of a party-spirit never broke in upon any of his friendships; he was as zealous in recommending Dr. Hickes’s great work as if it had been his own-, and assisted Mr. Spinkes in his replies to Mr. Collier in the controversy about the necessity of mixing wine and water in the sacrament, in 1718 and 1719. He was a great lover of etymology; and 'Mr. Thwaites in his Saxon Grammar, takes notice of his skill and acuteness that way, which he was extremely well qualified for, by knowing most of the languages from east to west. Mr. John Chapman, chaplain to the archbishop of Canterbury (in “Remarks upon the Letter to Dr. Waterland in relation to the natural account of Languages,” pag. 8, 9.) has done him the honour to place him in a list of great names after Bochart, Walton, Vossius, Scaliger, Duret, Heinsius, Selclen, &c. all men of letters and tracers of languages. Wotton lived at a time when a man of learning would have been better preferred than he was; but it is supposed that some part of his conduct, which was very exceptionable, prevented it.

, an eminent artist of Holland, was born at Haerlem, in 1620, and was the son of Paul Wouvermans, a tolerable history-painter, of whom, however, he did not learn the principles of his art, but of John Wynants, an excellent painter of Haerlem. It does not appear that he ever was in Italy, or ever quitted the city of Haerlem; though no man deserved more the encouragement a-nd protection of some powerful prince than he did He is one instance, among a thousand, to prove that oftentimes the greatest merit remains without either recompence or honour. His works have all the excellences we can wish; high finishing, correctness, agreeable composition, and a taste for colouring, joined with a force that approaches to the Caracci’s . The pieces he painted in. his latter time have a grey or blueish cast; they are finished with too much labour, and his grounds look too much like velvet: but those he did in his prime are free from these faults, and equal in colouring and correctness to any thing Italy can produce. Wouvermans generally enriched his landscapes with huntings, halts, encampment of armies, and other subjects where horses naturally enter, which he designed better than any painter of his time: there are also some battles and attacks of villages by his hand. These beautiful works, which gained him great reputation, did not make him rich; on the contrary, being charged with a numerous family, and but indifferently paid for his work, he lived very meanly; and, though he painted very quick, and was very laborious, had much ado to maintain himself. The misery of his condition determined him not to bring up any of his children to painting. In his last hours, which happened at Haerlem in 1688, he burnt a box filled with his studies and designs; saying, I have been so ill-paid for my labours, that I would not have those designs engage my son in so miserable a profession." Different authors, however, ascribe the burning of his designs to different motives. Some say it proceeded from his dislike to his brother Peter, being unwilling that he should reap the product of his labours; others allege that he intended to compel his son (if he should follow th'e profession) to seek out the knowledge of nature from his own industry, and not indolently depend on copying those designs; and other writers assign a less honourable motive, which seems to be unworthy of the genius of Wouvermans, and equally unworthy of being perpetuated.

Houbraken observes, that the works of Wouvermans and Bamboccio were continually placed in competition by the ablest judges of the art; and the latter having painted a picture which was exceedingly admired, John De Witt prevailed on Wouvermans to paint the same subject, which he executed in his usual elegant style. These pictures being afterwards exhibited together to the public, while both artists were present, De Witt said (with a loud voice), “All our connoisseurs seem to prefer the works of those painters who have studied at Rome; and observe only, how far the work of Wouvermans, who never saw Rome, surpasses the work of him who resided there for several years!” That observation, which was received with general applause, was thought to have had too violent an effect on the spirits of Bamboccio and by many it was imagined that it contributed to his untimely death.

, a man of taste and learning, was born Nov. 28, 1701, in the parish of St. Botolph, Aldersgate. His father, sir Daniei Wray, was a London citizen, who resided in Little Britain, made a considerable fortune in trade (as a soap-boiler), and purchased an estate in Essex, near Ingatestone, which his son possessed aftr r him. Sir Daniel served the office of sheriff for that county, and was knighted in 1708 on presenting a loyal address to queen Anne. His son was educated at the Charter-house, and was supposed in 1783 to have been the oldest survivor of any person educated there. In 1718 he went to Queen’s college, Cambridge, as a fellow commoner. He took his degree of B. A. in 1722, after which he made the tour of Italy, accompanied by John, earl of Morton, and Mr. King, the son of lord chancellor King, who inherited his title. How long he remained abroad between 1722 and 1728 is not precisely ascertained, except by the fact that a cast in bronze, by Pozzo, was taken of his profile, in 1726, at Home. It had this inscription upon the reverse, “Nil actum reputans, si quid superesset agendum,” which line is said to have been a portrait of his character, as he was in all his pursuits a man of uncommon diligence and perseverance. After his return from his travels, he became M.A.-in 1728, and was already so distinguished in philosophical attainments, that he was chosen a fellow of the Royal Society in March 1728-9. He resided however generally at Cambridge, though emigrating occasionally^ to London, till 1739, or 1740, in which latter year, January 1740-41, he was elected F. S. A. and was more habitually a resident in town. In 1737 commenced his acquaintance and friendship with the noble family of Yorke; and in 1745, Mr. Yorke, afterwards earl of Hardwicke, as teller of the exchequer, appointed Mr.Wray his deputy teller, in which office he continued until 1782, when his great punctuality and exactness in any business he undertook made the constant attendance of the office troublesome to him. He was an excellent critic in the English language; an accomplished judge of polite literature, of virtft, and the fine arts; and deservedly a member of most of our learned societies; he was also an elected trustee of the British Museum. He was one of the writers of the “Athenian Letters” published by the earl of Hardwicke; and in the first volume of the Archaeologia, p. 128, are printed “Notes on the walls of antient Rome,” communicated by him in 1756; and “Extracts from different Letters from Rome, giving an Account of the Discovery of a most beautiful Statue of Venus, dug up there 1761.” He died Dec. 29, 1783, in his eighty. second year, much regretted by his surviving friends, to whose esteem he was entitled by the many worthy and ingenious qualities. which he possessed. Those of his heart were as distinguished as those of his mind; the rules of religion, of virtue, and morality, having regulated his conduct from the beginning to the end of his days. He was married to a lady of merit equal to his own, the daughter of Barrel, esq. of Richmond. This lady died at Richmond, where Mr.Wray had a house, in May 1803. Mr. Wray left his library at her disposal and she, knowing his attachment to the Charter-house, made the governors an offer of it, which was thankfully accepted and a room was fitted up for its reception, and it is placed under the care of the master, preacher, head schoolmaster, and a librarian. The public at large, and particularly the friends of Mr. Wray, will soon be gratified by a memoir of him written by the lare George Hardinge, esq. intended for insertion in Mr. Nichols’s “Illustrations of Literature.” This memoir, of which fifty copies have already been printed for private distribution, abounds with interesting anecdotes and traits of character, and copious extracts from Mr. Wray’s correspondence, and two portraits, besides an engraving of the cameo.

, a learned bishop of Ely, was descended of a very ancient family, which came originally from Denmark. His father, Francis, citizen and mercer of London, was the only son of Cuthbert Wren, of Monkskirby.in Warwickshire, second son of William Wren of Sberbume-honse and of Billy-hall in the bishopric of Durham: but the chief seat of the family was at Binchester in that county. Our prelate was born in the parish of St. Petercheap, London, Dec. 23, 1585. Being a youth of promising talents, he was much noticed while at school by bishop Andrews, who being chosen master of Pembroke-hall in Cambridge, procured his admission into that society June 23, 1601, and assisted him in his studies afterwards, which he pursued with such success as to be chosen Greek scholar, and when he had taken his batchelor’s degree was elected fellow of the college Nov. 9, 1605. He commenced M.A. in 1608, and having studied divinity was ordained deacon in Jan. and priest in Feb. 1610. Being elected senior regent master in Oct, 1611, he kept the philosophy act with great applause before king James in 1614, and the year following was appointed chaplain to bishop Andrews, and was presented the same year to the rectory of Teversham in Cambridgeshire. In 1621 he was made chaplain to prince (afterwards king) Charles, whom he attended in that office to Spain in 1623. After his return to England, he was consulted by the bishops Andrews, Neile, and Laud, as to what might be the prince’s sentiments towards the church of England, according to any observations he had been able to make. His answer was, “1 know my master’s learning is not equal to his father’s, yet I know his judgment is very right: and as for his affections in the particular you point at (the support of the doctrine and discipline of the church) I have more confidence of him than of his father, in whom you have seen better than I so much inconstancy in some particular cases.' 7 Neile and Laud examined him as to his grounds for this opinion, which he gave them at large; and after an hour’s discussion of the subject, Andrews, who had hitherto been silent, said,” Well, doctor, God send you may be a true prophet concerning your master’s inclination, which we are glad to hear from you. I am sure I shall be a true prophet: I shall be in my grave, and so shall you, my lord of Durham (Neile), but my lord of St. David’s (Laud) and you, doctor, will live to see the day, that your master will be put to it upon his head and his crown, without he will forsake the support of the church."

In 1624, the rectory of Bingharn in Nottinghamshire was conferred upon Mr.Wren, together with a stall in the church of Winchester. In July 1625 he was chosen master of Peterhouse, in Cambridge, to which he became a great benefactor, building a great part of the college, putting their writings and records into order, and especially contributing liberally, and procuring the contributions of others towards the beautiful chapel, which was completed and dedicated by him in 1632. In July 1628 he was promoted to the dignity of dean of Windsor and Wolverhampton. The same year he served the office of vice-chancellor, and was made register of the garter. While he held this office, he cornposed in Latin, a comment upon the statutes of Henry VIII. respecting the order. This was published by Anstis, in the <c Register of the most noble order of the Garter.“Ashmole had a high opinion of this work, and regretted that he had not met with it before he had almost finished his” Institution of the order of the Garter."

In April 1629, Mr.Wren was sworn a judge of the starchamber for foreign causes. In 1633, he attended Charles I. in his progress to Scotland, and he had some hand in composing the ill-fated form of liturgy fur that country. On his return home he was made clerk of the closet to his majesty, and was about the same time created D. D. at Cambridge. In 1634 he was installed a prebendary of Westminster, and the same year promoted to the bishopric of Hereford, which he held only until the following year, when he was translated to the see of Norwich, in which he sat two years and a half, and appears to have been very unpopular with the puritan party. Lord Clarendon informs us that he “so passionately and warmly proceeded against the dissenting congregations, that many left the kingdom, to the lessening of the wealthy manufacture there of kerseys and narrow cloths, and, which was worse, transporting that mystery into foreign parts.” But the author of the “Parentalia” says, “that this desertion of the Norwich weavers was chiefly procured through the policy and management of the Dutch, who, wanting that manufacture, (which was improved there to great perfection) left no means unattempted to gain over these weavers to settle in their towns, with an assurance of full liberty of conscience, and greater advantages and privileges than they had obtained in England.” This author commends his modesty and humility, particularly in never seeking preferment: but he says too little of his zeal, which was indeed, ardent and active. This drew upon him the unjust imputation of popery. Nothing seems to have rendered him more hateful and invidious to the parliament, than his standing high in the favour of his sovereign.

In 1636 he succeeded Juxon, as dean of his majesty’s chapel, and in May 1638 was translated to the bishopric of Ely. He had not enjoyed this above two years, when in Dec. 1640, the day after the. impeachment of Laud, Hampden was sent by the Commons with a message to the House of Peers, acquainting their lordsbips that the Commons had received informations of a very high nature against Matthew Wren, bisbop of Ely, for setting up idolatry and superstition in divers places, and acting some things of that nature in his own person, and also to signify, that because they hear of his endeavouring to escape out of the kingdom, some course might be taken for his putting in security to be forthcoming, &c. Their lordships fixed his bail at 10,0001.; and this being given, he was impeached July 5, 1641, of high crimes and misdemeanours. These were contained in twenty-four articles, the sum total of which amounts to a zeal he shewed in enforcing the observances of the church. Against these he composed a long and spirited defence, in consequence of which his enemies declined trying him for his life, which they commuted for an order to keep him in prison in the Tower during their pleasure. This lasted full eighteen years, during which he employed himself chiefly in study and in composing some of his works. He bad offers of release from Cromwell, but he disdained the terms, which were an acknowledgment qf f the favour, and submission to the usurper. When the restoration drew nigh, he was released in March 1659, and returned to his palace at Ely in 1660. In May 1661, he introduced to the convocation the form of prayer and thanksgiving which is still in use on May 29. In 1663 he built a new chapel at Pembroke-hall, Cambridge, at his own expence, and settled an estate upon the college for the perpetual support of the building.

Bishop Wren died at Ely-house, London, April 24, 1667, in his eighty-second year, and was buried in Pemhroke-hall chapel. He was a man of unquestionable learning, and sincere in his attachment to the doctrines and discipline of the church, of great courage in suffering for his principles, but of a most intolerant spirit. No prelate’s name occurs oftener in the accounts of the prosecutions of the puritans. He resembled Laud in many respects, and narrowly escaped his fate. He distinguished himself by some publications; as, 1. “Increpatio Bar Jesu, sive Polemica? adsertiones locorum aliquot Sacrse Scripturae ah imposturis perversionum in Catechesi Racoviana,” Loud. 1660, in 4to, and reprinted in the ninth volume of the “Critici Sacri.” 2. “The abandoning of the Scots Covenant, 1661,” 4to 3. “Epistolae Variaj <ul -Vires doctissimos” particularly to Gerard John Vossius. 4. Two “Sermons;” one printed in 1627, the other in 1662. Dr, Richardson made use of some of his Mss. in his “De Presulibus Ano-liae.”

, eldest son of the preceding, was born Aug. 20, 1629, at Peter- house, Cambridge, ut which time his father was master of that college. His first education was in that university, heing admitted of St. Peter’s-college in 1642, whence he removed to Oxford, where he was a student, not in a college or hall, but in a private house, as he could not conform to the principles or practises of the persons who then had the government of the university. At the restoration' he was elected burgess of St. Michael in Cornwall, in the parliament which began May8, 1661, and was appointed secretary to the earl of Clarendon, lord high chancellor of England, who visiting the university of Oxford, of which he was chancellor, in Sept. 1661, Mr. Wren was there created master of arts. He was one of the first members of the Royal Society, when they began their weekly meetings at London, in 166O. After the fall of his patron, the earl of Clarendon, he became secretary to James duke of York, in whose service he continued till his death, June 11, 1672, in the fortythird year of his age. He was interred in the same vault with his father, in the chapel of Pembroke- hall, Cambridge. He wrote, 1. “Considerations on Mr. Harrington’s Commonwealth of Oceana, restrained to the first part of the preliminaries, London, 1657,” in 8vo. To this book is prefixed a long letter of our author to Dr. John Wilkins, warden of Wadham-college in Oxford, who had desired him to give his judgment concerning Mr. Harrington’s “Oceana.” Harrington answered this work in the first book of his “Prerogative of popular government,” 1658, 4to, in which he reflects on Mr. Wren as one of those virtuosi, who then met at Dr. Wilkins’ a lodgings at Wad ham- college, the seminary of the Royal Society, and describes them as an assembly of men who “had an excellent fcculty of mag^ nifying a louse, and diminishing a commonwealth.” Mr. Wren replied in 2, “Monarchy asserted; or, the State of Monarchical and Popular Government, in vindication of the considerations on Mr. Harrington’s * Oceana,' London, 1659,” in 8vo. Harrington’s rejoinder was an indecent piece of buffoonery, entitled “Politicaster i or, a Comical Discourse in^answer to Mr. Wren’s book, entitled ‘ Monarchy asserted, &c.’” 1659, 4to. Sir Edward Hyde, after^ wards earl of Clarendon, in a letter to Dr. John Barwick, dated at Brussels the 25th of July, 1659, and printed in the appendix to the doctor’s “Life,” was very solicitous, that Mr. Wren should undertake a confutation of Hobbes’s “Leviathan:” “I hope,” says he, “it is only modesty in Mr. Wren, that makes hirn pause upon undertaking the work you have recommended to him; for I dare swear, by what I have seen of him, he is very equal to answer every part of it: I mean, every part that requires an answer. Nor is there need of a professed divine to vindicate the Creator from making man a verier beast than any of those of the field, or to vindicate scripture from his licentious interpretation. I dare say, he will find somewhat in Mr. Hobbes himself, I mean, in his former books, that contradicts what he sets forth in this, in that part in which he takes himself to be most exact, his beloved philosophy. And sure there is somewhat due to Aristotle and Tuily, and to our universities, to free them from his reproaches; and it is high time, if what I hear be true, that some tutors read his Leviathan, instead of the others, to their pupils. Mr. Hobbes is my old friend, yet I cannot absolve him from the mischiefs he hath done to the king, the church, the laws, and the nation; and surely there should be enough to be said to the politics of that man, who, having resolved all religion, wisdom, and honesty, into an implicit obedience to the laws established, writes a book of policy, which, I may be bold to say, must be, by the established laws of any kingdom or province in Europe, condemned for impious and seditious: and therefore it will be very hard if the fundamentals of it be not overthrown. But I must ask both yours and Mr. Wren’s pardon for enlarging so much, and antedating those animadversions he will make upon it.”

, a learned and illustrious English architect and mathematician, was nephew to bishop Wren, and the son of Dr. Christopher Wren, who was fellow of St. John’s college, Oxford, afterwards chaplain to Charles I. and rector of Knoyle in Wiltshire; made dean of Windsor in 1635, and presented to the rectory of Hasely in Oxfordshire in 1638; and died at Blechindon, in the same county, 1658, at the house of Mr. William Holder, rector of that parish, who had married his daughter. He was a man well skilled in all the branches of the mathematics, and had a great hand in forming the genius of his only son Christopher.' In the state papers of Edward, earl of Clarendon, vol.1, p. 270, is an estimate of a building to be erected for her majesty by dean Wren. He did another important service to his country. After the chapel of St. George and the treasury belonging to it had been plundered by the republicans, he sedulously exerted himself in recovering as many of the records as could be procured, and was so successful as to redeem the three registers distinguished by the names of the Black, Blue, and lied, which were carefully preserved by him till his death. They were afterwards committed to the custody of his son, who, soon after the restoration, delivered them to Dr. Bruno Ryves, dean of Windsor.

His son Christopher, who is the subject of this article, was born at Knoyle Oct. 20, 1632 and, while very young, discovered a surprising turn for learning, especially for the mathematics. He was sent to Oxford, and admitted a gentleman-commoner at Wadham college, at about fourteen years of age: and the advancements he made there in mathematical knowledge, before he was sixteen, were, as we learn from Oughtred, very extraordinary, and even astonishing. His uncommon abilities excited the admiration of Dr. Wilkins, then warden of his college, and of Dr. Seth Ward, Savilian professor of astronomy, who then resided in Wadham. By Dr. Wilkins he was introduced to Charles, elector palatine, to whom he presented several mechanical instruments of his- own invention. In 16*7 he became acquainted with sir Charle* Scarborough, at whose request he undertook the translation of Oughtred’s geometrical dialling into Latin. He took a bachelor of arts degree in 1650; and in 1651 published a short algebraical tract relating to the Julian period. In 1652 betook his master’s degree, having been chosen fellow of All Souls’ college. Soon after, he became*one of that ingenious and learned society, who then met at Oxford for the improvement of natural and experimental philosophy.

Aug; 1657, he waschosen professor of astronomy in Gresham college; and his lectures, which were much frequented, tended greatly to the promotion of real knowledge. In his inaugural oration, among other things, he proposed several methods, by which to account for the shadows returning backward ten degrees on the dial of king Ahaz, by the laws of nature. One subject of his lectures was upon telescopes, to the improvement of which he had greatly contributed; another was on certain properties of the.air and the barometer. In 1658, he read a description of the body and different phases of the planet Saturn, which subject he proposed to pursue; and the same year communicated some demonstrations concerning cycloids to Dr. Wallis, which were afterwards published by the doctor at the end of his treatise upon that subject. About that time also, he solved the problem proposed by Pascal, under the feigned name of John de Montfort, to all the English mathematicians; and returned another to the mathematicians in France, formerly proposed by Kepler, and then solved likewise by himself, of which they never gave any solution. He did not continue long at Gresham college; for, Feb. 5, 1660-1, he was chosen Savilian professor of astronomy at Oxford, in the room of Dr. Seth Ward. He entered upon it in May; and in September was created doctor of civil law.

Among his other eminent accomplishments, he had gained so considerable a skill in architecture, that he was sent for the same year from Oxford, by order of Charles II. to assist sir John Denham, surveyor-general of his majesty’s works. In 1663, he was chosen 'fellow of the Royal Society; being one of those who were first appointed by the council after the grant of their charter. Not long after, it being expected that the king would make the society a visit, the lord Brounker, president, by a letter desired the advice of Dr. Wren, who was then at Oxford, concerning the experiments which might be most proper for his majesty’s entertainment: to whom the doctor recommended principally the Torricellian experiment, and the weatherneedle, as being not bare amusements, but useful, and likewise neat in the operation, and attended with little incumbrance. Dr. Wren did great honour to this illustrious body, by many curious and useful discoveries in astronomy, natural philosophy, and other sciences, related in the “History of the Royal Society” where the author Sprat, who was a member of it, has inserted them from the registers and other books of the society to 1665. Among other of his productions there enumerated is a lunar globe, representing not only the spots and various degrees of whiteness upon the surface, but the hills, eminences, and cavities; and not only so, but it is turned to the light, shewing all the lunar phases, with the various appearances that happen from the shadows of the mountains and valleys; The lunar globe was formed, not merely at the request of the Royal Society, but likewise by the command of Charles II. whose pleasure, for the prosecuting and perfecting of it was signified by a letter under the joint hands of sir Robert Moray and sir Paul Neile, dated from Whitehall, the 17th of May, 1661, and directed to Dr. Wren, Savilian professor at Oxford. His majesty received the globe with satisfaction, and ordered it to be placed among the curiosities of his cabinet. Another of these productions is a tract on the doctrine of motion that arises from the impact between two bodies, illustrated by experiments. And a third is, the history of the seasons, as to the temperature, weather, productions, diseases, &c. &c. For which purpose he contrived many curious machines, several of which kept their own registers, tracing out the lines of variations, so that a person might know what changes the weather had undergone in his absence: as wind-gages, thermometers, barometers, hygrometers, rain- gages, &c. &c. He made also great additions to the new discoveries on pendulums; and among other things shewed, that there may be produced a natural standard for measure from the pendulum for common use. He invented many ways to make astronomical observations more easy and accurate, He fitted and hung quadrants, sextants, and radii more commodiously than formerly: he made two telescopes to open with a joint like a sector, by which observers may infallibly take a distance to half minutes, &c. He made many sorts of retes, screws, and other devices, for improving telescopes to take small distances, and apparent diameters, to seconds. He made apertures for taking in more or less light, as the observer pleases, by opening and shutting, the better to fit glasses for crepusculine observations. He added much to the theory of dioptrics; much to the manufacture of grinding good glasses. He attempted, and not without success, the making of glasses of other forms than spherical. He exactly measured and delineated the spheres of the hamoura of the eye, the proportions of which to one another were only guessed at before: a discussion shewing the reasons why we see objects erect, and that reflection conduces as much to vision as refraction. He displayed a natural and easy theory of refractions, which exactly answered every experiment. He fully demonstrated all dioptrics in a few propositions, shewing not only, as in Kepler’s Dioptrics, the common properties of glasses, but the proportions by which the individual rays cut the axis, and each other, upon which the charges of the telescopes, or the proportion of the eye-glasses and apertures, are demonstrably discovered. He made constant observations on Saturn, and a true theory of that planet, before the printed discourse by Huygens, on that subject, appeared. He made maps of the Pleiades and other telescopic stars: and proposed methods to determine the great question as to the earth’s motion or rest, by the small stars about the pole to be seen in large telescopes. In navigation he made many improvements. He framed a magnetical terella, which he placed in the midst of a plane board with a hole, into which the terella is half immersed, till it be like a globe with the poles in the horizon the plane is then dusted over with steel filings from a sieve the dust, by the magnetical virtue, becomes immediately figured intofurrows that. bend like a sort of helix, proceeding as it were out at one pole, and returning in it by the other; the whole plane becoming figured like the circles of a planisphere. It being a question in his time among the problems of navigation, to what mechanical powers sailing against the wind was reducible; he shewed it to be a wedge: and he demonstrated, how a transient force upon an oblique plane would cause the motion of the plane against the first mover: and he made an instrument mechanically producing the same effect, and shewed the reason of sailing on all winds. The geometrical mechanism of rowing, he shewed to be a lever on a moving or cedent fulcrum: for this end, he made instruments and experiments, to find the resistance to motion in a liquid medium; with other things that are the necessary elements for laying down the geometry of sailing, swimming, rowing, flying, and constructing of ships. He invented a very speedy and curious way of etching. He started many things towards the emendation of waterworks. He likewise made some instruments for respiration, and for straining the breath from fuliginous vapours, to try whether the same breath, so purified, will serve again. He was the first inventor of drawing pictures by microscopical glasses. He found out perpetual, or at least long-lived lamps, for keeping a perpetual regular heat, in order to various uses, as hatching of eggs and insects, production of plants, chemical preparations, imitating nature in producing fossils anji minerals, keeping the motion of watches equal, for the longitude and astronomical uses. He was the first author of the anatomical experiment of injecting liquor into the veins of animals. By this operation, divers creatures were immediately purged, vomited, intoxicated, killed, or revived, according to the quality of the liquor injected. Hence arose many other new experiments, particularly that of transfusing blood, which has been prosecuted in sundry curious instances. Such is a short account of the principal discoveries which Dr. Wren presented, or suggested, to the Royal Society, or were improved by him. We now return to his progress as an architect.

In 1665, he went over to France, where he not onljr surveyed all the buildings of note in Paris, and made excursions to other places, but took particular notice of what was most remarkable in every branch of mechanics, and contracted acquaintance with all the considerable virtuosi*. Upon his return home, he was appointed architect and one of the commissioners for the reparation of St. Paul’s cathedral; as appears from Mr. Evelyn’s dedication to him of “The Account of Architects and Architecture,” 1706, folio, where we have the following account. “I have named St. Paul’s, and truly not without admiration, as oft as I recall to mind, as I frequently do, the sad and deplorable condition it was in; when, after it had been made a stable of horses, and a den of thieves, you, with other gentlemen and myself, were by the late king Charles named to survey the dilapidations, and to make report to his majesty, in order to a speedy reparation. You will not, as I am sure, forget the struggle we had with some who were for patching it up any how, so the steeple might stand, instead of new building; when, to put an end to the contest, five days after, that dreadful conflagration happened, out of whose ashes this phoenix is risen, and was by providence designed for you.” Within a few days after the fire, which began Sept. 2, 1666, he drew a plan for a new city, of which Oldenburg, the secretary of the Royal Society, gave an account to Mr. Boyle. “Dr. Wren,” says he, “has drawn a model for a new city, and presented it to the king, who produced it himself before his council, and manifested much approbation of it. I was yesterday morning with the doctor, and saw the model, which methiriks does so well provide for security, conveniency, and beauty, that I can see nothing wanting as to these three main articles: but whether it has consulted with the populousness of a great city, and whether reasons of state would, have that consulted with, is a qusere with me,” &c. The execution of this noble design was unhappily prevented by

* "The great number of drawings was sacrificed to the god of fake taste,

of his own, but it was so far lucky for another design for Hampton court in a

erected palaces only, no churches, to have executed, but was overruled."

St. Paul’s escaped, but Hampton court Walpole. the disputes which arose about private property, and the haste and hurry of rebuilding; though it is said that the practicability of Wren’s whole plan, without infringement of any property, was at that time demonstrated, and all material objections fully weighed and answered.

Upon the decease of sir John Denham, in March 1688, he succeeded him in the office of surveyor-general of his majesty’s works. The theatre at Oxford will be a lasting monument of his great abilities as an architect; which curious work was finished by him in 1669. As in this structure the admirable contrivance of the flat roof, being eighty feet over one way, and seventy the other, without any arched work or pillars to support it, is particularly remarkable, it has been both largely described, and likewise delineated, by the ingenious Dr. Plott, in his “Natural History of Oxfordshire.” But the conflagration of the city of London gave him many opportunities afterwards of employing his genius in that way; when, besides the works of the crown, which continued under his care, the cathedral of St. Paul, the parochial churches, and other public structures, which had been destroyed by that dreadful calamity, were rebuilt from his designs, and under his direction; in the management of which affair he was assisted in the measurements and laying out of private property by the ingenious Mr. Robert Hooke. The variety of business in which he was by this means engaged requiring his constant attendance and concern, he resigned his Savilian professorship at Oxford in 1673; and the year following he, received from the king the honour of knighthood. He was one of the commissioners who, at the motion of sir Jonas Moore, surveyor-general of the ordnance, had been appointed by his majesty to find a proper place for erecting a royal observatory; and he proposed Greenwich, which was approved of. On Aug. 10, 1675, the foundation of the building was laid; which, when finished under the direction of sir Jonas, with the advice and assistance of sir Christopher, was furnished with the best instruments for making astronomical observations; aud Mr. Flamsted was constituted his majesty’s first professor there.

About this time he married the daughter of sir Thomas Coghill, of Belchington, in Oxfordshire, by whom he had one son of his own name; and, she dying soon after, he married, a daughter of William lord Fitzwilliam, baron of Lifford in Ireland, by whom he had a son and a daughter In 1680, he was chosen president of the Royal Society; afterwards appointed architect and commissioner of Chelsea-college; and, in 1684, principal officer or comptroller of the works in the castle of Windsor. He sat twice in parliament, as a representative for two different boroughs; first, for Piympton in Devonshire in 1685, and again in 1700 for Melcomb-Regis in Dorsetshire. He was employed in erecting a great variety of churches and public edifices, when the country met with an indelible disgrace in a court intrigue, in consequence of which, in April 1718, his patent for royal works was superseded, when this venerable and illustrious man had reached his eighty- sixth year, after half a century spent in a continued, active, and laborious service to the crown and the public. Walpole has well said that “the length of his life enriched the reigns of several princes, and disgraced the last of them.” Until this time he lived in a house in Scotland-yard, adjoining to Whitehall; but, after his removal from that place in 1718, he dwelt occasionally in St. James’s-street, Westminster. He died Feb. 25, 1723, aged ninety -one, and was interred with great solemnity in St Paul’s cathedral, in the vault under the south wing of the choir, near the east end. Upon a flat stone, covering the single vault, which contains his body, is a plain English inscription and another inscription upon the side of a pillar, in these terms

As to his person, he was of low stature, and thin; but, by temperance and skilful management, for he was not unacquainted with anatomy and physic, he enjoyed a good state of health to a very unusual length of life. He was modest, devout, strictly virtuous, and very communicative of what he knew. Besides his peculiar eminence as an architect, his learning and knowledge were very extensive in all the arts and sciences, and especially in the mathematics. Mr. Hooke, who was intimately acquainted with him, and very able to make a just estimate of his abilities, has comprised his character in these few but comprehensive words: “I must affirm,” says he, “that since the time of Archimedes, there scarcely ever has met in one man, in so great a perfection, such a mechanical hand, and so philosophical a mind.” And a greater than Hooke, even the illustrious and immortal Newton, whose signet stamps an indelible character, speaks thus of him, with other eminent men: “D. Christophorus Wrennus, Eques Auratus, Johannes Wallisius, S. T. D. et D. Christianus Hugenius, hujus aetatis Geometrarum facile principes.” Mr. Evelyn, in the dedication referred to above, tells him, that “he inscribed his book with his name, partly through an ambition of publickly declaring the great esteem I have ever had,” says he, “of your virtues and accomplishments, not only in the art of building, but through all the learned cycle of the most useful knowledge and abstruser sciences, as well as of the most polite and shining; all which is so justly to be allowed you, that you need no panegyric, or other history, to eternize them, than the greatest city of the universe, which you have rebuilt and beautified, and are still improving: witness the churches, the royal courts, stately halls, magazines, palaces, and other public structures; besides that you have built of great and magnificent in both the universities, at Chelsea, and in the country; and are now advancing of the royal Marine-hospital at Greenwich: all of them so many trophies of your skill and industry, and conducted with that success, that, if the whole art of building were lost, it might be recovered and found again in St. Paul’s, the historical pillar, and those other monuments of your happy talent and extraordinary genius.”

Among the many public buildings erected by him in the city of London, the church of St. Stephen in Waibroke, that of St. Mary-le-Bow, the Monument, and the cathedral of St. Paul, have more especially drawn the attention of foreign connoisseurs. “The church of Waibroke,” says the author of the ‘ Critical Review of the public buildings, &c. of London,’ “so little known among us, is famous all over Europe, and is justly reputed the master-piece of the celebrated sir Christopher Wren. Perhaps Italy itself can produce no modern building that can vie with this in taste or proportion. There is not a beauty which the plan would admit of, that is not to be found here In its greatest perfectjon; and foreigners very justly call our judgment in question, for understanding its graces no better, and allowing it. ho higher a degree of fame.” The steeple of St. Mary-le-Bow, which is particularly grand and beautiful, stands upon an old Roman causey, that lies eighteen feet below the level of the present street; and the body of the church on the walls of a Roman temple. The Monument is a pillar of the Doric order, the pedestal of which is forty feet high and twentyone square, the diameter of the column fifteen feet, and the altitude of the whole 202; which is a fourth part higher than that of the emperor Trajan at Rome. It was begun in 167 1, and finished in 1677. But St. Paul’s will probably be considered as the greatest monument of sir Christopher’s genius. He died, says Waipole, at the age of ninety-one, having lived to see the completion of St. Paul’s; a fabric and an event, which one

Westminster Abbey, repaired. cannot wonder left such an impression of content on the mind of the good old man, that, being carried to see it once a year, it seemed to recall a memory that was almost deadened to every other use.“The same writer observes, that” so many great architects as were employed on St. Peter’s (at Rome) have not left it,* upon the whole, a more perfect edifice than this work of a single mind."

Sir Christopher Wren never printed any thing himself; but several of his works have been published by others: some in the “Philosophical Transactions,” and some by Dr. Wallis and other friends; while some are still remaining in manuscript, and several volumes of his designs are in the library of All Souls college. The title of one of them is, “Delineationes novae fabricae templi Paulinijuxta tertiam propositionem et ex sententia regis Caroli II. sub private sigillo expresses 14 Maii, ann. 1678.” By this it appears that he floated very much in his designs for St. Paul’s. One of them is very much like that of San Gallo for St. Peter’s at Rome. In another, the dome is crowned with a pine-apple, and it is curious to observe how every design for the present beautiful dome excels the other. The favourite design, however, of the great architect himself was not taken.

Sir Christopher was succeeded in his estate by his son and only surviving child, Christopher Wren, esq. This gentleman was born Feb. 16, 1675 (the year St. Paul’s was founded), and was educated at Eton school and Pembroke hall, Cambridge. In 1694, sir Christopher procured him the office of deputy-clerk engrosser; but this preferment did not prevent him from making a tour through Holland, France, and Italy. On his return from the continent he was elected member of parliament for Windsor in 1712 and 1714. He died Aug. 24, 1747, aged seventy-two, and was buried in the church of Wroxhall, adjoining to his seat at Wroxhall in Warwickshire. He was a man very much esteemed, and was equally pious, learned, and amiable. He had made antiquity his particular study, well understood it, and was extremely communicative. He wrote and published in 1708, in 4to, a work entitled “Numismatum antiquorum sylloge, populis Graecis, municipiis et coloniis Romanis cusorum, ex chimeliarcho editoris.” This, which he dedicated to the Royal Society, contains representations of many curious Greek medallions in four plates, and two others of ancient inscriptions; these are followed by the legends of imperial coins in the large and middle size, from Julius Caesar to Aurelian, with their interpretations: and subjoined is an appendix of Syrian and Egyptian kings, and coins of cities, all collected by himself. He also collected with so much care and attention, as to leave scarcely any curiosity ungratifiecl, memoirs of the life of bishop Wren, Dr. Christopher Wren, dean of Windsor, and his illustrious father; with collections of records and original papers. These were published in fol. under the title of “Parentalia,” by his son Stephen, a physician, assisted by Mr. Ames, in 1750, and are illustrated by portraits and plates. Mr. Wren married twice; in May 1706 to Mary, daughter of Mr. Musard, jeweller to queen Anne, who died in 1712; he afterwards married in 1715 dame Constance, widow of sir Roger Burgoyne, bart. and daughter of sir Thomas Middleton, of Stansted Montfitchet, Essex, who died in 1734. By each marriage he had one sbn, Christopher, and Stephen. Christopher, the eldest, an eccentric humourist, was the poetical friend of lady Luxborough and Shenstone. Displeasing his father, all the unentailed estates were given from him to sir Roger Burgoyne, bart. son of sir Roger. Wroxall is still in the family, and owned by Christopher Wren, esq. now (1806) in the East Indies, who is the sixth Christopher Wren in succession from the father of sir Christopher.

, a learned and loyal divine of the seventeenth century, was the son of Richard Wright, citizen and silk-dyer of London, who was the son of Jeffrey Wright, of Loughborough, in Leicestershire. He was born in Black- Swan alley, Thames-street, in the parish of St. James’s, Garlick Hythe, London, Dec. 23, 1611, and educated partly at Mercers’- chapel school, but principally at Merchant Taylors, whence he was elected scholar of St. JobnVcollege, Oxford, in 1629, by the interest of Dr. Juxon, then president, w/ho became his patron. He was much admired at this time for a natural eloquence, and a love of polite literature. In 1632 he was elected fellow, and while bachelor of arts, made a collection of modern Latin poetry, which he published afterwards under the title of “Delitiae delitiarum, siveepigrammatum ex optimis quibusque hujus novissimi seculi Poetis in amplissima ilia Bibl. Bodleiana, et pene omnino alibi extantibus artthologia in unum corollum connexa,” Ox. 1637, 12mo. In 1636, when archbishop Laud entertained the royal family at St. JohnVcollege, Mr. Wright was selected to make an English address, and afterwards distinguished himself as a performer in a comedy called “Love’s Hospital,” which was acted before their majesties in the hall, by a company of St. John’s men.

In Sept. 1637, and 1639, betook deacon’s and priest’s orders, and was so much admired as an eloquent preacher as to be frequently called upon to preach at St. Mary’s, St. Paul’s, London, &c, In 1645 he became vicar of Okeham in Rutlandshire, by the interest of his patron Jnxon, now bishop of London, and received institution, but refused induction, because in that case he must have taken the covenant, which was altogether repugnant to his principles, and therefore a nonconformist was placed in his living, one Benjamin King. Mr. Wright then went to London, and lived retired till after the death of the king, when he was hospitably received into the family of sir George Grime or Graham at Peckham, and while here he instructed sir George’s sons in Latin and Greek, and read the Commonprayer on all Sundays and holidays, and preached and administered the sacrament. About 1655 he returned to London, on being chosen by the parishioners of St. Olave, Silver-street, to be their minister. In this office he remained for four years, and was in fact rector, but would not take possession on account of the republican oaths and obligations necessary. He performed all his duties, however, according to the forms of the Church of England, although at some risk. On the restoration Benjamin King, who had been put into his living at Okeham, resigned, by his hand and seal, all title to it, and Mr. Wright took possession and retained it to his dying day, refusing some other preferments. He lived here to a very advanced age, and died May 9, 1690, and was buried in Okeham church. Besides the “Delitiae paetarum” already mentioned, he published 1. “Five Sermons in five several stiles or ways of preaching,” Lond. 1656, 8vo. The object of this curious collection is to exhibit the advantages of education in fitting for the ministry, as well as the different styles of some eminent men of that period, viz. bishop Andrews, bishop Hall, Dr. Mayne, and Mr. Cartwright. Dr. Birch is mistaken in calling this an imitation of different stjles; it is a selection from the works of the respective authors, 2. “A practical commentary, or exposition on the hook of Psalms,” Lond. 1661, fol. 3. “Practical Commentary on the Pentateuch,” ibid. fol. 4. “Parnassus biceps, or several choice pieces of poetry, composed by the best wits that were in both the universities before their dissolution,” ibid. 1656, 8vo. He wrote some other works which have not been printed.

He left a son, James Wright, known to dramatic antiquaries, as one of the earliest historians of the stage, and perhaps one of the first collectors of old plays after Cartwright, whbse collection was at Dulwich-college. His work on this subject, which is extremely scarce, is entitled “Historia Histrionica; an historical account of the English stage, shewing the ancient use, improvement, and perfection, of dramatic representations in this nation. In a dialogue of plays and players,” Lond. 1699, 8vo. It was-first brought forward by Oldys, who quoted it in his life of Alleyn the player in the Biographia Britannica, By Warburton’s recommendation it was prefixed to Dodsley’s “Old Plays,” but the preface has been omitted which Warton says is a sensible one, and certainly points out the only use of most old plays, 'as exhibiting the manners of the times. Wright wrote likewise “Country conversations, being an account of some discourses that happened on a visit to the country last summer, on divers subjects; chiefly, of the modern comedies, of drinking, of translated verse, of painting and painters, of poets and poetry,” Lond. 1694, 12mo. He appears also to have been a skilful antiquary, and had formed a very curious collection, which was unfortunately consumed in a fire in the Middle Temple in 1698. Among his Mss. was an excellent transcript of Leland’s “Itinerary,” of the age of queen Elizabeth, and consequently made before the present mutilations and corruptions. On this he had much correspondence with Hearne. His other works were, 1. “A poem, being an Essay on the present ruins of St. Paul’s cathedral,” Lond. 1663, 4to. 2. “History and Antiquities of the county of Rutland,” ibid. 1634, fol. soon followed by “Additions” in 1687, and “Farther Additions,” 1714. This is a work of much labour and research, although not perfect. '6. “A new der scription of the city of Paris, in two parts, out of the French,” ibid. 1687, 8vo. 4. “Verses anniversary to the venerable memory of his ever honoured father, &c.” 1690, 8vo. 5. “Monasticon Anglicanum, &c.” an accurate epitome in English of Dugdale’s “Monasticon,” ibid. 1693, fol. 6. “Three poems of St. Paul’s cathedral, viz. The Ruins (mentioned above), The re-building, The Choir,” 1697, fol. 7. “Phcenix Paulina, a poem on St. Paul’s cathedral,” 1709, 4to. 8. “Burley on the hill, a poem,” 4to, no date, but reprinted in his last additions to his Rutlandshire. Hearne, who knew and respected Wright, informs us, that he wrote strictures on Wood’s “Athenæ,” but that they remained in manuscript. Wright, a few years before his death, gave Hearne a complete catalogue of his works, which on application he had refused to Wood, “as an injudicious biographer.”

Wright, who was born about 1644, was probably educated at Merchant Taylors’ school, but was not of either university. In 1666 be became a student of New Inn, and in three years removed to the Middle Temple, and was at length called to the bar. He died about 1715.

, a noted English mathematician, who flourished in the latter part of the sixteenth century and beginning of the seventeenth, is thus characterised in a Latin paper in the library of Gonvile and Caius college, Cambridge: “This year (1615) died at London, Edward Wright, of Garveston, in Norfolk, formerly a fellow of this college; a man respected by all for the integrity and simplicity of his manners, and also famous for his skill in the mathematical sciences; so that he was not undeservedly styled a most excellent mathematician by Richard Hackluyt, the author of an original treatise of our English navigations. What knowledge he had acquired in the science of mechanics, and how usefully he employed that knowledge to ths public as well as to private advantage, abundantly appear both from the writings he published, and from the many mechanical operations still extant, which are standing monuments of his great industry and ingenuity. He was the first undertaker of that difficult but useful work, by which a little river is brought from the town of Ware in apew canal, to supply the city of London with water but by the tricks of others he was hindered from completing the work he had begun. He was excellent both in contrivance and execution, nor was he inferior to the most ingenious mechanic in the making of instruments, either of brass or any other matter. To his invention is owing whatever advantage Hondius’s geographical charts have above others; for it was Wright who taught Jodocus Horn dius the method of constructing them, which wa.s till then unknown; but the ungrateful Hondius concealed the name of the true author, and arrogated the glory of the invention to hjmself. Of this fraudulent practice the good man could nqt help complaining, and justly enough, in the preface to his treati.se of the” Correction of Errors in the art of Navigation;“which he composed with excellent judgment and after long experience, to the great advancement of naval affairsi For the improvement of this art he was appointed mathematical lecturer by the East India company, and read lectures in the house of that worthy knight sir Thomas Smith, for which he had a yearly salary of fifty pounds, This office he discharged with great reputation, and much to the satisfaction of his hearers. He published in English a book on the doctrine of the sphere, and another concerning the construction of sun-dials. He also prefixed an ingenious preface to the learned Gilbert’s book on the loadstone. By these and other his writings, he has transmitted his fame to latest posterity. While he was yet a fellow of this college, he could not be concealed in his private study, but was called forth to the public business of the nation by the queen, about 1593. He was ordered to attend the earl of Cumberland in some maritime expeditions. One of these he has given a faithful account of, in the manner of a journal or ephemeris, to which he has prefixed an elegant hydrographical chart of his own contrivance. A little before his death he employed himself about an English translation of the book of logarithms, then lately discovered by lord Napier, a Scotchman, who had a great affection for him. This posthumous work of his- was published soon after by his only son Samuel Wright, who was also a scholar of this college. He had formed many other useful designs, but was hindered by death from bringing them to perfection. Of him it may truly be said, that he studied more to serve the public than himself; and though he was rich in fame, and in the promises of the great, yet he died poor, to tfie scandal of an ungrateful age.” So far the memoir; other particulars concerning him are as follow:

Mr. Wright first dicovered the true way of dividing the meridian line, according to which the Mercator’s charts are constructed, and upon which Mercator’s sailing is founded. An account of this he sent from Caius college, Cambridge, where he was then a fellow, to his friend Mr. Blondeviile, containing a short tahle for that purpose, with a specimen of a chart so divided, together with the manner of dividing it. Ail which Blondeviile published in 1594, among his “.Exercises.” And, in 1597, the rev. Mr. William Barlowe, in his “Navigator’s Supply,” gave a demonstration of this division as communicated by a. friend.

At length, in 1599, Mr. Wright himself printed his celebrated treatise entitled “The Correction of certain Errors in Navigation,” which had been written many years before; where he shews the reason of this division of the meridian, the manner of constructing his table, and its uses in navigation, with other improvements. In 1610 a second edition of Mr. Wright’s book was published, and dedicated to his royal pupil* prince Henry; in which the author inserted farther improvements; particularly he proposed an excellent way of determining the magnitude of the earth; at the same time recommending, very judiciously, the making our common measures in some certain proportion to that of a degree on its surface, that they might not depend on the uncertain length of a barley corn. Some of his other improvements were the table of latitudes for dividing the meridian, computed as far as to minutes: an instrument, he calls the sea-rings, by which the variation of the compass, the altitude of the sun, and the time of the day, may be readily determined at once in any place, provided the latitude be known; the correcting of the errors arising from the eccentricity of the eye in observing by the cross-staff; a total amendment in the tables of the declinations and places of the sun and stars, from his own observations, made with a six-foot quadrant, in 1594, 95, 96, 97; a sea-quadrant, to take altitudes by a forward or backward observation; having also a contrivance for the ready finding the latitude by the height of the polar-star, when not upon the meridian. And that this book might be the better understood by beginners, to this edition is subjoined a translation of Zamorano’s Compendium; and added a large table of the variation of the compass as observed in very different parts of the world, to shew it is not occasioned by any magrietical pole. The work has gone through several other editions since. And, beside the books above mentioned, he wrote another on navigation, entitled “^he Haven-finding Art.” Some accounts of him say also, that it was in 1589 that he first began to attend the earl of Cumberland in his voyages. It is also said that he made for his pupil, prince Henry, a large sphere with curious movements, which, by the help of springwork, not only represented the motions of the whole celestial sphere, but shewed likewise the particular systems of the sun and moon, and their circular motions, together with their places and possibilities of eclipsing each other: there is in it a work for a motion of 17,100 years, if it should not be stopped, or the materials fail. This sphere, though thus made at a great expence of money and ingenious industry, was afterwards in the time of the civil wars cast aside, among dust and rubbish, where it was found in 1646, by sir Jonas Moore, wh.o at his own expence restored it to its first state of perfection, and deposited it at his own house in the Tower, among his other mathematical instruments and curiosities.

, commonly called Wright of Derby, a very distinguished painter, was born at Derby, September 3, 1734. His father was an attorney there. In early life, he gave indications of a taste for mechanics, and those habits of attentive observation, which generally lead to perfection in the fine arts. In 1751, he came to London, and was placed with Hudson, the most eminent portraitpainter of the day, and who, lord Orford tells us, pleased the country gentlemen with “his honest similitudes, fair tied wigs, blue velvet coats, and white sat tin waistcoats, which he bestowed liberally on his customers.” Wright used to lament that he could not receive much instruction from this master, but it is certain he at this time painted both portraits and historical pieces in a very capital style, of which his “Blacksmith’s forge,” “Air-pump, &c.” are proofs. In 1773, after marrying, he visited Italy, and made great advances in his profession. In 1775, he returned to England, and settled for two years at Bath, after which his residence was entirely at Derby.

His attention was directed for some years to portrait painting; and from the specimens he has left, there can be no dbubt that he would have stood in the first rank in this branch of the art, had he chosen to pursue it; but his genius was not to be circumscribed within such narrow limits, and therefore, at a mature age, he visited Italy* to study the precious remains of art which that country possessed. His fine drawings, after Michael Angelo (which have scarcely been seen except by his particular friends), and the enthusiasm with which he always spoke of the sublime original, evinced the estimation in which he held them; and from their extreme accuracy, they may be considered as faithful delineations of the treasures of the Capella Sestina. In 1782 he was elected an associate of the Royal Academy; but offended at Mr. Garvey’s being chosen royal academician before himself, he resigned his associate’s diploma in disgust, yet continued to exhibit at intervals with that society. In 1785 he made an exhibition of his own pictures at the auction room, now Robins’s, in the Great Piazza, Covent Garden. The collection consisted of twenty four pictures.

, of Barwell, Leicestershire, barrister at law, was elected recorder of Leicester in 1680; called by Writ, April 11, 1692, to take the degree of serjeant at law; knighted Dec. 30, 1696, and made king’s serjeant. On the refusal of the lords chief justices Holt and Treby, and Trevor the attorney-general, to accept the great seal, which was taken from lord Somers, it was delivered to sir Nathan, with the title of lord-keeper, May 21, 1700. As he was raised to this situation by the tories, so he seems to have acted in conformity to the views of that party. Burnet says, that many gentlemen of good estates and ancient families were put out of the commission of the peace by him, for no other visible reason but because they had gone in heartily to the revolution, and had continued zealous for king William; and, at the same time, men of no worth nor estate, and known to be ill-affected to queen Anne’s title, and to the protestant succession, were put in. He adds, that the lord-keeper was a “zealot to the party, and was become very exceptionable in all respects. Money, as was said, did every thing with him; only in his court, I never heard him charged for any thing but great slowness, by which the chancery was become one of the heaviest grievances of the nation.” The same author likewise says, that the lord-keeper “was sordidly covetous; and did not at all live suitable to that high post: he became extremely rich, yet I never heard him charged with bribery in his court.” One of the most remarkable events that happened while he was in office, was his sentence for dissolving the Savoy, July 13, 1702; and in the same year, Nov. 30, he reversed a decree of his great predecessor, lord Somers. Sir Nathan’s removal, however, which happened in May 1705, is said to have “been a great loss to the church.” He passed the remainder of his days in retirement, beloved and respected, at Chaldecot-Hall, in Warwicksbire,"wbere he died Aug. 4, 1721.

, an eminent dissenting clergyman, was born Jan. 30, 1682-3, being eldest son of Mr. James Wright, a nonconformist minister at Retford, in the county of Nottingham, by Mrs. Eleanor Cotton, daughter of Mr Cotton, a gentleman of Yorkshire, and sister to the rev. Mr. Thomas Cotton of Westminster, whose funeral-sermon his nephew preached and published. At eleven years old he lost his father, being then at school at Attercliffe, in Yorkshire, whence he removed to Darton, in the same county, under the care of his grandmother, and his uncle Cotton. At sixteen he studied under the care of the rev. Mr. Jollie, at Attercliffe, whom about the age of twentyone he quitted, and went to his uncle’s house at the Haigh, >!vhere he officiated as his chaplain and after his death he came to London, having preached only three or four sermons in the country. He lived a little while in his uncle’s family at St. Giles’s, and thence went to be chaplain to Jady Susannah Lort, at Turnham-green, and was chosen 10 preach the Sunday evening-lecture at Mr. Cotton’s, at St. Giles’s. Being soon after invited to assist Dr. Grosvenor at Crosby-square meeting, he quitted lady Lort and St. Giles’s, and was soon after chosen to carry on the evening-lecture in Southwark, in conjunction with the rev. Mr. Haman Hood, who soon quitting it, it devolved on Mr. Wright, then only twenty-three. On the death of Mr. Matthew Sylvester, 1708, he was chosen pastor of the congregation at Blackfriars, which increased considerably Under his care, and where he continued many years, till he removed to Carter- lane, which meeting-house was built for him, and opened by him Dec. 5, 1734, with a sermon on 2 Chron. vi. 40. His sermons, printed singly, amount to near forty. But his most considerable work was iris? “Treatise on the New Birth, or, the being born again, without which it is impossible to enter into the kingdom of God,” which had gone through fifteen editions before his death. Dr. Wright is traditionally understood to have been the author of the song, “Happy Hours, all Hours excelling.” He was remarkable for the melody of his voice and the beauty of his elocution. Archbishop Herring, when a young man, frequently attended him as a model of delivery, not openly in the meeting house, but in a large porch belonging to the old place in Blackfriars. He married, in 1710, the widow of his predecessor, Mr. Sylvester, daughter of the rev. Mr. Obadiah Hughes, minister of the dissenting congregation at Enfield, aunt to the late Dr. Obadiah Hughes, by whom he had one son, since dead, a tradesman in the city, and one daughter, married to a citizen in Newgate-street, a most accomplished woman, but who became the victim of her own imprudence. He died April 3, 1746, at Newington-green, which was his residence. His funeral -sermon was preached at Carter-lane meeting by Dr. Milner and another at the same place, by Dr. Obadiah Hughes, who wrote his epitaph.

, an eminent modern architect, was born at Burton, in the county of Stafford, about 1743, of a respectable family, which is now become perfectly patriarchal in its numerous and extensive branches. His education, till the age of fourteen, was such as a country town afforded, but having at that period, exhibited a fondness for architectural design, though in humble and rude atlempts, his friends had the happiness to succeed in introducing him into the suite of lord Bagot, then about to depart for Rome as the ambassador of Great Britain at the Ecclesiastical States. That genius which first budded spontaneously in its own obscure, native territory, could hardly fail to shoot forth in strength and beauty when transplanted to the classic and congenial soil of Italy. Amid the architectural glories of the West, the fallen temples of the World’s fallen mistress, our young student stored up that transcendant knowledge of the rules of his profession, and that exquisite taste for the developement of those rules, which, in after-years, placed him without a professional rival in his own country. Brilliant, quick, and intuitive, a2 was his genius, he was never remiss in investigating and making himself master of the details and practical causes by which the great effective results of architecture are produced. He has been heard frequently to state that he measured with his own hand every part of the dome of St. Peter’s, and this too at the imminent danger of his life, being under the necessity of lying on his back on a ladder slung horizontally, without cradle or side-rail, over a frightful void of 300 feet. From Rome he departed for Venice, where he remained above two years a pupil of the celebrated Viscentini, an architect and painter. Under this master he acquired a very unusual perfection in architectural painting; and he has executed a few, and but a few, paintings in that line, which equal any by Panini. At the unripe age of twenty, when few young men have even commenced their pupilage to a profession of so much science and taste, Mr. Wyatt arrived in London with a taste formed by the finest models of ancient Rome, and the instruction of the best living masters in Italy. To him then nothing was wanting but an opportunity to call forth his powers into action, nor was that long withheld. He was employed to build the Pantheon in Oxford-street, a specimen of architecture which attracted the attention and commanded the admiration of all persons of taste in Europe, by its grandeur of symmetry, and its lavish but tasteful richness of decoration. Never, perhaps, was so high a reputation in the arts obtained by a first effort. Applications now poured in upon Mr. Wyatt, not only from all parts of England, Ireland, and Scotland, but also from the Continent. The empress of Russia, that investigator and patron of talent in all departments, desirous to possess the architect of the Pantheon, and to exercise his genius in a projected palace, offered him (through her ambassador at London) a carte blanche, as to remuneration, if he would settle at St. Petersburg; but he was recommended by his friends to decline the offer of the munificent Catherine. From this period it may well be supposed that he ranked foremost in his profession, and executed most of the important and costly works of architecture which were undertaken. On the death of sir William Chambers he received the most flattering and substantial proof of the king’s great estimation, by being appointed surveyor-general to the Board of Works, which was followed by appointments to almost all the important offices connected with his profession in the government departments; and a dispute having arisen in the Royal Academy, which induced Mr. West to relinquish the president’s chair, Mr. Wyatt was elected, and reluctantly obeyed his majesty’s command to accept the vacant office, which he restored to Mr. West the ensuing year. From the building of the Pantheon to the period of his death, this classical architect erected or embellished some of the most considerable mansions, palaces, and other buildings, in the United Kingdom; among which are, the palace at Kew, Fonthili abbey, Hanworth church, House of Lords, Henry the Seventh’s chapel, Windsor castle, Buistrode, Doddington hall, Cashiobury, Ashridge hall, &c. &c. The writer of his life says, that although Mr. Wyatt was educated a Roman architect, and made his grand and successful debut in England in that character, yet his genius was not to be bounded in a single sphere, and it afterwards revived in this country the long- forgotten beauties of Gothic architecture. It is, however, a more general opinion that Mr. Wyatt was far from successful either in his original attempts, or in his restorations of the pure Gothic.

A man who walked foremost in the ranks of a lucrative profession (in a country filled with a rich and liberal aristocracy) for near 48 years, a considerable portion of which he was honoured with the royal favour, might naturally be supposed to have amassed a fortune almost princely; but, Mr. Wyatt bequeathed to his family little more than a name universally beloved and regretted, and a reputation which will live as long as the liberal arts continue to embellish and ennoble human life. To account for this, says his biographer, it is only necessary to observe, that, if to superior and all-powerful genius were added conduct and prudence equivalent, every individual so gifted would become a Napoleon or a Wellington the destroyer or the saviour of nations: but infinite wisdom having ordained that such instances should be most rare, and that the mass of mankind should live in a great degree equalized in power, we commonly find that genius and great parts are paralyzed by an inattention to the minor considerations and details of calculating prudence, while a slow and dull intellect is often compensated by industry and worldly caution. Mr. Wyatt' s genius achieved for him greatness at an early age, without the humbler aids last alluded to, and those discreet handmaids to wealth and permanent prosperity were never afterwards found in his train. He died Sept. 5, 1813, aged about seventy. He was proceeding to London with Mr. Codrington, in that gentleman’s carriage, when it was overturned near Marlborongh. The suddenness and violence of this accident was fatal to Mr. Wyatt: it is supposed to have produced a concussion of the brain. His death was instantaneous. The suavity of manners, the kind and obliging disposition, and the intelligent mind of Mr. Wyatt, attracted and retained the notice and friendship of some of the most v illustrious persons in. this kingdom; among whom are to be ranked the sovereign, and almost every branch of the royal family. No one, indeed, ever obtained more friends, or created fewer enemies. Mr. Wyatt left a widow and four sons, the eldest of whc-m, Mr. Benjamin Dean Wyatt, already has attained great fame in the profession of architecture.

, a statesman and poet, the only son and heir of sir Henry Wyat of Allington-castle, in Kent, was born in 1503. His mother was the daughter of John Skinner, of the county of Surrey. His father was imprisoned in the Tower in the reign of Richard III. when he is said to have been preserved by a cat which fed him while in that place, for which reason he was always pictured with acat in hisarms, or beside him. On the accession of Henry VIL be had great marks of favour shewn him, among which w0,s the honour of knighthood, and a seat in the privy-council. One of the last services in which he was employed by that king, was conducting to the Tower the unfortunate earl of Suffolk, who was afterwards beheaded by Henry VIII. He was also a member of Henry VIII.'s privy-council, master of the jewel-office, and of the vanguard of the army, commanded by the king in person, which fought the memorable battle of the Spurs. He died in 1533.

The honours of educating sir Thomas has been claimed for both universities; by Carter for St. John’s college, Cambridge, and by Anthony Wood for Oxford, because he resided for sometime on the establishment of cardinal Wolsey’s new college, now Christ-church. He then set out on his travels according to the custom of that age, and returned after some years, a gentleman of high accomplishments and elegant manners, and of such conversation talents both as to sense and wit as to have attracted the admiration of all ranks, and particularly of his sovereign, who bestowed on him the order of knighthood, and employed him in various embassies. Mr. Warton appears offended with Wood for saying that “the king was in a high manner delighted with his witty jests,” while he allows that Henry was probably as much pleased with his repartees as his politics. Lloyd, whom Mr. Gray and lord Orford have adopted as an authority, reports enough of his wit, to convince us that he might delight a monarch of Henry’s fickleness and passionate temper. Persons of this character are often more easily directed or diverted by a striking expression, than by a train of argument.

According to Lloyd, he was frequently honoured with the king’s familiar conversation, which never put Wyat so much off his guard as to betray him into any fooleries inconsistent with his character. When urged by the king to dance at one of the court-balls, he replied that, “He who thought himself a wise man in the day-time, would not be a fool at night.” His general deportment is said to have been neither too severe for Henry VIII.‘s time, nor too loose for Henry VII.’s, with whose court, however, he could have little acquaintance. In him also was said to have been combined the wit of sir Thomas More, and the wisdom of sir Thomas Cromwell. It is no small confirmation of this character that his friend Surrey describes him as of “a visage stern and mild,” a contrariety which seems to be very happily preserved in Holbein’s incomparable drawing lately published by Mr. Chamberlain.

But his wit was not evanescent. We are told that he brought about the reformation by a bon mot, and precipitated the fall of Wolsey by a seasonable story. When the king was perplexed respecting his divorce from queen Catherine, which he affected to feel as a matter of conscience, sir Thomas exclaimed, Lord! that a man cannot repent him of his sin without the pope’s leave!“A truth thus wittily hinted was afterwards confirmed by the opinion of Cranrner and of the universities, and became a maxim of church and state. The story by which he promoted the fall of Wolsey has not descended to our time*; Lloyd merely says that when the king happened to be displeased with Wolsey,” sir Thomas ups with the story of the curs baiting the butcher’s dog, which contained the whole method of that great man’s ruin," alluding to the common report of Wolsey’s being the son of a butcher at Ipswich.

In the early state of the reformation, the clergy were discontented, because afraid of losing their valuable lands. “Butter the rooks nests,” said sir Thtfmas, “and they will never trouble you.” The meaning, not very obvious, was that the king should give the church lands to the great families, whose interest it would then be to prevent the reestablishment of popery. The wit, however, of this advice is more remarkable than the wisdom, for notwithstanding the robbery of the church, which has hept her poor ever since, popery was effectually re-established in queen Mary’s reign. The liberality of the only other bon 'mot recorded of sir Thomas may be questioned. One day he told the king that he had found out a living of 100l. a year more than enough, and prayed him to bestow it on him, and when the king answered that there was no such in England, sir Thomas mentioned a the provost-ship of Eaton, where a man hath his diet, his lodging, his horsemeat, his servant’s wages, his riding charge, and an hundred pounds per annum besides."

Sir Thomas was a man whose acquaintance was much Courted, for his splendid entertainments, his knowledge of the political relations of the kingdom, his discernment in discovering men of parts, and his readiness to encourage them; and for the interest he was known to possess at court. ID became a proverb, when any person received preferment, that “he had been in sir Thomas Wyat’s closet.” To this may be added, thai his conversation had that happy mixture of the grave and gay which excludes dullness as well as levity, and his manners were so highly polished that he differed in opinion with the utmost civility, and expressed his doubts as if he needed the information which he was able to impart.

Amidst this prosperous career, he had the misfortune, like most of the eminent characters of this reign, to fall under the severe displeasure of the king, and was twice imprisoned, but for what offences his biographers are not agreed. Fuller says he had heard that he fell into disfavour about the business of queen Anne Bullen. Lloyd insinuates the same, and some have gone so far as to accuse him of a criminal connection with her, but all this is in part erroneous. From the oration which he delivered on his second trial, and which lord Orford has printed in his “Miscellaneous Antiquities,” he expressly imputes his first imprisonment to Charles Brandon, duke of Suffolk. “His first misfortune flowed from a court-cabal; the second from the villainy, jealousy, and false accusation of that wretch Bonner, bishop of London, whose clownish manners, lewd behaviour, want of religion, and malicious perversion of truth, sir Thomas paints with equal humour and asperity.” Bonner accused him of a treasonable correspondence with cardinal Pole, and this, with some treasonable expresssions concerning the king, formed the principal charges against him, which he repelled with great spirit, ease, and candour. The words which he was accused of having uttered were, "that the king should be cast out of. a cart’s a e;-and that by God’s blood, if he were

so, he was well served, and he would he were so." Sir Thomas acknowledged the possibility of his having uttered the first part of this sentence, and explained his meaning, viz. that between the emperor and the king of France, his master Henry would probably be left in the lurch.

He was tried for this by a jury before a committee of the council, and probably acquitted, as we find that he regained the confidence of the king, aild was afterwards sent ambassador to the emperor. His eagerness to execute this con>­mission, whatever it was, proved fatal, for riding post in the heat of summer, he was attacked by a malignant fever, of which he died at Shirebourne in Dorsetshire, 1541, in the thirty-eighth year of his age, and was buried in the great conventual church there .

Lord Orford informs us that in Vertue’s manuscript collections he found that Vertue was acquainted with a Mr. Wyat, who lived in Charterhouse-yard, and was the representative descendant of that respectable family. In 1721, and at other times, Vertue says, at that gentleman’s house, he saw portraits of his ancestor for seven descents, and other pictures and ancient curiosities . Sir Thomas has usually been termed sir Thomas Wyat the elder, to distinguish him from sir Thomas Wyat, his son, who suffered death for high treason in the reign of queen Mary., His lady, according to Wood, was Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas Brooke, lord Cobham . His son left issue, by Jane his wife, daughter and co-heir of William Hawte of Bourne, knight, a son named George Wyat of Boxley in Kent, restored 13 Elizabeth.

Sir Thomas’s biographers are in general silent on the subject of his connection with lord Surrey. It is known, however, that they were closely allied by friendship, and similarity of taste and studies. Surrey’s character of Wyat is a noble tribute to his memory. The year following his death, Leland published a volume of elegiac verses, some of which are very elegant, and all highly encomiastic, entitled “Naenise in mortem ThomaB Viati, Equitis incomparabilis, Joanne Lelando Antiquario, Auctore,” 4to. This scarce pamphlet has a woodcut of Wyat, supposed to be by Holbein, but represents him as a much older man than he was, and with a huge bushy beard hiding more than half his features. The copy in the British Museum is dated 1552.

His poems were first published by Tottel, along wit^h Surrey’s and the collection by uncertain authors. The authenticity of Surrey’s and Wyat’s poems seems to be confirmed by this care of Tottel to distinguish what he knew from what he did not know, and what, from the ignorance of an editor of so riiuch taste, we apprehend were not generally known. Mr, Warton has favoured us with a very elaborate and elegant criticism on Wyat, but has found it impossible to revive his poetical fame. He contributed but little to the refinement of English poetry, and his versification and language are deficient in harmony and pei> spicuity. From a close study of the Italian poets, his imagination dwells too often on puerile conceits and contrarieties, which, however, to some are so pleasing that they are not to this day totally excluded from our poetry. As a lover, his addresses are stately, and pedantic, with very little mixture of feeling or passion, and although detached beauties may be pointed out in a few of his sonnets, his genius was ill adapted to that species of poetry. In all respects he is inferior to his friend Surrey, and claims a place in the English series chiefly as being the first moral satirist, and as having represented the vices and follies of his time in the true spirit of the didactic muse.

, an English comic poet, eldest son of Daniel Wycherley, of Cleve, in Shropshire, esq. was born about 1640. At fifteen years. of age he was sent to France, in the western parts of which he resided, upon the banks of the Charante, where he was often admitted to the conversation of one of the most accomplished ladies of the court of France, madame de Montausier, celebrated by Voiture in his “Letters.” A little before the restoration of Charles II. he became a gentleman-commoner of Queen’s-college in Oxford, where he lived in the provost’s lodge, and was entered in the public library, under the title of “Philosophic Studiosus,” in July 1660. He left the university without being matriculated, or any degree conferred on him; having, according to Wood, been by Dr. Barlow, reconciled to the Protestant Religion, which he bad a little before deserted in his travels. He afterwards entered himself of the Middle Temple; but, making his first appearance in town in a reign when wit and gaiety were the favourite distinctions, he soon quitted the dry study of the law, and pursued things more agreeable to his own genius, as well as to the taste of the age. As nothing was likely to succeed better than dramatic performances, especially comedies, he applied himself to the writing of these and in about the space of ten years published four: “Love in a Wood, or St. James’s Park,” in 1672; “The Gentleman-Dancing-Master,” 1673; “Plain Dealer,” in 1678; and “Country-Wife,” in 1683. These were collected and printed together in 1712, 8vo.

Upon the publication of his first play, he became acquainted with several of the wits, both of the court and town; and likewise with the duchess of Cleveland, by whom, according to Mr. Dennis, and the secret history of those times, he was admitted to the last degree of intimacy. Villiers duke of Buckingham 4iad also the highest esteem for him; and, as master of the horse to the king, made him one of his equerries; and, as colonel of a regiment, captain- lieutenant of his own company, resigning to him, at the same time his own pay as captain, with many other advantages. King Charles likewise shewed him signal marks of favour; and once gave him a proof of esteem which perhaps, never any sovereign prince before had given to an author who was only a private gentleman. Wycherley happened to fall sick of a fever at his lodgings in Bowstreet, Covent*Garden, when the king did him the honour to visit him; and, finding his body extremely weakened, and his spirits miserably shattered, and his memory almost totally gone, he commanded him, as soon as he should be able to take a journey, to go to the south of France, believing that the air of Montpelier would contribute to restore him as much as any thing; and assured him, at the same time, that he would order him 500l. to defray the charges of the journey. Wycherley accordingly went into France, and, having spent the winter there, returned to England in the spring, entirely restored to his former vigour both of body and mind. The king, it is said, shortly after his arrival told him, that “he had a son, who he had resolved should be educated like the son of a king; and that he could not chuse a more proper man for his governor than Mr. Wycherley;” for which service 1500l. per annum should be settled upon him. But there seems no solid foundation for this report.

Wycherley, however, soon lost the favour of the king and of the courtiers. Dennis relates, that, immediately after he had received the preceding offer from the king, he went down to Tunbridge, to take either the benefit of the waters, or the diversions of the place when, walking one day upon the Wells- walk with his friend Mr. Fairbard, of Gray’s-Inn, just as he came up to the bookseller’s the countess of Drogheda, a young widow, rich, noble, and beautiful, came to the bookseller, and inquired for “The Plain Dealer.” “Madam,” says Mr. Fairbeard, “since you are for `The Plain Dealer,' there he is for you,” pushing Wycherley towards her. “Yes,” says Wycherley, “this lady can bear plain dealing; for she appears to be so accomplished, that what would be compliment said to others, spoken to her would be plain dealing.” “No truly, sir,” said the countess, “I am not without my faults, any more than the rest of my sex and yet I love plain dealing, and am never more fond of it than when it tells me of them.” “Then, madam,” says Mr. Fairbeard, “you and the Plain Dealer seem designed by heaven for each other.” In short, Wycherley walked with the countess upon the walks, waited upon her home, visited her daily at her lodgings while she was at Tunbridge, and at her lodgings in Hatton-garden, after she went to London; where, in a little time, he got her consent to marry her, which he did without acquainting the king.

But this match, so promising in appearance both to his fortunes and to his happiness, was the actual ruin of both. As soon as the news of it came to court, it was looked upon as an affront to the king, and a contempt of his majesty’s orders; and Wycherley’s conduct after marriage occasioned this to be resented more heinously; for he seldom or never went near the fiourt, which made him be thought ungrateful. But the true cause of his absence was not known: in short, the lady was jealous of him to distraction; jealous to that degree, that she could not endure him to be one moment out of her sight. Their lodgings were in Bowstreet, Covent-garden, over against a tavern, whither if he at any time went with friends, he was obliged to leave the windows open, that his lady might see there was no woman in company; or she would immediately put on the airs of a frantic woman. At last she died, and settled her fortune on him; but his title being disputed after her death, the expence of the law and other incumbrances so far reduced him, that, not being able to satisfy the importunity of his creditors, he was thrown into prison.

In this confinement he languished seven years; nor was he released till James II. going to see his “Plain Dealer,” was so charmed with the entertainment, that he gave immediate orders for the payment of his debts; adding a pension of 200l. per annual while he continued in England. But the bountiful intentions of that prince had not the designed effect, purely through his modesty; he being ashamed to give the earl of Mulgrave, whom the king had sent to demand it, a full account of his debts. He laboured under the weight of these difficulties till his father died; and then, too, the estate that descended to him was left under very uneasy limitations, since, being only a tenant for life, he could not raise any money for the payment of his debts. However, he took a method of doing it that was in his power, though few suspected it to be his choice, and this was, making a jointure. He had often declared, as major Pack says, that “he was resolved to die married, though he could not bear the thoughts of living married again;” and accordingly, just at the eve of his death, married a young gentlewoman of 1500l. fortune, part of which he applied to the uses he wanted it for. Eleven days after the celebration of these nuptials, Jan. 1, 1715, he died, and was interred in the vault of Covent-garden church. He is said to have requested very gravely of his wife upon his death-bed, that she “would not take an old man for her second husband.”

Besides the plays abovementioned, he published a volume of poems in 1704, folio, of very inferior merit; and in 1728, his “Posthumous Works in prose and verse” were published by Theobald, in octavo. His curious correspondence with Pope may be seen in that poet’s works, with many anecdotes of Wycherley, who appears to have been a libertine through the whole course of his life; nor are his works free from the licentiousness, so much encouraged when he was the favourite of Charles and James II.

, a very accomplished nobleman of the fifteenth century, was the son of sir Richard Wydeville, by Jaqueline of Luxembourg, duchess dowager of Bedford. He was born about 1442, and in his seventeenth year accompanied his father, who was now created lord Rivers, to Sandwich, where he had been sent to equip a strong squadron, in order to deprive Richard Nevil earl of Warwick, of his government of Calais but that nobleman contrived to surprize lord Rivers in port, and took him and all his ships, together with his son Anthony, to Calais, where they were for some time detained as prisoners. From this it appears that both father and son were engaged in the interest of the house of Lancaster, and in opposition to that of York. But king Edward IV. being raised to the throne, and afterwards espousing lady Elizabeth Gray, daughter to lord Rivers, and sister to Anthony Wycleville, the former attachment of the Wydeville’s to the Lancastrian interest was forgotten, and they began almost solely to engross the favour of king Edward.

Anthony Wydeville distinguished himself both as a warrior and statesman in king Edward’s service. The Lancastrians making an insurrection in Northumberland, he attended the king into that country, and was a chief commander at the siege of Atnwick castle; soon after which he was elected into the order of the garter. In the tenth of the same reign, he defeated the dukes of Clarence and Warwick in a skirmish near Southampton, and prevented their seizing a great ship called the Trinity, belonging to the latter. He attended the king into Holland on the change of the scene, returned with him, and had a great share in his victories, and was constituted governor of Calais, and captain-general of all the king’s forces by sea and land. He had before been sent ambassador to negociate a marriage between the king’s sister and the duke of Burgundy; and in the same character concluded a treaty between king Edward and the duke of Bretagne. On prince Edward being created prince of Wales, he was appointed his governor, and had a grant of the office of chief butler of England; and was even on the point of attaining the high honour of espousing the Scottish princess, sister to king James III.; the bishop of Rochester, lord privy-seal, and sir Edward Wydeville, being dispatched into Scotland to perfect that marriage.

A remarkable event of this earl’s life was a personal victory he gained in a tournament, over Anthony count de la Roche, called the bastard of Burgundy, natural son of duke Philip the Good. This illustrious encounter was performed -in a solemn and most magnificent tilt held for that purpose in Smithfield. Our earl was the challenger; and from the date of the year, and the affinity of the person challenged, this ceremony was probably in honour of the afore-mentioned marriage of the lady Margaret, the king’s sister, with Charles the Hardy, last duke of Burgundy. Nothing, lord Orford observes (whose narrative we follow), could be better adapted to the humour of the age, and to the union of that hero and virago, than a single combat between two of their near relations. A long account of this affair is given in a note in the Biog. Brit. art. Caxton, vol. III. new edit. It may be sufficient for our purpose to say that Wydeville was victorious.

On the death of king Edward, the queen sent a messenger to her brother earl Rivers, desiring him to assemble a body of troops in Wales, and with them to bring the young king immediately to London to be crowned; but this design was defeated by the intrigues of Richard duke of Gloucester, afterwards Richard III. who by treachery got possession of the earl’s person, as well as that of the young king, and next day earl Rivers, with lord Richard Gray, and sir Thomas Vaughan, was conveyed as a prisoner to the castle of Pontefract. They were all soon after beheaded by order of the usurper, and without any form of trial, on the very same day that lord Hastings was by the same order beheaded in the Tower of London.

Earl Rivers was at this time (1483) in the forty-first year of his age. He was without dispute one of the most accomplished noblemen of his time. Sir Thomas More asserts that “Vir haud facile discernas, manuve aut consilio promptior,” equally able to advise, and to execute in affairs of state. Lord Orford observes, that “the credit of his sister (the queen), the countenance and example of his prince, the boisterousness of the times, nothing softened, nothing roughened the mind of this amiable lord, who was as gallant as his luxurious brother-in-law, without his weaknesses; as brave as the heroes of either Rose, without their savageness; studious in the intervals of business, and devout after the manner of those whimsical times, when men challenged others whom they never saw, and went barefoot to visit shrines, in countries of which they scarce had a map.”

The works of this gallant and learned nobleman were (with the exception of a ballad in Percy’s collection) translations, published in the infancy of English printing by Caxton: 1 “The Dictes and Sayinges of the Philosophers, translated out of Latyn into Frenshe by a worshipful man called Messire Jehan de Teonville, sometyme provost of Parys,” and thence rendered into English by lord Rivers. It is supposed to have been the second book ever printed in England by Caxton. The date is Nov. 18, 1477. 2. “The morale Proverbes of Christyne of Pyse.” 3. “The boke named Cordyale or Memorare novissima,” a third translation from the French, the original author not named, dated 1480. Caxton says that lord Rivers “made divers babdesayenst the seven dedely synnes.” All these curiosities will be found amply described in Mr. Dibdin’s “Typographical Antiquities.” Hume says that earl Rivers “first introduced the noble art of printing into England,” but this is evidently a mistake. He did indeed countenance and employ Caxton, and appears to have introduced him to Edward IV.; and both he and Tiptoft, earl of Worcester (See Tiptoft), contributed very much, by their example and patronage, to the restoration of learning in this kingdom. From various causes, however, England was long behind other nations on the continent in real learning, or a wish for it; and we have no great pleasure or pride in contemplating the productions of our first printers.

, the illustrious founder of New college, Oxford, was born at Wykeham in Hampshire in 1324. Whether Wykeham was his family name, seems doubtful. He mentions his father and mother only by their Christian names, John and Sybil), or Sybilla. Some of his biographers are inclined to think that his father’s name was Long, and others Perrot, but there is no direct evidence for either, and we know by many other instances that nothing was more uncertain at the period of his birth than the state of family names.

His parent’s were of good reputation and character, but in mean circumstances when he was born; yet from the number of his contemporary relations, whose names and situations are upon record, it is probable that the family was not of mean extraction. Of their poverty there is less reason to doubt the report, as they could not afford to give their son a liberal education. He soon, however, found a patron, supposed to be Nicholas Uvedale, lord of the manor of Wykeham, and governor of Winchester castle, who must have discovered some talents worth improving, since he maintained him at Winchester school, where he was instructed in grammatical learning, and where he gave early proofs of piety and diligence, employing his leisure hours in acquiring a knowledge of arithmetic, mathematics, logic, divinity, and the canon and civil law. He was afterwards employed by his patron, in quality of secretary, and either by him, or by Edyngdon, bishop of Winchester, or by both) was recommended to the notice of Edward III.

This circumstance, however honourable to his talents, appears to have limited the progress of what was then deemed education, and disposed him to a life of business rather than of study, but can never be advanced to justify the opinion that he was deficient in useful learning. He certainly did not study at Oxford, and escaped the contests prevailing between the disciples of Occham and of Duns Scotus, which seem to have formed the only learning then in vogue; but that one who dignified every office civil and ecclesiastical with the wisdom, talents, and popularity of Wykeham, should have been illiterate, is an absurdity too gross to require refutation, and would have passed unnoticed, had it not been, as far as his architectural abilities are concerned* in some measure countenanced by the Wartons.

He was about twenty-two, or twenty-three years of age' when first introduced at court, but in what employment has not been ascertained, although it was probably of the same nature with those which he afterwards so ably filled, There is" every reason to think that his skill in drawing recommended him to a sovereign who was bent on adding to his country the ornament and utility of magnificent and durable structures. The first office he held, or the first of which we read, had evidently a reference to this object, In May 1356, he was appointed clerk of all the king’s works at the castle, and in the park of Windsor. It was by his advice that the king was induced to pull down great part of this castle, and by his skill that it was rebuilt nearly in the manner in which we find it. His other great work was Queenborough castle; and although in these military structures he had little scope for the genius displayed afterwards at Oxford and Winchester, they would have been sufficient to prove that he had already reached that degree of architectural skill which modern art can but poorly imitate.

With a sovereign of Edward III.'s magnificent taste, it was but natural that Wykeham should now become a favourite, and accordingly we find that his majesty wished to distinguish him by many marks of royal favour. In order to facilitate this, it was necessary he should take orders, as ecclesiastical promotion was more particularly within his majesty’s pjwer, where the pope did not think proper to interfere; but this part of Wykeham’s* history is not so clearly detailed as could be wished. There is, on the contrary, some reason to think that he was in the church before he had given proof of his talents at Windsor and Queenborough. In all the patents for the offices he held, he is styled Clericus, but, as his biographer supposes, he had as yet only the clerical tonsure, or some of the lower orders, while the historian of Winchester thinks he was ordained priest by bishop Edyngdon. The first preferment bestowed on him was the rectory of Pulham in Norfolk, in 1357, and as the court of Rome threw some obstacles in the way which kept him for a time out of that living, the king, in 1359, granted him two hundred' pounds a year over and above all his former appointments, until he should get quiet possession of Pulham, or some other benefice, to the value of one hundred marks. But the disproportion between the worth of the living, and the compensation for delay, is so very striking as to incline us to think, either that Dr. Lowth has by mistake inserted 200l. for 20l. or that the king took this opportunity to shew a special mark of his favour, for which the loss of the living should be the ostensible motive. In the mean time he was presented to the prebend of Flixton in the church of Lichfieid, which he afterwards exchanged for some other benefice, and in 1359 he was constituted chief warden and surveyor of the king’s castles of Windsor, Leedes, Dover, and Hadlam; and of the manors of old and new Windsor, Wichenier, and several other castles, manors, and houses, and of the parks belonging to them. In 1360, the king granted him the deanery of the royal free chapel, or collegiate church of St. Martin le Grand, London, which he held about three years; during which he rebuilt, at his own expense, the cloister of the Chapter-house, and the body of the church. This is the first instance on record in which he is noticed as a public benefactor. In 1361 he was quietly settled in the rectory of Pulham, and in less than two years received many other ecclesiastical preferments, specified by Dr. Lowth. The annual value of his livings, for some years before he became bishop of Winchester, amounted to 842l. but “he only received the revenues of the church with one hand, to expend them in her service with the other.”

His civil promotions were not less rapid and honourable. He was made keeper of the privy seal in 1364, and soon after secretary to the king, and chief of the privy council, and governor of the great council, These last terms his biographer supposes were not titles of office, hut were used to express the influence he now possessed in the management of affairs of state, and which was so great, that, according to Froissart, “every thing was done by him, and nothing was done without him.”

On the death of his old friend and patron William de Edyngdon, bishop of Winchester, in 1366, Wykeham was immediately and unanimously elected by the prior and convent to succeed him. Some delay having taken place before he c'ould be admitted into possession, it has been supposed that he was objected to by the king on account of his want of learning. But this is utterly destitute of foundation, as it was by the king’s express desire that he was chosen, and what is yet more in point, the pope’s bull, contrary to the official language used at that time, and in which there was frequently no mention of learning, declares that Wykeham was recommended to his holiness, “by the testimony of many persons worthy of credit, for his knowledge of letters, his probity of life and manners, and his prudence and circumspection in affairs both spiritual and temporal.” The real cause of the delay is stated at great length by Dr. Lowth, and depended on circumstances belonging to the history of that age, connected with the general state of ecclesiastical patronage.

His advancement to the bishopric was followed by his being appointed chancellor of England. In his speeches to parliament, it has been observed that he innovated on the practice of his clerical predecessors whose oratory savoured more of the pulpit than the bench, by introducing a style and manner wholly* political. In 1371, when the parliament, become jealous of churchmen, requested that secular men only should be appointed to offices of state, Wykeham resigned the seal, but without any loss of favour on the part of the king, the commons, or the public at large. The king was obliged to comply wiih the request to dismiss churchmen from the high offices of state, but soon found it necessary to have recourse to the only persons of that age whose education and talents seemed to fit them for such preferments. Soon after his being settled in the bishopric of Winchester, he began to employ his architectural skill in the repairs of the cathedral, the whole expense of which was defrayed by himself, but his more enlarged designs for this edifice were delayed to a more distant period. The care he bestowed on other parts of his episcopal duty, in reforming abuses, and establishing discipline, was not less exemplary, and in the case of his visitation of the Hospital of St. Cross, involved him in a long and troublesome dispute, which ended greatly to the benefit of that institution, and clearly to the honour of his firmness, judgment, and integrity. His mind appears now to have been deeply impressed by sentiments of enlarged liberality, and wholly influenced by those motives which determined him to become a benefactor to his country upon a most munificent scale.

The foundation of a college, or of some institution for the education of youth, had probably been revolved for a considerable time. About two years after he entered on the bishopric of Winchester, he began to make purchases in the city of Oxford with that view, and he connected with it the plan of a college at Winchester, which should be a nursery for that of Oxford. As early as 1373 he established a school at Winchester, in which he placed certain poor scholars who were to be instructed in grammatical learning, by one Richard de Herton, with an assistant. But the progress of this generous plan was for some time impeded by the intrigues of a party, headed by the duke of Lancaster, in the last year of the reign of Wykeham’s friend and master Edward III. An accusation, branching into eight articles, was brought against him, but upon a fair trial, seven were found destitute of proof, and the eighth only was laid hold of, as a pretext for seizing into the king’s hands the temporalities of the bishopric of Winchester, excluding the bishop from parliament, and removing him from court. A measure so violent, and justified upon such slight grounds, was not to be overlooked even in those days of popular acquiescence. At the ensuing convocation, the bishop of London, William Courtney, had the spirit to oppose any subsidy to the king until satisfaction should be made for the injury done to the whole body of the clergy, in the person of the bishop of Winchester; and he was so firmly supported by the convocation, that the archbishop of Canterbury, though a warm partizan of the duke of Lancaster, was obliged to admit Wykeham into their assembly, where he was received by every member with all possible marks of respect. Nor was he less a favourite with the people, who, when they rose in the affair of Wickliffe, demanded that the duke of Lancaster should allow the bishop to be brought to a fair trial. Wykeham was soon after restored to his temporalities, but with the ungracious condition, that he should fit out three ships of war for a certain time, or if they were not wanted, pay the amount of the probable expense to the king that king who had formerly heaped so many marks of favour on him, but who, although in some measure reconciled to him, was now too much enslaved by a party to act with his wonted liberality.

Edward III. died June 21, 1377; and on the accession of Richard II. Wykeham was released from all his difficulties, and by a solemn declaration of the privy council, most honourably acquitted of the accusations formerly preferred against him by the Lancaster party. This new reign, however, was a period of turbulence, faction, and bloodshed, and it required all the wisdom and circumspection of his steady mind to preserve the favour of the king, and the confidence of the people. Yet in both he was in a considerable degree successful. It was not long before the parliament appointed him one of the commissioners to inquire into the abuses of the former reign, and in their other proceedings they appear to have looked up to him as a statesman of inflexible integrity; nor was he less consulted in all matters of difficulty by the king and council. But notwithstanding such encouragement, the part he had to act was extremely arduous: the new reign was distracted by contending factions, and in the conflict of factions men or independent minds can seldom be safe; but what rendered the danger greater was, that the king, as he grew up, listened more to flatterers and favourites, than to the legitimate advisers of the crown.

When Richard assumed the reins of government, on coming of age, one of his first measures was to appoint Wykeham lord chancellor, and to dismiss the administration which had the care of public affairs during his minority. The new ministers, however, unwilling to be suspected of owing their appointments to a fit of caprice, after a short time, professed to resign, that their conduct might be investigated in parliament; and what they wished, actually happened. The commons declared in favour of their conduct, and they were all restored. In conjunction with them, Wykeham had the satisfaction of being very instrumental in promoting public tranquillity, until his resignation of the great seal in 1391. After this he seems to have kept at a distance from the management of public affairs, and thus avoided the risk of countenancing those ruinous proceedings which led to the deposition of the king; and qluring the succeeding reign his age and infirmities afforded an excuse for his no longer attending as a peer of parliament.

If we consider the importance of the undertaking begun at Oxford, and connected with a similar plan at Winchester, it will not appear surprising that he should, during the greater part of the reign of Richard II. have been disposed to bestow his whole attention on objects so dear to his heart. What he projected was certainly sufficient for the attention of any one man, and enough to immortalize the greatest. The design, bishop Lowth has eloquently expressed, was noble, uniform, and complete. “It was no less than to provide for the perpetual maintenance and instruction of two hundred scholars, to afford them a liberal support, and to lead them through a perfect course of education, fcom the first elements of letters, through the whole circle of the sciences; from the lowest class of grammatical learning to the highest degrees in the several faculties.” A design so enlarged, so comprehensive, so munificent, had not yet been conceived by the most illustrious of our English founders. In bringing it to perfection, we have not only to admire the generosity which supplied the means (for opulence may sometimes be liberal at a small expense), but that grasp of mind which at once planned and executed all that can be conceived most difficult in such a vast undertaking, and which enabled him to shine with equal lustre as benefactor, legislator, and architect, and give a lesson and example which could never be exceeded by the wisest of his posterity.

Within less than three years from this commencement of his plan, the society consisted of a warden and seventy fellows, who were called Pauperes Scholares Vtnerabilis Domini Domini Wilhelmi de Wykeham Wynton. Episcopi. The warden had a salary of 20l. a year, and the fellows were lodged in the places hired for them, and then known by the names of Blake-hall, Hert-hall, Shule-hall, Mayden-hall, and Hamer-hall. The annual expense of their lodging amounted to iOi 13.S. 4d.; and each was allowed Is. and 6d. a week for commons.

In 1379, having completed the several purchases of land necessary for the scite of the college, he obtained the king’s patent or licenceto found, dated June 3.0, of that year; and likewise the pope’s bull to the same effect. In his charter of foundation which he published on November 26 following, his college is entitled Seinte Marie College of Wynchestre in Oxenford. But it is raxher remarkable that the name of New college, which was then given in common speech without much impropriety, should be by-some means continued until the present day, when it is in reality the oldest as to its principal buildings, and the seventh in the order of foundation. The foundation-stone was laid March 5, 1380, and the whole completed in six years; and on April 14, 1386, the society took possession by a public entrance accompanied with much solemnity.

According to the statutes, the society consisted of a warden and seventy poor scholars , clerks, students in theology, canon and civil law, and philosophy; twenty were appointed to the study of laws, ten of them to that of the canon, and ten to that of the civil law; the remaining fifty were to apply themselves to philosophy, or arts, and theology; two to the study of medicine, and two to astronomy; all of whom were obliged to be in priest’s orders within a certain time, except in case of lawful impediment. Besides these there were ten priests, three clerks, and sixteen boys or choristers, to minister in the service of the chapel. The body of statutes, wb-ich was entirely of his composition, underwent many revisions and corrections, the result of experience and profound thinking on a subject which appears to have engrossed his whole mind, and although some of the latter revisions left an opening for irregularities which the society have not always been able to prevent, these statutes upon the whole are considered as highly judicious and complete, and have been very closely copied by succeeding founders .

During the progress of the building, he established in form that society at Winchester which was to supply New college with its members. The charter of foundation is dated Oct. 20, 1382, and the college named Seinee Marie College of Wynchestrea. The year after New college was finished he began this other upon the scite where stood the school at which he received his early education. This, likewise, was completed in six years, with a magnificence scarcely inferior to that of New college, and was opened for the reception of its intended inhabitants, March 28, 1393. The society resembles that of his other institution, consisting of a warden, seventy scholars, to be instructed in grammatical learning, ten secular priests, perpetual fellows, three priests, chaplains, three clerks, and sixteen choristers: and for the instruction of the scholars, a schoolmaster, and an undermaster or usher. The founder of Queen’s college, by his twelve fellows, and seventy scholars, intended to allude to the apostles and disciples. The historian of Winchester informs us that the same design entered into the contemplation of Wykeham. The warden and ten priests represented the apostles, with the omission of Judas. The head master and second master, with the seventy scholars, denoted the seventy-two disciples, as in the vulgate, for the English bible, which is translated from the Greek, has only seventy the three chaplains, and three inferior clerks marked the six faithful deacons Nicholas; one of the number, having apostatized, has therefore no representative; and the sixteen choristers represented the four greater, and the twelve minor prophets.