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, wife of the preceding, and for several years the best actress in England, was the daughter of an eminent upholsterer in Covent-garden, and sister to Dr. Thomas Augustin Arne, the musician. Her first appearance on the stage was as a singer, in which the sweetness of her voice rendered her very conspicuous, although she had not much judgment, nor a good ear. It was in this situation, that, in April 1734, she married Theoph. Cibber, then a widower for the second time. The first year of their nuptials was attended with as much felicity as could be expected, but the match was by no means agreeable to his father, who had entertained hopes of settling his son in a higher rank in life than the stage; but the amiable deportment of his daughter-in-law, and the seeming reformation of his son, induced him to take the young couple into favour. As he was a manager of Drury-lane play-house at that time, and his son having hinted somewhat respecting Mrs. Cibber’s talents as an actress, he desired to hear a specimen. Upon this her first attempt to declaim in tragedy, he was happy to discover that her speaking voice was perfectly musical, her expression both in voice and feature, strong and pathetic at pleasure, and her figure at that time perfectly in proportion. He therefore assiduously undertook to cultivate those talents, and produced her in 1736, in the character of Zara, in Aaron Hill’s tragedy, being its first representation. The audience were both delighted and astonished. The piece, which was at best an indifferent translation, made its way upon the stage; and Mrs. Cibber’s, reputation as an actress was fully established, with its agreeable concomitants, a rise of salary, &c. The character, however, which she acquired in public, was lost in private life. She was married to a man who was luxurious and prodigal, and rapacious after money to gratify his passions or vanity, and at length he resolved to make a profit of the honour of his wife. With this view, therefore, he cemented the closest friendship with a gentleman, whom he introduced to his wife, recommended to her, gave them frequent interviews, and even saw them put, as if by accident, in the same bed, and had then the impudence to commence a trial for criminal correspondence, which brought to light his nefarious conduct. He laid his damages at 5000l. but the jury discerning the baseness of his conduct, gave only 10l. costs; a sum not sufficient to reimburse him a fortieth part of his expences. From that time Mrs. Cibber discontinued living with her husband, and resided entirely with the gentleman who was the defendant in this abominable trial.

As an actress, she was thought most excellent in tender parts, till, during the rebellion, she appeared in the character of Constance, in Shakspeare’s King John, in which she manifested not only the maternal tenderness of a Merope, but such dignity, spirit, and passion, as perhaps have never been exceeded, if equalled, on any stage. Handel himself was exceedingly partial to her, and took the trouble of teaching her the parts expressly composed for her limited compass of voice, which was a mezzo soprano, almost, indeed, a contralto, of only six or seven notes, with all the drudgery of repetition necessary to undergo in teaching persons more by the ear than the eye. He and Quin usually spent their Sunday evenings at Mrs. Cibber’s, where wit and humour were more frequently of the party, than Melpomene, Euterpe, or Orpheus. Besides her excellence as an actress, she has some claims as a translator, the “Oracle of St.,Foix” being rendered by her into English in 1752, and played for her benefit, not entirely without success. The disorder of which she died was supposed to be a rupture of one of the coats of the stomach, which formed a sack at the bottom of it, into which the food passed, and thus prevented digestion. She died Jan. 30, 1766, and was buried in one of the cloisters of Westminster-abbey leaving one child by the gentleman with whom she cohabited.

After finishing the course of his juvenile studies, he took the manly gown, or the ordinary robe of the citizens, at the accustomed age of sixteen: and being then introduced into the forum, was placed under the care of Q. Mucius Scoevola the augur, the principal lawyer as well as statesman of that age; and after his death under that of Scaevola, who had equal probity and skill in the law. Under these masters he acquired a complete knowledge of the laws of his country; which was thought to be of such consequence at Rome, that boys at school learned the laws of the twelve tables by heart, as a school exercise. In the mean time he did not neglect his poetical studies, which he had pur­'sued under Archias: for he now translated “Aratus on the phenomena of the Heavens,” into Latin verse, of which many fragments are still extant; and published also an original poem of the heroic kind, in honour of his countryman C. Marius. This was much admired and often read by Atticus; and old Sca3vola was so pleased with it, that in the epigram, which he seems to have made upon it, he fondly declares, that it would live as long as the Roman name and learning subsisted. But though some have said, that Cicero’s poetical genius would not have been inferior to his oratorial, if it had been cultivated with the same diligence, it is more generally agreed that his reputation is least of all indebted to his poetry. He may, however, have been a critic, and it is certain jhat Lucretius submitted his poem to him for correction.

The peace of Rome being now disturbed by a domestic war, which writers call the Italic, Social, or Marsic, Cicero served as a volunteer under Sylla. For though his natural inclination was not much bent on military renown, yet even those who applied themselves to studies and civil affairs at Rome, found it necessary to acquire a competent share of military skill, that they might be qualified to govern provinces and command armies, to which they all succeeded of course in the administration of the great offices of state. Cicero’s natural disposition, however, led him chiefly to improve himself in those studies which conduced eventually to the establishment of his high fame He was constant in his attendance upon orators and philosophers; resumed his oratorial studies under Molo the Rbodian, one of the ablest of that profession, and is supposed to have written those rhetorical pieces on the subject of invention, which he afterwards condemned in his advanced age, as unworthy of his maturer judgment. He also became the scholar of Philo the academic; studied logic with Diodorus the stoic; and declaimed daily in Latin and Greek with his fellow students M. Piso and Q. Pompeius, both somewhat older than himself, with whom he had contracted an intimate friendship. And that he might neglect nothing which could any ways contribute to his perfection, he spent the intervals of his leisure with such ladies as were remarkable for their politeness and knowledge of the fine arts, and in whose company his manners acquired a polish. Having now run through all his course of oratory, he offered himself to the bar at the age of twenty-six, and pleaded some causes in a manner which gained him the applause of the whole city, thus beginning his career at the same age in which Demosthenes first began to distinguish himself in Athens. Three years afterwards he travelled to Greece and Asia, then the fashionable tour either for curiosity or improvement. His first visit was to Athens, the seat of arts and sciences, where he met with his school-fellow T. Pomponius, who, from his love to and long residence in Athens, obtained the surname of Atticus: and here they revived and confirmed that memorable friendship which subsisted between them through life, with exemplary constancy. From Athens he passed into Asia, and after an excursion of two years, came back again to Italy.

On his arrival at Rome, after one year more spent at the bar, he obtained the dignity of quaestor. The quaestors were the general receivers or treasurers of the republic, and were sent annually into the provinces distributed to them by lot, and Lilybseum, one of the provinces of the island of Sicily, happened to fall to Cicero’s share;. and he acquitted himself so as to gain the love and admiration of all the Sicilians, and in his leisure hours he employed himself very diligently, as he used to do at Rome, in his. rhetorical studies. Before he left Sicily, he made the tour of the island, and at the city of Syracuse discovered the tomb of Archimedes, and pointed it out to the magistrates, who, to his surprise, knew nothing at all of any such tomb. He came away from Sicily, highly pleased with the success of his administration, and flattering himself that all Rome was celebrating his praises, and that the people would grant him whatever he should desire. With these hopes he landed at Puteoli, a considerable port adjoining to Baiie, wherewas a perpetual resort of the rich and great but here he was not a little mortified by the first friends he met, whose conversation convinced him that his fame was not so extensive as he imagined.

We have no account of the precise time of Cicero’s marriage with Terentia, but it is supposed to have been celebrated immediately after his return from his travels to Italy, when he was about thirty years old. He was now disengaged from his quaestorship in Sicily, by which office he had gained an immediate right to the senate, and an actual admission into it during life; and settled again in Rome, where he employed himself constantly in defending the persons and properties of its citizens, and was indeed a general patron. Five years were almost elapsed since Cicero’s election to the qusestorship, the proper interval prescribed by law, before he could hold the next office of sedile; to which he was now, in his thirty-seventh year, elected by the unanimous suffrage of all the tribes. But before his entrance into the office, he undertook the celebrated prosecution of C. Verres, the late praetor of Sicily; who was charged with many flagrant acts of injustice, rapine, and cruelty, during his triennial government of that island. This was one of the most memorable transactions of his life; for which he was greatly and justly celebrated by antiquity, and for which he will in all ages be admired and esteemed by the friends of mankind. The public administration was at that time, in every branch of it, most infamously corrupt, and the prosecution of Verres was both seasonable and popular, as it was likely to give some check to the oppressions of the nobility, and administer relief to the distressed subjects. Cicero had no sooner agreed to undertake it, than an unexpected rival started up, one Q,. Caecilius, a Sicilian by birth, who had been quaestor to Verres; and by a pretence of personal injuries received from him, and a particular knowledge of his crimes, claimed a preference to Cicero in the task of accusing him, or at least to bear a joint share with him. But this pretended enemy was in reality a secret friend, employed by Verres himself to get the cause into his hands in order to betray it: and on the first bearing Cicei'o easily shook off this weak antagonist, rallying his character and pretensions with a great deal of wit and humour, and the cause being committed to Cicero, an hundred and ten days were granted to him by law for preparing the evidence; to collect which, he was obliged to go to Sicily, in order to examine witnesses, and facts to support the indictment. Aware that all Verres’s art would be employed to gain time, in hopes to tire out the prosecutors, and allay the heat of the public resentment, he took along with him his cousin L. Cicero, that he might be enabled to finish his

progress the sooner. The Sicilians received him every where with all the honours due to the pains he was taking in their service; and all the cities concurred in the impeachment, excepting Syracuse and Messana, with which Verres had kept up a fair correspondence, and which last continued throughout firm in its engagements to him. Cicero came back to Rome, to the surprise of his adversaries, much sooner than he was expected, with most ample proofs of Verres’s guilt, but found, what he suspected, a strong cabal formed to prolong the affair by all the arts of delay which interest or money could procure. This suggested to him to shorten the method of the proceeding, so as to bring it to an issue before the present praetor M. Glabrio, and his assessors, whom he considered as impartial judges. Instead, therefore, of spending any time in employing his eloquence, as usual, on the several articles of the charge, he only produced his witnesses to be interrogated-: whose evidence so confounded Hortensius, though the reigning orator at the bar, and usually styled the King of the forum, that he had nothing to say for his client. Verres, despairing of all defence, submitted immediately, without waiting for the sentence, to a voluntary exile; where he lived many years, forgotten and deserted by all his friends. He is said to have been relieved in this miserable situation by the generosity of Cicero; yet was proscribed and murdered after all by Marc Antony, for the sake of those fine statues and Corinthian vessels of which he had plundered the Sicilians: “happy only,” as Lactantius spys, “before his death, to have seen the more deplorable end of his old enemy and accuser Cicero.”

After the expiration of his ædileship, his cousin L. Cicero, the late companion of his journey to Sicily, died an event the more unfortunate at this juncture, because he wanted his help in making interest for the prsetorship, for which he now offered himself a candidate. However, such was the people’s regard for him, that in three different assemhlies convened for the choice of praetors, two of which were dissolved without effect, he was declared every time the first proctor, by the suffrages of all the centuries. This year a law was proposed by Manilius, one of the tribunes, that Pompey, who was then in Cilicia, extinguishing the remains of the piratic war, should have the government of Asia added to his commission, with the command of the Mithridatic war, and of all the Roman armies in those parts. Cicero supported this law with all his eloquence in a speech still extant, from the rostra, which he never mounted till this occasion; where, in displaying the character of Pompey, he drew the picture of a consummate general, with great strength and beauty. He was now in sight of the consulship, the grand object of his ambition; and therefore, when his praetorship was at an end, he would not accept any foreign province, the usual reward of that magistracy, and the usual object with those who held it. So attached indeed was he to a certain path to renown, that amidst all the hurry and noise of his busy life, he never neglected those arts and studies in which he had been educated, but paid a constant attention to every thing which deserved the notice of a scholar and a man of taste. Even at this very juncture, though his ambition was eagerly fixed on the consulship, he could find time to write to Atticus about statues and books. Atticus resided many. years at Athens, where Cicero employed him to buy statues for the ornament of his several villas; especially his favourite Tusculum, his usual retreat from the hurry and fatigues of the city. Here he had built several rooms and galleries, in imitation of the schools and porticos of Athens; which he called likewise by their Attic names of the Academy and Gymnasium, and designed for the same use, of philosophical conferences with his learned friends. He had given Atticus a general commission to purchase for him any piece of Grecian art or sculpture, that was elegant and curious, illustrative of literature, or proper for the furniture of his academy; which Atticus executed to his great satisfaction. Nor was he less eager in collecting Greek books, and forming a library, by the assistance of Atticus, who, having the same taste and free access to all the libraries of Athens, procured copies of the works of their best writers, not only for his own use, but for sale also. Having with much pains made a very large collection of choice and curious books, he signified to Cicero his design of selling them; yet seems to have intimated that he expected a larger sum for them than Cicero could easily spare; which induced Cicero to beg of him to reserve the whole number for him, till he could raise money enough for the purchase.

Cicero being now in his forty-third year, the proper age required by law, declared himself a candidate for the consulship along with six competitors. The two first were patricians; the two next plebeians, yet noble; the two last the sons of fathers, who had first imported the public honours into their families: Cicero was the only new man, as he was called, amongst them, or one born of equestrian rank. Two of them, C. Antonius and Catiline, employed bribery on this occasion in the most shameful manner, but as the election approached, Cicero’s interest appeared to be superior to that of all the candidates, and in his case, instead of choosing consuls by a kind of ballot, or little tickets of wood distributed to the citizens with the names of the several candidates severally inscribed upon each, the people loudly and universally proclaimed Cicero the first consul; so that, as he himself says, “he was not chosen by the votes of particular citizens, but the common suffrage of the city; nor declared by the voice of the crier, but of the whole Roman people.” This year several alterations happened in his own family. His father died; his daughter Tullia was given in marriage at the age of thirteen to C. Piso Frugi, a young nobleman of great hopes, and one of the best families in Rome; and his son and heir was also born in the same year.

His first care, after his election to the consulship, was to gain the confidence of Antonius, who was elected with him, by the offer of power to his ambition, and money to his pleasures; and it was presently agreed between them, that Antonius should have the choice of the best province, which was to be assigned to them at the expiration of their year. Immediately after his coming into office, he had occasion to exert himself against P. Servilius Rullus, one of the new tribunes, who had been alarming the senate with the promulgation of an Agrarian law: the purpose of which was, to create a decemvirate, or ten commissioners, with absolute power for five years over all the revenues of the republic, to distribute them at pleasure to the citizens;, &c. These laws used to be greedily received by the populace, and were proposed therefore by factious magistrates, as oft as they had any point to carry with the multitude, so that Cicero’s first business was to quiet the apprehensions of the city, and to baffle, if possible, the intrigues of the tribune. After defeating him therefore in the senate, he pursued him into the forum; where he persuaded the people to reject this law. Another alarm was occasioned by the publication of a law of L. Otho, for the assignment of distinct seats in the theatres to the equestrian order, who used before to sit promiscuously with the populace, a very invidious distinction, which might have endangered the peace of the city, if the effects of it had not been prevented by the authority of Cicero.

The next transaction of moment in which he was engaged, was the defence of C. Rabirius, an aged senator, in whose favour there is an oration of his still extant. But that which constituted the glory of his consulship, was the suppression of that horrid conspiracy which was formed by Catiline, the model of all traitors since, for the subversion of the commonwealth. Catiline was now renewing his efforts for the consulship with greater vigour than ever, and by such open methods of bribery, that Cicero published a new law against it, with the additional penalty of a ten years’ exile. Catiline, who knew the law to be levelled at himself, formed a design to kill Cicero, with some other chiefs of the senate, on the day of election, which was appointed for October 20. But Cicero gave information of it to the senate, the day before, upon which the election was deferred, that they might have time to deliberate on an affair of so great importance: and the day following, in a full house, he called upon Catiline to clear himself of this charge; where, without denying or excusing it, he bluntly told them,> that “there were two bodies in the republic,” meaning the senate and the people, “the one of them infirm with a weak head; the other firm without a head; which last had so well deserved of him, that it should never want a head while he lived.” He had made a declaration of the same kind, and in the same place, a few days before, when, upon Cato’s threatening him with an impeachment, he fiercely replied, that, “if any flame should be excited in his fortunes, he would extinguish it, not with water, but a general ruin.” These declarations startled the senate, and convinced them, that nothing but a desperate conspiracy, ripe for execution, could inspire so daring an assurance:. so that they proceeded immediately to that decree, which was the usual refuge in all cases of imminent danger, “of ordering the consuls to take care that the republic received no harm.”

This was the state of the conspiracy, when Cicero delivered the first of those four speeches which were spoken upon the occasion of it, and are still extant. The meeting of the conspirators was on November 6, in the evening; and on the 8th he summoned the senate to the temple of Jupiter in the capitol, where it was not usually held but in times of public alarm. Catiline himself, though his schemes were not only suspected, but actually discovered, had the confidence to come to this very meeting, which so shocked the whole assembly, that none of his acquaintance durst venture to salute him; and the consular senators quitted that part of the house in which he sat, and left the whole clear to him. Cicero was so provoked by his impudence, that instead of entering upon any business, as he designed, he addressed himself directly to Catiline, and laid open the whole course of his villanies, and the notoriety of his treasons. Catiline, astonished by the thunder of his speech, had little to say for himself in answer to it: but as soon as he was got home, and began to reflect on what had passed, perceiving it in vain to dissemble any longer, he resolved to enter into action immediately, before the troops of the republic were increased, or any new levies made: so that after a short conference with Lentulus, Cethegus, and the rest, about what had been doncerted at the last meeting, and promising a speedy return at the head of a strong army, he left Rome that very night with a small retinue, and made the best of his way to Manlius’s camp in Etruria; upon which he and Manlius were both declared public enemies by the senate.

In the mean time Lentulus, and the rest of Catiline’s associates, who were left in the city, were preparing for the execution of their grand design, and soliciting men of all ranks, who seemed likely to favour their cause. Among the rest they agreed to make an attempt upon the ambassadors of the Allobroges; a warlike, mutinous, faithless people, inhabiting the countries now called Savoy and Dauphiny, greatly disaffected to the Roman power, and already ripe for rebellion. These ambassadors, who were preparing to return home, much out of humour with the senate, and without any redress of the grievances they were sent to complain of, received the proposal at first very greedily; but reflecting afterwards on the difficulty and danger of the enterprise, discovered what they knew to Q. Fabius Sanga, the patron of their city, who immediately gave intelligence of it to the consul. Cicero advised the ambassadors to feign the same zeal which they had hitherto shewn, till they had got distinct proofs against the particular actors in it: and that then upon their leaving Rome in the night, they might be arrested with their papers and letters about them. All this was successfully executed, and the whole company brought prisoners to Cicero’s house by break of day. Cicero summoned the senate to meet immediately, and sent at the same time for Gabinius, Statilius, Cethegus, and Lentulus; who all came, suspecting nothing of the discovery. With them, and the ambassadors in custody, he set out to meet the senate: and after he had given an account of the whole affair, Vulturcius, one of the conspirators who was taken with the ambassadors, was called in to be examined separately; who soon confessed, that he had letters and instructions from Lentulus to Catiline, to press him to accept the assistance of the slaves, and to lead his army with all expedition towards Rome, to the intent that when it should be set on fire in different places, and the general massacre Gegun, he might be at hand to intercept those who escaped, and join with his friends in the city. The ambassadors were examined next; who produced letters to their nation from Lentulus, Cethegus, and Statilius, which so confounded the conspirators, that they had nothing to say. After the criminals were withdrawn and committed to close custody, the senate unanimously resolved that public thanks should be decreed to Cicero in the amplest manner; by whose virtue, council, and providence, the republic was delivered from the greatest dangers. Cicero however thought it prudent to bring the question of their punishment without further delay before the senate, which he summoned for that purpose the next morning. As soon as he had opened the business, Silanus, the consul elect, advised, that those who were then in custody, with the rest who should afterwards be taken, should all be put to death. To this all who spoke after him readily assented, except J. Caesar, then praetor elect, who gave it as his opinion, that the estates of the conspirators should be confiscated, and their persons closely confined in the strong towns of Italy. This had Jike to have been adopted, when Cicero rose up, and made his fourth speech which now remains on the subject of this transaction; which turned the scale in favour of Silanus’s opinion. The vote was no sooner passed, than Cicero resolved to put it in execution, lest the night, which was coming on, should produce any new disturbance. He went therefore from the senate, attended by a numerous guard; and taking Lentulus from his custody, conveyed him through the forum to the common prison, where he was presently strangled, as were Cethegus, Statilius, and Gabinius. Catiline in the mean time was enabled to make a stouter resistance than they iuiagined, having filled up his troops to the number of two legions, or about 12,000 fighting men; but when the account came of the death of Lentulus and the. rest, his army began to desert, and after many fruitless attempts to escape into Gaul by long marches and private roads through the Apennines, he was forced at length to a battle; in which, after a sharp and bloody action, He and all his army were entirely destroyed. Thus ended this famed conspiracy: and Cicero, for the great part he acted in the suppression of it, was honoured with the glorious title of Pater Patria3, which he. retained for a long time after.

Cicero was now about to resign the consulship, according to custom, in an assembly of the people, and to take the usual oath of having discharged it with fidelity; which also was generally accompanied with a speech from the expiring consul. He had mounted the rostra, and was ready to perform this last act of his office, when Metellus, one of the new tribunes, would not suffer him to speak, or to do any thing more, than barely take the oath: declaring, that he who had put citizens to death unheard, ought not to be permitted to speak for himself. Upon which Cicero, who was never at a loss, instead of pronouncing the ordinary form of an oath, exalting the tone of his voice, swore out aloud, that he had saved the republic and city from ruin: which the multitude below confirmed with an universal shout. Yet he became now the common mark of all the factious, against whom he had declared perpetual war, and who at length drove him out of that city, which he had so lately preserved. He now, however, upon the expiration of his consulship, sent a particular account of his whole administration to Pompey, who was finishing the Mithridatic war in Asia; in hopes to prevent any wrong impression there, from the Calumnies of his enemies, and to draw from him some public declaration in his favour. But Pompey, being prejudiced by Metellus and Caesar, answered him with great coldness, and took no notice at all of his services in the affair of Catiline.*

The most remarkable event that happened in this year, the forty-fifth of Cicero’s life, was the pollution of the mysteries of the Bona Dea by P. Clodius; which, by an unhappy train of consequences, deeply involved Cicero. Clodius had an intrigue with Caesar’s wife Pompeia, who, according to annual custom, was now celebrating in her house those awful sacrifices of the goddess, to which no male creature ever was admitted; and where every thing masculine was so scrupulously excluded, that even male portraits were covered during the ceremony. Clodius, however, eager to witness it, dressed himself in a woman’s habit, but was detected before he could execute his project; and when brought to trial, endeavoured to prove himself absent at the time of the fact; but Cicero deposed, that Clodius had been with him that very morning at his house in Rome. Ciodius, however, was absolved by a majority of thirty-one to twenty-five of his judges, the iniquity of which decision, Cicero constantly inveighed against. In revenge for this, about a year after, Clodius endeavoured to get himself chosen tribune, and in that office to drive Cicero out of the city, by the publication of a law, which by some stratagem or other he hoped to obtrude upon the people. Caesar was at the bottom of the scheme, and Pompey secretly favoured it: not that they intended to ruin Cicero, but to lessen his importance. Cicero affected to treat all this with contempt, sometimes rallying Clodius with much pleasantry, sometimes admonishing him with no less gravity; but it appears to have alarmed him, and to have inclined him to unite himself more closely with Pompey, in hopes of his protection against a storm, which he saw ready to burst upon him.

The first triumvirate, as it has commonly been called, was now formed; which was in reality a traitorous conspiracy of three of the most powerful citizens of Rome, Pompey, Caesar, and Crassus, to extort from their country by violence, what they could not obtain by law. Cicero might have been admitted a partner in their league: but he would not enjer into any engagements, which he and all the friends of the republic abhorred. Clodius now began to threaten Cicero with all the -terrors of his tribunate, to which he had been chosen without any opposition. Ctesar’s whole aim was to subdue Cicero’s spirit, and force him to A dependence upon him: and therefore while he was privately encouraging Clodius, he vras proposing expedients to Cicero for his security. But though his enemies seemed to gain ground, he was unwilling to owe the obligation of his safety to Caesar, whose designs he always suspected, and whose measures he never approved, and who now therefore resolved to assist Clodius with all his power to oppress him; while Pompey gave him the strongest assurances, confirmed by oaths and vows, that he would sooner be killed himself, than suffer him to be hurt. Clodius in the mean time was courting the people by several new laws, contrived chiefly for their advantage, that he might introduce with a better grace the banishment of Cicero: which was now directly attempted by a special law, importing, that whoever had taken the life of a citizen uncondemned and without trial, should be prohibited from fire and water. Though Cicero was not named, yet he was marked out by the law: his crime was, the putting Catiline’s accomplices to death; which, though done by a general vote of the senate, was alleged to be illegal, and contrary to the liberties of the people. Cicero, finding himself thus reduced to the condition of a criminal, changed his habit upon it, as was usual in the case of a public impeachment; which, however, was thought an hasty and inconsiderate step, since he was not named in the law, which reached only to those who had taken the life of a citizen illegally: but it seems doubtful whether his taking no notice of it would have saved him, as the combination against him was deeply laid. Even Caesar, who affected great moderation, was secretly his adversary; and Pompey became reserved, and at last flatly refused to help him: while the Clodian faction treated his character and consulship with the utmost derision, and even insulted his person in the public streets. Cicero now called a council of his friends, to decide whether it was best to defend himself by force, or to save the effusion of blood by retreating till the storm should blow over: and the issue was, that he should submit to a voluntary exile.

As to the public news of the year, the grand affair that engaged all people’s thoughts was the expectation of a breach between Caesar and Pompey, which seemed to be now unavoidable, and which Cicero soon learned from his friends, as he was returning from uis province of Cilicia, But as he foresaw the consequences of a war more coolly and clearly than any of them, his first resolution was to apply all his endeavours and authority to the mediation of a peace. He had not yet declared for either side, although his inclination was to follow Pompey and while he was endeavouring to remain neuter, he had an interview with Pompey, who, finding him wholly bent on peace, contrived to have a second conference with him hefore he reached the city, in hopes to prevent any project of an accommodation. Cicero, however, the more he observed the disposition of both parties, the more he perceived the necessity of it; and that a war must necessarily end in a tyranny of some kind or other. When he arrived at the city, he found the war in effect proclaimed: for the senate had just voted a decree, that Caesar should dismiss his army by a certain day, or be declared an enemy; and Cæsar’s sudden march towards Rome effectually confirmed it. In the midst of all this hurry and confusion, Caesar was extremely solicitous to prevail with Cicero to stand neuter, but in vain, for Cicero was impatient to be gone to Pompey. In the mean time Caesar’s letters on the subject afford a striking proof of the high esteem and credit in which Cicero flourished at this time in Rome: when, in a contest for empire, which force alone was to decide, the chiefs on both sides were so solicitous to gain a man to their party, who had no peculiar talents for war. Steadfast to his purpose, he embarked at length for Dyrrhachium; and arrived safely in Pompey’s camp with his son, his brother, and his nephew, committing the fortunes of the whole family to the issue of that cause. But he soon had reason to dislike every thing which they had done, or designed to do; and saw that their own councils would ruin their cause. In this disagreeable situation he declined all employment; and finding his counsels wholly slighted, resumed his usual way of raillery, for he was a great jester, and what he could not dissuade by his authority, endeavoured to make ridiculous by his jests. When Pompey put him in mind of his coming so late to them: “How can I come late” said he, “when I find nothing in readiness among you?” and upon Pompey’s asking him sarcastically, where his son-in-law Dolabella was; “He is with your father-in-law,” replied he. To a person newly arrived from Italy, and informing him of a strong report at Rome, that Pompey was blocked up by Caesar; “And you sailed hither therefore,” said he “that you might see it with your own eyes.” By the frequency of these splenetic jokes, he is said to have provoked Pompey so far as to tell him, “I wish you would go over to the other side, that you may begin to fear us.”

After the battle of Pharsalia, in which Pompey was defeated, Cicero returned to Italy, and was afterwards received into great favour by Caesar, who was now declared dictator for the second time, and Marc Antony his master of the horse. At his interview with Caesar he had no occasion to depart from the dignity of his character, for Caesar no sooner saw him than he alighted, and ran to embrace him, and walked with him alone, conversing very familiarly for several furlongs. About the end of the year, Caesar embarked for Africa, to pursue the war against the Pompeian generals, and Cicero, despairing of any good from either side, chose to live retired; and whether in the city or the country, shut himself up with his books; which, as he often says, “had hitherto been the diversion only, but were now become the support of his life.” In this retreat he entered into a close friendship and correspondence with M. Terentius Varro, who is said to have been the most learned of all the Romans; and wrote two of those pieces upon orators and oratory, which are still extant in his works. He was now in his sixty-first year, and having been divorced from his wife Terentia, he incurred both censure and ridicule for marrying a handsome young woman named Publilia, of an age disproportioned to his own, and to whom he was guardian. But at present he was yet more imprudent in frequently hazarding Caesar’s displeasure by his sarcastic remarks. Some of these jests upon Caesar’s administration are still preserved, and shew an extraordinary want of caution in times so critical. Caesar had advanced Laberius, a celebrated player, to the order of knights; but when he stepped from the stage to take his place on the equestrian benches, none of the knights would admit him to a seat amongst them. Cicero, however, as he was marching off therefore with disgrace, said, “I would make room for you here on our bench, if we were not already too much crowded:” alluding to Caesar’s filling up the senate also with the lowest of his creatures, and even with strangers and barbarians. At another time, being desired by a friend in a public company to procure for his son the rank of a senator in one of the corporate towns of Italy, He shall have it,“says he,” if you please, at Rome; but it will be difficult at Pompeii.“An acquaintance likewise from Laodicea, coming to pay his respects to him, and being asked what business had brought him to Rome, said, that he was sent upon an embassy to Caesar, to intercede with him for the liberty of his country: upon which Cicero replied,” If you succeed, you shall be an ambassador also for us." Caesar, it must be allowed, to his honour, preserved such a reverence for his character, that he gave him many marks of personal favour; and this influence Cicero employed only to screen himself in the general misery of the times, and to serve those unhappy men who were driven from their country and families for the adherence to that cause which he himself had espoused. Cicero was now oppressed by a new affliction, the death of his beloved daughter Tullia; who died in childbed, soon after her divorce from her third husband Dolabella. She was about thirty-two years old at the time of her death, and was most affectionate to her father. To the usual graces of her sex, she added the more solid accomplishments of knowledge and polite letters, was qualified to be the companion as well as the delight of his age; and was justly esteemed not only as one of the best, but the most learned of the Roman ladies. His affliction for the death of this daughter was so great, that he endeavoured to shun all company by removing to Atticus’s house, where h'e lived chiefly in his library, turning over every book he could meet with on the subject of moderating grief. But, rinding his residence even here too public, he retired to Asturia, one ol his seats near Antium, a little island on the Latian shore, at the mouth of a river of the same name, covered with woods and groves, cut out into shady walks; a scene of all others the fittest to indulge melancholy, and where his whole time was employed in reading and writing. After the death of Caesar, Cicero was freed at once from all subjection to a superior, whose power he perpetually dreaded, and was now without competition the first citizen in Rome, the first in credit and authority both with the senate and people. The conspirators had no sooner killed Caesar in the senate-house, which Cicero tells us he had the pleasure to see, than Brutus, lifting up his bloody dagger, called upon him by name, to congratulate with him on the recovery of their liberty. It is evident from several of his letters, that he had an expectation- of such an attempt; for he prophesied very early, that Caesar’s reign could not last six months, but must necessarily fall, either by violence, or of itself; nay farther, he hoped to live to see it; yet it is equally certain that he had no hand in it, nor was at all acquainted with it.

Octavius had no sooner settled the affairs of the city> and subdued the senate to his mind, than he marched back towards Gaul to meet Antony and Lepidus, who had already passed the Alps, and brought their armies into Italy, in order to have a personal interview with him; which had been privately concerted for settling the terms of a triple league, the substance of which was, that the three should be invested jointly with supreme power for the term of five years, with the title of triumvirs, for settling the state of the republic; that they should act in all cases by common consent; nominate the magistrates and governors both at home and abroad, and determine all affairs relating to the public by their sole will and pleasure, &c. The last thing which they adjusted was, the list of a proscription, which they were determined to make of their enemies, consisting of 300 senators and 2000 knights, among whom was Cicero, who was at his Tusculan villa when he first received this unexpected news, and immediately set forward towards Asturia, the nearest village which he had upon the sea, where he embarked in a vessel ready for him; but the winds being unfavourable, he landed at Circaeum, and spent a night near that place in great anxiety and irresolution. This at last ended in his returning to his Formian villa, about a mile from the coast, weary of his life and the sea, and declaring he would die in that country which he had so often saved. Here he slept soundly for several hours, till his slaves forced him into his litter or portable chair, and carried him away towards the ship, having just heard that soldiers were already come into the country in quest of him. As soon as they were gone, the soldiers arrived at the house, and pursuing towards the sea, overtook him in the wood. As soon as they appeared, the servants prepared to defend their master’s life at the hazard of their own; but Cicero commanded them to set him down, and to make no resistance. Then looking upon his executioners with great presence and firmness, and thrusting his neck as forwardly as he could out of the litter, he bade them do their work, and take what they wanted. Upon which they cut off his head, and both his hands, and returned with them in all haste and great joy towards Rome, as the most agreeable present which they could carry to Antony. Popilius, the commander of the soldiers, whom Cicero had formerly fended In an accusation for a capital crime, charged himself with the conveyance, without reflecting on the infamy of carrying that head which had saved his own. He found Antony in the forum, and upon shewing from a distance the spoils which he brought, he was rewarded upon the spot with the honour or' a crown, and about 8000l. sterling. Antony ordered the head to be fixed upon thd rostra between the two hands; and, satiated with Cicero’s blood, declared the proscription at an end. This barbarous murder was committed Dec. 7, B. C. 43, A. U. C. 710, and in the sixty-fourth year of Cicero’s age.

As a philosopher, he rather related the opinions of others than advanced any new doctrines of his own conceptions. He attached himself chiefly to the Academic sect, but did not neglect to inform himself of the doctrines of other sects, and discovered much learning and ingenuity in refuting their dogmas. He was an admirer of the doctrine of the stoics concerning natural equity and civil law, and adopted their ideas concerning morals, although not with servility. The sect to which he was most averse was the Epicurean, but upon the whole, from the general cast of his writings, the Academic sect was best suited to his natural disposition. Through all his philosophical works, he paints in lively colours, and with all the graces of fine writing, the opinions of philosophers; and relates, in the diffuse manner of an orator, the arguments on each side of the question in dispute; but we seldom find him diligently examining the exact weight of evidence in the scale of reason, carefully deducing accurate conclusions from certain principles, or exhibiting a series of arguments in a close and systematic arrangement. On the contrary, we frequently hear him declaiming eloquently, instead of reasoning conclusively, and meet with unequivocal proofs, that he was better qualified to dispute on either side with the Academics, than to decide upon the question with the Dogmatists, and therefore appears rather to have been a warm admirer and an elegant memorialist of philosophy, than himself to have merited a place in the first order of philosophers. The editions of Cicero’s works, in whole, or in parts, are far too numerous to be specified in this place. We may, however, notice among the most curious or valuable: 1. his whole works, first edition, by Minutianus, Milan, 1498—1499, 4 vols. fol. of great rarity and price 2. By Paul Manutius, Venice, 1540 4to 10 vols. 8vo; 3. By R, Stephens, Paris, 1543, 8 vols. 8vo 4. By Lambinus, Paris, 1566, 2 vols. fol.; 5. Elzivir, Leyden, 1642, 10 vols. 8vo; 6. Gronovius, 11 vols. 12mo, and 4 vols. 4to; 7. Verburgius, Amst. 1724, 2 voLs. fol.; 4 vols. 4to; 8. Ernest, Leipsic, 1774, 8 vols. 8vo 9. Olivet, Paris, 1740, 9 vols. 4to; Geneva, 1758, 9 vols. and Oxford, 1783, 10 vols. 4to; 10. Foulis, Glasgow, 1749, 20 vols. 12mo; 11. Lallemande, Paris, 1768, 12 vols. 12mo. For his separate pieces we must refer to Dibdin and Clarke. Most of his productions have been translated into various languages, and several into English, by Melmoth, Guthrie, Jones, and others. Melmoth, as well as Middleton, has written a life of Cicero, both with some degree of partiality, but with great ability.

Augustus, however, now made him a priest or augur, as well as one of those magistrates who presided over the coinage of the public money: and no sooner became the sole master of Rome, than he took him for his partner in the consulship: and by these favours to the son, Augustus made some atonement for his treachery to the father. Soon after his consulship, he was made proconsul of Asia, or, as Appian says, of Syria, one of the most considerable provinces of the empire: from which time we find no farther mention of him in history. He died probably soon after; before a maturity of age and experience had given him an opportunity of retrieving the reproach of his intemperance, and distinguishing himself in the councils of the state. But from the honours already mentioned, it is evident that his life, though blemished by some scandal, yet was not void of dignity; and, amidst all the vices with which he is charged, he is allowed to have retained his father’s wit and politeness.

, an eminent artist, was born at Bologna (some say at Rome) in 1628, and was taught his ait by Giovanni Battista Cairo Casalasco; and afterwards became the disciple of Albano, in whose school he appeared with promising and superior talents, but although these, while he studied with Albano, were exceedingly admired, yet, to improve himself still farther in correctness of design, and also in the force and relief of his figures, he studied Raphael, Annibale Caracci, Caravaggio, Correggio, and Guido; and combined something of each in a manner of his own. He is accounted very happy in his taste of composition, and excellent in the disposition of his figures; but a judicious writer says, that he was censured for bestowing too much labour on the finishing of his pictures, which considerably diminished their spirit; and also for affecting too great a strength of colouring, so as to give his figures too much relief, and make them appear as if not united with their grounds. However well or ill-founded these observations may be, yet through all Europe he is deservedly admired for the force and delicacy of his pencil, for the great correctness of his design, for a distinguished elegance in his compositions, and also for the mellowness which he gave to his colours. The draperies of his figures are in general easy and free; his expression of the passions is judicious and natural; and there appears a remarkable grace in every one of his figures.

, another renowned painter, was born at Florence in 1240, and was the first who revived the art of painting in Italy. Being descended of a noble family, and of sprightly parts, he was sent to school to study the belles lettres, but he generally betrayed his natural bias by drawing figures upon paper, or on his books. The fine arts having been extinct in Italy, ever since the irruption of the barbarians, the senate of Florence had sent at that time for painters out of Greece. Cimabue was their first disciple, and used to elope from school and pass whole days in viewing their work. His father, therefore, agreed with these Greeks to take him under their care, and he soon surpassed them both in design and colouring. Though he wanted the art of managing his lights and shadows, was but little acquainted with the rules of perspective, and in other particulars but indifferently accomplished, yet the foundation which he laid for future improvement, entitled him to the name of the “father of the first age, or infancy of modern painting.”

Cimabue was also a great architect as well as painter, and concerned in the fabric of Sancta Maria del Fior in Florence during which employment he died in 1300. He left many disciples, and among the rest Giotto, who proved an excellent master, and was his first rival. Dante mentions him in the eleventh canto of his purgatory as without a rival till Giotto appeared. Cimabue’s portrait, by Simon Sanese, was in the chapel-house of Sancta Maria Novella. It is a figure which has a lean face, a little red beard, in point; with a capuche, or monk’s hood upon his head, after the fashion of those times.

, an eminent musician and composer, was born at Capo di Monte, Naples: he studied music at the couservatorio of Loretto, and was a disciple of the admirable Duronte. He was carefully educated in other respects, and his docility and sweetness of temper, during his youth, gained him the affection of all who knew him. On quitting the conservatorio his talents were soon noticed, and his operas, chiefly comic, became the delight of all Italy. But though he composed for buffo singers, his style was always graceful, never grotesque or capricious. There is an ingenuity in his accompaniments which embellishes the melody of the voice part, without too much occupying the attention of the audience. His operas of “Il Pittore Parigino,” and “L'Italiana in Londra,” were carried to Rome, and thence to the principal cities of Italy, where their success was so great in 1782 and 1783, that he received an order from Paris to compose a cantata for the birth of the dauphin, which was performed by a band of more than 100 voices and instruments. In 1784 he was engaged to compose for the theatres and cities which seldom had operas expressly composed for them; bringing on their stage such as were set for great capitals, such as Rome, Naples, Venice, and Milan. By these means the expences of poet and composer were saved. He composed operas likewise at Petersburgh and Madrid, and his success and fame were more rapid than those of any composer of the last century, except Piccini, and the fame of his comic opera of “L'ltaliana in Londra,” seems to have been as extensive as that of the “Buona Figliuola.”

, a physician at Florence, where he was born in 1625, had not only great skill in his profession, but very extensive literary knowlege, and few men were better acquainted with books of rarity and curiosity. He was a member of the academy of Apatisti at Florence, and of the academy of Parma, and of other learned societies. But he had, unfortunately, the art of creating enemies by the severity of his censures and personal remarks; and having taken some liberties of this kind in his “Biblioteca volante” with Dr. Moniglia, first physician to Cosmo III. he was sent to prison, and released only on condition of retracting what he had so imprudently advanced. After this, he quitted the dominions of the grand duke, and having travelled over most part of Italy, settled at Loretto, where he practised physic, and where he died in 1706. In 1677 he published the first two parts of his “Biblioteca volante,” or fugitive library; a curious and useful collection of remarks and information respecting rare books, in which he was assisted by the learned Magliabechi, who was his intimate friend. The third, fourth, and fifth parts he published at Naples about the year 1686. The whole was reprinted, with additions by Sancassani, at Venice, 4 vols. 4to, 1734—1747. He had a design of publishing an account of Tuscan authors, which we are sorry to find was prevented by his poverty and want of encouragement. The only other publication we know of Cinelli’s, was a new edition, with improvements, of “Bocchi’s Curiosities of Florence,” 1677, 8vo.

, a celebrated Italian lawyer and poet of the fourteenth century, who usually is known by that name, although he was of the ancient family of the Sinibaldi or Sinibuldi, and his first name was Guittoncino (not Ambrogino, as Le Quadrio says), the diminutive of Cuittone, and by abbreviation Cino. Much pains were bestowed on his education, and according to the fashion of the times, he studied law; but nature had made him a poet, and he cultivated that taste in conjunction with his academical exercises. He took his first degree in civil law at Bologna, and in 1307 was appointed assessor of civil causes but at that time was obliged to leave Pistoia, owing to the civil commotions. Cino was a zealous Ghibelin, and was now glad to seek an asylum in Lombardy, whither he followed his favourite Selvaggia, whose charms he so often celebrates in his poems, but where he had the misfortune to lose her. After her death he travelled for some time in Lombardy, and is thought to have visited Paris, the university of which was at that time the resort of many foreigners. On his return, however, to Bologna in 1314, he published his “Commentary on the first nine Books of the Code,” a very learned work, which placed him among the ablest lawyers of his time, and has been often printed, first at Pavia in 1483; the best edition is that improved by Cisnez, Franefort, 1578. He now took his doctor’s degree, ten years after he had received that of bachelor, and his reputation procured him invitations to become law-professor, an office which he filled for three years at Trevisa, and for seven years at Perugia. Among his pupils in the latter place was the celebrated Bartolo, who studied under him six years, and declared that he owed his knowledge entirely to the writings and lessons of Cino. From Perugia he went to Florence, but his reputation was confined to the civil law. At this time the canonists and legists were sworn enemies, and Cino, not only in his character as a legist, but as a Ghibelin, had a great aversion to decretals, canons, and the whole of papal jurisprudence. It is not true, however, as some have asserted, that he taught civil law to Petrarch, or canon law to Boccaccio, although he communicated with Petrarch on poetical matters, and exhibited to him a style which Petrarch did not disdain to imitate.

Cino was professor at Florence in 13. '54, when he was appointed gonfalonier at Pistoia, where his party had gained the ascendancy; but either from a partiality for his present situation, or some other motive, he declined accepting the honour. We find him, however, on his return to his native country, when he was seized with a disorder which proved fatal in 1336, or the beginning of 1337, and not, according to Tiraboschi, in 1341, leaving, as his biographer says, two reputations which long subsisted without injuring one another, that of one of the revivers of civil jurisprudence, and one of the founders of Italian poetry. It is ia the latter character that his fame has been of longest duration, and in which he has been praised by Dante, and more abundantly by Petrarch, who chose him for one of his models. Modern critics, however, have discovered among many beauties, an occasional flatness and obscurity in some of his poetical pieces. They were first printed at Rome in 1559, and reprinted thirty years after with a second part, and are in several collections.

, or Cigoli. See Cardi.

, younger brother to the preceding, was born in May 1654, and educated in the freeschool of Bury St. Edmund’s, under Mr. Edward Leeds, a Greek scholar of considerable eminence. He was admitted of Ciirist’s-college, Cambridge, January 12, 1671, under the tuition of Dr. Widdrington, and regularly took his degrees in arts, and in 1704 commenced D. D. Upon his brother’s removal to Gray’s- inn, he was elected in his room, March 21, 1680, preacher at St. Mary’s, in St. Edmundsbury. In this station, which he held near forty-six years, he was a constant preacher, and diligent in every other part of his ministry. On the first of February, 1683, he was instituted to the rectory of Thurlo parva. Dr. John Moore, then bishop of Norwich, who was well acquainted with his merit and abilities, collated him on the 14th of June, 1693, to the archdeaconry of Sudbtfry; and in March 1707, he was instituted to the rectory of Hitchain, in Suffolk. This eminent divine, extremely valued and respected on account of his exemplary charity and other virtues, died January 27, 1726-7, in the seventy-third year of his age, and was buried in the chancel of the parish church of St. Mary’s, in St. Edmundsbury. Among other children, he had Nicolas, afterwards bishop of Si. David’s, and of Exeter, who died Dec. 8, 1746. Dr. Clagett published some occasional sermons, a pamphlet entitled “A Persuasive to an ingenuous Trial of Opinions in Religion,” Lond. 1685, 4to, and a volume entitled “Truth defended, and Boldness in Error rebuked or, a Vindication of those Christian Commentators who have expounded some Prophecies of the Messias not to be meant only of him. Being a Confutation of part of Mr. Whiston’s book, entitled, The Accomplishment of Scripture Prophecies; wherein he pretends to disprove all duplicity of sense in prophecy. To which is subjoined, an Examination of his hypothesis, That our Saviour ascended up into Heaven several times after his Resurrection. And in both, there ar,e some remarks upon other Essays of the said author, as likewise an Appendix and a Postscript. With a large Preface,” Lond. 1710, 8vo.

, an English organist and composer of church music, was educated in the Chapel Royal, under Dr. Blow, who seems to have had a paternal affection for hir. In 1693 he resigned, in his favour, the place of master of the children and almoner of St. Paul’s, of which cathedral Clarke was soon after likewise appointed organist. In 1700 Dr. Blow and his pupil were appointed gentlemen extraordinary in the King’s chapel; of which, in 1704, on the death of Mr. Francis Pigoot, they were jointly admitted to the place of organist. The compositions of Clarke are not numerous, as an untimely aud melancholy end was put to his life before his genius had been allowed time to expand. Early in life he was so unfortunate as to conceive a violent and hopeless passion for a very beautiful lady of a rank far superior to his own; and his sufferings, under these circumstances, became at length so intolerable, that he resolved to terminate them by suicide. The late Mr. Samuel Wiley, one of the lay-vicars of St. Paul’s, who was very intimate with him, related the following extraordinary story. “Being at the house of a friend in the country, he found himself so miserable, that he suddenly determined to return to London: his friend, observing in his behaviour great marks of dejection, furnished him with a horse, and a servant to attend him. In his way to town, a fit of melancholy and despair having seized him, he alighted, and giving his horse to the servant, went into a field, in the corner of which there was a pond surrounded with trees, which pointed out to his choice two ways of getting rid of life; but not being more inclined to the one than the other, he left it to the determination of chance; and taking a piece of money out of his pocket, and tossing it in the air, determined to abide by its decision; but the money falling on its edge in the clay, seemed to prohibit both these means of destruction. His mind was too much disordered to receive comfort, or take advantage of this delay; he therefore mounted his horse and rode to London, determined to find some other means of getting rid of life. And in July 1707, not many weeks after his return, he shot himself in his own hotise in St. Paul’s church -yard; the late Mr. John Reading, organist of St. Dunstan’s church, a scholar of Dr. Blow, and master of Mr. Stanley, intimately acquainted with Clarke, happening to go by the door at the instant the pistol went off, upon entering the house, found his friend and fellow-student in the agonies of death.”

, a very industrious and useful writer of the seventeenth century, less known than his services deserved, and particularly entitled to notice in a work of this kind, was born Oct. 10, 1599, at Woolston, in the county of Warwick, of which place his father had been minister for upwards of forty years. Under his tuition he remained until he was thirteen years old, when he was sent to school under one Crauford, an eminent teacher at that time. Here he informs us that he fell into loose practices from keeping bud company, but occasionally felt the reluctance which a pious education usually leaves. At the end of four years he was sent to Cambridge, and entered of Emanuel, which was then, according to his account, the Puritan college. After taking his bachelor’s degree, his father recalled him home, and he was for some time employed as a family-tutor in Warwickshire, after which, being now in orders, he was invited into Cheshire, as assistant to Mr. Byrom, who had the living of Thornton, and with whom he continued almost two years, preaching twice every Sunday during that time. Some scruples respecting the ceremonies occasioned him much trouble, and. he had an intention of removing to London; but happening to receive a pressing invitation from the inhabitants of Wirrall, a peninsula beyond West Chester, he consented to settle among them at Shotwick, where no regular service had been performed, and became here very useful as a preacher, and very popular through an extensive district. After, however, five years’ quiet residence here, a prosecution was instituted against him for the omission of ceremonies (what they were he does not inform us) in the Chancellor’s court; and while about to leave Shotwick in consequence of this, the mayor, aldermen, and many of the inhabitants of Coventry, invited him to preach a lecture in that city, which he accepted, and carried on for some time; but here likewise he excited the displeasure of Dr. Buggs, who held the two principal livings in Coventry, and who prosecuted him before the bishop, Dr. Morton. After this, by the influence of Robert earl of Warwick, he was enabled to preach at Warwick, and although complained of, was not molested in any great degree. Soon after, lord Brook presented him to the rectory of Alcester, where he officiated for nine years, and, as he informs us, “the town, which before was called * drunken Alcester,' was now exemplary and eminent for religion.” When the et c<etcra oath was enjoined, the clergy of the diocese met and drew up a petition against it, which Mr. Clarke and Mr. Arthur Salway presented to his majesty at York, who returned for answer, that they should not be molested for refusing the oath, until the consideration of their petition in parliament. This business afterwards requiring Mr. Clarke to go to London, he was chosen preacher of the parish of St. Bennet Fink, a curacy which is said to have been then, as it is now, in the gift of the canons of Windsor. Walker, from having included this among the livings sequestered by the parliamentary reformers, would seem to intimate that Mr. Clarke must have succeeded to it at the expence of the incumfyent; but the fact is, there was no incumbent at the time. We learn from Clarke’s dedication of his “Mirror” to Philip Holman, esq. of Warkworth in. Northamptonshire, a native of St. Bennet Fink, and a great benefactor to it, that for many years before this time (probably before 1646) the parish had little maintenance for a minister; theif tithes, being impropriated, went another way. They had no stock, no land, no house for the minister, no lecture, nor any one gift sermon in the year. This Mr. Holman, however, had furnished a house for the curate and settled it upon feoffees in trust, and had promised to add something towards his further maintenance. Such was the situation of the parish when Mr. Clarke was elected, and he remained their preacher until the restoration. During the whole of this period, he appears to have disapproved of the practices of the numerous sectaries which arose, and retained his attachment to the constitution and doctrines of the church, although he objected to some of those points respecting ceremonies and discipline, which ranks him among the ejected non-conformists. Most of his works appear to have been compiled, as indeed they are generally dated there, at his house in Threadneedle- street, and it was the sole business of his future life, to enlarge and republish them. In 1660, when Charles II. published a declaration concerning ecclesiastical affairs, the London clergy drew up a congratulatory address, with a request for the removal of re-ordination and surplices in colleges, &,c, Vol. IX. D D which Mr. Clarke was appointed to present. In the following year he was appointed one of the commissioners for revising the book of Common Prayer, but what particular share he took we are not informed; nor are we told more of his history, while in the church, than that he was seven or eight years a governor, and two years president of Sion college. When ejected for non-conformity, such was his idea of schism and separation, that he quietly submitted to a retired and studious life. From the church, which he constantly attended as a hearer, he says, he dared not to separate, or gather a private church out of a true church, which he judged the church of England to be. In this retirement he continued twenty years, partly at Hammersmith, and partly at Isleworth, revising what he had published, and compiling other works, all of which appear to have been frequently reprinted, notwithstand­*ig their size and price. He died Dec. 25, 1682, universally respected for his piety, and especially for his moderation in the contests which prevailed in his time.

His principal publications were, 1. “A Mirror or Looking-glass for Saints and Sinners,” containing remarkable examples of the fate of persecutors, and vicious persons of all descriptions, and notices of the lives of persons eminent for piety. This was a 12mo volume of 227 pages, published in 1646, which was so successful, and the author so partial to the subject, that in 1655 he republished it in an 8vo of 42 sheets, and in 1657 in a folio of 240 sheets, to which in 1671 he added another volume of equal size. In this enlarged form, we know not any work, except Turner’s “Providences,” or Wanley’s “Wonders,” both of which follow his plan, that contains a greater portion of the marvellous as well as the useful. He must have turned over a prodigious number of volumes to accumulate such a mass of anecdote. 2. “The Marrow of Ecclesiastical History, containing the lives of the Fathers, Schoolmen, Reformers, and eminent modern Divines, &c.” 1649, 4to. Dr. “Berkenhout gives the priority to Fuller’s” Abel Redivivus,“but he does not appear to have heard of Clarke, who unquestionably was the first who published any collection of Biography in English, and who is respectfully noticed by Fuller, as his predecessor. In 1650 he published a second part, and both together, with additions, in a thick quarto of above 1000 pages, in 1654, with many portraits in wood copper; but the best edition is that of 1675, folio. 3.” A General Martyrology,“or abridgement of Fox and of some more recent authors, 1651, fol.; to this, in 1652, he added an” English Martyrology,“reprinted together in 1660, and in 1677, with an additional series of the lives of Divines. The value of most of his lives is, that they are taken from scarce volumes and tracts, which it would now be extremely difficult as well as expensive to procure. 4.” The Lives of sundry eminent persons In this latter age,“1683, fol. with portraits better executed than in his other works, which has imparted a particular value to this volume in the estimation of portrait- collectors. Mr. Clarke’s other works are” The Marrow of Divinity, with sundry cases of Conscience,“1659, fol.: a treatise against the toleration of schismatics and separatists, entitled” Golden Apples, or seasonable and serious Counsel," &c. 1659, 12mo and some lesser historical tracts and sermons.

, son of the preceding, was educated at Pembroke-hall, Cambridge, where he lost his fellowship, in the time of the Rump parliament, for refusing to take the engagement. He had, however, enough of the, non-conformist, to resign, after the restoration, the living of Grendon in Buckinghamshire. He applied himself early to the study of the scriptures; and the books which he published, as helps to others in the same course of study, are proofs of his industry and abilities. His “Annotations on the Bible,” 1690, fol. printed together with the sacred text, was the great work of his life. It is commended in very high terms by Dr. Owen and Mr. Baxter, as a laborious and judicious performance, and has been an excellent fund for some modern commentators, who have republished a great part of it, with very little alteration. He died Feb. 24, 1700-1, in his seventy-fifth year. The great grandson of the Martyrologist was Dr. Samuel Clarke, or Clark (for his posterity dropped the e), pastor of a congregation of dissenters at St. Alban’s, and author of “Scripture Promises,” a popular work, often reprinted. This Dr. Samuel Clark was father to the late rev. Samuel Clark of Birmingham, who was assistant to Dr. Doddridge in his academy, and died by a fall from his horse in 1769; and also to Mrs. Rose, wife of Dr. Rose of Chiswick, a gentleman well known in the literary world.

Afterwards, in order to fit himself for the sacred function, he studied the Old Testament in the Hebrew, the New in the Greek, and the primitive Christian writers. Having taken orders, he became chaplain to Moore bishop of Norwich, by the introduction of the celebrated Whiston, then chaplain to the bishop, who in 1698, being collated to the living of Lowestoff in Suffolk, resigned his chaplainship, and was succeeded by Clarke. In this station Clarke lived for near twelve years, with all the freedom of an equal rather than as an inferior to the bishop, who esteemed him highly while he lived, and at his death gave him a striking proof of confidence, by leaving solely in his hands all the concerns of his family: a trust which Clarke executed very faithfully, and to the entire satisfaction of every person concerned. In 1699 he published two treatises: one entitled, “Three practical essays on Baptism, Confirmation, and Repentance;” the other, “Some reflections on that part of a book called Amyntor, or a defence of Milton’s life (written by Toland), which relates to the writings of the primitive fathers, and the canon of the New Testament. In a letter to a friend.” This was published without a name, but was afterwards added to his letter to Dodwell, &c. In 1701 he published a paraphrase upon the gospel of St. Matthew; which was followed in 1702 by the paraphrases upon the gospels of St. Mark and St, Luke, and soon after by a third volume upon St. John; afterwards often printed together in 2 vols. 8vo. He had begun a paraphrase upon the Acts of the Apostles, and was to have extended his labours to the remaining books of the New Testament, but something accidentally interrupted the execution, which he himself used to say, was made Jess necessary by the labours of several worthy and learned persons since the appearance of his work upon the four gospels.

Meanwhile bishop Moore, his patron, gave him the rectory of Drayton near Norwich, and procured for him a parish in that city; and these he served himself in that season when the bishop resided at Norwich. His preaching was without notes, until he became rector of St. James’s. In 1704 he was appointed to preach BoyieV lecture; and the subject he chose was, “The Befog and Attributes of God.” He succeeded so well in this, and gave such high satisfaction, that he was appointed to preach the same lecture the next year; when he chose for his subject, “The 1 Evidences of natural and revealed Religion.” These sermons were first printed in two distinct volumes: the former in 1705, the latter in 1706. They have since been printed in one volume, and have passed through several editions. In the fourth or fifth were added several letters to Clarke from Butler, afterwards bishop of Durham, relating to the demonstration of the being and attributes, with the doctor’s answers. In the sixth edition was added, a discourse concerning the connection of the prophecies in the Old Testament, and the application of them to Christ: and an answer to a seventh letter concerning the argument a priori. It may not be amiss to observe, that Clarke’s sermons concerning the being and attributes of God occasioned a controversy, but we dp not find that Clarke himself ever appeared in it *.

* This controversy produced several sidered the najture of Space, Duration, pieces for and against Dr. Clarke’s and necessary Existence: being an an­‘ Demonstration of the Being and At- swer to a late book entitled, ’ A Transtributes of Gorl.“It was animad- lat ion of Dr. King’s Origin of Evil,' and verted upon by Mr. Edmund Law, the some other objections together with a late bishop of Carlisle, in his Notes Compendium of a Demonstration of the upon archbj*hop King’s Essay on the Being and Attributes of God,” London, Origin of Kvil,“translated from the 1732, 8vo. Mr. Law vindicated his Latin. This occasioned a piece enti- Remarks in a” Postscript“to the setled,” A Defence of Dr. Clarke’s De- cond edition of Dr. King’s Essay which inonstrationof the Being and Attributes oecasioned, "A second Defence of Dr. of Cod wherein is particularly con- Clarke’s Demonstration of the About this time, Whiston tells us, he discovered tha'6 Clarke had been looking into the primitive writers, and suspected that the Athanasian doctrine of the Trinity was not the doctrine of those early ages. Mr. Whiston adds, that he heard him say, that he never read the Athanasian creed in his parish, at or near Norwich, but once; and that was. only by mistake, at a time when it was not appointed by the rubric. In 1706 he published a letter to Mr. Dodweil, as an answer to all the arguments in his epistolary discourse against the immortality of the soul, and representing the judgment of the fathers, to whom Mr. Dodweli had appealed, concerning that matter. This appears to have given universal satisfaction, but the controversy did not stop here; for the celebrated Collins, as a second to Dodweil, went much farther into the philosophy of the dispute, and indeed seemed to produce all that could possibly be said against the immateriality of the soul, as well as the liberty of human actions. This enlarged the scene of the dispute; into which our author entered, and wrote with such a spirit of clearness and demonstration, as at once shewed him greatly superior to his adversaries in metaphysical and physical knowledge; and made every intelligent reader rejoice, that such an incident had happened to provoke and extort from him that copious and strong reasoning and perspicuity of expression, which were indeed very much wanted upon this intricate and obscure subject. Clarke’s letter to Dodweil was soon followed by four defences of it, in four several Letters to the author of a Letter to the learned Mr. Henry Dodweil; containing some

and Attributes of God: in answer to a Eternity, as also the Self-Existence, Postscript, &c. By the author of the necessary Existence, and Unity of the first Defence,“London, 1732, in 8vo. DivineNature, by Edmund Law,M. A.” The same year was published a pam- the other entitled, “An Examination pbk-t, entitled,” Dr. Clarke’s notion of Dr. Clarke’s notion of Space, by Joof Space examined ia vindication of seph Clarke, M. A.“Mr. John Clarke; the translation of archbishop King’s author of the two Defences of Dr. ' Origin of Evil:V being an answer to Clarke’s Demonstration, having pubtwo late pamphlets entitled, A Defence, lished a third, Mr. Joseph Clarke pub­&c.” Mr. John Jackson published a lished “A farther Examination of Dr. piece, entitled,” The Existence and Clarke’s notions of Space, with some Unity of God, proved from his Nature considerations on the possibility of and Attributes: being a Vindication of Eternal Creation: in reply to Mr. 3)r. Claike’s Demonstration of the John Clarke’s third Defence, &c. To lleing and Attributes of God,“London, which are added, some remarks oa 1734, in 8vo. The same year appeared Mr. Jackson’s exceptions to Dr. Clarke’s two pamphlets, printed at Cambridge notions of Space examined in his Exone entitled,” An Enquiry into the v istence and Unity,“&c, ideas x of Space, Time, Immensity, and remarks on a pretended demonstration of the immateriality and natural immortality of the soul, in Mr. Clarke’s answer to his late epistolary discourse, &c. They were afterwards all printed together; and the answer to Toland’s Amyntor added to them. In the midst of all these labours he found time to shew his regard to mathematical and physical studies, which were not a little improved by the friendship of sir Isaac Newton, at whose request he translated his” Optics" into Latin in 1706. With this version sir Isaac was so highly pleased, that he presented him with the sum of 500l. or 100l. for each child, Clarke having then five children.

After this paper had been before the upper house, being apprehensive that, if it should be published separately, as afterwards happened, without any true account of the preceding and following circumstances, it might be misunderstood in some particulars, he caused an explanation, dated July 5, to be presented to the bishop of London, the next time the upper house met: setting forth, “That whereas the paper laid before their lordships the Friday before, was, through haste and want of time, not drawn up with sufficient exactness, he thought himself indispensably obliged in conscience to acquaint their lordships, that he did not mean thereby to retract any thing he had written, but to declare that the opinion set forth at large in his Scripture Doctrine, &c. is, that the Son was eternally begotten by the eternal incomprehensible power and will of the Father, &c. and that, by declaring he did not intend to write any more concerning the doctrine of the Trinity, he did not preclude himself from a liberty of making any inoffensive corrections in his former books, if they should come to another edition, or from vindicating himself against any misrepresentations or aspersions, which might possibly hereafter be cast upon him, on occasion of this controversy.” After the delivery of this explanation, the upper house resolved, July 5,. to proceed no farther upon the extract, laid before them by the lower house and ordered Dr. Clarke’s papers to be entered in the acts of that house. But the lower house, not so satisfied, resolved, July 7, that the paper subscribed by Dr. Clarke, and communicated to them by the bishops, does not contain in it any recantation of the heretical assertions and offensive passages complained of in their representation, and afterwards produced in their extract; nor gives such satisfaction for the great scandal occasioned thereby, as ought to put a stop to any farther examination and censure thereof. Thus ended. this affair; the most authentic account of which we have in a piece entitled, “An Apology for Dr. Clarke, containing an account of the late proceedings in convocation, upon his writings concerning the Trinity, 1714, 8vo,” written, Whiston tells us, by a clergyman in the country, a common friend of his and Dr. Clarke’s, with the knowledge and assistance of the latter. The “Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity,” as we have observed, was first published in 1712; afterwards there was a second edition, with many alterations, in 1710; and there has been, since his death, a third edition, with very great additions, left under the doctor’s hand ready prepared for the press. Bishop Hoadly assures us, in opposition to those who have supposed Clarke to have retracted his notions concerning the Trinity, that, “from the time of publishing this book to the day of his death, he found no reason, as far as he was able to judge, to alter the notions which he there professed.” Mr. Whitaker, in his “Origin of Arianism disclosed,” has taken uncommon pains to support the truth of chevalier Ramsay’s assertion, that Dr. Clarke greatly repented of his ever having published his work upon the Trinity. The testimonies on the other side of the question Mr. Whitaker endeavours to reconcile, by supposing that the doctor occasionally avowed his repentance, and yet continued his practices. He avowed fully “to Mr. Ramsay what he was too timid to avow to his son, to a Hoadly, or to an Emlyn; and what he even took pains to conceal from them, in a seeming continuance of opinion, and in an actual perseverance of conduct.” All this, however, has been most confidently denied by Dr. Clarke’s friends.

A considerable number of these “Select Psalms and Hymns” having been dispersed by the Society for promoting Christian knowledge, before the alteration of the doxologies was taken notice of, he was charged with a design of imposing upon the society, whereas it was answered that the edition of them had been prepared by him for the use of his own parish only, before the society had thoughts of purchasing any of the copies: and as the usual forms of doxology were not established by any legal authority, ecclesiastical or civil, in this he had not offended. Robinson, however, bishop of London, so highly disliked this alteration, that he thought proper to publish a letter to the incumbents of all churches and chapels in his diocese, against their using any new forms of doxology. The letter is dated Dec. 26, 1718, and begins thus: “Reverend brethren, there is an instance of your care and duty, which I conceive myself at this time highly obliged to offer, and you to regard, as necessary for the preservation of the very foundations of our faith. Some persons, seduced, I fear, by the strong delusions of pride and self-conceit, have lately published new forms of doxology, entirely agreeable to those of some ancient heretics, who impiously denied a trinity of persons in the unity of the Godhead, I do therefore warn and charge it upon your souls, as you hope to obtain mercy from God the Father through the merits of Jesus Christ our Lord, and by the sanctification of the Holy Ghost, three persons and one God blessed for ever, that you employ your best endeavours to prevail with your several flocks, to have a great abhorrence for the abovementioned new forms, and particularly that you do not suffer the same to be used, either in your churches, or in any schools, where you are to prevent that most pernicious abuse, &c.” This letter was animadverted upon by Whiston, in “A Letter of Thanks to the right reverend the lord bishop of London, for his late letter to his clergy against the use of new forms of Doxology, &c.” Jan. 17, 1719; and in a pamphlet entitled “An humble apology for St. Paul and the other apostles; or, a vindication of them and their doxologies from the charge of heresy. By Cornelius Paets,” 1719. Soon after came out an ironical piece entitled “A Defence of the Bishop of London, in answer to Winston’s Letter of Thanks, &c. addressed to the archbishop of Canterbury. To which is added, a Vindication of Dr. Sacheverell’s late endeavour to turn Mr. Winston out of his church.” Winston’s Letter of Thanks occasioned likewise the two following pieces; viz. “The lord bishop of London’s Letter to his Clergy vindicated, <kc. by a Believer, 1719;” and “A seasonable review of Mr. Winston’s account of primitive Doxologies, &c. by a Presbyter, &c. 1719.” This presbyter was supposed to be Dr. William Berriman. To the latter Whiston replied in a second letter to the bishop of London; and the author of “The seasonable Review, &c.” answered him in a second Review, &c. As to Clarke’s conduct in this affair, we are not surprised to find Whiston declaring it to be one of the most Christian attempts towards somewhat of reformation, upon the primitive foot, that he ever ventured upon: but he adds,“that the bishop of London, in the way of modern authority, was quite too hard for Dr. Clarke, in the way of primitive Christianity.”

About this time Dr. Clarke was presented by the lord Lechmere, chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, to the mastership of Wigston’s hospital in Leicester. In 1724 he published seventeen sermons preached on several occasions, eleven of which were never before printed; and the year following a sermon preached at the parish church of St. James, upon the erecting a charity-school for the education of women servants. In 1727, upon the death of sir Isaac Newton, he was offered by the court the place of master of the mint, worth communibus annis 1200 or 1500l. a year. Upon this offer, Whiston tells us, the doctor advised with his friends, and particularly with Mr. Emlyn and himself, ahout accepting or refusing it. They advised him against accepting it, as what he wanted not; as what was entirely remote from his profession, and would hinder the success of his ministry. He was himself generally of the same opinion with them, could not thoroughly reconcile himself to this secular preferment, and therefore absolutely refused it. Whiston seems to wonder that Clarke’s admirers should lay so little stress upon this refusal, as to mention it not at all, or at least very negligently; while “he takes it,” he says, “to be one of the most glorious actions of his life, and to afford undeniable conviction that he vvas in earnest in his religion.”

The character of Dr. Clarke has been thus drawn by Dr. Hare, bishop of Chichester, and by bishop Hoadly. Dr. Hare, in his pamphlet entitled “The difficulties and discouragements which attend the study of the Scripture, in the way of private judgement,” says that he is “a man who has all the good qualities that can meet together to recommend him. He is possessed of all the parts of learning that are valuable in a clergyman, in a degree that few possess any single one. He has joined to a good skill in the three learned languages a great compass of the best philosophy and mathematics, as appears by his Latin works; and his English ones are such a proof of his own piety, and of his knowledge in divinity, and have done so much service to religion, as would make any other man, that was not under the suspicion of heresy, secure of the friendship and esteem of all good churchmen, especially of the clergy. And to all this piety and learning, and the good use that has been made of it, is added a temper happy beyond expression: a sweet, easy, modest, inoffensive, obliging behaviour adorns all his actions; and no passion, vanity, insolence, or ostentation, appears either in what he writes or says: and yet these faults are often incident to the best men, in the freedom of conversation, and writing against impertinent and unreasonable adversaries, especially such as strike at the foundation of virtue and religion. This is the learning, this the temper of the man, whose study of the scriptures has betrayed him into a suspicion of some heretical opinions.”

Bishop Hoadly writes thus of Clarke: “He was a person of a natural genius, excellent enough to have placed him in the superior rank of men without the acquirements of learning; and of learning enough to have rendered a much less cdmprehensive genius very considerable in the ways of the world. But in him they were both united to such a degree, that those who were of his intimate acquaintance 'knew not which to admire most. The first strokes of knowledge, in some of its branches, seemed to be little less than natural to him: for they appeared to lie right in his mind, as soon as any thing could appear; and to be the very same, which afterwards grew up with him into perfection, as the strength and cultivation of his mind increased. He had one happiness very rarely known among the greatest men, that his memory was almost equal to his judgment, which is as great a character as can well be given of it.” Then, after observing how great the doctor was in “all branches of knowledge and learning, he goes on thus:” If in any one of these many branches he had excelled only so much as he did in all, this alone would justly have entitled him to the name of a great man. But there is something so very extraordinary, that the same person should excel, not only in those parts of knowledge which require the strongest judgment, but in those which want the help of the strongest memory also; and it is so seldom seen, that one who is a great master in theology, is at the same time skilfully fond of all critical and classical learning, or excellent in the physical and mathematical studies, or well framed for metaphysical and abstract reasonings; that it ought to be remarked, in how particular a manner, and to how high a degree, divinity and mathematics, experimental philosophy and classical learning, metaphysics and critical skill, all of them, various and different as they are amongst themselves, united in Dr. Clarke.“Afterwards the bishop informs us, how earnestly his acquaintance and friendship was sought after by the greatest lovers of virtue and knowledge; what regard was paid to him by the chief persons of the law; and, above all, what pleasure her late majesty queen Caroline took in his conversation and friendship: for” seldom a week passed, says he, “in which she did not receive some proof of the greatness of his genius, and of the force of his superior understanding.”

“If any one should ask,” continues the bishop, “as it is natural to do, how it came to pass that this great man was never raised higher in the church? I must answer, that it was neither for want of merit, nor interest, nor the favour of some in whose power it was to have raised him. But he had reasons within his own breast, which hindered him from either seeking after, or accepting any such promotion. Of these he was the proper, and indeed the only judge: and therefore I say no more of them.” The truth is, his scruples about subscription were very great; as we are informed by Sykes, who observes, in his eulogium of Clarke, printed at the end of Whiston’s Historical Memoirs, that "the doctor would often wish, that those things which were suspected by many, and judged unlawful by some, might be seriously considered, and not made terms of communion. He thought it would be the greatest happiness to see the occasions of good and learned men’s scruples removed out of the public forms of divine service, and the doctrines of Christianity reduced to the New Testament only; and that it would be right to have nothing required from the preachers of the gospel, but what was

Vol. IX, purely primitive. This he thought to be the only means of making the minds of sincere Christians easy and quiet. This he believed would make men much more charitable to one another: and make the governors of the church and state transact their important affairs with greater ease and freedom from disturbances.“Upon the whole, bishop Hoadly makes no scruple to declare, that” by Dr. Clarke’s death, the world was deprived of as bright a light, and masterly a teacher of truth and virtue, as ever yet appeared amongst us and,“says he in the conclusion of his account,” as his works must last as long as any language remains to convey them to future times, perhaps I may flatter myself that this faint and imperfect account of him may be transmitted down with them. And I hope it will be thought a pardonable piece of ambition and self-interestedness, if, being fearful lest every thing else should prove too weak to keep the remembrance of myself in being, I lay hold on his fame to prop and support my own. I am sure, as I have little reason to expect that any thing of mine, without such an assistance, can live, I shall think myself greatly recompensed for the want of any other memorial, if my name may go down to posterity thus closely joined with his; and I myself be thought of, and spoke of, in ages to come, under the character of The Friend of Dr. Clarke.“' On the other hand, Whiston, who wrote his Life, and held him in as high estimation as either Dr. Hare or Dr. Hoadly, candidly mentions those failings, some of which, perhaps, may occur to the reader in perusing the preceding pages, and considerably lessen our opinion of his consistency. In the lirst place, he blames Clarke for subscribing the articles, at a time when he could not, with perfect truth and sincerity, assent to the Athanasian parts of them; namely, at his taking the degree of doctor in divinity. Mr. Whiston, then professor of mathematics at Cambridge, endeavoured to dissuade him from it; and, when he could not prevail on that head, he earnestly pressed him to declare openly, and in writing, in what sense he subscribed the suspected articles: but he could not prevail on this head neither. Upon this occasion, professor James, who suspected Dr. Clarke of an inclination to heretical pravity, said to him, upon his subscribing the articles,” he hoped he would not go from his subscription.“The doctor replied,” He could promise nothing as to futurity, and eould only answer as to his present sentiments*“However, Mr.Whiston acknowledges, that Dr. Clarke, for many years before he died, perpetually refused all, even the greatest preferments, which required subscription, and never encouraged those who consulted him to subscribe. In the next place, he objects to Dr. Clarke his not acting sincerely, boldly, and openly, in the declaration of his true opinions, and his over-cautious and over-timorous way of speaking, writing, and acting, in points of the highest consequence. When Mr. Whiston gave him frequent and vehement admonitions upon this head, his general answer, he tells us, was, who are those that act better than I do” Very few of which,“says he,” I could ever name to him though I did not think that a sufficient excuse.“Lastly, Mr. Whiston is greatly displeased with Dr. Clarke’s conduct in relation to the affair of the convocation, and concludes the account of that affair with these words” Thus ended this unhappy affair unhappy to Dr. Clarke’s own conscience unhappy to his best friends and above all unhappy as to its consequences, in relation to the opinion unbelievers were hereupon willing to entertain of him, as if he had prevaricated all along in his former writings for Christianity."

Some anecdotes respecting Dr. Clarke’s personal character, lately collected by the rev. Mr. Jones of Welwyn, are not incurious. We learn from them, that Dr. Clarke was of a very humane and tender disposition. When his young children amused themselves with tormenting and killing flies upon the windows, he not only forbad such practices, but calmly reasoned with them, in such a familiar manner, as was calculated to make a powerful impression upon their minds. He was very ready and condescending in answering applications to him with respect to scruples; numberless instances of which occurred in the course of his life. One thing of which Dr. Clarke was peculiarly cautious was, not to lose the least minute of his time. He always carried some book about him, which he would read whilst riding in a coach, or walking in the fields, or if he had any leisure moments free from company or his other studies. Nay, he would read even in company itself, where he might take such a liberty without offence to good manners, and yet with all this value for time, we are told that he would spend whole hours in playing cards.

2 and by other marks of unusual proficiency in literature, that he was commonly spoken of, among the rest of the scholars, by the title of “The lad of Cains.” His public exercise, which we have mentioned above, was long remembered in the university, and by the learned men of that period. Dr. Henry Yarborough, prebendary of York, and rector of Tewing, Herts, declared, that he never heard any act equal to it or like it. The same gentleman, when at the age of seventy- seven, said, that he would gladly take a ride to Cambridge, to hear such another act as had been kept by Dr. Clarke. Dr. Clarke’s memory was remarkably strong. He told Mr. Pyle, of Lynn, that he never forgot any thing which he had once thoroughly apprehended and understood. The doctor, with his intimate friends, was perfectly free and easy; but if strangers were introduced, he behaved with much circumspection, conversing only upon common topics. When he visited Dr. Sykes, his usual way was to sit with him upon a couch, and, reclining upon his bosom, to discourse with him, in the most familiar manner, upon such subjects as were agreeable to the taste and judgment of both.

, a learned divine and antiquary, was horn at Haghmon abbey, in Shropshire, in the year 1696, and was educated at Shrewsbury school, under the care of Mr. Lloyd, for whom he always entertained the greatest regard. From Shrewsbury he was removed to St. John’s college, in the university of Cambridge, where he became a fellow, Jan. 22, 1716-17. His election at so early a period of life was owing to a number of vacancies, occasioned by the removal of several non-juring fellows, in consequence of an act of parliament. He commenced B. A. 1715; in 1719 became M. A.; and the reputation which he acquired when young was such, that he was chosen to be chaplain to Dr. Adam Ottley, bishop of St. David’s: but this prelate dying in 1723, he does not appear to have received any advantage from the appointment. He was afterwards domestic chaplain to Thomas Holies, duke of Newcastle; in which situation he did not continue long, as in 1724, he was presented by archbishop Wake to the rectory of Buxted, in Sussex, without any solicitation of his own, partly on account of his extraordinary merit, and partly from a regard to the special recommendation of the learned Dr. William Wotton, whose daughter he married. In 1738, he was made prebendary and residentiary of the prebend of Hova Villa in the cathedral church of Chichester, Some years before this he had given to the public a specimen of his literary abilities, in a preface to his father-in-law Dr. Wotton’s “Leges Walliae Ecclesiastical,” 1730; and it is thought that an excellent “Discourse on the Commerce of the Romans,” which was highly extolled by Dr. Taylor, in his “Elements of the Civil Law,” came either from his hand or from that of his friend Mr, Bowyer. It is reprinted in that gentleman’s “Miscellaneous Tracts,” and in “The Progress of Maritime Discovery,” by Mr. Clarke’s grandson. But Mr. Clarke’s chief work was “The Connexion of the Roman, Saxon, and English Coins; deducing the antiquities, customs, and manners of each people to modern times; particularly the origin of feudal tenures, and of parliaments: illustrated throughout with critical and historical remarks on various authors, both sacred and profane,” 1767, 4to, dedicated to the duke of Newcastle. It had been perused in manuscript by Arthur Onslow, esq. speaker of the house of commons, who honoured him with some useful hints and observations: but he was chiefly indebted to Mr. Bowyer, who superintended the publication, drew up several of the notes, wrote part of the dissertation on the Roman sesterce, and formed an admirable index to the whole. By this work our author acquired great reputation. Mr. Pinkerton, in his Essay on Medals, says that a student cannot begin with a better book in this science.

, properly Claude Gele'I;, an inimitable landscape painter, was born at Lorraine in 1600, and served an apprenticeship to the trade of a pastry-cook. In the early part of his life he shewed no symptoms of- that astonishing genius, which in his more advanced years attracted the admiration of the world. He was very little indebted to any master for instruction, except Agostino Tassi, who had been a disciple of Paul Bril, and with great labour taught Claude some of the rules of perspective, and the method of preparing his colours. But although at first be could with difficulty comprehend the rudiments y of the art, yet in the progress of his instructions his rnind seemed to expand; his ideas improved; his imagination became more lively; and with wonderful eagerness he applied himself to his studies. During these he explored the true principles of painting, by an incessant examination of nature, usually studying in the open fields, where he very frequently continued frofn sun-rise till the dusk of the evening. There he sketched whatever he thought beautiful or striking; and every curious tinge of light, on all kinds of objects, he marked in his sketches with a similar colour; from which he gave his landscapes such an appearance of nature and truth, as has rarely been discovered in any artist that ever painted in that style. Sandrart relates, that Claude used to explain to him, as they walked through the fields, the causes of the different appearances of the same prospect at different hours of the day, from the reflections or refractions of light, from dews or vapours, in the evening or morning, with all the precision of a philosopher.

Claude, as we have observed, was elected minister of the church of Montauban, about 1662; but four years after he was forbid by the court to exercise his functions there, which obliged him to go a second time to Paris, where he continued near nine months, without being able to remove the obstacles of his return to Montauban. During this interval, he was invited to the church of Bourdeaux; but the congregation of Charenton, being unwilling to lose a person of Claude’s abilities, gave him also an invitation in 1666. From that time to the revocation of the edict of Nantz, he did very great service to the cause of the French protestants by his excellent works, and by the minute attention he paid to the affairs which the deputies of provinces communicated to him. No man was ever better qualified to head either a consistory or a synod, or to manage a personal dispute. He discovered this latter talent in the last conference, which Mad. de Duras desired to hear. This lady would not forsake her religion till she had heard Claude and the bishop of Meaux dispute in her presence; and they accordingly disputed at the countess de Roie’s, her sister’s, the 1st of March, 1678. Each disputa'nt wrote the relation of his conference, and ascribed the victory to himself. These relations were at first only handed about in ms. but at last the bishop of Meaux published his in 1682, and that of Claude followed soon after. Claude was distinguished from the rest of the ministers, by the manner in which the court ordered him to leave the kingdom. He, like them, had a fortnight allowed him to leave it: but the Romish clergy found means to shorten even that time. For, Oct. 22, 1685, the day on which the revocation of the edict of Nantz was registered at Paris, Claude at ten in the morning was ordered to leave France in twenty-four hours. He obeyed with the utmost submission; and set out, attended by one of the king’s footmen, who was ordered to conduct him to the frontiers of France; and who, though he executed his orders faithfully, yet treated him with civility. He travelled in the Brussels coach; and his fame flying before him, procured him much kind and hospitable attention during his journey. He passed through Cambray, where he lay; and was there presented with some refreshments by the Jesuits. Even their rector paid him a visit, which Claude returned; and the difference of religion did not interrupt this interchange of civilities.

In consequence of Orosius pronouncing him a heathen, “an obstinate pagan,” Cave thinks it may be reasonably inferred that he had written against the Christian religion. This Fabricius opposes, but Lardner says it may be reckoned somewhat remarkable, that a learned man, a devout worshipper of all the gods, a wit and a poet, and author of many works, should never say any thing disrespectful of Christianity. He allows, however, that it is somewhat more extraordinary that Claudian should so excel in Latin verse, as to approach the best writers of the Augustan age in purity and elegance. Gibbon’s character of Claudian, corresponding with this, is written with more than usual care and discrimination. If, says this historian, we fairly balance Claudian’s merits and defects, we shall acknowledge that he does not either satisfy, or silence our reason. It would not be easy to produce a passage that deserves the epithet of sublime or pathetic; to select a verse that melts the heart, or enlarges the imagination. We should vainly seek in the poems of Claudian, the happy invention and artificial conduct of an interesting fable, or the just and lively representation of the characters and situations of real life. For the service of his patron, he published occasional panegyrics and invectives; and the design of these slavish compositions encouraged his propensity to exceed the limits of truth and nature. These imperfections, however, are compensated in some degree by the poetical virtues of Claudian. He was endowed with the rare and precious talent of raising the meanest, of adorning tjie most barren, and of diversifying the most similar topics; tys colouring, mere specially in descriptive poetry, is soft and splendid; and he seldom fails to display, and even to abuse, the advantages of a cultivated understanding, a copious fancy, an easy, and sometimes forcible expression; and a perpetual flow of harmonious versification. To these commendations, independent of any accidents of time and place, we must add the peculiar merit which Claudian derived from the unfavourable circumstances of his birth. In the decline of arts, and of empire, a native of Egypt, who had received the education of a Greek, assumed in a mature age the familiar use and absolute command of the Latin language, soared above the heads of his feeble contemporaries, and placed himself, after an interval of three hundred years, among the poets of ancient Rome. Strada, in his Prolusions, allows him to contend with the five heroic poets, Lucretius, Virgil, Ovid, Lucan, and Statius. His patron is the accomplished courtier, Balthazar Castiglione. His admirers are numerous and passionate. Yet the rigid critics reproach the exotic weeds, or flowers, which spring too luxuriantly in his Latian soil, and for which Dr. Warton, one probably ranked by Gibbon among these “rigid critics,” places Claudian with Statius and Seneca the tragedian, as authors into which no youth of genius ought to be suffered to look.

, or, as some add, Claudius Clemens, bishop of Turin in the ninth century, and one of the earliest reformers of popish superstitions, was a native of Spain, and in his youth a disciple of Felix bishop of Urgel, whom he accompanied into France, Italy, and Germany, but whose errors he afterwards renounced, and obtained access to the court of Lewis le Debonnaire, emperor and king of France. Lewis admitted him among his almoners and chaplains, and having preached before the court, a thing very rare in those days, he was much admired as an expounder of the Scriptures, of which Fleury assures us he had great knowledge. On this account Lewis, who perceived the ignorance of a great part of Italy, and was willing to provide the churches of Piedmont with one who might stem the growing torrent of image worship, promoted Claudius to the see of Turin, about the year 817, in which he fully answered his expectations, and both in his preaching and writings successfully combated the prevailing superstitions. His commentaries on several parts of the Old and New Testaments are still extant in manuscript, in various French libraries; but his “Commentary on the Galatians,” Paris, 1542, is the only part of his works which has been printed, except his “prefaces” to the book of Leviticus and to the Epistle to the Ephesians, which father Mabillon published; an abridged “Chronicle” which father Labbe attributes to him; and a letter addressed to the emperor Charlemagne on the two eclipses of the year 8 10, which is in the tenth vol. of D'Acheri’s collection. In his commentary on the Galatians, he every where asserts the equality of all the apostles with St. Peter, and owns Jesus Christ as the proper head of the church. He inveighs against the doctrine of human merits, and against raising traditions to a height of credibility equal to that of the divine word. He maintains salvation by faith alone, admits the fallibility of the church, exposes the futility of praying for the dead, and of the idolatrous practices then supported by the Roman see. These tenets involved him in a controversy with a recluse named Dungal, and with Jonas, bishop of Orleans; and created many more dangerous enemies, from whom, however, he appears to have been protected by the French court, and died in peace in the year 339.

, a German Jesuit, was born at Bamberg, in Germany, in 1537. He became a very studious mathematician, and elaborate writer, his works making five large folio volumes; and containing a complete body or course of the mathematics. They are mostly elementary, and commentaries on Euclid and others; having very little of invention of his own. His talents and writings have been variously spoken of, and it must be acknowledged that he exhibits more of industry than genius. He was sent for to Rome, to assist, with other learned men, in the reformation of the calendar, by pope Gregory; which he afterwards undertook a defence of, against Scaliger, Vieta, and others, who attacked it. He died at Rome, the 6th of February, 1612, after more than fifty years close application to the mathematical sciences.

The next appearance of Dr. Clayton from the press, was in a work undoubtedly his own, “A Vindication of the Histories of the Old and New Testament; in answer to the Objections of the late Lord Bolingbroke; in two letters to a young nobleman,” 1752, 8vo; a work of great ability, in which some of lord Bolingbroke’s objections to several parts of scripture are well exposed and confuted. In 1753, he published “A Journal from Grand Cairo to Mount Sinai, and back again. Translated from a manuscript written by the Prefetto of Egypt, in company with the Missionaries de propaganda Fids at Grand Cairo. To which are added, some remarks on the origin of hieroglyphics, and the mythology of the ancient heathens.” Dedicated to the Society of Antiquaries, London, 4to and 8vo. The bishop, having become possessed of the original Journal from Grand Cairo to Mount Sinai, and which had been mentioned by Dr. Pococke in his Travels through the East, communicated this translation of it to the Society of Antiquaries, with a view of exciting them to make some inquiry into certain ancient characters, which, as appears from the Journal, are discovered in great numbers in the Wilderness of Sinai, at a place well known by the name of Gebel el Mokatah, or the Written Mountains. It does not appear that any measures were taken by the Society of Antiquaries; but the celebrated Mr. Edward Wortley Montagu, who went from Cairo to the Desert of Sinai, with, the express purpose of seeing and describing the objects proposed by the bishop, was greatly disappointed, and convinced that the characters were not written by the Israelites; and we believe the researches of more recent travellers have been equally unsuccessful.

, a celebrated Greek philosopher, of the stoical sect, son of Phanias, and disciple of Zeno, was born at. Assus in Lydia, 33<J B. C. He subsisted by drawing water during the night, that he might pursue his studies by day. Being cited before the areopagus to declare how he gained his livelihood, he brought with him a gardener and a country-woman, saying that he drew water for the one, and kneaded dough for the other. The judges were ordering him a present; but Cleanthes refused to accept of it. This philosopher was for many years so poor, that he was obliged to write the heads of his master’s lectures upon shells and bones, for want of money to buy paper. But, notwithstanding all his poverty, he persevered in the study of philosophy, and remained a pupil of Zeno nineteen years. His natural faculties were slow; but resolution and perseverance enabled him to overcome every difficulty; and he at last became so complete a master of the stoic system, that he was perfectly qualified to succeed Zeno in his school. His fellow disciples often ridiculed him for his dulness, by calling him an ass; but he took no other notice of the sarcasm, than by saying in his defence, that if he was an ass, he was the better able to bear the burthen of Zeno’s doctrine. Being reproved for his timidity, he replied, “It is to this quality that I am indebted for my innocence.” Though he was not of the school of Arcesilaus, when he heard him condemned for undermining by his doctrine the foundations of virtue, he candidly apologized for him, by remarking, that though he might seem an enemy to virtue in his discourses, he showed himself her friend in his conduct. Arcesilaus being informed of the handsome apology which Cleanthes had made for him, said to him, “You know how much I dislike flattery; why will you flatter me?” “Is it then flattery,” replied Cleanthes, “to say of you, that you speak one thing, and do another?” Cleanthes frequently advised his pupils to conceive of pleasure, as a deity sitting on her throne, attended by the virtues, who are ready on every occasion to whisper in her ear, “Do nothing which will occasion pain or grief 'to yourself or others.” A friend observing him silent in company, said, “One would think, Cleanthes, from your silence, that you took no pleasure in conversing with your friends” Cleanthes replied, “It is because I know the value of this pleasure, that I am silent for I wish my friends to enjoy it as well as myself.” The reason which he assigned for the superiority of former philosophers above the present was, that formerly philosophers studied things, whereas now they study only words. When he was old, he still retained the entire use of his faculties, and often said, that he should always think life worth preserving as long as he should be able to write and "study. Long after his death; which happened in his ninetieth year, the Roman senate paid respect to his memory, by ordering a statue to be erected in honour of him at Assus.

Early in the year 1736, when young Cleghorn had scarcely entered into his twentieth year, so great had been his progress, and so high a character had he acquired, that at the recommendation of Dr. St. Clair he was appointed urgeon in the 22d regiment of foot, then stationed in Minorca, under the command of Gen. St. Clair. During a residence of thirteen years in that island, whatever time could be spared from attending the duties of his station, he employed either in investigating the nature of epidemic diseases, or in gratifying the passion he early imbibed for anatomy, frequently dissecting human bodies, and those of apes, which he procured from Barbary, and comparing structure with the descriptions of Galen and Vesalius. In these pursuits he was much assisted by his correspondent Dr. Fothergill, who he acknowledges was indefatigable in searching the London shops for such books as he wanted, and in forwarding them by the earliest and best opportunities.

In 1749 he left Minorca, and came to Ireland with the S2d regiment; and in autumn 1750 he went to London, and, during his publication of “The Diseases of Minorca,” attended Dr. Hunter’s anatomical lectures. In the publication of his book he was materially assisted by Dr. Fothergill. This work not only exhibits an accurate state of the air, but a minute detail of the vegetable productions of the island; and concludes with medical observations, important in every point of view, and in some instances either new, or applied in a manner which preceding practitioners had not admitted. We are indebted to Dr. Cleghorn for recommending acescent vegetables in low, remittent, and putrid fevers, and the early and copious exhibition of bark, which had been interdicted from mistaken facts, deduced from false theories.

, was the son of colonel Cleland, that celebrated fictitious member of the Spectator’s Club whom Steele describes under the name of Will Honeycombe. He was educated at Westminster- school, to which he was admitted in 1722, and was there the contemporary of lord Mansfield, He was early in life sent as consul to Smyrna, where perhaps he first imbibed those loose principles which in the infamous work he afterwards wrote, are so dangerously exemplified. On his return from Smyrna, he went to the East Indies; but, quarrelling with some of the members of the presidency of Bombay, he made a precipitate retreat from the east, with little or no benefit to his fortune. Being without profession, or any settled means of subsistence, he soon fell into difficulties; a prison and its miseries were the consequences. In this situation, about the year 1750, one of those booksellers who disgrace the profession, offered him a temporary relief for writing a work most grossly immoral, and fit only for the brothels, which brought a stigma on his name that time has not obliterated. The sum given for the copy was 20 guineas; the sum received for the sale could not be less than 10,000l. For this publication he was called before the privy council; and the circumstance of his distress being known, as well as his being a man of some parts, John earl Granville, the then president, nobly rescued him from the like temptation, by getting him a pension of 100l. a. year, which he enjoyed to his death, and which had so much the desired effect, that except the “Memoirs of a Coxcomb,” which has some smack of dissipated manners, and the “Man of Honour,” written as an amende honorable for his former exceptionable book, he dedicated the rest of his life to political, dramatic, and philological studies. In 1765 he published “The Way to Things by Words, and to Words by Things,” 8vo, which wast followed in 1768 by “Specimens of an Etymological Vocabulary, or Essay by means of the Analytic method to retrieve the ancient Celtic,” and Proposals for publishing by subscription, in 2 vols. 4to, “The Celtic retrieved by the Analytic method, or reduction to Radicals; illustrated by various and especially British antiquities;” but he does not appear to have received encouragement sufficient to enable him to print this work. In these publications, however, he has displayed a fund of ingenuity and erudition, not unworthy the education he received at Westminster. His political effusions appeared chiefly in the Public Advertiser, under the signatures A Briton, Modestus, &c. but were tedious and dull. His dramatic trifles and occasional poems were more lively, although they had not strength to survive their day. He Jived within the income of his pension, with some addition from his newspaper labours, in a retired situation in Petty France, where he died Jan. 23, 1789, in his eightieth year, having survived his infamous publication long enough to see, we trust with shame and sorrow, the extensive misery it created, and which it never was in his power to check.

is said to have been born at Rome, where he probably became the companion and fellow labourer of St. Paul; and was one of those, as it is generally imagined, whom St. Paul mentions as having their “names written in the book of life.” Origen calls him a disciple of St. Peter; and it is not unlikely that he might aid and assist this apostle in founding the church at Rome. It is certain, that he was afterwards bishop of that see; but when he was made so, cannot be clearly determined. Some follow the authority of Tertullian and Eusebius, that Clemens was consecrated by St. Peter, but admitted at first to preside over that part only of the church which comprised the Jewish converts; and that he did not come into the full possession and administration of his office till the death of Linus, who had been ordained by St. Paul, bishop of the Gentile church, and of Anacletus, who succeeded him: and this has been fixed to the year 93. Others have contended, that Clemens succeeded to the care of the whole church in the year 64 or 65, and that he held it to the year 81, or, as others again will have it, 83; but all this, with the other circumstances of this father’s life, are matters of conjecture.

We have nothing remaining of his works, of whose genuineness we can be certain, excepting one epistle, which Dr. Lardner thinks was written in the year 95 or 96. It was written to the church of Corinth, in the name of the church of Rome, to quiet some disturbances which had been raised by unruly brethren in the former; and to reestablish and confirm them in that faith which had been delivered to them by the apostles, but from which some of them had revolted. This epistle has usually been esteemed one of the most valuable monuments which have come down to us of ecclesiastical antiquity, and affords ample testimony to the antiquity, genuineness, or authority of the books of the New Testament, while it bears itself all the characters of primitive simplicity. References to, and quotations from it, are often to be found among the early writers for Christianity. Here Clemens exhorts the Corinthians to be united, and at peace with one another he enjoins obedience particularly, and submission to their spiritual governors he declares those who had formed cabals against their pastors s and had troubled the church with their seditions, utterly unworthy of the name of Christians: he points out to them the fatal consequences of such divisions: he presses them to return immediately to their duty, by submitting to their rightful pastors, and practising all humility, kindness, and charity one towards another.

, an eminent father of the church in the end of the second and beginning of the third century, was an Athenian, or according to others an Alexandrian on which account he is usually called Clemens Alexandrines, by way of distinguishing him from Clemens Romanus. When Pantsenus was sent by Demetrius, bishop of Alexandria, to preach the gospel to the Indians, at th6 request of their ambassadors, about the year 191 Clemens succeeded him in the catechetical school. He acquitted himself admirably well in this employment, and had many eminent pupils, as Origen and Alexander bishop of Jerusalem. Clemens’s method of instructing the catechumens is said to have been this. He pointed out to them, and explained all that was good in the pagan philosophy; and then led them on insensibly to Christianity. In his philosophic character, which he too much preserved, he was an eclectic; that is, not attached to any particular sect of philosophers, but a selector of what he thought good and sound in them all.

1. “Protrepticon ad gentes,” or, An exhortation to the pagans in which he refutes the error and falsehood of their religion, and exhorts them to embrace Christianity. 2. “Paedagogus,” or, the schoolmaster: or, a regular plan of duty for the Christian convert. And, 3. The “Stromata.” Daniel Heinsius has well enough compared these three works of Clemens to the three different degrees which the heathen mystagogues and philosophers observed, when they introduced a candidate to the knowledge of the jnysteries: the first of which was purgation, the second initiation, and the third intuition. Clemens, he adds, in his “Protrepticon” has laboured to purge his pupil from the filth of heathen idolatry and superstition: in his “Psedagogus” he has initiated him into the rites and duties of a Christian: and in his “Stromata” he has admitted him. to a sight of those mysteries which the adepts only were qualified to contemplate; but it must be allowed that his philosophical opinions frequently tended to obscure his theology, and he is less explicit than most of the fathers on the leading principles of Christianity.

, one of the popes so called, whose proper name was Bertrand de Gouth, or de Goth, was appointed bishop of Comminges, then archbishop of Bourdeaux by Boniface VIII. and afterwards elected pope at Perugia, June 5, 1305. The ceremony of his coronation was performed at Lyons, Sunday, November 10, but interrupted by a wall giving way, from being overloaded with spectators: by which accident John II. duke of Bretany was ^killed, the king wounded, and the tiara thrown from the pope’s head. This accident was considered as a presage of the misfortunes which afflicted Italy and all Christendom during the pontificate of Clement V. He was the first pope who resided at Avignon. In 1311, he held the general council of Vienne, appropriated to himself the first year’s revenue of all the English benefices, which was the origin of first fruits, abolished the order of templars, and made the collection of what are called the “Clementine Constitutions” of which there are some scarce editions; Mentz, 1460, 1467, and 1471, fol. They formed afterwards part of the body of canon law. Clement V. died at Roquemaure on the Rhone, April 20, 1314, as he was going to Bourdeaux for change of air. It is generally allowed that he was a reproach to the church, and the high office he held in it.

, a learned French historian,- and a Benedictine of the congregation of St. Maure, was born at Beze in Burgundy, April 7, 1714, After his first studies at the college of Dijon, he embraced the monastic life in the abbey of Vendome, where he studied so hard as to injure his health. Being afterwards ordered to Paris by his superiors, he devoted himself principally to history, to which his attention was drawn by that vast collection of French historical documents, of which we have already spoken so largely in the lives of Bouquet and Andrew du Chesne, and which was continued by Haudiquier, Housseau, Precieux, and Poirier. Clement became now their successor in this great work, and in conjunction with father B rial, published in 1770 the twelfth volume, and in 1786 the thirteenth, enriched by two hundred articles of great value and curiosity. Clement wrote also, 1. “Nouveaux eclaircissemens sur l'origine de Pentateuque des Samaritains,” a work begun by Poncet, and completed with a preface, &c. by Clement. 2. “A Catalogue of the Mss. in the library of the Jesuits at St. Germain-des-Pres. 3.” L'art de verifier les dates,“1780 1792, 3 vols. folio. This work, which is accounted in France a master-piece of learning, was begun by the Benedictins Antine, Clemencet, and Durand, whose labours, however, are far inferior to those of Clement, who employed thirty years of his life upon it, almost without any intermission. The only objection is to the chronological table, or index, which is said to be somewhat inaccurate. Clement was a free associate of the academy of inscriptions, but his studies were interrupted by the revolution, which obliged him to quit one convent after another, and at last seek an asylum with a nephew. The remainder of his days were employed in a work to introduce the former, under the title of” L'art de verifier les dates avant J. C." In this he had made considerable progress, when he was carried oft by a stroke of apoplexy, March 29, 1793.

, the celebrated queen of Egypt, was the daughter of Ptolemy Auletes, king of that country; who, dying in the year 51 B. C. bequeathed his crown to the eldest of his sons and the eldest of his daughters; ordering them to be joined to each other in marriage, according to the usage of their family, and jointly to govern. They were both of them very young, Cleopatra the eldest being only seventeen; and therefore he committed them to the tuition of the Roman senate. They, however, could not agree, either to be married, or to reign together, and Ptolemy, the brother, having deprived Cleopatra of that share in the government which was left her by Auletes’s will, and driven her out of the kingdom, she raised an army in Syria and Palestine, and commenced a war with him. At this time Julius Caesar, who was in pursuit of Pompey, came to Alexandria, and began to arbitrate between Ptolemy and his sister Cleopatra. But Cleopatra, considering that Cossar was extravagantly addicted to women, laid a plot to attach him first to her person, and next to her cause: and requested that she might be peiv mitted to plead her cause in person before him. This being granted, she came secretly into the port of Alexandria in a small skiff towards the dusk of the evening; and contrived to be carried to Caesar’s apartment, who was too sensible of the charms of beauty not to be touched with those of Cleopatra. She was then in the prime of her youth, about the twentieth year of her age; a perfect beauty, with a commanding address, and a voice harmonious and bewitching. All these charms she prostituted immediately to Caesar, who next morning sent for Ptolemy, and pressed him to receive his sister again upon her own terms: but Ptolemy appealed to the people, and a war commenced, in which Ptolemy lost a battle, and his life, in endeavouring to escape. Caesar then settled the kingdom upon Cleopatra, and the surviving Ptolemy, her younger brother, as king and queen. This Ptolemy, however, was at this time only eleven years old, and Cleopatra, when he was grown up, and capable of sharing the royal authority, causeu him to be poisoned, and thus reigned alone in Egypt. However, she followed Caesar to Rome, and was there when he was killed in the senatehouse; but being terrified by that accident, and the subsequent disorders of the city, she made her escape with great precipitation.

It would not be to our purpose to be particular in relating the war between Antony and Caesar; the battle of Actium, as is well known, determined the victory in favour of the latter, and Cleopatra flying first, Antony hastened after. He conceived however great displeasure against her upon this occasion, and continued three days without seeing her; but afterwards recovered his usual humour, and devoted himself to pleasure. Meanwhile, Cleopatra made trial of all sorts of poisons upon criminals, even to the biting of serpents; and finding, after many experiments, that the sting of an asp gave the quickest and the easiest death, it is believed she made choice of that kind of death, if she should be driven to despair. After they were returned to Egypt, and found themselves abandoned by all their allies, they sent to make proposals to Caesar. Cleopatra asked the kingdom of Egypt for her children; and Antony desired he might live as a private man at Athens, if Caesar was not willing he should remain in Egypt. Cuesar absolutely rejected Antony’s proposal, and sent to Cleopatra that he would refuse her nothing that was just and reasonable, if she would rid herself of Antony, or drive him out of her kingdom. She refused to act openly against Antony; but betrayed him in every effort that he made, till she obliged him to put an end to his own life, for fear of falling into Crcsar’s hands. When Antony was dead, Cleopatra could not forbear most passionately bemoaning the loss of him: however, upon Caesar’s approach to Alexandria, she began to consult her own security. Near the temple of Isis she had raised a stately building, which she designed for her sepulchre: into this she now retired; and into this was carried by her order all her treasure, as gold, jewels, pearls, ivory, ebony, cinnamon, and other precious woods. It was filled besides with torches, faggots, tow, and other combustible matter: so that Caesar, who had notice of it, was afraid lest out of despair she should burn herself in it, with all those vast riches and therefore contrived to give her hopes from time to time that she might expect all good usage, from the esteem he had for her. It was his secret wish to expose this queen in his triumph to the Romans; and with this view he sent Proculus to employ all his art and address in seizing her, which he at length accomplished, and Cassar, although extremely glad to have her in his possession, commanded her to be served in all respects like a queen. She became, however, inconsolable for the loss of her liberty, and fell into a fever, which gave her hopes that all her sorrows would soon end with her life. She had besides resolved to abstain from eating; but this being known, her children were threatened with death if she persisted in that. Caesar at length resolved to see her, and by his civilities endeavoured to reconcile her to life. He found her upon a low bed; but as soon as she saw Caesar, she rose up in her shift, and threw herself at his feet. Caesar civily raised her up, and sat down at her bed’s head. She began to justify herself; but the proofs against her being too notorious, she turned her justification into prayers, and put into his hand an inventory of all her treasure and jewels. Having private notice soon after, that she was to be carried to Rome within three days, to grace Caesar’s triumph, she caused herself to be bitten by an asp, which, it is said, was brought to her concealed in a basket of figs; and of this she died. Caesar, deprived as he was of the greatest ornament of his triumph, yet ordered her a very magnificent funeral; and her body, as she desired, was laid by that of Antony.

The first thing he published, after he was settled at Amsterdam, was a work of his uncle David Le Clerc, late professor of the oriental languages at Geneva, entiled “Theological Dissertations,” Amst. 1685, 8vo; to which are subjoined dissertations on the same subject by Stephen. Le Clerc, his father, with the lives of both, and notes, in which he frequently differs from them in opinion. In 1687 he published another volume by them, consisting of a “Computus Ecclesiasticus” by David, and some philosophical dissertations by Stephen. About the same time he was editor of his friend Charles Le Cene’s “Dialogues upon several theological subjects,” to which he added five of his own, pointing out the mischiefs that metaphysics have occasioned to religion. Between the first and second publication of his father’s and uncle’s pieces, commenced his celebrated controversy with the learned father Simon, who had just published his “Critical History of the Old Testament.” Le Clerc, in 1685, published a criticism, upon it, entitled “Sentimens de quelques theologiens de Hollande,” &c. In this he vented several bold opinions, which he afterwards retracted or explained into a more harmless sense, such as that the Pentateuch was not written by Moses, that the writers of the Old and New Testament were not inspired, &c. Even Bayle, although not scrupulous to make bold assertions, disapproved Le Clerc’s sentiments, as tending to confirm the Calvinists in their dislike of the Arminians, as a sect, which he strongly says, they considered as the common sink of all the Atheists, Deists, and Socinians in Europe.

In 1694, he published his “Life of Cardinal Richelieu,” 2 vols. 8vo, of which a second edition appeared in 1696, and a third in 1714. In 1696 he also published two tracts on “Lotteries,” and on “Incredulity.” In 1697, his “Compendium of Universal History” appeared, and although merely an abridgment of Petavius, has been found so useful as to pass through several editions. In 1698, he published his Latin translation of Hammond’s “Paraphrase and Notes on the New Testament,” 2 vols. fol. but took many liberties, as already noticed, with Hammond’s sentiments. This was again reprinted in 1714. In 1699, he published, with a dedication to Dr. Sharp, archbishop of York, his “Harmonia Evangelica,” Gr. and Lat. and in the same year the first of his “Parrhasiana” or thoughts upon various subjects, moral and literary. This does not appear to have given universal satisfaction, and involved him in a long dispute with Bayle on the principles of the Manicheans, and in another with the same gentleman, on the system of plastic natures advanced by Cudworth and Dr. Grew. We are not of opinion that a longer account of these disputes would now be very interesting, yet those who have patience to peruse the several attacks and replies of the combatants, will be frequently struck with their talents, ingenuity, and perseverance.

Our predecessors affect to wonder that Le Clerc, who always expressed an high regard for the English nation, dedicated several of his principal works to the prelates and great men of it, and was so instrumental, by means of his “Bibliotheques,” in spreading the abilities, learning, and merits of its ablest writers throughout Europe, should yet be so frequently attacked by some or other of its scholars and divines, and this they explain by adding that Le Clerc’s Arminian principles were directly opposite to the nonjuring and high church principles, which then prevailed much in England; that though he expressed a zeal for Christianity, yet he abhorred any thing which looked like an hierarchy; and that hence he was often led to speak favourably, and perhaps with some degree of approbation, of books published here, which were in the mean time, together with their authors, anathematised by our own divines. Tindal’s “Rights of the Christian Church,” which came out in 1706, affords a memorable instance, which Le Clerc, in his “Bibliotheque Choisie” of the same year, not only approved, but even epitomised, and recommended it in the strongest terms imaginable. It may be remembered also, that about the same time, or perhaps a little before, there was a scheme formed among some great personages, to bring Le Clerc over -to England, and to make a better provision for him than he enjoyed at Anasterdam; for this some affirm to have been one cause of the jealousy and ill-will conceived against him; but after what we have said of Le Clerc’s religious principles, it will not perhaps be thought that any other reason is necessary to explain the zeal of his opponents, or their opinion that such a determined enemy to the establishment and its doctrines would have proved no great acquisition to the church of England.

He always enjoyed a very good state of health till 1728, when he was seized with a palsy and fever, which deprived him of speech and almost of memory. The malady increased daily; and after spending the last six years of his life with little or no understanding, he died Jan. 8, 1736, in his seventy-ninth year. He had been married in 1691, when he was abuut thirty-four years old; and his wife, who was the daughter of Gregorio Leti, brought him four children, who all died young. Le Clerc was not ambitious of either honours or riches. He was satisfied with a competency of fortune, if indeed he could be said to have it; and though it may be supposed that he was driven to write so much for the sake of the profits attending it, yet he tells us in that life which he wrote of himself to 1711, that he had received for all his labours little else from the booksellers than books. Whatever projects might be on foot for his coming into England, they do not seem to have been begun on his side: for he always appeared happy in the studious and philosophic ease which he enjoyed at Amsterdam, dividing his time between his pupils and his books.

, an eminent designer and engraver, was born at Metz, in 1637, of a family in such an humble condition, that he entered while very young into the abbey of St. Arnould, in that city, in quality of helper in the kitchen. He had such a natural talent for drawing, that all the moments of leisure he could get from his employment he Hlled up in making little portraits with a pen on such scraps of paper as he found about the kitchen. The prior of the house caught him one day occupied in this manner; and, on examining his performance, perceived in it such marks of genius as allowed him not to doubt that young Le Clerc would attain to excellence if assisted by art. He immediately took the resolution to cultivate his natural talents, put the crayon into his hand, and gave him to the care of one of the monks, with orders to get him instructed. At ten years old he could handle the graver. At the same time he applied himself to the study of geometry, perspective, fortification, and architecture, in which he made as rapid a progress as in drawing and engraving. Marshal de la Ferte made choice of him for his geographical engineer; Louis XIV. for his engraver in ordinary, at the solicitation of Colbert; and pope Clement XI. honoured him with the title of a Roman knight. In addition to this superior merit, and this strong capacity for the arts, Le Clerc had kind affections and an insinuating address. He died at Paris the 25th of October, 1714, at the age of seventy-seven. This master treated every subject with equal excellence; as landscapes, architecture, ornaments, discovering a lively and glowing imagination kept under due restraint, a correctness of design, a wonderful fertility, and elegant expression and execution. The productions of his graver, amounting to upwards of 3000, would have been sufficient of themselves to have gained him great reputation, independently of those of his pen. The principal of the latter kind are: 1. “A Treatise of Theoretic and Practical Geometry,” reprinted in 174-5, 8vo, with the life of the author. Colbert, informed of the success of this work, ordered Le Clerc a pension of 600 crowns, and apartments in the Gobelins. But he presently after gave up this pension, which confined him to the king’s service, in order to work more freely, and on subjects of his own choice. 2. “A Treatise on Architecture,” 12 vols. 4to. 3. “A Discourse on Perspective,” in which the author shews a profound knowledge of his subject. After Callot, he is the engraver who has most distinctly shewn five or six leagues extent of country in a small space.

, or rather Cleiveland (for so he and his family spelt their name) (John), a noted loyalist and popular poet in the reign of Charles I. was the eldest son of the rev. Thomas Cleiveland, M. A. some time vicar of Hinckley, and rector of Stoke, in the county of Leicester. He was born in 1613, at Loughborough, where his father was then assistant to the rector; but educated at Hinckley, under the rev. Richard Vynes, a man of genius and learning, who was afterwards as much distinguished among the presbyterian party as his scholar was among the cavaliers. In his fifteenth year our poet was removed to Cambridge, and admitted of Christ’s college, Sept. 4, 1627, where he took the degree of B. A. in 163 1 He was thence transplanted to the sister foundation of St. John’s college in the same university, of which he was elected fellow March 27, 1634, and proceeded to the degree of M. A. in 1635. Of this society he continued many years a principal ornament, being one of the tutors, and highly respected by his pupils, some of -whom afterwards attained to eminence. By the statutes of that college, he should have taken orders within six years after his being elected fellow: but he uas admitted on the law line (as the phrase there is) November 2, 1640, and afterwards on that of physic, January 31, 1642, which excused him from complying with this obligation; though it does not appear that he made either law or physic his profession: for, remaining at college, he became the rhetoric reader there, and was usually employed by the society in composing their speeches and epistles to eminent persons (of which specimens may be seen in his works), being in high repute at that time for the purity and terseness of his Latin style. He also became celebrated for his occasional poems in English, and, at the breaking out of the civil wars, is said to have been the first champion that appeared in verse for the royal cause; which he also supported by all his personal influence: particularly by exerting his interest in the town of Cambridge, to prevent Oliver Cromwell (then an obscure candidate, but strongly supported by the puritan partv) from being elected one of its members. Cromwell’s stronger genius in this, as hi every other pursuit, prevailing, Cleveland is said to have shown great discernment, by predicting at so early a period, the fatal consequences that long after ensued to the cause of royalty. Cromwell got his election by a single vote, which Cleveland declared “had ruined both church and kingdom.” The parliament party carrying all before them in the eastern counties, Cleveland retired to the royal army, and with it to the king’s head quarters at Oxford, where he was much admired and caressed for his satirical poems on the opposite faction, especially for his satire on the Scottish covenanters, entitled “The Rebel Scot.” In his absence he was deprived of his fellowship, Feb. 13, 1644, by the earl of Manchester, who, under the authority of an ordinance of parliament, for regulating and reforming the university of Cambridge, ejected such fellows of colleges, &c. as refused to take the solemn league and covenant. From Oxford Cleveland was appointed to be judge-advocate in the garrison at Newark, under sir Richard Willis the governor, and has been commended for his skilful and upright conduct in this difficult office, where he also distinguished his pen occasionally, by returning smart answers to the summons, and other addresses to the garrison. Newark, after holding out the last of all the royal fortresses, was at length, in 1646, by the express command of the king (then a prisoner in the Scots army), surrendered upon terms, which left Cleveland in possession of his liberty, but destitute of all means of support, except what he derived from the hospitality and generosity of his brother loyalists, among whom he lived some years, obscure and unnoticed by the ruling party, till, in November 1655, he was seized at Norwich, as “a person of great abilities,” adverse and dangerous to the reigning government; and being sent to Yarmouth, he was there imprisoned for some time, till he sent a petition to the lord-protector, wherein the address of the writer has been much admired, who, while he honestly avows his principles, has recourse to such moving topics, as might sooth his oppressor, and procure his enlargement: in which he was not disappointed, for the protector generously set him at liberty, disdaining to remember on the throne the opposition he had received in his canvass for parliament as a private burgess. Cleveland thence retired to London, where he is said to have found a generous Maecenas; and, being much admired among all persons of his own party, became member of a club of wits and loyalists, which Butler, the author of Hiir dibras, also frequented. Cleveland then lived in chambers at Gray’s-inn (of which Butler is said to have been a member), and, being seized with an epidemic intermitting fever, died there on Thursday morning, April 29, 1659. His friends paid the last honours to his remains by a splendid funeral: for his body was removed to Hunsdon -house, and thence carried for interment, on Saturday May 1, to the parish church of St. Michael Royal, on College-hill, London, followed by a numerous attendance of persons eminent for their loyalty or learning: to whom his funeral sermon was preached by his intimate friend Dr. John Pearson, afterwards bishop of Chester, author of the Exposition of the Creed.

Cleveland has had the fate of those poets, who, “paying their court to temporary prejudices, have been at one time too much praised, and at another too much neglected.” Both his subjects, and his manner of writing, made his poems extremely popular among his contemporaries, but entirely forgotten and disregarded since. For his manner, he excelled among that class of writers so much admired in the last century, whom our great critic has aptly termed “metaphysical poets, who abound with witty rather than just thoughts, with far-fetched conceits, and learned allusions, that only amuse for a moment, utterly neglecting that beautiful simplicity and propriety which will interest and please through every age.” For his subjects he generally chose the party disputes of the day, which are now no longer understood or regard-ed. Contemporary with Milton, he was in his time exceedingly preferred before him; and Milton’s own nephew, Phillips, tells us, he was by some esteemed the best of the English poets. But Cleveland is now sunk into oblivion, while Milton’s fame is universally diffused. Yet Milton’s works could, with difficulty, gain admission to the press, at the time when it was pouring forth those of Cleveland in innumerable impressions; and the press now continually teems with re- publications of the Paradise Lost, &c. whereas the last edition of Cleveland’s works was in 1687, 8vo.

Few letters have excited a more general admiration; the reason of which is thus explained by Dr. Campbell, in his “Philosophy of Rhetoric.” “We shall find,” says he, “that the very same sentiment expressed diffusely, will be admitted barely to be just expressed concisely, will be admired as spirited. To recur to examples, the famous answer returned by the countess of Dorset, to the letter of sir Joseph Williamson, secretary of state to Charles the Second, nominating to her a member for the borough of Appleby, is an excellent illustration of this doctrine. If we consider the meaning, there is mention made of two facts, which it was impossible that any body of common sense, in this lady’s circumstances, should not have observed, and of a resolution in consequence of these, which it was natural for every person who had a resentment of bad usage to make. Whence then results the vivacity, the fire which is so manifest in the letter? Not from any thing extraordinary in the matter, but purely from the laconism of the manner. An ordinary spirit would have employed as many pages to express the same thing, as there are affirmations in this short letter. The epistle might in that case have been very sensible, and withal very dull; but would never have been thought worthy of being recorded as containing any thing uncommon, or deserving a reader’s notice.”

The countess’s funeral sermon was preached on the 14-th of April, 1676, at Appleby, by Dr. Edward Rainbow, bishop of Carlisle. The text chosen by him, in reference to the numerous works of architecture in which she was perpetually employed, was from the Proverbs of Solomon “Every wise woman buildeth her house.” The bishop has entered very largely into her character, and in describing the extent of her understanding, informs us, that Dr. Donne said to her ladyship, in her younger years, “That she knew well how to discourse of all things, from predestination to slea-silk.” Her munificence and spirit in building were very conspicuous. One of her first structures was a pillar, in the highway, at the place where she and her mother last parted, and took their final farewell; and besides a monument to her tutor Samuel Daniel, the poetical historian, and another to Spenser, she founded two hospitals, and repaired or built seven churches and six castles.

, third earl of Cumberland, and father to the preceding, was very eminent for his skill in navigation. He was born at Brougham castle, We*stmoreland, Aug. 8, 1558, and educated at Peterhouse, Cajnbridge, where his tutor was the celebrated John Whitgift^ afterwards archbishop of Canterbury. In this place he applied himself chiefly to the study of the mathematics, to which his genius led him, and by which he became qualified for the several great expeditions he afterwards undertook. His first public employment, of a melancholy kind indeed, was in 1586, when he was one of the peers who sat in judgment upon Mary queen of Scots. But having a greater inclination to act by sea than by land, and, according to the fashion of the times, being bent on making foreign discoveries, and defeating the ambitious designs of the court of Spain, then preparing the armada that was to conquer England, he fitted out, at his own charge, a little fleet, consisting of three ships and a pinnace, with a view to send them into the South Sea, to annoy the Spanish settlements there. They sailed from Gravesend, June 26, 1586, and from Plymouth Aug. J7; but were forced back hy contrary winds into Dartmouth, from whence putting out again on the 29th, they fell in with the coast of Barbary the 17th September, and the next day sailed into the road of Santa Cruz. On the 25th they came to the river Oro, just under the northern tropic, where they anchored. Searching upwards the next day, they found that river to be as broad all the way for fourteen or fifteen leagues, as at the mouth, which was two leagues over; but met with no town nor house. On the last of September they departed for Sierra Leone; where they arrived the 2 1st of October, and going on shore, they burned a town of the negroes, and brought away to their ships about fifteen tons of rice; and having furnished themselves with wood and water, they sailed the 2 1st of November from Sierra Leone, making the straights of Magellan. The 2d of January 1587 they discovered land; and on the 4th of that month fell in with the American shore, in 30 deg. 40 min. south lat. Continuing their course southward, they took, January 10, not far from the river of Plata, a small Portuguese ship; and the next day another; out of which they furnished themselves with what necessaries they wanted. The 12th of January they came to Seal Island, and two days after to the Green Island, near which they took in water. Returning to Seal Island, a consultation was held on the 7th of February, whether they should continue their course for the South Sea, and winter in the straights of Magellan, or spend three or four months upon the coast of Brazil, and proceed on their voyage in the spring. The majority being for the former, they went as far as 44 degrees of southern latitude. But meeting with storms and contrary winds, they took a final resolution, on the 21st of February, to return to the coast of Brazil. Accordingly they fell in with it the 5th of April, and, after taking in water and provisions in the bay of Camana, came into the port of Baya the llth. Eight Portuguese ships being there, they found means to carry off four of them, the least of which were of a hundred and thirty tons, notwithstanding all the resistance made by the enemy; and also brought a supply of fresh provision from the shore. In this spirited manner, the earl undertook no less than eleven expeditions, fitted out at his own expence, in which he made captures to a prodigious amount 5 and, on his return, was graciously received by his royal mistress, who created him knight of the garter in 1591. In 1601 he was one of the lords that were sent with forces to reduce the earl of Essex to obedience. He departed this life at the Savoy in London, Oct. 30, 1605, and was buried at Skipton, in Yorkshire, the 30th of March following; where a fine toinb was afterwards erected to his memory.

To fulfil his engagement in the service to which he had been appointed, he embarked in one of the ships belonging to the East India company, and arrived at Madras in 1744. In his new employment he however discovered the same dislike to application, and the same aversion to controul, by which his character had hitherto been distinguished. This intractable disposition proved as disagreeable to his superiors as it must have been the occasion of much inconvenience to himself. One instance is related. Having acted or neglected something inconsistently with the discipline of office, his misconduct was reported to the governor, who commanded him to ask pardon of the secretary whom he had offended. He made his submission in terms of contempt, which the secretary mistaking for a compliment, invited him to dinner. “No, sir,” replied Clive, “the governor did not command me to dine with you.”

Though his exploits will excite the admiration, and receive the plaudits of posterity, yet in his lifetime the same ingratitude was shewn him, which the greatest men, in all ages and countries, have experienced; for, on the pretence “that all acquisitions made under the influence of a military force, or by treaty with foreign powers, do of right belong to the state,” a party in the house of commons, countenanced by the minister, attempted to ruin both his fortune and his fame. A motion was made in this assembly, on the 21st of February, 1773, to resolve, that, “in the acquisition of his wealth, lord Clive had abused the powers with which he was entrusted.” The speech he made on the occasion concluded with the following words “If the resolution proposed should receive the assent of the house, I shall have nothing left that I can call my own, except my paternal fortune of 500l. a year; and which has been in the family for ages past. But upon this I am content to live; and perhaps I shall find more real content of mind and happiness, than in the trembling affluence of an unsettled fortune. But to be called, after sixteen years have elapsed, to account for my conduct in this manner; and after an uninterrupted enjoyment of my property, to be questioned, and considered as obtaining it unwarrantably, is hard indeed! and a treatment of which I should not think the British senate capable. Yet if this should be the case, I have a conscious innocence within me, which tells me that my conduct is irreproachable. Frangas non fades. They may take from me what I have*, they may, as they think, make me poor, but I will be happy. Before I sit down, I have one request to make to the house, that when they come to decide upon my honour, they will not forget their own.” The house of commons rejected the motion, and resolved, “that lord Clive had rendered great and meritorious services to his country.”

Lord Clive was one of the few men whose conduct was always directed by the dictates of his own mind, and whose decisions were therefore secret. Like the first of the Caesars, the talents of other men could add nothing to the reach of his genius, or the correctness of his judgment. Lord Chatham emphatically called him a heaven-born general; as, without experience, or being versed in military affairs, he surpassed all the officers of his time. In parliament, he represented, from the year 1760, to his decease, the ancient borough of Shrewsbury, the chief town of the county wherein he was born. The interest which he took in the disputations of this assembly, was seldom sufficient to induce him to speak; but when the attack upon his conduct had called into action the powers of his mind, his eloquence was such as has not been often surpassed.

, an actress of great merit, whose piaiden name was Raftor, was born in 1711, and shewed a very early inclination and genius for the stage. Being recommended to Cibber, he immediately engaged her at a small salary, and she made her first appearance on the stage in boy’s clothes, in the character of Isnienes, the page of Ziphores, in the play of “Mithridates,” at Drury-lane theatre. Continuing to improve in her profession, she added both to her salary and her fame. In 1731 her performance of Nell in the “Devil to pay,” fixed her reputation as the greatest performer of her time in that species of character, in which for more than thirty years she remained without a rival. In the next year, 1732, she united herself in marriage with George Clive, a gentleman of the law, and brother to baron Chve; an union which was not productive of happiness to either party. They soon agreed to separate, and for the rest of their lives had no intercourse together. Mr. Clive, if we mistake not, died at Bath in 1780, but we doubt whether he was brother to the baron of the exchequer, as above mentioned. In 1768, Mrs. dive’s intimate friend Mrs. Pritchard quitted the stage; and the succeeding year she determined to follow her example; but certainly might have continued several years longer to delight the public in various characters adapted to her figure and time of life, as to the last she was admirable and unrivalled. From this time Mrs. Clive retired to a small but elegant house near Strawberry-hill, Twickenham, where she passed the remainder of her life in ease and independence, respected by the world, and beloved by a circle of friends; at which place, after a short illness, she departed this life, December 6, 1785. A'more extensive walk in comedy than that of Mrs. Clive cannot be imagined; the chambermaid, in every varied shape which art or nature could lend her; characters of whim and affectation, from the high-bred lady Fanciful, to the vulgar Mrs. Heidelberg; country girls, romps, hoydens, and dowdies; superannuated beauties, viragoes, and humourists. To a strong and pleasing voice, with an ear for music, she added all the sprightly action requisite to a number of parts in ballad farces. Her mirth was so genuine, that whether it was restrained to the arch sneer and the suppressed half-laugh, widened to the broad grin, or extended to the downright honest burst of loud laughter, the audience was sure to accompany her. Mrs. Clive, in private life, was so far above censure, that her conduct in every relation of it was not only laudable but exemplary. For her benefits she introduced some trifling pieces on the stage, written by herself or hejr friends, but of no great merit.

, an ingenious professor of the veterinary art, was born at Norwich, Aug. 12, 1725. His father was a blacksmith, in humble life, and could only afford to allow his son a short time for instruction, in the elements of reading, writing, and arithmetic. He was taken from school before he had made much progress in his education; and when he was seventeen years old, he was obliged, by the death of his father, to carry on the business for the benefit of his mother and her family, which consisted of four children. About the year 1750, he was first noticed by Dr. Kirwan Wright, an eminent physician, and a man of learning, who encouraged him to direct his mind to the investigation and treatment of the diseases of horses. To this pursuit he devoted his attention with great zeal and success. Through the same friend he was induced to acquire a knowledge of the Latin and French languages, in. order to make himself acquainted with the best authors on farriery and medicine, but particularly Vegetius and La Fosse. His Latin teacher was a Mr. Pagan, under whose tuition he made a rapid progress: and in French he instructed himself without the help of any master. He was much assisted in his Latin studies by acting as an amanuensis, and sometimes read in^ Latin books, to Dr. Wright, who had the misfortune to be deprived of his sight. During this time he was a hard worker as well as a hard student. He used to work at the forge, the regular hours, from sixo'clock in the morning until eight at night, and then frequently got ready the nails requisite for his men the next day. To his labours as a blacksmith, a veterinary practitioner, a student of Latin and French, he added others, as a student of mathematics. He became a member of a society established in Norwich, among men of original minds and small incomes, for improvement in mathematics and experimental philosophy, under the direction of Mr. Peter Bilby. Here ho associated with John Fransham, with Mr. Arderon, F. 11. S. a friend and correspondent of Baker, whose inquiries with the microscope excited general interestat that time, and with other working and thinking men. Mr. Clover had a greater quickness of apprehension, and excelled Fransham in mathematics; but the latter had made a greater proficiency in the classics, and was therefore qualified to become his master. After his return from his eccentric excursion to Newcastle, Mr. Clover employed Fransham occasionally to ride the horses home after they were shod, and whilst the iron was heating, they used both to be employed in Latin exer^ses and mathematical problems, worked upon a slate hung against the forge. Thus the tutor assisted in all the labours of his pupil, and, ' after correcting an exercise, or discussing the properties of a circle, he earned his frugal meal by conducting home the horses which his pupil had shod. Natural philosophy, natural history, and botany, engaged much of this little Bilbean society’s attention. Mr. Clover demonstrated at several of their meetings the origin and progress of the bots found in the stomach and intestines of horses, so early as 1753. He discovered the manner in which the larvae of these insects f&strus equij are conveyed from the coat of the horse, where they are deposited by the fly, into the animal’s stomach; and he illustrated, by many experiments, the whole progress of their transformation, which has been since so well described by Mr. B. Clarke, in the Linnean Transactions for 1796. In 1765, Mr. Clover’s reputation had increased so much that he relinquished working at the forge, and devoted himself wholly to the veterinary art. In this he was assisted by the most eminent medical practitioners of those days, particularly Mr. Gooch, who has inserted in the second volume of his surgical cases, a letter from Mr. Clover, giving a description and a drawing of an ingenious machine invented by him for the cure of ruptured tendons and fractured legs in horses. For many years Mr. Clover was severely afflicted with giddiness and pain in his head, which obliged him to decline business in 178!. He continued, however, to interest himself in every improvement that was made, and always took delight in recounting the results of his extensive experience. One of his greatest amusements was to talk with those who studied physic and surgery; and he continued to read the new medical publications, and to deliver short private lectures on the theory and practice of the healing art, with a lively interest, until the very day of his death. It is to be regretted that he never could be prevailed upon to extend the usefulness of his knowledge and experience in the diseases of animals, by any publication of his observations; but he felt a diffidence and fastidiousness in writing that could never be overcome, though his readiness to communicate information was universally acknowledged. The latter end of his life was cheered by the amusement of gardening, in which he excelled. He marked the gradual decay of his bodily organs with perfect tranquillity and composure, and watched his declining pulse when he expired Feb. 19, 1811, in the eighty-sixth year of his age. With an understanding vigorous and acute, and n. power of discrimination and discernment peculiar to himself, Mr. Clover possessed the external advantage of a strong muscular frame of body, which was tall and well proportioned.

, justly celebrated for his astonishing miniatures and illuminations in missals and other religious books, was born in Sclavonia in the year 1498. He was originally educated for the church, and took orders, but was afterwards suffered to relinquish the sacerdotal habit by a dispensation from the pope. Soon after the age of eighteen, his love of painting prompted him to travel to Rome, where he was taken into the service of the cardinal Grimani, by whom he was, for the space of three years, employed in making careful pen-drawings from the finest medals. He afterwards became the scholar of Julio Romano, and made considerable advancement in oil-painting; but his master, perceiving the extraordinary talent which he evinced for miniature, succeeded in persuading him to apply himself entirely to that branch of the art; and' it may with justice be said, that we owe to the sagacity of Julio Romano, and the unexampled assiduity of Clovio, the most exquisite and delicately finished performances of that kind in the known world; since he not only far surpassed all who went before him, but to this day stands unrivalled, by all those who have since attempted to walk in his footsteps. In addition to the instruction which our artist received from the favourite scholar of Raffaele, he derived great benefit from the works of Buonarotti, many of which he copied in a most beautiful and finished manner; and he afterwards reaped great advantage from the friendship and experience of Girolamo da 1 Libri, a miniature painter of great note at Verona: the result of all these studies was a style of drawing, partaking of the purity of the Roman, and the grandeur of the Florentine school; united, not unfrequently, to the rich colouring of Titian or the ambient hue of Correggio.

, or Cluvier), a celebrated geographer, was born of an ancient and noble family at Dantzic, in 1580, and educated by his father with a great deal of care, and sent to Leyden to study the civil law. But Cluver had no inclination for law, and his genius inclining him early to the love of geography, Joseph Scaliger is said to have advised him to make that his particular study, and not to do violence to his inclinations any longer. This advice was followed, upon which Cluver presently set out for the Low Countries, in order to take a careful survey of them but passing- through Brabant, for the sake of paying a visit to Justus Lipsius, he had the misfortune to be robbed, which obliged him to return immediately to Leyden. Meanwhile, his father, incensed by his deserting the study of the law, refused to furnish him with money, which drove him to bear arms, as he afterwards did two years in Hungary and Bohemia. It happened at that time, that the baron of Popel, who was his friend, was arrested by an order from the emperor; and thinking himself extremely ill used, he drew up a kind of manifesto by way of apology, which he sent to Cluver to translate into Latin. This Cluver having performed, caused it to be printed at Leyden which so displeased the emperor, that he complained by his ambassador to the States, and had Cluvcr arrested. Ciuver, however, was soon set at liberty, upon which he returned to his geographical studies, and travelled through several countries, particularly England, France, Germany, and Italy. He was also a great linguist, being able to talk with ease and fluency, as we are told, no less than ten languages. He died at Ley den, 1623, only forty -three years old, justly esteemed the first geographer who had put his researches in order, and reduced them to certain principles.

, was a famous Hebrew professor at Bremen, where he was born in 1603. In 1650 he was chosen to teach theology at Leyden, which he did with great reputation, and died there 1669, aged sixty-six, leaving a son. Cocceius wrote long commentaries on the Bible, and other works, which made much noise in Holland, and were printed at Amsterdam, 1701, 10 vols. fol. In 1708 was published his “Opera Anecdota Theologica et Philologica,” 2 vols. fol. His singular method of interpreting the Holy Scriptures raised him opponents in Voetius, Desmarets, and several other protestants; but he had nevertheless, and has still, numerous disciples in Holland, who are called Cocceians, and believe, like him, and like many other divines in other countries, that there will be a visible reign of Christ upon earth, by which that of antichrist shall be abolished; and that during this reign, the Jews and all nations being converted, the church should attain its highest glory. In explaining the Scriptures, he always looked beyond the literal meaning to something that should wear the appearance of mystery. He regarded the Old Testament as a perpetual representation or mirror of the history of Christ, and his church; he maintained that all the Jewish prophecies have a relation to Christ, and that his miracles, actions, and sufferings, and those of his apostles, were types of future events.

In 1693, when she was only fourteen years of age, she wrote some verses, and sent them to Mr. Bevil Higgons, tf on his sickness and recovery from the small-pox,“and was only in her seventeenth year when she produced a tragedy, entitled” Agnes de Castro,“which was acted with applause at the Theatre-Royal in 1695, and printed the following year in 4to, without her name. The play is founded upon a French novel of the same title, printed at Paris in 1688. In 1697, she addressed some verses to Mr. Congreve on his” Mourning Bride“which gave rise to an acquaintance between her and that celebrated writer. In 1698, her tragedy, entitled” Fatal Friendship,“was performed at the new theatre in Lincoln’s-inn-fields, and printed the same year in 4to, with a dedication to the princess Anne of Denmark. This play was considered as the most perfect of her dramatic performances and it was praised by Hughes and Farquhar. On the death of Mr. Dry den, in 1701, our poetess joined with several other ladies, in paying a just tribute to his memory in verse. Their performances were published together in that year, under the title of” The Nine Muses; or, Poems written l>y so many Ladies, upon the death of the late famous John Dryden, esq.“The same year she also brought upon the stage a comedy, called” Love at a Loss; or, most votes carry it,“acted at the Theatre-Royal, and published in quarto; but on account of her absence from London while it was in the press, it was so incorrectly printed, that she would gladly have suppressed the edition; and many years after she revised it, with a view to a second performance, which never took place. Soon after, before the close of the year 1701, she produced another tragedy, called” The Unhappy Penitent,“which was performed at the Theatre-Royal in Drury-lane, also printed in 4to. In the midst of this attention to poetry and dramatic writing, she spent much of her time in metaphysical studies. She was a great admirer of Mr. Locke’s” Essay on Human Understanding;" and drew up a defence of that work, against some remarks written by Dr. Thomas Burnet, master of the Charter-house. This was published in May 1702, without a name, lest the public should be prejudiced against a metaphysical treatise written by a woman. She also professed herself to be desirous of concealing her name, from an unwillingness tobe known to Mr. Locke, under the character of his defender. But her name was not long concealed; and Mr. Locke desired his cousin, Mr. King, afterwards lord chancellor, to pay her a visit, and make her a present of books; and upon her owning her performance, he wrote her a letter of acknowledgment. She also received a letter of thanks for this piece from Mrs. Burnet, the last wife of the celebrated prelate of that name. It appears, that at the latter end of 1701, she was some time at Salisbury, on a visit to her relations in that city.

A considerable part of the summer of 1707 was spent by Mrs. Trotter at Ockham- Mills, near Ripley, in the county of Surrey. During her retirement there, Mr. Fenn, a young clergyman of an excellent character, paid his addresses to her, but she had previously engaged in a correspondence by letters with Mr. Cockburn , which terminated in a mirriage in the beginning of 1708. Mr. Cockburn had taken orders in the church of England but a short time before his marriage; and soon after that event, he had the donative of Nayland in Suffolk, where for some time they settled; but Mr. Cockburn removed to London to be curate of St. Dunstan’s church in Fleet-street. In this situation he remained till the accession of king George the First, when, entertaining some doubts about taking the oath of abjuration, he was obliged to quit his curacy, and for ten or twelve years was reduced to great difficulties in procuring subsistence for his family. During that period, he was employed in instructing the youth of an academy in Chancery-lane in the Latin tongue. But in 1726, by consulting the lord chancellor King, and his own father, upon the meaning and intent of the oath of abjuration, and byreading some papers which were put into his hands upon the subject, he was at length reconciled to taking it. In consequence of this, being the following year invited to be minister of the episcopal congregation at Aberdeen, he qualified himself conformably to the law; and on the day of king George the Second’s accession, he preached there a sermon on the duty and benefit of praying for the government. This sermon was printed, and being animadverted upon, he published a reply to the remarks on it, with some papers relative to the oath of abjuration, which were much commended. Soon after his settlement at Aberdeen, the lord chancellor King presented him to the living of LongHorseley, near Morpeth, in Northumberland, in order to enable him the better to support his family, and he was permitted to remain at Aberdeen, till the negligence and ill behaviour of the curates, whom he employed at LongHorseley obliged him to quit his station at Aberdeen in 1737, whereby his income was considerably lessened.

In her younger years, Mrs. Cockburn was much celebrated for her beauty, as well as for her genius and other accomplishments. She was small of stature, but was distinguished by the unusual vivacity of her eyes, and the delicacy of her complexion, which continued to her death. In her private character she appears to have been benevolent and generous; and remarkable for the uncommon evenness and chearfulness of her temper. Her conversation was innocent, agreeable, and instructive: she had not the least affectation of being thought a wit; but was modest and diffident, and constantly endeavoured to adapt her discourse to her company. Throughout the whole course of her life, she seems to have been in very narrow and straitened circumstances; and after her marriage she had little leisure for study, and was very ill provided with books. But she endured the inconveniences of her situation, with a patience and fortitude that were truly exemplary. It is justly observed by Dr. Birch, that “her abilities as a writer, and the merit of her works, will not have full justice done them, without a due attention to the peculiar circumstances in which they were produced; her early youth, when she wrote some; her very advanced age, and ill state of health, when she drew up others; the uneasy situation of her fortune, during the whole course of her life; and an interval of nearly twenty years, in the vigour of it, spent in the cares of a family, without the least leisure for reading or contemplation. After which, with a mind so long diverted and encumbered, resuming her studies, she instantly recovered its entire powers, and in the hours of relaxation from her domestic employments, pursued, to their utmost limits, some of the deepest inquiries of which the human mind is capable.” It was in 1751, that her works were published by Dr. Birch, 2 vols. 8vo, under the following title: “The Works of Mrs. Catherine Cockburn, theological, moral, dramatic, and poetical.” None of her dramatic pieces were included in this collection, excepting “The Fatal Friendship,” it being found, that all her writings could not be comprised in the two volumes proposed to be printed for those who had subscribed for her works. Besides the other pieces already mentioned in the course of this account of her life, Dr. Birch’s collection contains, a letter of advice to her son; letters between Dr. Sharp, archdeacon of Northumberland, and prebendary of Durham, and Mrs, Cockburn, concerning the foundation of moral virtue letters between Mrs. Cockburn and several of her friends and some short essays in prose, with several songs, and other poems.

, one of the curopalates, or officers who had the care of the imperial palace of Constantinople, appears to have flourished in the latter part of the fifteenth century, and wrote a treatise concerning the origin of that city in the Greek language, and another concerning the officers of the palace, and those of the great church in that city. These works were translated into the Latin by George Douza and Francis Junius, and printed in Greek and Latin at Paris, in 1615. His Antiquities of Constantinople were published by Goar, at the royal press, in 1648, fol.

Thou hast no faults, or I no faults can spy,

Thou art all beauty, or all blindness I.

, a miscellaneous writer and translator of the seventeenth century, and probably an ancestor of the preceding, was born of an ancient family in Gloucestershire, in 1602, and educated at Oxford, where he was elected demy of Magdalen college, in July 1619, and completed his degree of M. A. in 1626. He then travelled, and on his return settled as a private gentleman in Norfolk, where he married. Wood says he was always accounted a puritan. He died of the plague in London, in 1665. His publications are: 1. “The Life and Death of Robert earl of Essex,” Loud. 1646, 4to, in which, according to Wood, he shewed himself a “rank parliamentarian.” 2. “A Collection of Proverbs.” 3. “The Life of Æsop,” prefixed to Barlow’s edition of the Fables, 1666, fol. 3. A translation of Du Moulin “On the Knowledge of God,” Lond. 1634. 4. “Heptameron, or the History of the Fortunate Lovers,” ibid. 1654, 8vo. The original of this was written by Margaret de Valois, queen of Navarre. He published also translations of Justin, Quiutus Curtius, the comedy of Ignoramus, and the prophecies of the German Prophets, &c.

, called likewise P. Van Aelst, from the place of his nativity, a town in Flanders, was, if we may judge from the writers who have spoken of him, or from the admirable prints remaining from his designs, one of the greatest painters which either Germany or Flanders produced in his age. After he had been some time instructed in the school of Bernard of Brussels, he went to Rome to complete his studies, and soon proved himself an excellent designer, and a bold and spirited painter, as well in fresco as in oil. At his return to his own country he married, but his wife soon dying, he once more travelled, and at the solicitations of a merchant, a friend of his, accompanied him to Constantinople in 1531. Having stayed some time with the Turks, and drawn some most animated representations of their customs and ceremonies, which he afterwards cut in wood, he once more arrived in the place of his nativity, and took a second wife. Towards the latter part of his life he wrote some excellent treatises upon geometry, architecture, and perspective. His pictures of history, as well as his portraits, were much esteemed. He was made painter to the emperor Charles V. and died at Antwerp in 1550. After his death, the prints which he had made of Turkish costume were published by his widow. This admirable work consists of seven large pieces, which, when joined together, form a frieze, divided into compartments by Cariatides on a tablet in the first block is written in old French “Les moeurs et fachom de faire de Turcz, avecq les regions y appertenantes, ont est au vif contrefaicetze par Pierre Cceck d‘Alost, luy estant en Turque, Tan de Jesu Christ MDXXXIII. lequel aussy de sa main propre a pourtraict ces figures duysantes a Pimpression dy’celles;” and on the last is this inscription: “Marie ver hulst, vefue du diet Pierre d'Alost, tres passe en Tan MDL. a faict imprimer les diet figures, soubz grace et privilege dTimperialle majeste en Tan MCCCCCLIII.” These prints are very rare.

, an eminent French merchant, was the richest subject in Europe in the fifteenth century. He enjoyed an office of trust in the court of Charles VII. of France, and his industry was of more service to that country, than the boasted bravery of a Dunois or a Maid of Orleans. He had established the greatest trade that had ever been carried on by any private subject in Europe; and since his time Cosmo de Medicis is the only person that equalled him. He had 300 factors in Italy and the Levant. He lent 200,000 crowns of gold to his master, Charles VII. without which he never could have recovered Normandy; and therefore nothing can be a greater stain to the annals of this reign, than the persecution of so useful a man. After he had represented his prince in foreign states, he was accused of having poisoned the beautiful Agnes Sorel, Charles’s mistress; but this was without foundation, and the real motive of his persecution is not known. He was by the king’s order sent to prison, and the parliament tried him: all that they could prove against him was, that he had caused a Christian slave to be restored to his Turkish master, whom this slave had robbed and betrayed; and that he had sold arms to the sultan of Egypt. For these two facts, one of which was lawful, and the other meritorious, his estate was confiscated, and he was condemned to the amende honorable, and to pay a fine of 100,000 crowns. He found more virtue in his clerks than in the courtiers who ruined him: the former contributed to relieve him under his misfortunes, and one of them particularly, who had married his niece, facilitated his escape out of his confinement and out of France. He went to Rome, where Calixtus III. filled the papal chair, who gave him the command of part of a fleet which he had equipped against the Turks. He died on his arrival at the Isle of Chio, in 1456; therefore Mr. de Voltaire is mistaken in saying, in his “Essay on Universal History,” that “he removed to Cyprus, where he continued to carry on his trade; but never had the courage to return to his ungrateful country, though strongly invited.” Charles VII. afterwards restored some part of Coeur’s property to his children.

, a learned and ingenious physician, was born at Hildesheim, in Lower Saxony, towards the end of the seventeenth century. Being educated to the practice of medicine, after taking the degree of doctor, he went to M.unster, where he soon distinguished himself by his superior skill and abilities. His works, which are numerous, bear ample testimony to the vigour of his intellects, and of his application to letters. His last work, “If ermippus Redivivus,” in which he professes to shew the practicability of prolonging the lives of elderly persons to 115 years, by receiving the breath and transpirations of healthy young females, was written, or first published, when he was in his seventy-seventh year. This was translated into English, and published, with additions and improvements, by the late Dr. John Campbell, under the title of “Hermippus liedivivus, or the Sage’s triumph over old Age and the Grave.” A vein of humour runs through this, and indeed through most of the productions of this writer, which gave them great popularity when first published, though they are now little noticed, excepting, perhaps, the work ju$t mentioned, in which the irony is extremely delicate; in his rhapsody against the prevailing passion of taking snuff, he affects to consider a passion for taking snuff as a disease of the nostrils, similar to that affecting the stomach of girls in chlorosis, and therefore calls it the pica nasi. The title of this production is, “Dissertatio satyrica, physico-medico-moralis, de Pica Nasi sive Tabaci sternutatorii moderno abusu, et noxa,” Amstelodami, 1716, 12mo.

Ruysch, in the latter part of his life, imagined he had discovered a muscle at the ftindus uteri, to which he delegated the office of expelling the placenta, and to which he thought the performance of that duty might be left. This our author has ridiculed in a little volume, to which he gave the title of “Lucina Ruyschiana, sive musculus uteri orbicularis a clarissimo D. D. Ruyschio delectus,” published at Amsterdam, 1731. He published, the preceding year, “Archaeus faber febrium et medicus,” and in 1716, “Neothea,” written to shew the folly of sending to China for tea, when we have so many herbs at hand, as pleasant, and more healthy; but his wit was not powerful enough to make either the use of tea or tobacco unfashionable. For the titles of others of his works, see Boerhaave’s Methodus Studii Medici. Cohausen died at Munster, July 18, 1750, in the eighty-fifth year of his age.

, the Vauban of the Dutch, was born in 1632, or, according to Saxius, in 1641. His genius for the art of war, and for constructing fortifications, displayed itself early in life. Being engineer and lieutenant-general in the service of the States-general, he fortified and defended the greater part of their places. It was a curious spectacle, says the president Heinault, to see in 1692, at the siege of Namur, the fort Cohorn besieged by Vauban, and defended by Cohorn himself. He did not surrender till after he had received a wound judged to be mortal, but which, however, did not prove to be so. In 1703 the elector of Cologne, Joseph Clement, having espoused the part of France, and received a French garrison into Bonn, Cohorn kept up such a strong and terrible fire upon the place, that the commandant surrendered it three days afterwards. This great man died at the Hague in 1704, leaving the Hollanders several places fortified by his industry and skill, Bergen-op-zoom, which he called his master-piece, but which, it ought to be mentioned, he left unfinished, was taken in 1747 by the marshal de Loewendahl, notwithstanding its fine fortifications, which caused it to be regarded as impregnable. We have a treatise by Cohorn, in Dutch, on the new method of fortifying places.

, an English poet, the son of Thomas Cokayne, esq. of Ashbourne-hall, in Derbyshire, and of Pooley, in Warwickshire, was born in 1608, at Elvaston, in Derbyshire, the seat of the family of his mother, Anne, daughter of sir John Stanhope, of Elvaston, knt, He was educated at Trinity- college, Cambridge, and in 1632 set out on his travels through France and Italy, of which he has given an account in a poem to his sou Mr. Thomas Cokayne. On his return he married Anne, daughter of sir Gilbert Kniveton, of Mercaston, in Derbyshire, knt. and retiring to his lordship of Fooley, gave himself up to his books and boon companions. Fie boasts, among his poetical friends, of Donne, Suckling/ Randolph, Drayton, Massinger, Habington, Sandys, and May; and appears also to have cultivated the acquaintance of sir William Dugdale, and other antiquaries. During the civil war, he suffered greatly for his religion, the Romari Catholic, and for what was then as obnoxious, his loyalty to Charles I. under whom he claimed the title ofa baronet. His losses also were increased by his want of ceconomy, and he was obliged to part with his estates during his life, which terminated in Feb. 1684, when he was privately buried in the chancel of Polesworth church. His poems and plays, with altered title-pages, were printed and reprinted in 1658, and are now purchased at high prices, chiefly as curiosities. His mind appears to have been much cultivated with learning, and it is clear that he possessed considerable talents, but he scarcely exhibits any marks of genius. He is never pathetic, sublime, or even elegant; but is generally characterized by a kind of familiarity which amounts to doggrel, and frequently to flatness and insipidity. Still, as our valuable authority adds, it is im possible to read notices of so many of his contemporaries, whose habits of life are recalled to our fancies, without feeling a subordinate kind of pleasure that gives these domestic rhymes a lively attraction.

After this marriage, by which he became allied to some of the noblest houses in the kingdom, preferments flowed in upon him apace. The cities of Coventry and Norwich chose him their recorder; the county of Norfolk, one of their knights in parliament; and the house of commons, their speaker, in the thirty-fifth year of queen Elizabeth. The queen likewise appointed him solicitor-general, in 1592, and attorney-general the year following. Some time after, he lost his wife, by whom he had ten children; and in 1598 he married Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas Jord.Burleigh, afterwards earl of Exeter, and relipt of sir William Hatto.n. As this marriage was the source of many troubles to both parties, so the very celebration of it occasioned no small noise and disquiet, by an unfortunate circumstance that attended it. There had been the same year so much notice taken of irregular marriages, that archbishop Whitgift had signified to the bishops of his province to prosecute strictly all that should either offend in point of time, place, or form. Whether Coke looked upon his own or the lady’s quality, and their being married with the consent of the family, as placing them above such restrictions, or whether he did not advert to them, it is certain that they were married in a private house, without either banns or license; upon which he and his new married lady, the minister who officiated, Thomas lord Burleigh, and several other persons, were prosecuted in the archbishop’s court; but upon their submission by their proxies, were absolved from excommunication, and the penalties consequent upon it, because, says the record, they had offended, not out of contumacy, but through ignorance of the law in that point. The affair of greatest moment, in which, as attorney-general, he had a share in this reign, was the prosecution of the earls of Essex and Southampton, who were brought to the bar in Westminster-hall, before the lords commissioned for their trial, Feb. 19, 1600. After he had laid open the nature of the treason, and the many obligations the earl of Essex was under to the queen, he is said to have closed with these words, that, “by the just judgment of God, he of his earldom should be Robert the last, that of a kingdom thought to be Robert the first.”

In May 1603, he was knighted by king James; and the same year managed the trial of sir W. Raleigh, at Winchester, whither the term was adjourned, on account of the plague being at London; but he lessened himself greatly in the opinion of the world, by his treatment of that unfortunate gentleman; as he employed a coarse and scurrilous language against him hardly to be paralleled. The resentment of the public was so great upon this occasion, that as has been generally believed, Shakspeare, in his comedy of the “Twelfth Night,' 7 hints at this strange behaviour of sir Edward Coke at Raleigh’s trial. He was likewise reproached with this indecent behaviour in a letter which sir Francis Bacon wrote to him after his own fall; wherein we have the following passage:” As your pleadings were wont to insult our misery, and inveigh literally against the person, so are you still careless in this point to praise and disgrace upon slight grounds, and that suddenly; so that your reproofs or commendations are for the most part neglected and contemned, when the censure of a judge, coming slow, but sure, should be a brand to the guilty, and a crown to the virtuous. You will jest at any man in public, without any respect to the person’s dignity, or your own. This disgraces your gravity more than it can advance the opinion of your wit; and so do all your actions, which we see you do directly with a touch of vainglory. You make the laws too much lean to your opinion; whereby you shew yourself to be a legal tyrant, &c.“January 27, 1606, at the trial of the gun-powder conspirators, and March 28 following, at the trial of the Jesuit Garnet, he made two very elaborate speeches, which were soon after published in a book entitled” A true and perfect relation of the whole Proceedings against the late most barbarous traitors, Garnet, a Jesuit, and his confederates, &c.“1606, 4to. Cecil earl of Salisbury, observed in his speech upon the latter trial,” that the evidence had been so well distributed and opened by the attorney-general, that he had never heard such a mass of matter better contracted, nor made more intelligible to the jury.“This appears to have been really true; so true, that many to this day esteem this last speech, especially, his masterpiece. It was probably in reward for this service, that he was appointee! lord chief justice of the common-pleas the same year. The motto he gave upon his rings, when he was called to the degree of serjeant, in order to qualify him for this promotion, was,” Lex est tutissima cassis;“that is,” The law is the safest helmet.“Oct. 25, 1613, he was made lord chief justice of the kingVbench; and in Nov. was sworn of his majesty’s privy-council. In 1615 the king deliberating upon the choice of a lord- chancellor, when that r-ost should become vacant, by the death or resignation of Egerton lord Ellesmere, sir Francis Bacon wrote to his majesty a letter upon that subject, wherein he lias the following passage, relating to the lord chiefjustice:”If you take my lord Coke, this will follow: First, your majesty shall put an over-ruling nature into an overruling place, which may breed an extreme. Next, you shall blunt his industries in matter of finances, which seemeth to aim at another place. And lastly, popular men are no sure mounters for your majesty’s saddle." The disputes and animosities between these two great men are well known. They seem to have been personal; and they lasted to the end of their lives. Coke was jealous of Bacon’s reputation in many parts of knowledge; by whom, again, he was envied for the high reputation he had acquired in one; each aiming to be admired particularly in that in which the other excelled. Coke was the greatest lawyer of his time, but could be nothing more. If Bacon was not so, we can ascribe, it only to his aiming at a more exalted character; not being able, or at least not willing, to confine the universality of his genius within one inferior province of learning.

Sir Thomas Overbury’s murder in the Tower now broke out, at the distance of two years after; for Overbury died Sept. 16, 1613, and the judicial proceedings against his murderers did not commence till Sept. 1615. In this affair sir Edward acted with great vigour, and, as some think, in a manner highly to be commended; yet his enemies, who were numerous, and had formed a design to humble his pride and insolence, took occasion, from certain circumstances, to misrepresent him both to the king and people. Many circumstances concurred at this time to hasten his fall. He was led to oppose the king in a dispute relating to his power of granting commendams, and James did not choose to have his prerogative disputed, even in cases where it might well be questioned. He had a contest with the lord chancellor Egerton, in which it is universally allowed that he was much to be blamed. Sir Edward, as a certain historian informs us, had heard and determined a case at common law; after which it was reported that there had been juggling. The defendant, it seems, had prevailed with the plaintiff’s principal witness not to attend, or to give any evidence in the cause, provided he could he excused. One of the defendant’s agents undertakes to excuse him; and carrying the maa to a tavern, called for a gallon of sack in a vessel, and bid him drink. As soon as he had laid his lips to the flaggon, the defendant’s agent quitted the room. When this witness was called, the court was informed that he was unable to come; to prove which, this agent was produced, who deposed, “that he left him in such a condition, that if he continued in it but a quarter of an hour, he was a dead man.” For want of this person’s testimony the cause was lost, and a verdict given for the defendant. The plaintiffs, finding themselves injured, carried the business into chancery for relief; but the defendants, having had judgment at common law, refused to obey the orders of that court. Upon this, the lord chancellor commits them to prison for contempt of the court: they petition against him in the star-chamber; the lord chief justice Coke joins with them, foments the difference, and threatens the lord chancellor with a pnemunire. The chancellor makes the king acquainted with the business, who, after consulting sir Francis Bacon, then his attorney, and some other lawyers upon the affair, justified the lord chancellor, and gave a proper rebuke to Coke.

Roger Coke gives us a different account of the occasion of the chief justice’s being in disgrace; and informs us, that he was one of the first who felt the effects of the power of the rising favourite, Villiers, afterwards duke of Buckingham. The author of the notes on Wilson’s “Life of James,” published in the second volume of Kennet’s “Complete History of England,” tells us “that sir Edward lost the king’s favour, and some time after his place, for letting fall some words upon one of the trials, importing his suspicion that Overbury had been poisoned to prevent the discovery of another crime of -the same nature, committed upon one of the highest rank, whom he termed a sweet prince; which was taken to be meant of prince Henry.” Whatever were the causes of his disgrace, Which it is probable were many, he was brought upon his knees before the council at Whitehall, June J 6 16; and offences were charged upon him by Ylverton, the solicitor-general, implying, amongst other things, speeches of high contempt tittered in the seat of justice, and uncomely and undutiful carriage in the presence of his majesty, “the privy council, and judges.” Soon after, he presented himself again at the council-table upon his knees, when secretary Winwood informed him, that report had been made to his majesty of what had passed there before, together with the answer that he had given, and that too in the most favourable manner; that his majesty was no ways satisfied with respect to any of the heads; but that notwithstanding, as well out of his own clemency, as in regard to the former services of his lordship, the king was pleased not to deal heavily with him: and therefore had decreed, 1. That he be sequestered from the council-table, until his majesty’s pleasure be further known. 2. That he forbear to ride his summer circuit as justice of assize. 3. That during this vacation, while he had time to live privately and dispose himself at home, he take into his consideration and reviewhis books of Reports; wherein, as his majesty is informed, be many extravagant and exorbitant opinions set down and published for positive and good law: and if, in reviewing and reading thereof, he find any thing fit to be altered or amended, the correction is left to his discretion. Among other things, the king was not well pleased with the title of those books, wherein he styled himself “lord chief justice of England,” whereas he could challenge no more but lord chief justice of the King’s-bench. And having corrected what in his discretion he found meet in these Reports, his majesty’s pleasure was, he should bring the same privately to himself, that he might consider thereof, as in his princely judgment should be found expedient. Hereunto Mr. secretary advised him to conform himself in all duty and obedience, as he ought; whereby he might hope that his majesty in time would receive him again to his gracious and princely favour. To this the lord chief justice made answer, that he did in all humility prostrate himself to his majesty’s good pleasure; that he acknowledged that decree to be just, and proceeded rather from his majesty’s exceeding mercy than his justice; gave humble thanks to their lordships for their goodness towards him; and hoped that his behaviour for the future would be such as would deserve their lordships’ favours. From which answer of sir Edward’s we may learn that he was, as such men always are, as dejected and fawning in adversity, as he was insolent and overbearing in prosperity; the same meanness and poorness of spirit influencing his behaviour in both conditions.

In October he was called before the chancellor, and forbid Westminster-hall; and also ordered to answer several exceptions against his Reports. In November the king removed him from the office of lord chief justice. Upon his disgrace, sir Francis Bacon wrote him an admonitory letter, in which he remonstrates to him several errors yi his former behaviour and conduct. We have made a citation from this letter already; we will here give the remainder of it: for though perhaps it was not very generous in Bacon to write such a letter at such a season, even to a, professed adversary, yet it will serve to illustrate the character and manners of Coke. In this letter Bacon advised sir Edward to be humbled for this visitation and observes, “that affliction only levels the molehills of pride in us, ploughs up the heart, and makes it fit for wisdom to sow her seed, and grace to bring forth her increase.” He afterwards points out to him some errors in his conduct. “In discourse,” says he, “you delight to speak too much, not to hear other men. This, some say, becomes a pleader, not a judge. For by this sometimes your affections are entangled with a love of your own arguments, though they be the weaker; and with rejecting of those which, when your affections were settled, your own judgment would allow for strongest. Thus, while you speak in your element, the law, no man ordinarily equals you; but when you wander, as you often delight to do, you then wander indeed, and never give such satisfaction as the curious time requires. This is not caused by any natural defect, but first for want of election; when you, having a large and fruitful mind, should not so much labour what to speak, as to find what to leave unspoken. Rich soils are often to be weeded, Secondly, you cloy your auditory. When you would be observed, speech must be either sweet or short. Thirdly, you converse with books, not men, and books specially humane; and have no excellent choice with men, who are the best books. For a man of action and employment you seldom converse with, and then but with underlings; not freely, but as a schoolmaster, ever to teach, never to learn. But if sometimes you would in your familiar discourse hear others, and make election of such as knew what they speak, you should know many of those tales, which you tell, to be but ordinary; and many other things, which you delight to repeat and serve in for novelties, to be but stale. As in your pleadings you were wont to insult even misery, and inveigh bitterly against the person so are you still careless in this point,” &c. “Your too much love of the world is too much seen, when having the living of 10,000l. you relieve few or none. The hand that hath taken so much, can it give so little? Herein you shew no bowels of compassion, as if you thought all too little for yourself, or that God had given you all that you have, only to that end you should still gather more, and never be satisfied, but try how much you could gather, to account for all at the great and general audit day. We desire you to amend this, and let your poor tenants in Norfolk find some comfort, where nothing of your estate is spent towards their relief, but all brought up hither to the impoverishing your country.” He then tells him, “that in the case of Overbury he used too many delays, till the delinquent’s hands were loose, and his own bound; and that he was too open in his proceedings, and so taught them how to defend themselves. But that,” continues he, “which we commend you for, are those excellent parts of nature and knowledge in the law, which you are endued withal. But these are only good in their good use. Wherefore we thank you heartily for standing stoutly in the commonwealth’s behalf; hoping, it proceedeth not from a disposition to oppose greatness, as your enemies say, but to do justice, and deliver truth indifferently without respect of persons.”

A parliament was summoned, and met January 1621; and in February there was a great debate in the house of commons upon several points of importance, such as liberty of speech, the increase of popery, and other grievances. Sir Edward Coke was a member, and his age, experience, and dignity gave him great weight there: but it very soon appeared that he resolved to act a different part from what the court, and more especially the great favourite Buckingham, expected. He spoke very warmly; and also took occasion to shew, that proclamations against the tenor of acts of parliament were V9id: for which he is highly commended by Camden. The houses, being adjourned by the king’s command in June, met again in November; and fell into great heats about the commitment of sir Edwin Sands, soon after their adjournment, which had such unfortunate consequences, that the commons protested, Dec. 18, against the invasion of their privileges. The king prorogued the parliament upon the 21st; and on the 27th, sir Edward Coke was committed to the Tower, his chambers in the Temple broke open, and his papers delivered to sir Robert Cotton and Mr. Wilson to examine. January 6, 1622, the parliament was dissolved: and the same day sir Edward was charged before the council with having concealed some true examinations in the great cause of the earl of Somerset, and obtruding false ones: nevertheless, he was soon after released, but not without receiving high marks of the king’s resentment: for he was a second time turned out of the king’s privy-council, the king giving him this character, that “he was the fittest instrument for a tyrant that ever was in England.” And yet, says Wilson, in the house he called the king’s prerogative an overgrown monster. Towards the close of 1623 he was nominated, with several others, to whom large powers were given, to go gver to Ireland; which nomination, though accompanied with high expressions of kindness and confidence, was made with no other view but to get him out of the way for fear he should be troublesome, but he remained firm in his opinions, nor does it appear that he ever sought to be reconciled to the court; so that he was absolutely out of favour at the death of king James. In the beginning of the next reign, when it was found necessary to call a second parliament, he was pricked for sheriff of Bucks in 1625, to prevent his being chosen. He laboured all he could to avoid it, but in vain; so that he was obliged to serve the office, and to attend the judges at the. assizes, where he had often presided as lord chief justice. This did not hinder his being elected knight of the shire for Bucks in the parliament of 1628, in which he distinguished himself more than any man in the house of commons, spoke warmly for the redress of grievances, argued boldly in defence of the liberty of the subject, and strenuously supported the privilege of the house. It was he that proposed and framed the petition of rights; and, June 1628, he made a speech, in which he named the duke of Buckingham as the cause of all our miseries, though, lord Clarendon tells us, he had before blasphemously styled him the saviour of the nation; but although there is no great reason to conclude that all this opposition to the arbitrary measures of the court flowed from any principles of patriotism, he became for a time the idol of the party in opposition to the court, and his conduct at this time is still mentioned with veneration by their historians and advocates. Our own opinion is, that although lord Coke was occasionally under the influence of temper or interest, he was, upon the whole, a more independent character than his enemies will admit. After the dissolution of this parliament, which happened the March following, he retired to his house at Stoke Fogeys in Buckinghamshire^ where he spent the remainder of his days; and there, Sept. 3, 1634, breathed his last in his eighty-sixth year, expiring with these words in his mouth, as his monument informs us, “Thy kingdom come! thy will be done!” While he lay upon his death-bed, sir Francis Windebank, by an order of council, came to search for seditious and dangerous papers by virtue whereof he took his “Commentary upon Littleton,” and the “History of his Life” before it, written with his own hand, his “Commentary upon Magna Charta, &c.” the “Pleas of the Crown,” and the “Jurisdiction of Courts,” his eleventh and* twelfth “Reports” in ms. and 51 other Mss. with the last will of sir Edward, wherein he had been making provision for his younger grand-children. The books and papers were kept till seven years after, when one of his sons in 1641 moved the house of commons, that the books and papers taken by sir Francis Windebank might be delivered to sir Robert Coke, heir of sir Edward; which the king was pleased to grant. Such of them as could be found were accordingly delivered up, but the will was never heard of more.

Sir Edward Coke was in his person well-proportioned, and his features regular. He was neat, but not nice, in his dress: and is reported to have said, “that the cleanness of a man’s clothes ought to put him in mind of keeping all clean within.” He had great quickness of parts, deep penetration, a faithful memory, and a solid judgment. He was wont to say, that “matter lay in a little room;” and in his pleadings he was concise, though in set speeches and in his writings too diffuse. He was certainly a great master of his profession, as even his enemies allow; had studied it regularly, and was perfectly acquainted with every thing relating to it. Hence he gained so high an esteem in Westminster-hall, and came to enjoy so large a share in the favour of the great lord Burleigh. He valued himself, and indeed not without reason, upon this, that he obtained all his preferments without employing either prayers or pence; and that he became the queen’s solicitor, speaker of the house of commons, attorney-general, chief justice of both benches, high-steward of Cambridge, and a member of the privy-council, without either begging or bribing. As he derived his fortune, his credit, and his greatness, from the law, so he loved it to a degree of intemperance. He committed every thing to writing with an industry beyond example, and, as we shall relate just now, published a great deal. He met with many changes of fortune; was sometimes in power, and sometimes in disgrace. He was, however, so excellent at making the best of a disgrace, that king James used to compare him to a cat, who always fell upon her legs. He was upon occasion a friend to the church and clergy: and thus, when he had lost his public employments, and a great peer was inclined to question the rights of the church of Norwich, he hindered it, by telling him plainly, that “if he proceeded, he would put on his cap and gown again, and follow the cause through Westminster-hall.” He had many benefices in his own patronage, which he is said to have given freely to men of merit; declaring in his law language, that he would have law livings pass by livery and seisin, and not by bargain and sale.

“His learned and laborious works on the laws,” says a certain author, “will be admired by judicious posterity, while Fame has a trumpetleft her, or any breath to blow therein.” This is indisputably a just character of his writings in general: the particulars of which are as follow. About 1600 were published, in folio, the first part of the “Reports of sir Edward Coke, knt. her majesty’s attorneygeneral, of divers resolutions and judgments given with great deliberation by the reverend judges and sages of the law, of cases and matters in law, which were never resolved or adjudged before: and the reasons and causes of the said resolutions and judgments during the most happy reign of the most illustrious and renowned queen Elizabeth, the fountain of all justice, and the life of the law.” The second, third, and so on to the eleventh part of the “Reports” were all published by himself in the reign of James I. The twelfth part of his Reports has a certificate printed before it, dated Feb. 2, 1655, and subscribed E. Bulstrod; signifying, that he conceives it to be the genuine work of sir Edward Goke. The title of the thirteenth part is, “Select cases in law, reported by sir Edward Coke;” and these are asserted to be his in a preface-signed with the initials J. G.

In 1614 there was published, “A speech and charge at Norwich assizes,” intended to pass for sir Edward Coke’s; but he clearly disclaims it, in the preface to the seventh part of his Reports. He did indeed make a speech at that time, and in some measure to this purpose; but these notes of it were gathered and published without his knowledge in a very incorrect and miserable manner, and published with a design to prejudice and expose him. In 1614 was published in folio, “A book of entries, containing perfect and approved precedents of courts, declarations, informations, plaints, indictments, bars, duplications, rejoinders, pleadings, processes, continuances, essoigns, issues, defaults, departure in despight of the court, demurrers, trials, judgments, executions, and all other matters and proceedings, in effect, concerningthe practic part of the laws of England, in actions real, personal, mixed, and in appeals: being very necessary to be known, and of excellent use for the modern practice of the law, many of them containing matters in law, and points of great learning; collected and published for the common good and beneh't of all the studious and learned professors of the laws of England, 1” His “Institutes” are divided into four parts. The first is the translation and comment upon the “Tenures of Sir Thomas Littleton,” one of the judges of the common-pleas in the reign of Edward IV. It was published in his lifetime, in 1628 but that edition was very incorrect. There was a second published in 1629, said to be revised by the author, and in which this work is much amended; yet several mistakes remained even in that. The second part of the “Institutes” gives us magna charta, and other select statutes, in the languages in which they were first enacted, and much more correct than they were to be had any where else. He adds to these a commentary full of excellent learning, wherein he shews how the common law stood before those statutes were made, how far they are introductory of new laws, and how far declaratory of the old; what were the causes of making them, to what ends they were made, and in what degree, at the time of his writing, they were either altered or repealed. The third part of the “Institutes” contains the criminal law or pleas of the crown: where, among other things, he shews, in regard to pardons and restitutions, how far the king may proceed by his prerogative, and where the assistance of parliament is necessary. The fourth part of the “Institutes” comprehends the jurisdiction of all the courts in this kingdom, from the high court of parliament down to the court-baron. This part not being published till after his decease, there are many inaccuracies and some greater faults in it, which were animadverted upon and amended in a book written by William Pry nne, esq. and published in 1669. The thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth editions of the “Institutes,” 1788, 1789, and 1794, by Hargrave and Butler, are esteemed the best.

, a French poet, was born at Janville in the Orleanois in 1735, and was a votary of the muses from his very infancy. He made his first appearance in the literary world in 1758, by a poetical translation of Pope’s Eloisa to Ahelard; in which he was said to have retained the warmth of the original, with the richness of its images. His tragedies of Astarbe and Calisto, the one performed in 1758, and the other in 1760, were not so successful. The complexion of them is indeed sorrowful, and even gloomy, but never tragical. The “Temple of Guides,” and two of the “Nights” of Young, in French verse, the epistle to M. Duhamel, and the poem of Prometheus, which appeared afterwards, are in general versified in a soft and harmonious manner. The epistle to M. Duhamel, which is replete with rural descriptions and sentiments of beneficence, has been ranked by many of its enthusiastic admirers with the best epistles of Boileau. These several performances excited the attention of the French academy towards the author, who elected him a meaaber at the beginning of 1776; but before he had pronounced his inaugural discourse, he was snatched away by death, in the flower of his age, the 7th of April in the same year, after he had risen from his bed in a state of extreme Weakness, and burnt what he had written of a translation of Tasso. This poet, who has so well described the charms of nature in his poems, and who even understood the art of drawing, yet in all the variety of colours saw only white and black, and only the different combinations of light and shade. This singular organization, however, did not weaken the charms of his imagination. His works were collected in two vols. 8vo, Paris, 1779, and have been since reprinted in 12mo. Among these is a comedy entitled “Les perfidies a la mode,” in which are some agreeable verses, two or three characters well enough drawn, but not a single spark of the vis comica.

, marquis of Segnelai, one of the greatest statesmen that France ever had, was born at Paris in 1619, and descended from a family that lived at Rheirns in Champaigne, originally from Scotland (the Cuthberts), but at that time no way considerable for its splendour. His grandfather is said to have been a winejuerchant, and his father at first followed the same occupation but afterwards traded in cloth, and at last in silk. Our Colbert was instructed in the arts of merchandize, and afterwards became clerk to a notary. In 1648 his relation John Baptist Colbert, lord of S. Pouange, preferred him to the service of Michael le Tellier, secretary of state, whose sister he had married; and here he discovered such diligence and exactness in executing all the commissions that were entrusted to his care, that he quickly grew distinguished. One day his master sent him to cardinal Mazarine, who was then at Sedan, with a letter written by the queen mother; and ordered him to bring it back after that minister had seen it. Colbert carried the letter, and would not return without it, though the cardinal treated him roughly, used several arts to deceive him, and obliged him to wait for it several days. Some time after, the cardinal returning to court, and wanting one to write his agencte or memoranda, desired le Tellier to furnish him with a fit person for that employment; and Colbert being presented to him, the cardinal had some remembrance of him, and desired to know where he had seen him. Colbert was afraid of putting him in mind of Sedan, lest the remembrance of his behaviour in demanding the queen’s letter should renew his anger. But the cardinal was so far from disliking him for his faithfulness to his late master, that he received him on condition that he should serve him with the like zeal and fidelity.

In 1669 he was made secretary of state, and entrusted with the management of affairs relating to the sea: and his performances in this province were answerable to the confidence his majesty reposed in him. He suppressed several offices, which were chargeable and useless: and in the mean time, perceiving the king’s zeal for the extirpation of heresy, he shut up the chamber instituted by the edicts of Paris and Roan. He proposed several new regulations concerning criminal courts; and was extremely severe with the parliament of Tholouse, for obstructing the measures he took to carry the same into execution. His main design in reforming the tedious methods of proceeding at law, was to give the people more leisure to apply themselves to trading: for the advancement of which he procured an edict, to erect a general insurance-office at Paris, for merchants, &c. In 1672 he was made minister of state, and amidst these multiplied employments, it has been observed that he never neglected his own or his family’s interest and grandeur, or missed any opportunity of advancing either. He had been married many years, had sons and daughters grown up; all of whom, as occasion served, he took care to marry to great persons, and thus strengthened his interest by powerful alliances. Business, however, was certainly Colbert’s natural turn; and he not only loved it, but was very impatient of interruption in it. A lady of great quality was one day urging him, when he was in the height of his power, to do her some piece of service; and perceiving him inattentive and inflexible, threw herself at his feet,- in the presence of above an hundred persons, crying, “I beg your greatness, in the name of God, to grant me this favour 1” Upon which, Colbert, kneeling down over against her, replied, in the same mournful tone, “I conjure you, madam, in the name of God, not to disturb me'!”

, a person of considerable learning in the sixteenth century, was born at Godshill in the Isle of Wight, and educated in Wykeham’s school near Winchester. From thence he was chosen to New college, Oxford, of which he became perpetual fellow in 1523, and studying the civil law, took the degree of bachelor in that faculty, March 3, 1529-30. He then travelled into Italy, and improved himself in his studies at Padua, being a zealous Roman catholic, but upon his return to England, he acknowledged king Henry VIII. to be the supreme head of the church of England. In 1540, he took the degree of doctor of the civil law; and the same year resigned his fellowship, being then settled in London, an advocate in the court of arches, prebendary of Yatminster Secunda in the church of Sarum, and about the same time was made archdeacon of Ely. In September, 1540, he was admitted to the rectory of Chelmsford in Essex; and in October following, collated to the prebend of Holbora, which he resigned April 19, 1541; and was the same day collated to that of Sneating, which he voiding by cession in March ensuing, was collated to the prebend of Wenlakesbarne. In 1542 he was elected warden of New College; and in 1545 made rector of Newton Longville in Buckinghamshire. Soon after, when king Edward VI. came to the crown, Dr. Cole outwardly embraced, and preached up the reformation, but altering his mind, he resigned his rectory of Chelmsford in 1547; and in 1551 his wardenship of New College; and the year following, his rectory of Newton Longville. After queen Mary’s accession to the crown, he became again a zealous Roman catholic and in 1554 was made provost of Eton college, of which he had been fellow. The same year, June 20, he had the degree of D. D. conferred on him, and was one of the divines that disputed publicly at Oxford with archbishop Cranmer, and bishop Ridley. He also preached the funeral sermon before archbishop Cranmer' s execution. He was appointed one of the commissioners to visit the university of Cambridge; was elected dean of St. Paul’s the llth of December, 1556; made (August 8, 1557) vicar-general of the spiritualities under cardinal Pole, archbishop of Canterbury; and the first of October following, official of the arches, and dean of the peculiars; and in November ensuing, judge of the court of audience. In 1558 he was appointed one of the overseers of that cardinal’s will. In the first year of queen Elizabeth’s reign he was one of the eight catholic divines who disputed publicly at Westminster with the same number of protestants, and distinguished himself then and afterwards, by his writings in favour of popery, for which he was deprived of his deanery, fined five hundred marks, and imprisoned. He died in or near Wood -street compter, in London, in December, 1579. Leland has noticed him among other learned men of our nation. He is called by Strype “a person more earnest than wise,” but Ascham highly commends him for his learning and humanity. It is evident, however, that he accommodated his changes of opinions to the times, although in his heart he was among the most bigotted and implacable opponents of the reformed religion. His writings were, 1. “Disputation with archbishop Cranmer and bishop Ridley at Oxford,” in 1554. 2. “Funeral Sermon at the Burning of Dr. Thomas Cranmer, archbishop of Canterbury.” Both these are in Fox’s Acts and Monuments. 3. “Letters to John Jewell, bishop of Salisbury, upon occasion of a Sermon that the said bishop preached before the queen’s majesty and her honourable council, anno 1560,” Lond.1560, 8vo, printed afterwards among Bishop Jewell’s works. 4. “Letters to bishop Jewell, upon occasion of a Sermon of his preached at Paul’s Cross on the second Sunday before Easter, in 1560.” 5. “An Answer to the first proposition of the Protestants, at the Disputation before the lords at Westminster.” These last are in Burnet’s History of the Reformation.

, an eminent antiquary and benefactor to the history and antiquities of England, was the son of William Cole, a gentleman of landed property, at Baberham in Cambridgeshire, by his third wife, Catharine, daughter of Theophilus Tuer, of Cambridge, merchant, but at the time she married Mr. Cole, the widow of Charles Apthorp . He was born at Little Abington, a village near Baberham, Aug. 3, 1714, and received the early part of “his education under the Rev. Mr. Butts at Saffron-Walden, and at other small schools. From these he was removed to Eton, where he was placed under Dr. Cooke, afterwards provost, but to whom he seems to have contracted an implacable aversion. After remaining five years on the foundation at this seminary, he was admitted a pensioner of Cla/e hall, Cambridge, Jan. 25, 1733; and irt April 1734, was admitted to one of Freeman’s scholarships, although not exactly qualified according to that benefactor’s intention: but in 1735, on the death of his father, from whom he inherited a handsome estate, he entered himself a fellow-commoner of Clare Hall, and next year removed to King’s college, where he had a younger brother, then a fellow, and was accommodated with better apartments. This last circumstance, and the society of his old companions of Eton, appear to have been his principal motives for changing his college. In April 1736, he travelled for a short time in French Flanders with his halfbrother, the late Dr. Stephen Apthorp, and in October of the same year he took the degree of B. A. In 1737, in consequence of bad health, he went to Lisbon, where he remained six months, and returned to college May 1738. The following year he was put into the commission of the peace for the county of Cambridge, in which capacity he acted for many years. In 1740 his friend lord Montfort, then lord lieutenant of the county, appointed him one of his deputy lieutenants and in the same year he proceeded M. A. In 1743, his health beting again impaired, he took another trip through Flanders for five or six weeks, visiting St. Omer’s, Lisle, Tournay, &c. and other principal places, of which he has given an account in his ms collections. In Dec. 1744 he was ordained deacon in the collegiate church of Westminster, by Dr. Wilcocks, bishop of Rochester, and was in consequence for some time curate to Dr. Abraham Oakes, rector of Wethersfield in Suffolk. In 1745, after being admitted to priest’s orders, he was made chaplain to Thomas earl of Kinnoul, in which office he was continued by the succeeding earl, George. He was elected a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in 1747; and appears to have resided at Haddenham in the Isle of Ely in 1749, when he was collated by bishop Sherlock to the rectory of Hornsey in Middlesex, which he retained only a very short time. Speaking of that prelate, he says,” He gave me the rectory of Hornsey, yet his manner was such that I soon resigned it again to him. I have not been educated in episcopal trammels, and liked a more liberal behaviour; yet he was a great man, and I believe an honest man." The fact, however, was, as Mr. Cole elsewhere informs us, that he was inducted Nov. 25; but finding the house in so ruinous a condition as to require rebuilding, and in a situation so near the metropolis, which was always his aversion, and understanding that the bishop insisted on his residing, he resigned within a month. This the bishop refused t accept, because Mr. Cole had made himself liable to dilapidations and other expences by accepting of it. Cole continued therefore as rector until Jan. 9, 1751, when he resigned it into the hands of the bishop in favour of Mr. Territ. During this time he had never resided, but employed a curate, the rev. Matthew Mapletoft. In 1753 he quitted the university on being presented by his early friend and patron, Browne Willis, esq. to the rectory of Bletchley, in Buckinghamshire, which he resigned March 20, 1767, in favour of his patron’s grandson, the rev. Thomas Willis, and this very honourably, and merely because he knew it was his patron’s intention to have bestowed it on his grandson had he lived to effect an exchange.

What he contributed was in general, in itself, original and accurate, and would have done credit to a separate publication, if he had thought proper. Among the works which he assisted, either by entire dissertations, or by minute communications and corrections, we may enumerate Grose’s “Antiquities” Bentham’s “Ely” Dr. Ducarel’s publications; Philips’s “Life of Cardinal Pole” Gough’s “British Topography” the “Memoirs of the Gentlemen’s Society at Spalding” Mr. Nichols’s “Collection of Poems,” “Anecdotes of Hogarth,” “History of Hinckley,” and “Life of Bowyer.” With Granger he corresponded very frequently, and most of his corrections were adopted by that writer. Mr. Cole himself was a collector of portraits at a time when this trade was in few hands, and had a very valuable series, in the disposal of which he was somewhat unfortunate, and somewhat capricious, putting a different value on them at different times. When in the hope that lord Montstuart would purchase them, he valued them at a shilling each, one with another, which he says would have amounted to 160l. His collection must therefore have amounted to 3200 prints, but among these were many topographical articles: 130l. was offered on this occasion, which Mr. Cole declined accepting. This was in 1774; but previous to this, in 1772, he met with a curious accident, which had thinned his collection of portraits. This was a visit from an eminent collector. “He had,” says Mr. Cole, “heard of my collection of prints, and a proposal to see them was the consequence; accordingly, he breakfasted here next morning; and on a slight offer of accommodating him with such heads as he had not, he absolutely has taken one hundred and eighty-seven of my most valuable and favourite heads, such as he had not, and most of which had never seen; and all this with as much ease and familiarity as if we had known each other ever so long. However, I must do him the justice to say, that I really did offer him at Mr. Pemberton’s, that he might take such in exchange as he had not; but this I thought would not have exceeded above a dozen, or thereabouts, &c.” In answer to this account of the devastation of his collection, his correspondent Horace Walpole writes to him in the following style, which is not an unfair specimen of the manner in which, these correspondents treated their contemporaries: “I have had a relapse (of the gout), and have not been able to use my hand, or I should have lamented with you on the plunder of your prints by that Algerine hog. I pity you, dear sir, and feel for your awkwardness, that was struck dumb at his rapaciousness. The beast has no sort of taste neither, and in a twelvemonth will sell them again. This Muley Moloch used to buy books, and now sells them. He has hurt his fortune, and ruined himself to have a collection, without any choice of what it should be composed. It is the most under-bred ywine I ever saw, but I did not know it was so ravenous. I wish you may get paid any how.” Mr. Cole, however, after all this epistolary scurrility, acknowledges that he was“honourably paid” at the rate of two shillings and sixpence each head, and one, on which he and Walpole set an uncommon value, and demanded back, was accordingly returned.

Mr. Cole’s ms Collections had two principal objects, first, the compilation of a work in imitation of Anthony Wood’s Athense, containing the lives of the Cambridge scholars; and secondly, a county history of Cambridge; and he appears to have done something to each as early as 1742. They now amount to an hundred volumes, small folio, into which he appears to have transcribed some document or other almost every day of his life, with very little intermission. He began with fifteen of these volumes, while at college, which he used to keep in a lock-up case in the university library, until he had examined every book in that collection from which he could derive any informstion suitable to his purpose, and transcribed many ms lists, records, &c. The grand interval from this labour was from 1752 to 1767, while he resided at Bletchley; but even there, from his own collection of books, and such as he could borrow, he went on with his undertaking, and daring frequent jour nies, was adding to his topographical drawings and descriptions. He had some turn for drawing, as his works every where demonstrate, just enough to give an accurate, but coarse outline. But it was at Cambridge and Milton where his biographical researches were pursued with most effect, and where he carefully registered every anecdote he could pick up in conversation; and, in characterising his contemporaries, may literally be said to have spared neither friend nor foe. He continued to fill his volumes in this way, almost to the end of his life, the last letter he transcribed being dated Nov. 25, 1782. Besides his topography and biography, he has transcribed the whole of his literary correspondence. Among his correspondents, Horace Walpole must be distinguished as apparently enjoying his utmost confidence; but their letters add very little to the character of either, as men of sincerity or candour. Botli were capable of writing polite, and even flattering letters to gentlemen, whom in their mutual correspondence, perhaps by the. same post, they treated with the utmost contempt and derision.

Throughout the whole of Mr. Cole’s Mss. his attachment to the Roman catholic religion is clearly to be deduced, and is often almost avowed. He never can conceal his hatred to the eminent prelates and martyrs who were the promoters of the Reformation. In this respect at least he resembled Anthony Wood, whose friends had some difficulty in proving that he died in communion with the church of England, and Cole yet more closely resembled him in his hatred of the puritans and dissenters. When in 1767 an order was issued from the bishops for a return of all papists or reputed papists in their dioceses, Cole laments that in some places none were returned, and in other places few, and assigns as a reason for this regret, that “their principles fare much more conducive to a peaceful and quiet subordination in government, and they might be a proper balance, in time of need, not only to the tottering state of Christianity in general, but to this church of England in particular, pecked against by every fanatic sect, whose good allies the infidels are well known to be but hardly safe from its own lukewarm members; and whose safety depends solely on a political balance.” The “lukewarm members,” he elsewhere characterizes as latitudinarians, including Clarke, Hoadly, and their successors, who held preferments in a church whose doctrines they opposed.

As late as 1778 we find Mr. Cole perplexed as to the disposal of his manuscripts; to give them to one college which he mentions, would, he says, “be to throw them into a horse-pond,” for “in that college they are so conceited of their Greek and Latin, that with them all other studies are mere barbarism.” He once thought of Eton college; but, the Mss. relating principally to Cambridge university and county, he inclined to deposit them in one of the libraries there; not in the public library, because too public, but in Emanuel, with the then master of which, Dr. Farmer, he was very intimate. Dr. Farmer, however, happening to suggest that he might find a better place for them, Mr. Cole, who was become peevish, and wanted to be courted, thought proper to consider this “coolness and indifference” as a refusal. In this dilemma he at length resolved to bequeath them to the British Museum, with this condition, that they should not be opened for twenty years after his death. For such a condition, some have assigned as a reason that the characters of many living persons being drawn in them, and that in no very favourable colours, it might be his wish to spare their delicacy; but, perhaps with equal reason, it has been objected that such persons would thereby be deprived of all opportunity of refuting his assertions, or defending themselves. Upon a careful inspection, however, of the whole of these volumes, we are not of opinion that the quantum of injury inflicted is very great, most of Cole’s unfavourable anecdotes being of that gossiping kind, on which a judicious biographer will not rely, unless corroborated by other au. thority. Knowing that he wore his pen at his ear, there were probably many who amused themselves with his prejudices. His collections however, upon the whole, are truly valuable; and his biographical references, in particular, while they display extensive reading and industry, cannot fail to assist the future labours of writers interested in the history of the Cambridge scholars.

, an English botanist, was the son of a clergyman, and born at Adderbury, in Oxfordshire, about 1626. After he had been well-instructed in grammar-learning and the classics, he was entered in 1642 of Me rton- college, in Oxford. In 1650 he took a degree in arts; after which he left the university, and retired to Putney, near London; where he lived several years, and became the most famous simpler or botanist or his time. In 1656 he published “The art of simpling, or an introduction to the knowledge of gathering plants, wherein the definitions, divisions, places, descriptions, and the like, are compendiously discoursed of;” with which was also printed “Perspicillum microcosmologicum, or, a prospective for the discovery of the lesser world, wherein man is a compendium, c.” And in 1657 he published “Adam in Eden, or Nature’s paradise: wherein is contained the history of plants, herbs, flowers, with their several original names.” Upon the restoration of Charles II. in 1660, he was made secretary to Duppa, bishop of Winchester, in whose service he died in 1662.

, author of a Dictionary once in much reputation, was born in Northamptonshire about 1640. Towards the end of 1658, he was entered of Magdalencollege, in Oxford, but left it without taking a degree; and retiring to London, taught Latin there to youths, and English to foreigners, about 1663, with good success in Russel-street, near Covent-garden, and at length became one of the ushers in merchant-taylors’ school. But being there guilty of some offence, he was forced to withdraw into Ireland, from whence he never returned. He was, says Wood, a curious and critical person in the English and Latin tongues, did much good in his profession, and wrote several useful and necessary books for the instruction of beginners. The titles of them are as follows: 1. “The Complete English Schoolmaster or, the most natural and easy method of spelling and reading English, according to the present proper pronunciation of the language in Oxford and London, &c.” Lond. 1674, 8vo. 3. “The newest, plainest, and shortest Short-hand; containing, first, a brief account of the short-hand already extant, with their alphabets and fundamental rules. Secondly, a plain and easy method for beginners, less burdensome to the memory than any other. Thirdly, a v new invention for contracting words, with special rules for contracting sentences, and other ingenious fancies, &c.” Lond. 1674, 8vo. 3. “Nolens Volens or, you shall make Latin, whether you will or no; containing the plainest directions that have been yet given upon that subject,” Lond. 1675, 8vo. With it is printed: 4. “The Youth’s visible Bible, being an alphabetical collection (from the whole Bible) of such general heads as were judged most capable of Hieroglyphics; illustrated with twenty-four copper-plates, &c.” 5. “An English Dictionary, explaining the difficult terms that are used in divinity, husbandry, physic, philosophy, law, navigation, mathematics, and other arts and sciences,” Lond. 1676, 8vo, reprinted several times since. 6. “A Dictionary, English-Latin, and Latin-English; containing all things necessary for the translating of either language into the other,” Lond. 1677, 4to, reprinted several times in 8vo; the 12th edition was in 1730. 7. “The most natural and easy Method of learning Latin, by comparing it with English: Together with the Holy History of Scripture-War, or the sacred art military, c.” Lond. 1677, 8vo. 8. “The Harmony of the Four Evangelists, in a metrical paraphrase on the history of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ,” Lond. 1679, 8vo, reprinted afterwards. 9. “The Young Scholar’s best Companion: or an exact guide or directory for children and youth, from the A B C, to the Latin Grammar, comprehending the whole body of the English learning, &c.” Lond. 12mo. Cole’s Dictionary continued to be a schoolbook in very general use, for some time after the publication of Ainswdrth’s Thesaurus. But it has fallen almost into total neglect, since other abridgments of Ainsworth have appeared, by Young, Thomas, and other persons. The men, however, who have been benefactors to the cause of learning, ought to be remembered with graiitude, though their writings may happen to be superseded by more perfeet productions. It is no small point of honour to be the means of paving the way for superior works.

Here he read public lectures on St. Paul’s epistles, without stipend or reward; which, being a new thing, drew a vast crowd of hearers, who admired him greatly. And here he strengthened his memorable friendship with Erasmus, who came to Oxford in 1497, which remained unshaken and inviolable to the day of their deaths. He continued these lectures three years; and in 1501 was admitted to proceed in divinity, or to the reading of the sentences. In 1502 he became prebendary of Durnesford, in the churcfa of Sarum, and in Jan. 1504, resigned his prebend of Good Easter. In the same year he commenced D. D. and in May 1505, was instituted to the prebend of Mora in St. Paul’s, London. The same year and month he was made dean of that church, without the least application of his own; and being raised to this high station, he began to reform the decayed discipline of his cathedral. He introduced a new practice of preaching himself upon Sundays and great festivals, and called to his assistance other learned persons, such as Grocyn, and Sowle, whom he appointed to read divinity-lectures. These lectures raised in the nation a spirit of inquiry after the holy scriptures, which had long been laid aside for the school divinity; and eventually prepared for the reformation, which soon after ensued. Colet was unquestionably in some measure instrumental towards it, though he did not live to see it effected; for he expressed a great contempt of religious houses, exposed the abuses that prevailed in them, and set forth the danger of imposing celibacy on the clergy. This way of thinking, together with his free and public manner of communicating his thoughts, which were then looked upon as impious and heretical, made him obnoxious to the clergy, and exposed him to persecution from the bishop of London, Dr. Fitzjames; who, being a rigid bigot, could not bear to have the corruptions in his church spoken against, and therefore accused him to archbishop Warham as a dangerous man, preferring at the same time some articles against him. But Warham, well knowing the worth and integrity of Colet, dismissed him, without giving him the trouble of putting in any formal answer. The bishop, however, not satisfied with that fruitless attempt, endeavoured afterwards to stir up the king and the court against him; nay, we are told in bishop Latimer’s sermons, that he was not only in trouble, but would have been burnt, if God had not turned the king’s heart to the contrary.

These troubles and persecutions made him weary of the world, so that he began to think of disposing of his effects, and of retiring. Having therefore a very plentiful estate without any near relations (for, numerous as his brethren were, he had outlived them all), he resolved, in the midst of life and health, to consecrate the whole property of it to some standing and perpetual benefaction. And this he performed by founding St. Paul’s school, in London, of which he appointed William Lilly first master in 1512. He ordained, that there should be in this school an high master, a surmaster, and a chaplain, who should teach gratis 153 children, divided into eight classes and he endowed it with lands and houses, amounting then to 122l. 4s. 7½d per annum, of which endowment he made the company of mercers trustees. To further his scheme of retiring, he built a convenient and handsome house near Richmond palace in Surrey, in which he intended to reside, but having been seized by the sweating sickness twice, and relapsing into it a third time, a consumption ensued, which proved fatal September 16, 1519, in his fifty-third year. He was buried in St. Paul’s choir, with an humble monument prepared for him several years before, and only inscribed with his bare name. Afterwards a nobler was erected to his honour by the company of mercers, which was destroyed with the cathedral in 1666; but the representation of it is preserved in sir William Dugdale’s “History of St. Paul’s,” and in Knight’s life of the dean. On the two sides of the bust was this inscription: “John Colet, doctor of divinity, dean of Paul’s, and the only founder of Paul’sschocrf, departed this life, anno 1519, the son of sir Henry Colet, knt. twise mayor of the cyty of London, and free of the company and mistery of mercers.” Lower, there were other inscriptions in Latin. About 1680, when the church was taking down in order to be rebuilt, his leaden coffin was found inclosed in the wall, about two feet and a half above the floor. At the top of it was a leaden plate fastened, whereon was engraved the dean’s name, his dignity, his benefactions, &c. Besides his dignities and preferments already mentioned, he was rector of the fraternity or gild of Jesus in St. Paul’s church, for which he procured new statutes; and was chaplain and preacher in ordinary-to Henry VIII; and, if Erasmus is not mistaken, one of the privy-council.

Of his writings, those which he published himself, or which have been published since his death, are as follow: 1. “Oratio habita a doctore Johanne Colet, decano sancti Pauli, ad clerum in convocatione, anno 1511.” This being hardly to be met with, except in the Bodleian library at Oxford, among archbishop Laud’s Mss. was reprinted by Knight in his appendix to the life of Colet; where also is reprinted an old English translation of it, supposed to have been done by the author himself. 2. “Rudimenta grammatices a Joanne Coleto, decano ecclesioe sancti Pauli Londin. in usum scholae ab ipso institutae:” commonly called “Paul’s Accidence, 1539,” 8vo. 3. “The construction of the eight parts of speech, entitled Absolutissimus de octo orationis partium constructione libellus:” which, with some alterations, and great additions, makes up the syntax in Lilly’s grammar, Antwerp, 1530, 8vo. 4. “Daily Devotions or, the Christian’s morning and evening sacrifice.” This is said not to be all of his composition. 5. “Monition to a godly Life,” 1534, 1563, &c. 6. “Epistolae ad Erasmum.” Many of them are printed among Erasmus’s epistles, and some at the end of Knight’s Life of Colet. There are still remaining in ms. others of his pieces, enumerated in the account of his Life by Knight. It is probable that he had no intention of publishing any thing himself; for he had an inaccuracy and incorrectness in his way of writing, which was likely to expose him to the censures of critics; and besides, was no perfect master of the Greek tongue, without which he thought a man was nothing. The pieces above mentioned were found after his death in a very obscure corner of his study, as if he had designed they should lie buried in oblivion; and were written in such a manner as if intended to be understood by nobody but himself. With regard to sermons, he wrote but few; for he generally preached without notes.

The descriptions which are given of his person and character are much to his advantage. He was a tall, comely, graceful, well-bred man; and of uncommon learning and piety. In his writings his style was plain and unaffected; and for rhetoric he had rather a contempt, than a want of it. He could not bear that the standard of good writing should be taken from the exact rules of grammar; which, he often said, was apt to obstruct a purity of language, not to be obtained but by reading the best authors. This contempt of grammar, though making him sometimes inaccurate, and, as we have observed, laying him open to the critics, did not hinder him from attaining a very masterly style; so that his preaching, though popular, and adapted to mean capacities, was agreeable to men of wit and learning, and in particular was much admired by sir Thomas More. With regard to some of his notions, he was an eminent forerunner of the reformation; and he and Erasmus jointly promoted it, not only by pulling down those strong holds of ignorance and corruption, the scholastic divinity, and entirely routing both the Scotists and Thomists, who had divided the Christian world between them, but also by discovering the shameful abuses of monasteries, and the folly and danger of imposing celibacy upon the clergy; to which places he gave little or nothing while he lived, and left nothing when he died. Colet thought immorality in a priest more excusable than pride and avarice; and was with no sort of men more angry than with those bishops who, instead of shepherds, acted the part of wolves, and who, under the pretence of devotions, ceremonies, benedictions, and indulgences, recommended themselves to the veneration of the people, while in their hearts they were slaves to filthy lucre. He condemned auricular confession; and was content to say mass only upon Sundays and great festivals, or at least upon very few days besides. He had gathered up several authorities from the ancient fathers against the current tenets and customs of the church; and though he did not openly oppose the established religion, yet he shewed a particular kindness and favour to those who disliked the worshiping of images. As to his moral qualities, he was a man of exemplary temperance, and all other virtues: and is so represented by his intimate friend Erasmus, in an epistle to Jodocus Jonas, where the life, manners, and qualifications of Colet are professedly described.

, an engraver and print-seller of Antwerp, of the sixteenth century, is said to have received the first instructions in his art, in the place of his nativity; after which he repaired to Italy to complete his studies. He contributed not a little, by his assiduity, and the facility of his graver, to the numberless sets of prints of sacred stones, huntings, landscapes, flowers, fish, &c. with which the states of Germany and Flanders were at that time inundated. Many of these are apparently from his own designs, and others from Martin de Vos, Theodore Bernard, P. Breughel, John Stradanus, Hans Bol, and other masters. His style of engraving is at the same time masterly and neat, and his knowledge of drawing appears to have been considerable; but his prints partake of the defects of his contemporaries, his masses of light and shade being too much scattered, and too equally powerful. The following are amongst his numerous performances. The “Life of Christ in 36 small prints.” “The twelve months, small circles from H. Bol.” “The women of Israel chanting the psalm of praise, after the destruction of the Egyptians in the Red Sea.” This artist flourished according to Strutt and Heinecken about 1530 1550. His son, Hans or John, was an excellent draughtsman and engraver. He studied some time in Rome, and afterwards settled in his native place, Antwerp, where he assisted his father in most of his great works; and afterwards published a prodigious number of prints of his own, nowise inferior to those of Adrian. The works attributed by some to one Herman Coblent, are, by Heinecken, supposed to be by this master. His prints, according to Strutt, are dated from 1555 to 1622, so that he must have lived to a great age. We shall only notice the following amongst his numerous performances “The Life of St. Francis in 16 prints lengthways, surrounded by grotesque borders.” “Time and Truth,” a small upright print beautifully engraved, from J. Stradanus “The Last Judgment,” a large print, encompassed with small stories of the life of Christ. M. Heinecken mentions a print by an artist, who signs himself William Collaert, and supposes him the son of John Collaert.

, born at Tours in Auvergne, in 1524, was valet-de-chambre to Charles IX. Though a true catholic, he was taken for a protestant, and assassinated as such in the massacre of St. Bartholomew in 1572. He translated and augmented the polygraphy and the cabalistic writing of Trithemius, Paris, 1561, in 4to, which a Prison, named Dominique de Hottinga," published under his own name, without making any mention either of Trithemius or of Collange, at Embden, 1620, 4to. Collange had also some skill in the mathematics and in cosmography, and left a great many learned manuscripts described in our authorities.

, secretary and reader to the duke of Orleans, was born at Paris in 1709, and died in the same city Nov. 2, 1783, at the age of 75. In his character were united a singular disposition to gaiety, and an uncommon degree of sensibility; the death of a beloved wife accelerated his own. Without affecting the qualities of beneficence and humanity, he was humane and beneficent. Having a propensity to the drama from his infancy, he cultivated it with success. His “Partie-de-Chasse de Henri IV.” (from which our “Miller of Mansfield” is taken) exhibits a very faithful picture of that good king. His comedy of “Dupuis and Desronais,” in the manner of Terence, may perhaps be destitute of the vis cornica; but the sentiments are just, the characters well supported, and the situations pathetic. Another comedy, entitled “Truth in wine, or the Disasters of Gallantry,” has more of satire and broad humour. There are several more pieces of his, in which he paints, with no less liveliness than truth, the manners of his time; but his pencil is frequently as licentious as those manners. His talent at song-writing procured him the appellation of the Anacreon of the age, but here too he was deficient in delicacy. His song on the capture of Portmahon was the means of procuring him a pension from the court of 600 livres, perhaps the first favour of the kind ever bestowed. He was one of the last survivers of a society of wits who met under the name of the Caveau, and is in as much honourable remembrance as the Kit- K at club in London. This assembly, says a journalist, was of as much consequence to literature as an academy. Colle frequently used to regret those good old times, when this constellation of wits were wont to meet together, as men of letters, free and independent. The works of this writer are collected in 3 volumes, 12mo, under the title of " Theatre de SocieteY' Colle* was a cousin of the poet Regnard, whom he likewise resembled in his originality of genius.

Collier, however, was of too active a spirit to remain supine, and therefore began the attack upon the revolution: for his pamphlet is said to have been the first written on that side the question after the prince of Orange’s arrival, with a piece entitled “The Desertion discussed in a letter to a country gentleman, 1688,” 4to. This was written in, answer to a pamphlet of Dr. Gilbert Burnet, afterwards bishop of Salisbury, called “An Enquiry into the present State of Affairs, &c.” wherein king James is treated as a deserter from his crown; and it gave such offence, that, after the government was settled, Collier was sent to Newgate, where he continued a close prisoner for some months, but was at length discharged without being brought to a trial. He afterwards published the following pieces: 1. A translation of the 9th, 10th, llth, and 12th books of Sleidan’s Commentaries, 1689, 4to. 2. “Vindiciae juris regii, or remarks upon a paper entitled An Enquiry into the measures of submission to the Supreme Authority,” 1689, 4to. The author of this inquiry was also Dr. Burnet. 3. “Animadversions upon the modern explanation of 2 Hen. VII. chap. i. or a king de facto,” 1689, 4to. 4. “A Caution against Inconsistency, or the connection between praying and swearing, in relation to the Civil Powers,” 1690, 4to. This discourse is a dissuasive from joining in public assemblies. 5. “A Dialogue concerning the Times, between Philobelgus and Sempronius, 1690, 4to: to the right honourable the lords, and to the gentlemen convened at Westminster, Oct. 1690.” This is a petition for an inquiry into the birth of the prince of Wales, and printed upon a half sheet. 6. “Dr. Sherlock’s Case of Allegiance considered, with some remarks upon his Vindication,” 1691, 4to. 7. “A brief essay concerning the independency of Church Power,” 1692, 4to. The design of this essay is to prove the public assemblies guilty of schism, upon account of their being held under such bishops as had assumed, or owned such as had assumed, the sees of those who were deprived for not taking the oaths of the new government.

Thus did Collier, by such ways and means as were in his power, continue to oppose with great vigour and spirit the revolution and all its abettors: and thus he became obnoxious to the men in power, who only waited for an occasion to seize him. That occasion at length came; for information being given to the earl of Nottingham, then secretary of state, that Collier, with one Newton, another nonjuring clergyman, was gone to Romney marsh, with a view of sending to, or receiving intelligence from the other side of the water, messengers were sent to apprehend them. They were brought to London, and, after a short examination by the earl, committed to the Gate-house. This was in the latter end of 1692, but as no evidence of their being concerned in any such design could be found, they were admitted to bail, and released. Newton, as far as appears, availed himself of this but Collier refused to remain upon bail, because he conceived that an acknowledgment of the jurisdiction of the court in which the bail was taken, and consequently of the power from whence the authority of the court was derived, and therefore surrendered in discharge of his bail before chief justice Holt, and was committed to “the king’s-bench prison. He v/as released again at the intercession of friends, in a very few days; but still attempted to support his principles and justify his conduct by the following pieces, of which, it is said, there were only five copies printed: 8.” The case of giving Bail to a pretended authority examined, dated from the King’s-bench, Nov. 23, 1692,“with a preface, dated Dec. 1692; and, 9,” A Letter to sir John Holt,“dated Nov. 30, 1692; and also, 10.” A Reply to some Remarks upon the case of giving bail, &c. dated April, 1693.“He wrote soon after this, 11.” A Persuasive to consideration, tendered to the Royalists, particularly those of the Church of England,“1693, 4to. It was afterwards reprinted in 8vo, together with his vindication of it, against a piece entitled” The Layman’s Apology.“He wrote also, 12.” Remarks upon the London Gazette, relating to the Streights’ Fleet, and the Battle of Landen in Flanders," 1693, 4to.

When this affair was over, Collier employed himself in reviewing and finishing several miscellaneous pieces, which he published under the title of “Essays upon several Moral Subjects.” They consist of 3 vols. 8vo; the first of which was printed in 1697, and its success encouraged the author to publish a second in 1705, and a third in 1709. These were written with such a mixture of learning and wit, and in a style so easy and flowing, that notwithstanding the prejudice of party, which ran strong against him, they were in general well received, and have passed through many editions since. In 1698 he entered on his celebrated attempt to reform the stage, by publishing his “Short View of the immorality and profaneness of the English Stage, together with the sense of antiquity upon this argument,” 8vo. This engaged him in a controversy with the wits; and Congreve and Vanbrugh, whom, with many others, he had taken to task very severely, appeared openly against him. The pieces he wrote in this conflict, besides the first already mentioned, were, 2. “A Defence of the Short View, being a reply to Mr. Congreve’s amendments, &c. and to the vindication of the author of the Relapse,” 1699, 8vo. 3. “A Second Defence of the Short View, being a reply to a book entitled The ancient and modern Stages surveyed, &c.” 1700, 8vo the book here replied to was written by Mr. Drake. 4. “Mr. Collier’s dissuasive from the Play-house: in a letter to a person of quality, occasioned by the late calamity of the tempest,” 1703, 8vo. S. “A farther Vindication of the Short View, &c. in whjch the objections of a late book, entitled A Defence of Plays, are considered,” 1708, 8vo. “The Defence of Piays” has Dr. Filmer for its author. In this controversy with the stage, Collier exerted himself to the utmost advantage; and shewed that a clergyman might have wit as well as learning and reason on his side. It is remarkable, that his labours here were attended with success, and actually produced repentance and amendment; for it is allowed on all hands, that the decorum which has been for the most part observed by the later writers of dramatic poetry, is entirely owing to the animadversions of Collier. What Dryden said upon this occasion in the preface to his Fables does much credit to his candour and good sense. “I shall say the less of Mr. Collier, because in many things he has taxed me justly; and I have pleaded guilty to all thoughts and expressions of mine which can be truly arraigned of obscenity, profaneness, or immorality, and retract them. If he be my enemy, let him triumph; if he be my friend, as 1 have given him no personal occasion to be otherwise, he will be glad of my repentance. It becomes me not to draw my pen in the defence of a bad cause, when I have so often drawn it for a good one.” If Congreve andVanbrugh had taken the same method with Dryden, and made an ingenuous confession of their faults, they would have retired with a better grace than they did: for it is certain that, with all the wit which they have shewn in their respective vindications, they make but a very indifferent figure. “Congreve and Vanbrugh, says Dr. Johnson, attempted answers. Congreve, a very young man, elated with success, and impatient of censure, assumed an air of confidence and security. His chief artifice of controversy is to retort upon his adversary his own words: he is very angry, and hoping to conquer Collier with his own weapons, allows himself in the use of every term of contumely and contempt: but he has the sword without the arm of Scanderbeg; he has his antagonist’s coarseness, but not his strength. Collier replied; for contest was his delight: he was not to be frighted from his purpose, or his prey. The cause of Congreve was not tenable: whatever glosses he might use for the defence or palliation of single passages, the general tenour and tendency of his plays must always be condemned. It is acknowledged, with universal conviction, that the perusal of his works will make no man better; and that their Vol. X, ultimate effect is to represent pleasure in alliance with vice, and to relax those obligations by which life ought to be regulated. The stage found other advocates, and the dispute was protracted through ten years: but at last comedy grew more modest, and Collier lived to see the reward of his labour in the' reformation of the theatre.”

In 17 13, Collier, as is confidently related, was consecrated a bishop by Dr. George Hickes, who had himself been consecrated suffragan of Thetford by the deprived bishops of Norwich, Ely, and Peterborough, Feb. 23, 1694. As he grew in years, his health became impaired by frequent attacks of the stone, to which his sedentary life probably contributed: so that he published nothing more but a volume of “Practical Discourses” in 1725, and an additional sermon “upon God not the origin of Evil,” in 1726. Besides what has been mentioned, he wrote some prefaces to other men’s works; and published also an advertisement against bishop Burnet’s “History of his own Times:”' this was printed on a slip of paper, and dispersed in all the coffee-houses in 1724, and is to be seen in the “Evening-post, No. 2254.” He died of the stone, April 26, 1726, aged seventy-six; an.d was interred three days after in the church-yard of St. Pancras near London. Hs was a very ingenious, learned, moral, and religious man* and though stiff in his opinions, is aid to have had nothing stiff or pedantic in his behaviour, but a great deal of life, spirit, and innocent freedom. It ought never to be forgot, that Collier was a man of strict principle, and great sincerity, for to that he sacrificed all the most flattering prospects that could have been presented to him, and died at an advanced age in the profession and belief in which he had lived. He will long be remembered as the reformer of the stage, an attempt which he made, and in which he was successful, single-handed, against a confederacy of dramatic talents the most brilliant that ever appeared on the British stage. His reputation as a man of letters was not confined to his own country: for the learned father Courbeville, who translated into French “The Hero of Balthazar Gratian,” in his preface to that work, speaks in high terms of his “Miscellaneous Essays;” which, he says, set him upon a level with Montaigne, St. Evremond, La Bruyere, &c. The same person translated into French his “Short View of the English Stage;” where he speaks of him again in strong expressions of admiration and esteem.

, an eminent nonconformist divine, and a voluminous writer, was born at Boxstead, in Essex, in 1623, and educated at Emanuel college, Cambridge, where he took his degrees, probably during the usurpation, as we find him D. D. at the restoration. He had the living of St. Stephen’s Norwich, from which he was ejected for non-conformity in 1662. His epitaph says he discharged the work of the ministry in that city for forty- four years, which is impossible, unless he continued to preach as a dissenter after his ejection. He was one of the commissioners at the Savoy conference in the reign of Charles II. He particularly excelled as a textuary and critic. He was a man of various learning, and much esteemed for his great industry, humanity, and exemplary life. He wrote many books of controversy and practical divinity, the most singular of which is his “Weaver’s Pocket-book, or Weaving spiritualized,” 8vo. This book was particularly adapted to the place of his residence, which had been long famous for the manufacture of silks. Granger remarks that Mr. Boyle, in his “Occasional Reflections on several subjects,” published in 1663, seems to have led the way to spiritualizing the common objects, business, and occurrences of life. This was much practised by Mr. Flavel, and by Mr. Herrey; it is generally a “very popular method of conveying religious sentiments, although it is apt to degenerate into vulgar familiarity; but we know not if the practice may not be traced to bishop Hall, who published his” Occasional Meditations“in 1633. Calamy has given a very long list of Dr. Collings’s publications, to which we refer. In Poole’s” Annotations on the Bible" he wrote those on the last six chapters of Isaiah, the whole of Jeremiah, Lamentations, the four Evangelists, the epistles to the Corinthians, Galatians, Timothy and Philemon, and the Revelations. He died at Norwich Jan. 17, 1690.

It did not fall to his lot to have any share in the subse-r quent battle of the Nile, nor had he the good fortune to be placed in a station where any further opportunity was afforded to display his talents during the remainder of the war. He continued in the command of the Excellent, under the flag of lord St. Vincent, till January 1799, when his ship was paid off: and on the 14th of February, in the same year, on the promotion of flag officers, he was raised to the rank of rear-admiral of the white; and on the 12th of May following, hoisted his flag on board the Triumph, one of the ships under the command of lord Bridport on the Channel station. In the month of June 1800 he shifted his flag to the Barfleur, on the same station; and in 1801 was promoted to the rank of rear-admiral of the red, in which ship, and upon the same service, he continued to the end of the war, without any opportunity of doing more than effectually blockading the enemy’s fleet in their own ports, while they were proudly vaunting of their preparations for invading us: a service not less important to the honour, the interest, and the security of the nation, than those more brilliant achievements which dazzle the public eye. On the re-commencement of hostilities, however, admiral Collingwood was again called into service, and on the promotion of admirals on the 23d of April, 1804, was made vice-admiral of the blue, and resumed his former station off Brest. The close blockade which admiral Cornwallis kept up requiring a constant succession of ships, the vice-admiral shifted his flag from ship to ship as occasion required, by which he was always upon his station in a ship fit for service, without the necessity of quitting his station, and returning to port for victualling or repairs. But from this station he was called in May 1805, to a more active service, having been detached with a reinforcement of ships to the blockading fleet at Ferrol And Cadiz. Perhaps it would be difficult to fix upon a period, or a part of the character of lord Collingwood, which called for powers of a more peculiar kind, o-r displayed his talents to more advantage, than the period and the service in which he was now employed. Left with only four ships of the line, to keep in nearly four tjmes the number, it seems almost impossible so to have divided his little force as to deceive the enemy, and effect the object of his service; but this he certainly accomplished. With two of his ships close in as usual to watch the motions of the enemy, and make signals to the other two, which were so disposed, and at a distance from one another, as to repeat those signals from one to the other, and again to other ships that were supposed to receive and answer them, he continued to delude the enemy, and led them to conclude that these were only part of a larger force that was not in sight, and thus he not only secured his own ships, but effected an important service to his country, by preventing the execution of any plan that the enemy might have had in contemplation.

On the return of lord Nelson in the month of September he resumed the command, and vice-admiral Collingwood was his second. Arrangements were now made, and such a disposition of the force under his command as might draw the combined fleets out, and bring them to action. In a letter to a friend, dated the 3d of October, lord Nelson tvrote that the enemy were still in port, and that something rnust be done to bring them to battle. “In less than a fortnight,” he adds, “expect to hear from me, or of me, for who can foresee the fate of battle?”

At length the opportunity offered. The plan that was laid to Jure them out succeeded. Admiral Louis having been detached with four sail of the line to attend a convoy to a certain distance up the Mediterranean, and the rest of the fleet so disposed as to lead the enemy to believe it to be not so strong as it was, admiral Villeneuve was tempted to venture out -with 33 ships under his command (18 French and 15 Spanish), in the hope of doing something to retrieve the honour of rheir flag. On the 19th of October lord Nelson received the joyful intelligence from the ships that were left to watch their motions, that the combined fleet had put to sea, and as they sailed with light westerly winds, his lordship concluding their destination to be the Mediterranean, made all sail for the Straits with the fleet under his command, consisting of 27 ships, three of which were sixty-fours. Here he learnt from capt. Blackwood that they had not yet passed the Straits, and on the 21st, at day-light, had the satisfaction to discover them six or seven miles to the eastward, and immediately made the signal for the fleet to bear up in two columns. It fell to the lot of vice-admiral Collingwoocl, in the Royal Sovereign, to lead his column into action, and first to break through the enemy’s line, which he did in a manner that commanded the admiration of both fleets, and drew from lord Nelson the enthusiastic expression, “Look at that noble fellow! Observe the style in which he carries his ship into action!” while the vice-admiral, with equal justice to the spirit and valour of his friend, was enjoying the proud honour of his situation, and saying to those about him, “What would Nelson give to be in our situation!”

, an eminent writer on the side of infidelity, was the son of Henry Collins, esq. a gentleman of considerable fortune; and born at Heston near Hounslow, in Middlesex, June 21, 1676. He was educated in classical learning at Eton school, and removed thence to King’s college in Cambridge, where he had for his tutor Francis Hare, afterwards bishop of Chichester. Upon leaving college he went to London, and was entered a student in the Temple; but not relishing the study of the law, he abandoned it, and applied himself to letters in general. In 1700 he published a tract entitled “Several of the London Cases considered.” He cultivated an acquaintance and maintained a Correspondence with Locke in 1703 and 1704; and that Locke had a great esteem for him, appears from some letters to him published by Des Maizeaux in his collection of “Several pieces of John Locke, never before printed, or not extant in his works.” Locke, who died Oct. 28, 1704, left also a letter dated the 23d, to be delivered to Collins after his decease, full of confidence and the warmest affection; which letter is to be found in the collection above mentioned. It is plain from these memorials, that Collins at that time appeared to Locke to be an impartial and disinterested inquirer after truth, and not, as he afterwards proved, disingenuous, artfuJ, and impious.

Dec. 1709, came out a pamphlet, entitled, “Priestcraft in perfection; or, a detection of the fraud of inserting and continuing that clause, ‘ The church hath power to decree rites and ceremonies, and authority in controversies of faith,’ in the twentieth article of the Articles of the Church of England.” And, Feb. the year following, another called “Reflections on a late pamphlet,entitled, Priestcraft in perfection, &c.” both written by our author. The second and third editions of his “Priestcraft in perfection” were printed, with corrections, in 1710, 8vo. This book occasioned great and diligent inquiries into the subject, and was reflected on in various pamphlets, sermons, and treatises. These were answered by Collins, but not till 1724, in a work entitled, “An historical and critical essay on the 39 Articles of the Church of England: wherein it is demonstrated, that this clause, ‘The Church, &c.’ inserted in the 20th article, is not a part of the article, as they were established by act of parliament in the 13th of Elizabeth, or agreed on by the convocations of 1562 and 1571.” This essay, however, was principally designed as an answer to “The vindication of the Church of England from the aspersions of a late libel, entitled, Priestcraft in perfection, wherein the controverted clause of the church’s power in the 20th article is shewn to be of equal authority with all the rest of the articles, in 1710,” and to “An essay on the 39 Articles by Dr. Thomas Bennet,” published in 1715: “two chief works,” says Collins, “which seem written by those champions who have been supplied with materials from all quarters, and have taken great pains themselves to put their materials into the most artful light.” In the preface he tells us, that he undertook this work at the solicitations of a worthy minister of the gospel, who knew that he had made some inquiries into the “Modern Ecclesiastical History of England;” and, particularly, that he was preparing “An history of the variations of the church of England and its clergy from the reformation down to this time, with an answer to the cavils of the papists, made on occasion of the said variations:” but this work never appeared. The reader may see the whole state of this controversy in Collier’s “Ecclesiastical History,” where particular notice is taken of our author.

While this book was circulating in England, and all parties were exerting their zeal, either by writing or preaching against it, the author is said to have received great civilities abroad. From Holland he went to Flanders, and intended to have visited Paris; but the death of a near relation obliged him to return to London, where he arrived Oct. 18, 1713, greatly disappointed in not having seen France, Italy, &c. In 1715 he retired into the county of Essex, and acted as a justice of the peace and deputy-lieutenant for the same county, as he had done before in the county of Middlesex and liberty of Westminster. The same year he published “A philosophical inquiry concerning Human Liberty: r ' which was reprinted with some corrections in 1717. Dr. Samuel Clarke wrote remarks upon this inquiry, which are subjoined to the colJection of papers between him and Leibnitz; but Collins did not publish any reply on this subject, because, as we are told, though he did not think the doctor had the advantage orer him in the dispute, yet, as he had represented his opinions as dangerous in their consequences, and improper to be insisted on, Collins affected to say that, after such an insinuation, he could not proceed in the dispute upon equal terms: The inquiry was translated into French by the rev. Mr. D. and printed in the first volume of Des Maizeaux’s” Recueilde diverses pieces sur la philosophic, la religion naturelle, &c. par M. Leibnitz, Clarke, Newton, &c." published at Amsterdam 1720, 2 vols. 12mo. In 1718 he was chosen treasurer for the county of Essex, to the great joy, it is said, of several tradesmen and others, who had large sums of money due to them from the said county; but could not get it paid them, it having been embezzled or spent by their former treasurer. We are told that he supported the poorest of them with his own private cash, and promised interest to others till it could be raised to pay them: and that in 1722 all the debts were by his integrity, care, and management discharged.

It has already been observed, that he published, in 1724, his “Historical and critical essay upon the 39 Articles, &c.” The same year he published his famous book, called “A discourse of the grounds and reasons of the Christian religion,” in two parts the first, containing some considerations on the quotations made from the Old in the New Testament, and particularly on the prophecies cited from the former, and said to be fulfilled in the latter. The second, containing an examination of the scheme advanced by Whiston in his essay towards restoring the true text of the Old Testament, and for vindicating the citations thence made in the New Testament. To which is prefixed, “An apology for free debate and liberty of writing.” This discourse was immediately attacked by a great number of books; of which Collins has given a complete list, at the end of the preface to his “Scheme of literal Prophecy.” The most considerable were: 1. “A list of suppositions or assertions in the late Discourse of the grounds, &c. which are not therein supported by any real or authentic evidence; for which some such evidence is expected to he produced. By William Whiston, M. A.” 1724, tfvo. In this piece Whiston treats Collins, together with Toland, in very severe terms, as guilty of impious frauds and laycraft. 2. “The literal accomplishment of scripture -prophecies, being a full answer to a late Discourse of the grounds, &c. By William Whiston.” 3. “A defence of Christianity from the prophecies of the Old Testament, wherein are considered all the objections against this kind of proof, advanced in a late Discourse of the grounds, &c.” By Edward Chandler, then bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, afterwards of Durham. 4. “A discourse of the Connection of the Prophecies in the Old Testament, and application of them to Christ.” By Samuel Clarke, D. D. rector of St. James’s, Westminster. This however was not intended for a direct answer to Collins’s book, but as a supplement, occasioned by it, to a proposition in Clarke’s “Demonstration of the principles of natural and revealed religion” with which it has since been constantly printed. 5. “An essay upon the Truth of the Christian religion, wherein its real foundation upon the Old Testament is shewn, occasioned by the Discourse of the grounds,” &c. By Arthur Ashley Sykes. Collins gives it as his opinion, that of all the writers against the “Grounds,” &c. Sykes alone has advanced a consistent scheme of things, which he has proposed with great clearness, politeness, and moderation. 6. “The use and intent of Prophecy in the several ages of the church. In six discourses delivered at the Temple church in 1724.” By Thomas Sherlock, D. D. This was not designed as an answer to the “Grounds,” &c. but only to throw light upon the argument from prophecy attacked by our author. The reader will find the rest of the pieces written against the “Grounds,” &c. enumerated by Collins in the place referred to above; among which are Sermons, London Journals, Woolston’s Moderator between an infidel and an apostate, &c. amounting in number to no less than thirty-five, including those already mentioned. Perhaps there seldom has been a. book to which so many answers have been made in so short a time, that is, within the small compass of two years.

In 1726 appeared his “Scheme of Literal Prophecy considered; in a view of the controversy occasioned by a late book, entitled, A Discourse of the Grounds, &c.” It was printed at the Hague in 2 vols. 12mo, and reprinted at London with corrections in 1727, 8vo. In this work he mentions a dissertation he had written, but never published, against Whiston’s “Vindication of the Sibylline oracles” in which he endeavours to shew, that those oracles were forged by the primitive Christians, who were thence called Sibyllidts by the pagans. He also mentions a ms discourse of his upon the miracles recorded in the Old and New Testament. The “Scheme of Literal Prophecy 1 * had several answers made to it: the most considerable of which are, 1.” A vindication of the defence of Christianity, from the prophecies of the Old Testament.“By Edward Chandler, D. D.; with a letter from the rev. Mr. Masson, concerning the religion of Macrobius, and his testjfnony touching the slaughter of the infants at Bethlehem, with a postscript upon Virgil’s fourth eclogue, 1728, in 2 vols. 8vo. 2.” The necessity of Divine Revelation, and the truth of the Christian Revelation asserted, in eight sermons. To which is prefixed a preface, with some remarks on a late book entitled The Scheme of Literal Prophecy considered, &c. By John Rogers, D. D.“1727, 8vo. 3.” A letter to the author of the London Journal, April 1, 1727,“written by Dr. Arthur Ashley Sykes. Collins replied to the two last pieces, in” A Letter to Rogers, on occasion of his Eight Sermons, &c. to which is added, a Letter printed in the London Journal, April 1, 1727; with an answer to the same, 1727.“In his” Letter to Rogers“he observes, that the doctor had invited him to martyrdom in these words:” A confessor or two would be a mighty ornament to his cause. If he expects to convince us that he is in earnest, and believes himself, he should not decline giving us this proof of his sincerity. What will not abide this trial, we shall suspect to have but a poor foundation.“These sentiments, Collins tells us, are in his opinion false, wicked, inhuman, irreligious, inconsistent with the peace pf society, and personally injurious to the author of the” Scheme, &c.“He remarks, that it is a degree of virtue to speak what a man thinks, though he may do it in such a way as to avoid destruction of life and fortune, &c.” He declares, that the cause of liberty, which he defends, is “the cause of virtue, learning, truth, God, religion, and Christianity; that it is the political interest of all countries; that the degree of it we enjoy in England is the strength, ornament, and glory of our own; that, if he can contribute to the defence of so excellent a cause, he shall think he has acted a good part in life: in short, it is a cause,” says he to Dr. Rogers, “in which, if your influence and interest were equal to your inclination to procure martyrdom for me, I would rather suffer, than in any cause whatsoever; though I should be sorry that Christians should Le so weak and inconsistent with themselves, as to be your instruments in taking my life from me.”

His health began to decline several years before his death: and he was extremely afflicted with the stone, which at last put an end to his life, Dec. 13, 1729; he was interred in Oxford chapel. It is remarkable that notwithstanding the accusation of being an enemy to religion, he declared, just before his last minutes, “That as he had always endeavoured, to the best of his abilities, to serve God, his king, and his country, so he was persuaded he was going to that place which God had designed for them that love him.” Presently after, he said, that “the catholic religion is to love God, and to love man;” and he advised such as were about him to have a constant regard to those principles. His library, which was very large and curious, was sold by T. Ballard in 1730-1. The catalogue was drawn up by Dr. Sykes. We are told, that “the corruption among Christians, and the persecuting spirit of the clergy, had given him a prejudice against the Christian religion; and at last induced him to think, that, upon the foot on which it is at present, it is pernicious to mankind.” He has indeed given us himself an unequivocal intimation, that he had actually renounced Christianity, Thus, in answer to Rogers, who had supposed that it was men’s lusts and passions, and not their reason, which made them depart from the gospel, he acknowledges, that <c it may be, and is undoubtedly, the case of many, who reject the gospel, to be influenced therein by their vices and immoralities. It would be very strange,“says he,” if Christianity, which teaches so much good morality, and so justly condemns divers vices, to which men are prone, was not rejected by some libertines on that account; as the several pretended revelations, which are established throughout the world, are by libertines on that very account also. But this cannot be the case of all who reject the gospel. Some of them who reject the gospel lead as good lives as those who receive it. And I suppose there is no difference to the advantage of Christians, in point of morality, between them and the Jews, Mahometans, heathens, or others, who reject Christianity.“But we ought not to conclude this article without remarking, that whatever Mr. Collins’s character in private life, he was, at the same time, a most unfair writer. He seemed, with all his morality, to have very little conscience in his quotations, adapting them, without scruple, to his own purposes, however contrary they might be to the genuine meaning of the authors cited, or to the connection in which the passages referred to stood. So many facts of this kind were undeniably proved against him by his adversaries, that he must ever be recorded as a flagrant instance of literary disingenuity. Let these facts, which are clearly proved by Leland, be compared with his dying declarations. In addition to the answerers of Collins, we may mention dean Swift, in an excellent piece of irony, entitled” Mr. Collins’s Discourse of Freethinking, put into plain English, by way of abstract, for the use of the poor,“1713, reprinted in Mr. Nichols’s edition of his Works, vol. X. The twelfth chapter also of the” Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus," in Pope’s Works, is an inimitable ridicule on Collins’s arguments against Clarke, to prove the soul to be only a quality.

, an unfortunate but excellent English poet, was born at Chichester, Dec. 25, about 1720, the son of a reputable hatter in that city. In 1733 he was admitted scholar of Winchester college under Dr. Burton, and at nineteen was elected upon the foundation to Newcollege in Oxford. He was first upon the list; and, in order to wait for a vacancy in that society, was admitted a commoner of Queen’s college in the same university; but no such vacancy occurring, his tutor, very sensible of his desert, recommended him to the society of Magdalen; and this recommendation, backed by an uncommon display of genius and learning in the exercises performed on the occasion, procured him to be elected a demy of that college in July 1741. During his residence in this place, which was till he had taken a bachelor’s degree, he applied himself to poetry, and published an epistle to sir Thomas Hanmer on his edition of Shakspeare, and the “Persian,” or, as they have been since entitled, “Oriental Eclogues,” which, notwithstanding their merit, were not attended with any great success; and it was objected to them, that though the scenery and subjects are oriental, the style and colouring are purely European. Of the force of this objection, Mr. Collins himself became sensible in the latter part of his life. Yet their poetical merit is very great and Dr. Langhorne has not scrupled to assert, “that in simplicity of description and expression, in delicacy and softness of numbers, and in natural and unaffected tenderness, they are not to be equalled by any thing of the pastoral kind in the English language.”

About 1744 he suddenly left the university, and came to London, a literary adventurer, with many projects in his head, and very little money in his pocket. He designed many works, but either had not perseverance in himself, or the frequent calls of immediate necessity broke his schemes, and suffered him to pursue no settled purpose. Among other designs he published proposals for a “History of the Revival of Learning;” and Dr. Johnson has heard him speak with great kindness of Leo X. and with keen resentment of his tasteless successor. But probably not a page of the history was ever written. He also planned several tragedies, but he only planned them. Yet there were times when his poetical genius triumphed over his indolence; and produced in 1746, his “Odes descriptive and allegorical.” The success of this publication was inferior to that of the Oriental Eclogues. Mr. Millar, the bookseller, gave the author a handsome price, as poems were then estimated, for the copy, but the sale of them was not sufficient to pay the expence of printing. Mr. Collins, justly offended at the bad taste of the public, as soon as it was in his power, returned Mr Millar the copymoney, indemnified him for the loss he had sustained, and consigned the unsold part of the impression to the flames. Highly as Mr. Collins’s Odes deserved a superior fate, it is not surprising that they were not popular at their first appearance. Allegorical and abstracted poetry is not suited to the bulk of readers.

About this time Dr. Johnson fell into his company, who tells us, that “the appearance of Collins was decent and manly; his knowledge considerable, his views extensive, his conversation elegant, and his disposition cheerful. By degrees,” adds the doctor, “I gained his confidence; and one day was admitted to him when he was immured by a bailiff, that was prowling in the street. On this occasion recourse was had to the booksellers, who, on the credit of a translation of ‘ Aristotle’s Poetics,’ which” he engaged to write with a large commentary, advanced as much money as enabled him to escape into the country. He shewed me the guineas safe in his hand. Soon afterwards his uncle, Mr. Martin, a lieutenant-colonel, left him about 2000l. a sum which Collins could scarcely think exhaustible, and which he did not live to exhaust. The guineas were then repaid; and the translation neglected. But man is not born for happiness: Collins, who, while he studied to live, felt no evil but poverty, no sooner lived to study, than his life was assailed by more dreadful calamities, disease and insanity.“Dr. Johnson’s character of him, while it was distinctly impressed upon that excellent writer’s memory, is here at large inserted:” Mr. Collins was a man of extensive literature, and of vigorous faculties. He was acquainted, not only with the learned tongues, but with the Italian, French, and Spanish languages. He had employed his mind chiefly upon works of fiction, and subjects of fancy; and by indulging some peculiar habits of thought, was eminently delighted with those flights of imagination which pass the bounds of nature, and to which the mind is reconciled only by a passive acquiescence in popular traditions. He loved fairies, genii, giants, and monsters; he delighted to rove through the meanders of enchantment, to gaze on the magnificence of golden palaces, to repose by the water-falls of Elysian gardens. This was, however, the character rather of his inclination than his genius; the grandeur of wildness, and the novelty of extravagance, were always desired by him, but were not always attained. Yet as diligence is never wholly lost; if his efforts sometimes caused harshness and obscurity, they likewise produced in happier moments sublimity and splendour. This idea which he had formed of excellence, led him to Oriental fictions and allegorical imagery; and, perhaps, while he was intent upon description, he did not sufficiently cultivate sentiment. His poems are the productions of a mind not deficient in fire, nor unfurnished with knowledge either of books or life, but somewhat obstructed in its progress by deviation in quest of mistaken beauties. His morals were pure, and his opinions pious: in a long continuance of poverty, and long habits of dissipation, it cannot be expected that any character should be exactly uniform. There is a degree of want by which the freedom of agency is almost destroyed; and long association with fortuitous companions will at last relax the strictness of truth, and abate the fervour of sincerity. That this man, wise and virtuous as he was, passed always linen tangled through the snares of life, it would be prejudice and temerity to affirm; but it may be said that at least he preserved the source of action unpolluted, that his principles were never shaken, that his distinctions of right and wrong were never confounded, and that his faults had nothing of malignity or design, but proceeded from some unexpected pressure, or casual temptation. The latter part of his life cannot be remembered but with pity and sadness. He languished some years under that depression of mind which enchains the faculties without destroying them, and leaves reason the knowledge of right without the power of pursuing it. These clouds which he perceived gathering on his intellects, he endeavoured to disperse by travel, and passed into France; but found himself constrained to yield to his malady, and returned. He was for some time confined in a house of lunatics, and afterwards retired to the care of his sister in Chichester , where death, in 1756, came to his relief. After his return from France, the writer of this character paid him a visit at Islington, where he was waiting for his- sister, whom he had directed to meet him there was then nothing of disorder discernible in his mind by any but himself; but he had withdrawn from study, and travelled with no other book than an English Testament, such as children carry to the school: when his friend took it into his hand out of curiosity, to see what companion a man of letters had chosen: ‘ I have but one book,’ says Collins, ‘ but that is the best.’ Such was the fate of Collins, with whom I once delighted to converse, and whom I yet remember with tenderness. He was visited at Chichester in his last illness by his learned friends Dr. Warton and his brother; to whom he spoke with disapprobation of his t Oriental Eclogues,‘ as not sufficiently expressive of Asiatic manners, and called them his ’ Irish Eclogues.‘ He shewed them, at the same time, an ode inscribed to Mr. John Hume, ’ On the Superstitions of the Highlands;' which they thought superior to his other works, but which no search has yet found. His disorder was not alienation of mind, but general laxity and feebleness, a deficiency rather of his vital than intellectual powers. What he spoke wanted neither judgment nor spirit; but a few minutes exhausted him, so that he was forced to rest upon the couch, till a short cessation restored his powers, and he was again able to talk with his former vigour. The approaches of this dreadful malady he began to feel soon after his uncle’s death; and with the usual weakness of men so diseased, eagerly snatched that temporary relief with which the table and the bottle flatter and seduce. But his health continually declined, and he grew more and more burthensome to himself. “To what I have formerly said of his writings may bft added, that his diction was often harsh, unskilfully laboured, and injudiciously selected. He alVected the obsolete when it was not worthy of revival; and he puts his words out of the common order, seeming to think, with some later candidates for fame, that not to write prose is certainly to write poetry. His lines commonly are of slow motion, clogged and impeded with clusters of consonants. As men are often esteemed who cannot be loved, so the poetry of Collins may sometimes extort praise when it gives little pleasure .”

, was an ingenious botanist, whose family is of ancient standing in the north. Peter and James were the great grandsons of Peter Collinson, who lived on his paternal estate called Hugal-Hall, or Height of Hugal, near Windermere Lake, in the parish of Stavely, about ten miles from Kendal in Westmoreland. Peter, who vvus born Jan. 14, 1693-4, whilst a youth, discovered his attachment to natural history. He began early to make a collection of dried specimens of plants; had access to the best gardens at that time in the neighbourhood of London; and became early acquainted with the most eminent naturalists of his time; the doctors Derham, Woodward, Dale, Lloyd, and Sloane, were amongst his friends. Among the great variety of articles which form, that superb collection, now (by the wise disposition of sir Hans Sloane and the munificence of parliament) the British Museum, small was the number of those with whose history Collinson was not well acquainted, he being one of those few who visited sir Hans at all times familiarly; their inclinations and pursuits in respect to natural history being the same, a firm friendship had early been established between, them. Peter Collinson was elected F. R. S. Dec. 12, 1728 and perhaps was one of the most diligent and useful members, not only in supplying them with many curious observations, but in promoting and preserving a most extensive correspondence with learned and ingenious foreigners, in all countries, and on every useful subject. Besides his attention to natural history, he minuted every striking hint that occurred either in reading or conversation; and from this source he derived much information, as there were very few men of learning and ingenuity, who were not of his acquaintance at home; and most foreigners of eminence in natural history, or in arts and sciences, were recommended to his notice and friendship. His diligence and economy of time was such, that though he never appeared to be in a hurry, he maintained an extensive correspondence with great punctuality; acquainting the learned and ingenious in distant parts of the globe, with the discoveries and improvements in natural history in this country, and receiving the like information from the most eminent persons in almost every other. His correspondence with the ingenious Cadwallader Golden, esq, of NewYork, and the celebrated Dr. Franklin of Philadelphia, furnish instances of the benefit resulting from his attention to all improvements. The latter of these gentlemen communicated his first essays on electricity to Collinson, in a series of letters, which were then published, and have been reprinted in a late edition of the doctor’s works. Perhaps, at the present period, the account procured of the management of sheep in Spain, published in the Gentleman’s Magazine for May and June 1764, may not be considered among the least of the benefits accruing from his extensive and inquisitive correspondence. His conversation, cheerful and usefully entertaining, rendered his acquaintance much desired by those who had a relish for natural history, or were studious in cultivating rural improvements; and secured him the intimate friendship of some of the most eminent personages in this kingdom, as distinguished by their taste in planting and horticulture, as by their rank and dignity. He was the first who introduced the great variety of trees and shrubs, which are now the principal ornaments of every garden; and it was owing to his indefatigable industry, that so many persons of the first distinction are now enabled to behold groves transplanted from the Western continent flourishing so luxuriantly in their several domains, as if they were already become indigenous to Britain. He had some correspondents in almost every nation in Europe; some in Asia, and even at Pekin, who all transmitted to him the most valuable seeds they could collect, in return for the treasures of America. Linnæus, during his residence in England, contraded an intimate friendship with Mr. Collinson, which was reciprocally increased by a multitude of good offices, and continued to the last. Besides his attachment to natural history, he was very conversant in the antiquities of our own country, having been elected F. S. A. April 7, 1737; and he supplied the society with many curious articles of intelligence, and observations respecting both our own and other countries. In the midst of all these engagements, he was a mercer by trade, and lived at the Red Lion, in Gracechurch-street. His person was rather short than tall; he had a pleasing and social aspect; of a temper open and communicative, capable of feeling for distress, and ready to relieve and sympathize. Excepting some attacks of the gout, he enjoyed, in general, perfect health and great equality of spirits, and had arrived at his 75th year; when, being on a visit to lord Petre, for whom he had a singular regard, he was seized with a total suppression of urine, which, baffling every attempt to relieve it, proved fatal Aug. 11, 1768. Mr. Collinson left behind him many materials for the improvement of natural history; and the present refined taste of horticulture may in some respects be attributed to his industry and abilities. He married, in 1724, Mary, the daughter of Michael Russell, esq. of Mill Hill, with whom he lived very happily till her death, in 1753. He left issue a son, named Michael, who resided at Mill Hill, and died Aug. 11, 1795, whose son is still living; and a daughter, Mary, married to the late John Cator, esq. of Beckenham, in Kent. Both his children inherited much of the taste and amiable disposition of their father.

It was during his residence at Oxford that he engaged with his friend Bonnel Thornton, in publishing the “Connoisseur,” a periodical paper, which appeared once a week, and was continued from January 31, 1754, to September 30, 1756. When the age of the writers of this entertaining miscellany is considered, the wit and humour, the spirit, the good sense, and shrewd observations on life and manners, with which it abounds, will excite some degree of wonder, but will, at the same time, evidently point out the extraordinary talents which were afterwards to be more fully displayed in the “Jealous Wife” and tfee “Clandestine Marriage.” When he came to London, the recommendation of his friends, or his choice, but probably the former, induced him to fix upon the law for his profession, and he was received with great kindness by lord Bath, who seemed to mark him for the object of his patronage: a circumstance that gave rise to the suspicion that his lordship had a natural bias in favour of young Colman. He was entered of the society of Lincoln’s-inn, and in due season called to the bar. He attended there a very short time, though, from the frequency of his attendance on the courts, we must conclude that it was not for want of encouragement that he abandoned the profession. It is reasonable to suppose that he felt more pleasure in attending to the muse than to briefs and reports; and it will therefore excite no surprise, that he took the earliest opportunity of relinquishing pursuits not congenial to his taste. “Apollo and Littleton,” says Wycherley, “seldom meet in the same brain.” At this period Lloyd addressed to him a very pleasant poem on the importance of his profession, and the seducements to which he was liable, on account of his attachment to the sisters of Helicon. His first poetical performance is a copy of verses addressed to his cousin lord Pulteney, written in the year 1747, while he was yet at Westminster, and published in the St. James’s Magazine, a work conducted by his unfortunate friend Robert Lloyd; in conjunction with whom he wrote the best parodies of modern times, the “Odes to Oblivion and Obscurity.” In 1760, his first dramatic piece, “Polly Honeycomb,” was acted at Drury-lane with great success; and next year he was one of three different candidates for public favour in the higher branch of the drama; viz. Mr. Murphy, who exhibited the “Way to keep him;” Mr. Macklin, the “Married Libertine” and Mr. Colman, “The Jealous Wife.” The former and latter of these were successful, and Colman in a very high degree. About the same time the newspaper entitled “The St. James’s Chronicle” was established; of which he became a proprietor, and exerted the full force of his prosaic talents to promote its interest, in a series of essays and humourous sketches on occasional subjects. Among these he opened a paper called “The Genius,” which he published at irregular intervals as far as the fifteenth number. These papers appear, upon the whole, to be superior to the general merit of the Connoisseurs they haye rather more solidity, and the humour is more chaste and classical, His occasional contributions to the St. James’s Chronicle were very numerous, and upon every topic of the day, politics, manners, the drama, &c. A selection from them appears in his prose works, published by himself in 1787.

While Mr. Colman was thus shewing his attention to the theatre, he did not entirely neglect his classical studies. He gave the public, in 1783, a new translation of “Horace’s Art of Poetry,” accompanied with a commentary, in which he produced a new system to explain that very difficult poem. In opposition to Dr. Hurd, he supposes, “that one of the sons of Piso, undoubtedly the elder, had either written or meditated a poetical work, most probably a tragedy; and that he had, with the knowledge of the family, communicated his piece or intention to Horace; but Horace, either disapproving of the work, or doubting of the poetical faculties of the elder Piso, or both, wished to dissuade him from all thoughts of publication. With this view he formed the design of writing this epistle, addressing it with a courtliness and delicacy perfectly agreeable to his acknowledged character, indifferently to the whole family, the father and his two sons: Epistola ad Pisones de arte poetica.” This hypothesis is supported with much learning, ingenuity, and modesty; and the bishop of Worcester, on its publication, said to Dr. Douglas, the late bishop of Salisbury: “Give my compliments to Colman, and thank him for the handsome manner in which he has treated me, and tell him, that 1 think he is right” It may be added, that the late Dr. Warton and Dr. Beattie were of the same opinion.

, in Latin Angelus Colotius, an elegant Italian scholar, descended of an ancient and noble family, was born at Jesi, in 1467. He obtained in his youth the honour of knighthood, which was conferred upon him by the hands of Andreas Palaeologus Despota, when, then a refugee at Rome, he was recognized as the legitimate heir to the imperial diadem of Constantinople. Colocci was a disciple of Georgius Valla, under whom he made great progress in philosophy, but particularly in polite literature. For political reasons, which are detailed J>y Ubaldinus, in his life of this illustrious scholar, the family of Colocci were obliged, in the pontificate of Innocent VIII. to abandon the city of Rome where they had taken up their residence. Angelo, in consequence, repaired to Naples, where he became a member of the Pontana academy, under the assumed name of Angelus Colotius Bassus, and acquired an intimacy with the most eminent poets and wits of his time. Six years afterwards, Raving been permitted to return to his country, he divided his time betwixt his literary pursuits and the official duties entrusted to him by his countrymen, who sent him as ambassador to Alexander VI. in 1498. He then took up his residence at Rome, where his hause became an elegant and liberal resort for men of learning and genius, and where the academy of Rome, which after the death of Pomponius Laetus had fallen into decay, was again revived under his care. Here also his extensive gardens, which, in addition to the most captivating scenery resulting from a happy combination of nature and art, were adorned with a profusion of statues, inscriptions, and other elegant remains of classic antiquity, revived Uie magnificence and amenity of the celebrated gardens of Saliust, of which they were supposed to occupy the actual site. On such objects, and on the patronage of learning and learned men, he employed his riches. The senate of Rome, struck with his liberality, bestowed on him the title of patrician, which extended to his family; and he was held in the highest estimation by the popes Leo X. Clement VII. and Paul III. Leo, independently of 4000 crowns with which he rewarded him for some verses in his praise, made him his secretary, and gave him the reversion of the bishopric of Nocera in 1521, Colocci having at that time survived two wives. This gift was afterwards confirmed to him by Clement VII. who also appointed him governor of Ascoli. These favours, however, were insufficient to secure him when Rome was sacked in 1527. On that occasion, his house was burnt, his gardens pillaged, and he was obliged to pay a large sum for his life and liberty. He then went for some time to his country, and on coming back to Rome, his first care was to invite together the members of the academy who had been dispersed. In 1537 he took possession of the bishopric of Nocera, and died at Rome in 1549. His Latin and Italian poems were published in 1772, but our authority does not mention where or in what shape. Most of them had, however, previously appeared in his life by Ubaldinus, Rome, 1673, 8vo.

, a famous Jesuit, born at St. Symphorien, two leagues from Lyons, in 1641, acquired great reputation among his order by his extraordinary talents in the pulpit. He was preacher for two years at the court of James II. of England, who listened to his sermons with great pleasure, and, as it is said by the Romanists, with edification; hut, falling under the suspicion, though not convicted, of being concerned in a conspiracy, he was banished England, and betook himself to Parai, in the Charolois, where he died, Feb. 15, 1682. In conjunction with Marie Alacoque, he recommended the celebration of the solemnity of the heart of Jesus, and composed an office for the occasion. The first inventor of this rite, however, was Thomas Goodwin, president of Magdalen college, Oxford, an Arminian, who excited great notice in England, in the middle of the seventeenth century, by his ascetical and theological writings. His book entitled “Cor Christi in ccelis erga peccatores in terris,” printed in 1649, comprises the whole system of this devotion and was intended to promote the spread of it in England. La Colombiere, who was sent to London as confessor and preacher to the duchess of York, afterwards queen, found there a numerous sect, who, after Goodwin’s example, paid adoration to the fleshly heart of Jesus, as the symbolical image of divine love. He was astonished at the novelty of so ravishing a devotion, which had so long escaped the fertile invention of his fraternity; and carried it in triumph back with him to France, where, under the influence of heavenly visions and miracles, it struck deep root, and was extensively propagated. Among other agents a nun of the name of Marie Alacoque, who, in her heavenly visions, pretended to have conversed familiarly with Christ, was employed by the Jesuits to aid the deception, and in one of her visions, asserted that she had received orders from heaven to acquaint father la Colombiere, that he should institute a yearly festival to the heart of Jesus, propagate this devotion with all his might, and announce to such as should dedicate themselves to it, the assurance of their predestination to eternal life. The Jesuits immediately and zealously complied with the celestial mandate. There appeared at once in all quarters of the world, and in all languages, an innumerable swarm of publications, manuals, copper-plates, and medals, with hearts decorated with crowns of thorns, with lambent flames, transpiercing swords, or other symbolical impresses. They distributed scapularies to be worn day and night upon the breast, and tickets to be swallowed for driving out fevers. In all Spain there was not a nun who had not a present from the Jesuits of a heart cut out of red cloth, to be worn next the skin. In every catholic city and town, in all parts of the world, fraternities were erected, passionmasses and nine-day devotions were instituted, to the honour of the heart of Jesus; and panegyrical sermons delivered, exhorting the faithful to augment their zeal. The proselytes must vow, before the holy sacrament of the altar, an eternal fidelity to the heart of Jesus; and every soul was made responsible for the increase and growth of this new devotion; nay, the display of a burning zeal for making proselytes was regarded as the peculiar characteristic of the true worshipper of the heart. This devotion was represented in their sermons and writings, as a necessary means to the enjoyment of a blissful hereafter: it was no wonder, then, that the partisans of this devotion were in a short time as numerous in all catholic Christendom as the sands of the sea. The bishops approved and confirmed the brotherhoods, and consecrated churches, altars, and chapels, erected to the promotion of this enthusiasm. Kings and queens preferred petitions to the papal throne, that a proper office might be appointed in the breviary and choir, and a peculiar mass for the solemnization of the anniversary; and even at Rome fraternities arose and flourished that devoted themselves to the worship of the heart of Jesus. In recommendation of it the Jesuits were not wanting either in prophecies or miracles; among the foremost of whom was la Colombiere, who had an excellent taste in his compositions, and a noble delivery in the pulpit. His masterly eloquence displays itself amidst the extreme simplicity ofhis style, as we are told by the abbe Trublet, speaking of his sermons, published at Lyons 1757, in 6 volumes 12mo. He had an impetuous and lively imagination, and the warmth of his heart appears through all his discourses: it is the unction of pere Che'minaisr, only more ardent and glowing. All his sermons breathe the most gentle, and at the same time the most fervent piety: he has been equalled by few in the art of affecting his hearers, and no enthusiast ever fell less into the familiar. The celebrated Patru, his friend, speaks of him as the best skilled of his time in the refinements and niceties of the French language. There are likewise by him, “Moral Reflections,” and “Spiritual Letters.”

, or Colomesius, a learned French protestant, was born at Rochelle in 1638, where his father was a physician, and where he was probably educated. His application to various reading must evidently have been very extensive, and although he has no decided claims to originality, his works ranked in his own day, and some of them may still, as ably illustrating the history of learning and learned men. He faithfully treasured what he found in old, scarce, and almost unknown authors, and knew how to render the reproduction of learned curiosities both agreeable and useful. His great intimacy and high regard for Vossius, induced him to visit England, where Vossius was then canon of Windsor, and by his interest or recommendation he was appointed librarian at Lambeth, with a competent salary. This, however, he lost at the revolution, when his patron, archbishop Bancroft, was deprived for not taking the oaths to the new government. After this it is said that he fell into poverty, and died in Jan. 1692; and was buried in St. Martin’s church-yard. His principal works are, 1. “Gallia Orientalis,” reprinted at Hamburgh, 1709, in 4to, under the care of the learned Jabricius; and containing an account of such French as were learned in the Oriental languages. 2. “Hispania & Italia Orientalis,” giving an account of the Spanish and Italian Oriental scholars. 3. “Bibliotheque Choisie;” reprinted at Paris, 1731, with notes of M. de la Monnoye, 12mo. This was published at Hamburgh, 4to, by Christ. Wolf, an useful work, and of great erudition. 4. “Theologorum Presbyterianorum Icon,” in which he shews his attachment to episcopacy; and for which he was attacked by Jurieu (who had not half his candour and impartiality) in a book entitled “De P esprit d'Arnauld.” 5. “Des opuscules critiques & historiques,” collected and published in 1709, by Fabricius. 6. “Melanges Historiques,” &c. 7. “La vie du pere Sirmond,” &c. His “Colomesiana,” make a volume of the collection of Anas.

, a Venetian dominican, who died May 17, 1520, in his eightieth year, is chiefly known by a scarce book, entitled “Poliphili Hypnerotomachia,” Venice, 1499, fol. There is an edition of 1545, but none of 1467; the copies which pass for that edition, are of one or the other above mentioned editions; and the mistake has arisen from the last leaf, which contained the elate of the impressions, heing taken out, and the last but one left; on which is the date of the time when the work was written. It is a romance filled with mythological learning, of very little value but for its scarcity and whimsical composition, and has been translated into French by John Martin, Paris, 1561, fol

factions;" to which they were wont to one or both of them, were assassinated

reply, that if it pleased God to bring by bandittis or bravoes. estate of 60l. a year, clear of charges, besides lOl. for placing out the boys apprentices. In 1708 he settled his great benefaction of the hospital of St. Augustine in Bristol, consisting of a master, two ushers, and one hundred boys; for the maintenance of which boys, he gave an estate of 138l. 155. 6fd. a year. The charge of first setting up this hospital, and making it convenient for the purpose, amounted, it is said, to about 11,000l. He gave also 6l. yearly to the minister of All- Saints in Bristol, for reading prayers every Monday and Tuesday morning throughout the year, and I/, a year to the clerk and sexton: also 6l. a year for ever, for a monthly sermon and prayers to the prisoners in Newgate there; and 20l. yearly for ever to the clergy beneficed in that city, for preaching fourteen sermons in the time of Lent, on subjects appointed by himself. The subjects are these the Lent fast against atheism and infidelity the catholic church the excellence of the church of England the powers of the church baptism confirmation confession and absolution the errors of the church of Rome; enthusiasm and superstition restitution frequenting the divine service frequent communion the passion of our blessed Saviour. He bestowed, lastly, upwards of 2000l. in occasional charities and benefactions to churches and charity-schools, all within the city of Bristol. Beyond that city his benefactions were equally liberal. He gave 6000l. for the augmentation of sixty small livings, on the following terms: Any living that was entitled to queen Anne’s bounty might have this too, on condition that every parish, which did receive this, should be obliged to raise 100l. to be added to the lOOl. raised by Colston: and many livings have had the grant of this bounty. He gave to St. Bartholomew’s hospital in London 2000l. with which was purchased an estate of 100l. a year, which is settled on that hospital and he left to the same, by will, 500l. To Christ’s hospital, at several times, 1000l. and 1000l. more by will. To the hospitals of St. Thomas and Bethlehem 500l. each. To the workhouse without Bishopsgate, 2001. To the society for propagating the gospel in foreign parts, 300l. He built an almshouse for six poor people at Shene in Surry, and left very handsome legacies to Mortlake in the same county, where he died: viz. 45l. yearly, to be continued for twelve years after his death, for clothing and educating twelve boys and twelve girls in that place; and also 85l. he being so many years old, to eighty- five poor men and women there, to each 1l. to be distributed at the time of his decease. He gave lOO/. per annum, to be continued for twelve years after his death, and to be distributed by the direction of his executors: either to place out every year ten boys apprentices, or to be given towards the setting up ten young tradesmen, to each 10l. He gave likewise to eighteen charity-schools in several parts of England, and to be continued to them for twelve years after his death, to each school yearly 5l. Finally, he gave towards building a church at Manchester in Lancashire 20l. and towards the building of a church at Tiverton in Devonshire 50l.

, an ancient Italian poet and philosopher, was born at Stignano in Pescia, in 1330, His father, who was in the army, being involved in the troubles of his country, was obliged to retire to Bologna, where Coluccio was educated, or rather where he taught himself for some time without % master. It appears indeed from a letter which he wrote to Bernardo cli Moglo, that he did not apply himself to the cultivation of polite literature till he was arrived at man’s estate, and that it was then he went to Bologna? and attended the public lectures of the father of the above Bernardo. By his own father’s request, he afterwards studied law, but on his death quitted that profession for eloquence and poetry. It is not stated when he left Bologna, nor when he was permitted to return to Florence; but in 1363, in his thirty-eighth year, we find him the colleague of Francis Bruin, as apostolical secretary to pope Urban V, and it is probable that he quitted this employment when Urban went to France. He quitted at the same time the ecclesiastical habit, and married a lady by whom he had ten children. His reputation for knowledge and eloquence procured him the greatest offers from popes, emperors, and kings; but his love for his native country made him prefer, to the most brilliant prospects, the office of chancellor of the republic of Florence, which was conferred on him in 1375, and which he filled very honourably for thirty years. The letters he wrote appeared so striking to John Galeas Visconti, then at war with the republic, that he declared one letter of Coluccio’s to be more mischievous to his cause than the efforts of a thousand Florentine knights.

, renowned in Scotch history as the founder of a monastery at Icolmkill, and the chief agent in converting the northern Picts, was a native of Ireland, where he was a priest and abbot, and is supposed to have been born at Gartan, in the county of Tyrconnel, in 521. From thence, about the year 565, he arrived in Scotland, and received from Bridius, the son of Meilochon, the then reigning king of the Picts, and his people, the island of Hij, or Hy, one of the Western Isles, which was afterwards called from him Icolmkill, and became the famous burial-place of the kings of Scotland. There he built a monastery, of which he was the abbot, and which for several ages continued to be the chief seminary of North Britain. Columba acquired here such influence, that neither king or people did any thing without his consent. Here he died June 9, 597, and his body was buried on the island; but, according to some Irish writers, was afterwards removed to Down in Ulster, and laid in the same vault with the remains of St. Patrick and St. Bridgit. From this monastery at iona, of which some remains may yet be traced, and another, which he had before founded in Ireland, sprang many other monasteries, and a great many eminent men; but such are the ravages of time and the revolutions of society, that this island, which was once “the luminary of the Caledonian regions, whence savage clans and roving barbarians derived the benefits of knowledge, and the blessings of religion,” had, when Dr, Johnson visited it in 1773, “no school for education, nor temple for worship, only two inhabitants that could speak English, and not one that could write or read.”

, another eminent missionary for the propagation of the Christian religion in the sixth century, was a native of Ireland according to Jonas, who wrote his life, sir James Ware, and others; but Mackenzie maintains that he was a North Briton. From either Scotland or. Ireland, however, he went into England, where he continued some time, and in 589 proceeded to France, and founded the monastery of Luxevil, near Besanon, which he governed during twenty years. In 598 we find him engaged in a controversy with pope Gregory concerning the proper time of keeping Easter, which was then a frequent object of dispute; but Columbanus at last submitted to the court of Rome. After so long residence in France, he was banished for censuring the immoralities of Theodoric and his queen. He then went to Switzerland, where he was kindly received by Theodebert, king of that country, and was successful in converting the pagans; but the Swiss army being defeated by the French, he was obliged to remove to Italy, where, under the protection of the king of the Lombards, he founded, in 613, the abbey of Bobio, near Naples. Over this monastery he presided but a short time, dying Nov. 21, 61S. Authors are not agreed as to the order of monks to which Columbanus belonged, but it is certain that his disciples conformed to the rules of the Benedictines. His works are printed in the Bibl. Patrum, and consist of monastic rules, sermons, poems, letters, &c.

, a Genoese, and frequently mentioned in history as the discoverer of America, was born in 1442. Ferdinand his son, who wrote his life, would suggest to us, that he was descended from an ancient and considerable family; but it is generally believed that his father was a woolcomber, and that he himself was of the same trade, till, by having been at sea, he had acquired a taste for navigation. In his early years he applied himself much to the study of geometry and astronomy at Pavia, in order to understand cosmography: and learnt to draw, in order to describe lands, and set down cosmographical bodies, plains, or rounds. He went to sea at the age of fourteen: his first voyages were to those ports in the Mediterranean frequented by the Genoese; after which he took a voyage to Iceland; and proceeding still further north, advanced several degrees within the polar circle. After this, Columbus entered into the service of a famous sea-captain of his own name and family, who commanded a small squadron fitted out at his own expence; and by cruising against the Mahometans and Venetians, the rivals of his country in trade, had acquired both wealth and reputation. With him Columbus continued for several years, no less distinguished for his courage than his experience as a sailor. At length, in an obstinate engagement, off the coast of Portugal, with some Venetian caravals returning richly laden from the Low Countries, his ship took fire, together with one of the enemy’s ships to which it was first grappled. Columbus threw himself into the sea, laid hold of a floating oar, and by the support of it, and his dexterity in swimming, reached the shore, though above two leagues distant.

After this disaster he went to Lisbon, where he married a daughter of Bartholomew Perestrello, one of the captains employed by Prince Henry in his early navigations, and who had discovered and planted the islands of Porto Santo and Madeira, and by getting possession of his journals and charts, Columbus was seized with an irresistible desire of visiting unknown countries. He first made a voyage to Madeira; and continued during several years to trade with that island, the Canaries, Azores, the settlements in Guinea, and all the other places which the Portuguese had discovered on the continent of Africa. By these means he soon became one of the most skilful navigators in Europe. At this time the great object of discovery was a passage by sea to the East Indies, which was at last accomplished by the Portuguese, by doubling the Cape of Good Hope. The danger and tediousness of the passage, however, induced Columbus to consider whether a shorter and more direct passage to these regions might not be found out; and at length he became convinced that, by sailing across the Atlantic Ocean, directly towards the West, new countries, which probably formed a part of the vast continent of India, must infallibly be discovered. In 1474, he communicated his ideas on this subject to one Paul, a physician in Florence, a man eminent for his knowledge in cosmography, who suggested several facts in confirmation of the plan, and warmly encouraged Columbus to persevere in an undertaking so laudable, and which must redound so much to the honour of his country and the benefit of Europe. Columbus, fully satisfied of the truth of his system, was impatient to set out on a voyage of discovery, and to secure the patronage of some of the considerable powers of Europe, capable of undertaking such an enterprize. He applied first to the republic of Genoa; afterwards to the courts of Portugal, Spain, and England, successively, but met with a variety of mortifying interruptions. At last his project was so far countenanced by Ferdinand of Spain and queen Isabella, that our adventurer set sail with three small ships, the whole expence of which did not exceed 4000l. During his voyage he met with many difficulties from the mutinous and timid disposition of his men. He was the first who observed the variation of the compass, which threw the sailors into the utmost terror. For this phenomenon Columbus was obliged to invent a reason, which, though it did not satisfy himself, yet served to dispel their fears, or silence their murmurs. At last, however, the sailors lost all patience; and the admiral was obliged to promise so r lemnly, that in case land was not discovered in three days, he should return to Europe. That very night, however, the island of San Salvador was discovered, and the sailors were then as extravagant in the praise of Columbus as they had before been insolent in reviling and threatening him. They threw themselves at his feet, implored his pardon, and pronounced him to be a person inspired by heaven with more than human sagacity and fortitude, in order to accomplish a design so far beyond the ideas and conception of all former ages. Having visited several of the West India islands, and settled a colony in Hispaniola, he again set sail for Spain; and after escaping great dangers from violent tempests, arrived at the port of Palos on the 15th of March 1493.

, a Greek poet, was a native of Lycopolis, a city of Thebais, in Upper Egypt, of whose parentage or education nothing is recorded; but we learn from Suidas that he lived in the reign of Anastasius, who succeeded Zeno in the government of the Eastern empire, about the year 491. He wrote Caledonics, Persies, and Encomia; but none of his works now remain, except the “Rape of Helen,” and that in a mutilated state. It is not, however, destitute of imagery, and is adorned by a variety of striking and expressive epithets, although we may infer from it, that the true poetic spirit had then ceased to flourish. The first edition of this work is that by Aldus, 8vo, without a date, along with Quintus Calaber; and the last, if we mistake not, was by Harles, 1776, 8vo, but the best is said to be that of Lanness, Gr. & Lat. 1747, 8vo. The Italians and French have good translations in their respective languages, and there are three in English; the first by sir Edward Sherborne in 1701, valuable chiefly for his learned notes; the second partly by Fawkes, and partly by a nameless coadjutor, in 1780; and the third, inferior to that of Fawkes, by an anonymous writer, was published in 1786.

This account, we know not on what authority, appeared in the last edition of this Dictionary, and we suspect is erroneous, unless there were two Colwils, or Colvils, who both wrote in imitation of Butler. In 1681 one Samuel Colvil published, at London, “The mock poem, or the Whig’s supplication,” 12mo.

In 1659 he was admitted of Sidney-Sussex college, Cam-, bridge, April 18, after having completed his fourteenth year. Here he was under the care of the rev. Edmund Matthews, B. D. senior fellow and president of the college. To this gentleman he acknowledges his obligations for the pains he took in teaching him experimental philosophy, geometry, astronomy, and other parts of the mathematics, music, painting, and even the oriental languages, and the elements of philosophy and divinity. His family having been sufferers by the rebellion, he was obliged to husband his little property with the utmost care, and seems to have considered an exhibition of ten pounds annually as a very important acquisition; because with the addition of five pounds from a private benefactor, he informs us, “it enabled him to live very well, and from that time, he put his parents to no other expence, but that of providing him his clothes and books.” In January 1662 he was chosen scholar of the house, with another pension of five pounds per annum % which cheered an ceconomist of such humble expectations with the prospect of absolute plenty. Having been admitted to the degree of A. B. Jan. 21, 1662, he now indulged the natural wish of a young scholar, to continue in the university, and was led to entertain hopes of obtaining a fellowship, either in his own college, or in St. John’s, the master of which, Dr. Gunning, had made him many promises; but these proving abortive, and the ten pound exhibition being withdrawn (which did not come from the college, but from a fund raised by certain Kentish men resident in London) he was obliged to leave the university, and retire to his father’s house. In this situation, however, he was not without friends; a Mr. John Holney of Eden-bridge, a pious old gentleman, and his father’s particular friend, found out his merit, and made him a handsome present, with a request that he would draw upon him at any time for any sum he might want; and so many other friends from other quarters appeared, that Mr. Comber never found it necessary to avail himself of Mr. Holney’s munificence in the future periods of his life.

Early in 1663, he accepted an invitation to the house of his late preceptor Mr. Holland, now rector of All-hallows Staining, London, and being ordained deacon Aug. 18, he read prayers for Mr. Holland, and employed the week in studying at Sjon college. Soon after he was invited to be curate to the rev. Gilbert Bennet, who held the living of Stonegrave in Yorkshire, and who promised, if he liked him, to resign in his favour in a year or two, as he was possessed of other preferment. Having accepted this offer, he was next year ordained priest at York minster by archbishop Sterne, and no objection, was made to his age (twenty years) on account of his uncommon qualifications; and when this circumstance, which had not passed unobserved, was afterwards objected to the archbishop, as an irregularity, he declared he had found no reason to repent. In 1666 he was admitted at Cambridge to his master’s degree by proxy, the plague then raging at the university. At Stonegrave, his character having recommended him to the notice of Mr. Thornton of East-Newton in Yorkshire, he was invited to reside at that gentleman’s house, and he afterwards married one of his daughters. While he lived with this family, he wrote various theological pieces, and also amused himself with poetical compositions. In 1669 Mr. Bennet resigned the living of Stonegrave, and Mr, Comber was inducted in October of that year.

Besides the works already noticed, Dr. Comber wrote, 1. “A Scholastical History of the primitive and general use of Liturgies in the Christian Church; together with an Answer to Mr. David Clarkson’s late Discourse concerning Liturgies,” Lond. 1690, dedicated to king William and queen Mary. 2. “A Companion to the Altar; or, an Help to the worthy Receiving of the Lord’s Supper, by Discourses and Meditations upon the whole Communionoffice.” 3. “A brief Discourse upon the Offices of Baptism, Catechism, and Confirmation,” printed at the end of the Companion to the Altar.“4.” A Discourse on the occasional Offices in the Common Prayer, viz. Matrimony, Visitation of the Sick, Burial of the Dead, Churching of Women, and the Commination.“5.” A Discourse upon the Manner and Form of making Bishops, Priests, and Deacons,“London, 1699, 8vo, dedicated to archbishop Tenison. 6.” Short Discourses upon the whole Common Prayer, designed to inform the judgment, and excite the devotion of such as daily use the same;“chiefly byway of paraphrase, London, 1684, 8vo, dedicated to Anne, princess of Denmark, to whom the author was chaplain. 7. f Roman Forgeries in the Councils during the first four Centuries; together with an Appendix, concerning the forgeries and errors in the annals of Baronius,” ibid. 1689, 4to. It seems doubtful whether the edition of Fox’s “Christus Triumphans,” which appeared in 1672, was published by him. From his correspondence, and from a ms account of his life left in his family, his great grandson, the rev. T. Comber of Jesus college, Cambridge, published in 1799, an interesting volume, entitled “Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Thomas Comber, D. D. some time dean of Durham; in which is introduced a candid view of the scope and execution of the -several works of Dr. Comber, as well printed as ms.; also a fair account of his literary correspondence.” Of this we have availed ourselves as to the preceding facts, and must still refer to it for a more satisfactory detail of Dr. Comber’s public services and private character. He was unquestionably a pious, learned, and indefatigable supporter of the doctrine and discipline of the church of England; and his private character added a very striking lustre to his public professions. His principal works, not of the controversial kind, are those he wrote on the various parts of the liturgy, which, although in less reputation now than formerly, unquestionably were the first of the kind, and rendered the labours of his successors Nichols, Wheatley, &c. more easy. His style is in general perspicuous, although void of ornament, and the phraseology, somewhat peculiar; but these liturgical commentaries are chiefly valuable for the accumulation of learned references and authorities. As to his private character, his biographer assures us, that “his modesty and inambition were singularly remarkable. Content with a moderate fortune, he was desirous of continuing in a private station, though possessed of abilities and integrity capable of adorning the most exalted and splendid rank. Insensible equally to the calls of ambition and the allurements of wealth, we behold him declining situations of honour and emolument, to obtain which thousands have made shipwreck of their honour and conscience. When the importunity of his friends had at last prevailed on him to lay aside his thoughts of continuing in obscurity, and induced him to step forward into a more public life, we see him respected by all the great and good men of his time, and frequently receiving public marks of esteem from the lips of royalty itself. The same modesty which had made him desirous of continuing in a private station, still adhered to him when preferred to an eminent dignity in the church: unassuming and humble in private life, in public he was dignified without pride, and generous without ostentation.”

, a celebrated grammarian and protestant divine, was born in Moravia in 1592. Having studied in several places, and particularly at Herborn, he returned to his own country in 1614, and was made rector of a college there. He was ordained minister in 1616, and two years after became pastor of the church of Fulnec: at which time he was appointed master of a school lately erected. He then appears to have projected the introduction of a new method for teaching the languages. He published some essays for this purpose in 1616, and had prepared other pieces on that subject, which were destroyed in 1621, when the Spaniards plundered his library, after having taken the city. The ministers of Bohemia, and Moravia being outlawed by an edict in 1624, and the persecution increasing the year after, Comenius fled to Lesna, a city of Poland, and taught Latin. There he published in 1631, his book entitled “Janua linguarum reserata,” or, “the gate of languages unlocked” of which he gives us an account which is universally allowed to be true “I never could have imagined,” says he, “that this little book, calculated only for children, should have met with universal applause from the learned. This has been justified by the letters I have received from a great number of learned men of different countries, in which they highly congratulate me on this new invention; as well as by the versions which have been emulously made of it into several modern tongues. For it has not only been translated into twelve European languages, namely, Latin, Greek, Bohemian, Polish, German, Swedish, Dutch, English, French, Spanish, Italian, Hungarian; but likewise into the Asiatic languages, as, Arabic, Turkish, Persian, and even the Mogul, which is spoken all over the East Indies.” It was afterwards reprinted under the title of “Orbis sensualium pictus,” and is still, according to baron Born, used in the schools of Bohemia, Comenius being particularly skilled in the language of that country.

This book gained Comenius such reputation, that the governing powers of Sweden wrote to him in 1633, and offered him a commission for new regulating all the schools in that kingdom; which offer, however, he did not think proper to accept, but only promised to assist with his advice those who should be appointed to execute that commission. He then translated into Latin, a piece which he had written in his native tongue, concerning the new method of instructing youth, a specimen of which appeared under the title of “Pansophiae prodromus,” or “The forerunner of universal learning,” printed at London, 1639, 12mo, and translated by Jer. Collier, 1651. This made him considered as one very capable of reforming the method of teaching; and the parliament of England desired his assistance to reform the schools of this kingdom. He arrived at London, Sept. 1641, but the rebellion then commencing, shewed Comenius that this was not a juncture favourable to his designs; he went therefore to Sweden, whither he had been invited by Lewis de Geer, a gentleman of great merit, who had the public welfare very much at heart. He arrived there in August 1642, and discoursed with Oxenstiern about his method: the result of which conference was, that he should go and fix at Elbing in Prussia, and compose it. la the mean time Lewis de Geer settled a considerable stipend upon him, by which means, being delivered from the drudgery of teaching a school, he employed himself wholly in finding out general methods for those who instructed youth; Having spent four years at Elbing in this study, he returned to Sweden to shew his composition, which was examined by three commissioners, and declared worthy of being made public when completed. He spent two more years upon it at Elbing, and then was obliged to return to Lesna. In 1650 he took a journey to the court of Sigismund Ragotski, prince of Transilvania; where a conference was desired with him on the subject of education. He gave this prince some pieces, containing instructions for regulating the college of Patak, pursuant to the maxims laid down in his “Pansophia;” and, during four years, he was allowed to propose whatever he pleased with regard to the government of that college. After this he returned to Lesna, and did not leave it till it was burnt by the Poles; of which calamity, as we shall see below, Comenius was charged with being the cause. He lost there all his manuscripts, except what he had written on Pansophia, and on the Revelations. He fled into Silesia, thence to Brandenburgh, afterwards to Hamburgh, and lastly to Amsterdam; where he met with so much encouragement, that he was tempted to continue there for the remainder of his life. He printed there, in 1657, at the expence of his Maecenas, the different parts of his new method of teaching. The work is in folio, and divided into four parts. “The whole,” says Bayle, “cost the author prodigious pains, other people a great deal of money, yet the learned received no benefit from it; nor is there, in my opinion, any thing practically useful in the hints of that author.”

Comenius became at last sensible of the vanity of his labours, as we learn from the book he published in 1668 at Amsterdam, entitled “Unius necessarii,” or “Of the one thing needful;” in which he acquaints us also with the resolution he had made, of employing all his future thoughts wholly on his salvation, and this he probably kept. He died at Amsterdam, 1671, in his eightieth year. Had he lived much longer, he would have seen the falsity of his prophecies with regard to the millennium, which he affirmed would begin in 1672, or 1673. Whatever mortification Comenius must have felt on the score of his prophecies, his enemies have brought more serious charges against him. He was first reproached with having done great prejudice to his brethren, who were banished with him from Moravia. Most of them had fled from their country with considerable sums of money; but, instead of being ceconomists, they squandered it away in a short time, because Comenius prophesied they should return to their country immediately, and thus they were very soon reduced to beggary. He was also accused of having been the cause of the plundering and burning of Lesna, where his brethren had found an asylum, by the panegyric he made so unseasonably upon Charles Gustavus of Sweden, when he invaded Poland. Comenius proclaimed him in a prophetic manner to be the immediate destroyer of popery; by which the protestants of Poland became extremely odious to the Roman catholics of that kingdom. He did not seem to be undeceived when the king of Sweden turned his arms against Denmark; for he made him a second panegyric, wherein he congratulated him no less on this new invasion than he had done upon the former. But whatever credit the protestants of Lesna might give to Comenius, that city was surprised and burnt by the Polish army; on which occasion Comenius lost his house, his furniture, and his library; a proof that, if he was an impostor, he had first deceived himself. Part of his apocalyptic treatises, and some other pieces relating to his Pansophia, escaped the flames; he having just time to cover them, in a hole under ground, from which they were taken ten days after the fire but his “Lexicon Bobemicum,” a work which baron Born conceives would have been of the highest utility, was totally destroyed. On this he had spent above forty years of his life.

Besides the works already mentioned, Comenius wrote, 1. “Synopsis -Physicse, ad lumen divinum reformat,” Amst. 1643, and 1645, 12mo, published in English, 1651, 12mo. This book has procured him a place in Brucker’s class of scriptural philosophers. Comenius, according to his analysis of the work, supposes three principles of nature matter, spirit, and light: the first, a dark, inactive, corporeal substance, which receives forms; the second, the subtle, living, invisible substance, which animates material bodies; the third, a middle substance between the two former, lucid, visible, moveable, capable of penetrating matter, which is the instrument by which spirit acts upon matter, and which performs its office by means of motion, agitation, or vibration. Of these three principles he conceived all created beings to be composed. This doctrine he attempts to derive from the Mosaic history of the creation; but the scholastic fictions which men of this cast ascribe to Moses, Moses himself would probably never have owned. 2. “Ecclesiae Slavonic, &c. brevis historiola,” Amst. 1660, afterwards published by Buddeus under the title of “Historia Fratrum Bohcmorum,” 1702, ito. Several other of his publications, now of little interest, are enumerated in our authorities.

, or Noel Conti, an Italian writer, was born at Venice about the commencement of the sixteenth century, and became greatly distinguished for classical learning. He translated from Greek into Latin the “Deipnosophistse of Athenaeus,” the “Rhetoric of Hermogenes,” and he published original poems in both these languages. He wrote a history of his own times from 1545 to 1581, fol. 1612, a very scarce edition. The first was that of 1572, 4to, but his principal work is a system of mythology entitled “Mythologiae, sive explicationis Fabularum, lib. X.” Padua, 1616, 4to, and often reprinted. It was dedicated to Charles IX. of France. He died in 158i., and on account of his love of allegory and mysticism he was denominated by Joseph Scaliger, rather harshly, "Homo futilissimus.

, or Commines, Lat. Cominæus (Philip de), an excellent French historian, was born of a noble family in Flanders, 1446. He was a man of great abilities, which, added to his illustrious birth, soon recommended him to the notice of Charles the Bold, duke of Burgundy, with whom he lived in intimacy for about eight years. He was afterwards 'invited to the court of France by Louis XI. and became a man of consequence, not only from the countenance which was given him by the monarch, but from other great connections also, which he formed by marrying into a noble family. Louis made him his chamberlain, and seneschal or chief magistrate of the province of Poictou. He also employed him in several negotiations, which he executed in a satisfactory manner, and enjoyed the high favour of his prince. But after the death of Louis, when his successor Charles VIII. came to the throne, the envy of his adversaries prevailed so far, that he was imprisoned at Loches, in the county of Berry, and treated with great severity; but by the application of his wife, he was removed at length to Paris. After some time he was convened before the parliament, in which he pleaded his own cause with such effect, that, after a speech of two hours, he was discharged. In this harangue he insisted much upon what he had done both for the king and kingdom, and the favour and bounty of his master Louis XI. He remonstrated to them, that he had done nothing either through avarice or ambition; and that if his designs had been only to have enriched himself, he had as fair an opportunity of doing it as any man of his condition in France. He died in a house of his own called Argenton, Oct. 17, 1509; and his body, being carried to Paris, was interred in the church belonging to the Augustines, in a chapel which he had built for himself. In his prosperity he had the following saying frequently in his mouth: “He that will not work, let him not eat:” in his adversity he used to say, “I committed myself to the sea, and am overwhelmed in a storm.”

, of Gaza, a Christian poet of the third century, is the author of a Latin piece entitled “Institutiones.” It is composed in the form of verse, but without either measure or quantity: only care is taken that each line comprises a complete sense, and that it begins with something like an acrostic. It lay a long time in obscurity, until Rigaltius published it in his edition of Cyprian, and Davies at the end of Minutius Felix. It is more valuable for the strain of piety which prevails throughout the whole than for any poetical merit. Commodianus appears to have been originally a heathen, and as he informs us, was converted by reading the scriptures, and appears to have been also acquainted with secular authors. Lardner has bestowed a chapter on this work, and on the history of its author, in his “Credibility of the Gospel History.”

, a French monk, a native of Paris, is known as the author or editor of different works which met with a favourable reception. Among others he published “The remarkable Travels of Peter della Valle, . Si Roman gentleman, translated from the Italian,” 4 vols. 4to; “A new and interesting History of the kingdoms of Tonquin and Laos,” 4to, translated from the Italian of father Manni, in 1666. In the year preceding this, he published the third volume of father Lewis Coulon’s “History of the Jews.” He died at Paris in 1689.

King Charles now caused him to be sworn one of his privy council; and committed to his care the educating of his two nieces, the princesses Mary and Anne, which important trust he. discharged to the nation’s satisfaction. They were both confirmed by him upon January 23> 1676; and it is somewhat remarkable that they were both likewise married by him: the eldest, Mary, with William prince of Orange, November 4, 1677; the youngest, Anne, with George prince of Denmark, July 28, 1683. The attachment of these two princesses to the protestant religion was owing, in a great measure, to their tutor Compton; which afterwards, when popery came to prevail at the court of England, was imputed to him as an unpardonable crime. In the mean time he indulged the hopeless project of bringing dissenters to a sense of the necessity of an union among protestants; to promote which, he held several conferences with his own clergy, the substance of which he published in July 16SO. He further hoped, that dissenters might be the more easily reconciled to the church, if the judgment of foreign divines should be produced against their needless separation: and for that purpose he wrote to M. le Moyne, professor ef divinity at Leyden, to M. de PAngle, one of the preachers of the protestant church at Charenton near Paris, and to M. Claude, another eminent French divine. Their answers are published at the end of bishop Stillingfleet’s “Unreasonableness of Separation,” 1681, 4to; all concurring in the vindication of the church of England from any errors in its doctrine, or unlawful impositions in its discipline, and therefore in condemning a separation from it as needless and uncharitable. But popery was what the bishop most strenuously opposed; and while it was gaining ground at the latter end of Charles the lid’s reign, under the influence of the duke of York, there was no method he left untried to stop its progress. This zeal was remembered and resented on the accession of James II.; when, to his honour, he was marked out as the first sacrifice to popish fury, being immediately dismissed from the council-table; and on December 16, 1685, from being dean of the royal chapel. Means were also devised to entrap him into some measure which might affect his office as bishop of London, nor could this be difficult in the case of a man so firm and conscientious. The following is a striking instance of the intentions of the court to overturn the national church. Dr. John Sharp, rector of St, Giles’s in the Fields, afterwards archbishop of York, having in some of his sermons vindicated the doctrine of the church of England against popery; the king sent a letter, dated June 14, 1686, to bishop Compton, “requiring and commanding him forthwith to suspend Dr. Sharp from further preaching in any parish church or chapel within his diocese, until he had given the king satisfaction.” In order to understand how Sharp had offended the king, it must be remembered, that king James had caused the directions concerning preachers, published in 1662, to be now reprinted; and reinforced them by a letter directed to the archbishops of Canterbury and York, given at Whitehall, March 5, 1686, to prohibit the preaching upon controversial points; that was, in effect, to forbid the preaching against popery, which Sharp had done. The bishop refusing to suspend Dr. Sharp, because, as he truly alleged, he could not do it according to law, was cited to appear, August y, before the new ecclesiastical commission: when he was charged with not having observed his majesty’s command in the case of Sharp, whom he was ordered to suspend. The bishop, after expressing some surprise, humbly begged a copy of the commission, and a copy of his charge; but was answered by chancellor Jefferies, “That he should neither have a copy of, nor see, the commission neither would they give him a copy of the charge.” His lordship then desired time to advise with counsel; and time was given him to the 16th, and afterwards to the 3 1st of August. Then his lordship offered his plea to their jurisdiction: which being overruled, he protested to his right in that or any other plea that might be made for his advantage; and observed, “that as a bishop he had a right, by the most authentic and universal ecclesiastical laws, to be tried before his metropolitan, precedently to any other court whatsoever.” But the ecclesiastical commissioners would not upon any account suffer their jurisdiction to be called in question; and therefore, in spite of all that his lordship or his counsel could allege, he was suspended on Sept. 6 following, for his disobedience, from the function and execution of his episcopal office, and from all episcopal and other ecclesiastical jurisdiction, during his majesty’s pleasure; and the bishops of Durham, Rochester, and Peterborough, were appointed commissioners to exercise ecclesiastical jurisdiction within, the diocese of London. But the court did not think fit to meddle with his revenues. For the lawyers had settled that benefices were of the nature of freeholds; therefore, if the sentence had gone to the temporalities, the bishop would have had the matter tried over again in the king’s bench, where he was likely to find justice.

While this matter was in dependence, the princess of Orange thought it became her to interpose in the bishop’s favour; and wrote to the king, earnestly begging him to be gentle tp the bishop, who she could not think would offend willingly. She also wrote to the bishop, expressing the great share she took in the trouble he was fallen into; as did also the prince. The king wrote an answer to the princess, reflecting severely on the bishop, not without some sharpness on her for meddling in such matters. The bishop in the mean time acquiesced in his sentence; but being suspended only as a bishop, and remaining still whole in his other capacities, he made another stand against the king, as one of the governors of the Charter-house, in refusing to admit one Andrew Popham, a papist, into the first pensioner’s place in that hospital. While he was thus sequestered from his episcopal office, he applied himself to the improvement of his garden at Fulham; and having a great genius -for botany, enriched it with a variety of curious plants, domestic and exotic*. His suspension, however, was so flagrant a piece of arbitrary power, that the prince of Orange, in his declaration, could not omit taking notice of it; and when there was an alarm of his highness’s coming over, the court was willing to make the bishop reparation, by restoring him, as they did on Sept. 23, 1688, to his episcopal function. But he made no haste to resume his charge, and to thank the king for his restoration; which made some conjecture, and, as appeared afterwards with good reason, that he had no mind to be restored in that manner, and that he knew well enough what had been doing in Holland. On Oct. 3, 1688, however, he waited upon king James, with the archbishop of Canterbury, and seven other bishops, when they suggested to his majesty such advice as they thought conducive to his interest, but this had no effect. The first part the bishop acted in the revolution, which immediately ensued, was the conveying, jointly with the earl of Dorset, the princess Anne of Denmark safe from London to Nottingham; lest she, in the present confusion of affairs, might have been sent away into France, or put under restraint, because the prince, heir consort, had left king James, and was gone over to the prince of Orange.

* We learn from Mr. Ray and Plu- fore in England. This repository was kenet, that he jwined to his taste for ever open to the inspection of the cugardening, a real and scientific know- rious and scientific and we find Ray, led^e of plants; an attainment not Petiver, and Plukenet, in numerous usual among the great in those days, instances, acknowledging the assistHe collected a greater variety of green- ance they received from the free cornhouse rarities, and planted a greater munication of rare and new plants out variety of hardy exotic trees and shrubs, of the garden at FulUam. Pulteaey'5 than had been seen in any garden be* Sketches. At his return to London, he discovered his zeal for the revolution, and first set his hand to the association begun at Exeter. He waited on the prince of Orange, Dec. 21, at the head of his clergy; and, in their names and his own, thanked his highness fur his very great and hazardous undertaking for their deliverance, and the preservation of the protcstant religion, with the anc; ent laws and liberties of this nation. He gave his royal highness the sacrament, Dec. 30; and upon Jan. 29 following, when the house of lords, in a grand committee, debated the important question, “Whether the throne, being vacant, ou^ht to be filled by a regent or a king?” Compton was one of the two bisiiops, sir Jonathan Trelawny bishop of Bristol being the other, who made the majority for filling up the throne by a king. On February 14, he was again appointed of the privy-council, and made dean of the royal chapel; from both which places king James had removed him: and was afterwards chosen by king William, to perform the ceremony of his and queen Mary’s coronation, upon April 11, 1689. The same year he was constituted one of the commissioners for revising the liturgy, in which he laboured with much zeal to reconcile the dissenters to the church; and also in the convocation, that met Nov. 21, 1689, of which he was president. But the intended comprehension met with insuperable difficulties, the majority of the lower house being resolved not to enter into any terms of accommodation with the dissenters; and his lordship’s not complying so far as the dissenters liked, is supposed to have been the reason of Burnet’s calling him “a weak man, wilful, and strangely wedded to a party.” This however must seem extraordinary to those who consider, that those who are usually called high churchmen have spoken very coolly of him ever since, on that very account: and that even his opposing, as he did, the prosecution against Sacheverell in 1710, declaring him not guilty, and also protesting against several steps taken in that affair, has not been sufficient to reconcile them to his complying so far with the dissenters as he did. The fact appears to have been that the bishop endeavoured to act with moderation, for which no allowance is made in times of violent party- spirit.

Among the many excellent features of his character given by Dr. Gooch, his munificence stands conspicuous. “He disposed of money to every one who could make out (and it was very easy to make that out to him) that he was a proper object of charity. He answered literally the apostle’s character, poor enough himself, yet making many rich. He had divers ancient people, men and women^ whom he supported by constant annual pensions; and several chiklren at school, at his own cost and charge, besides those educated from children, and brought up to the universities, to the sea, or to trades, &c. The poor of his parish were always attending his gate for their dole, and for the remains of his constant hospitable table, which was always furnished, and free to those whom respect or business drew to him. His hall was frequented in the morning with petitioners of all sorts. More particularly, he spared no cost nor pains to serve the church and clergy. He bought many advowsons out of lay-hands. He gave great sums for the rebuilding of churches, and greater still for the buying in impropriations, and settling them on the poor vicars. There was no poor honest clergyman, or his widow, in want, but had his benevolence when applied for: not any in the reformed churches abroad, to whom he was not a liberal patron, steward, and perpetual solicitor for. The French refugees drank deep of his bounty for many years; so did the Irish in their day of affliction and likewise the Scotch episcopal party,” when ejected from their livings at the revolution. It may truly 'be said, that by his death the church lost an excellent bishop; the kingdom a consistent and able statesman; the protestant religion, at home and abroad, an ornament and refuge; and the whole Christian world, an eminent example of virtue and piety.

His works are: 1. “A translation from the Italian, of the Life of Donna Olympia Maldachini, who governed the church during the time of Innocent X. which was from the year 1644- to 1655,” London, 1667. 2. “A translation i'roni the French, of the Jesuits’ intrigues; with the private instructions of that society to their emissaries,” 1669. 3. “A treatise of the Holy Communion,” 1677. 4. “A Letter to the Clergy of the diocese of London, concerning Baptism, the Lord’s Supper, Catechising, dated April 25, 1679.” 5. “A second letter concerning the Half- communion, Prayers in an unknown tongue, Prayers to Saints, July 6, 1680.” 6. “A third letter, on Confirmation, and Visitation of the Sick, 1682.” 7. “A fourth letter, upon the 54th Canon,” April 6, 1683. 8. “A fifth letter, upon the 118th Canon, March 19, 1684.” 9. “A sixth letter, upon the 13th Canon, April Is, 1685.” They were all reprinted together in 1686, 12mo, under the title of “Episcopalia, or Letters of the right reverend father in God, Henry lord hishop of London, to the Clergy of his Diocese.” There is also, 10. “A Letter of his to a Clergyman in his Diocese, concerning Nonresistance:” written soon after the revolution, and inserted in the Memoirs of the life of Mr. John Kettlewell.

, a learned English divine, was born Oct. 18, 1608, at Yeatenton in Devonshire. He was educated in classical learning at private schools, and, in 3626, sent to Exeter college in Oxford. He soon distinguished himself for uncommon parts and learning*; by means of which he grew highly in favour with Dr. John Prideaux, then rector of Exeter college, and king’s professor in divinity, who, accordingto the fashion of wit in those times, used to say of him, “Conanti nihil est difficile.” He took his degrees regularly; and, July 1633, was chosen fellow of his college, in which he became an eminent tutor. Upon the breaking out of the civil war, he judged it convenient to leave the university in 1642. He retired first to Lymington, a living of his uncle’s in Somersetshire; where, his uncle being fled, and he in orders, he officiated as long as he could continue there with safety. While he was at Lymington, he was constituted by the parliament one of the assembly of divines; bnt it is said that he never sat among them, or at least very seldom, since it is certain that he never took the covenant. He afterwards followed his uncle to London, and for some time assisted him in the church of St. Botolph Aldgate. He then became a domestic chaplain to lord Chandos, in whose family he lived at Harefield. He is said to have sought this situation, for the sake of keeping himself as clear from all engagements and difficulties as the nature and fickle condition of those times would permit. Upon the same motive he resigned his fellowship of Exeter college, Sept. 27, 1647; but, June 7, 1649, was unanimously chosen rector of it by the fellows, without any application of his own; and. Wood allows that under his care it flourished more than any other college.

In a very short time, however, after being thus settled, he was in great danger of being driven out of all public employment again, by the parliament’s enjoining what was called* the engagement, which he did not take within the time prescribed. He had a fortnight given him to consider further of it; at the end of which he submitted, but under a declaration, subscribed at the same time with the engagement, which in fact enervated that instrument entirely. The terms of the engagement were; “You shall promise to be true and faithful to the commonwealth of England, as it is now established without king or house of lords.” Cojiant’s declaration before the commissioners, when he took the engagement, was in this form and manner: “Being required to subscribe, I humbly premise, first, that I be not hereby understood to approve of what hath been done in.- order unto, or under this present government, or the government itself nor will I be thought to condemn it; they being things above my reach, and I not knowing the grounds of the proceedings. Secondly, that I do not bind myself to do any thing contrary to the word of God. Thirdly, that I do not so hereby bind myself, but that, if God shall remarkably call me to submit to any other power, I may be at liberty to obey that call, not withstanding the present engagement. Fourthly, in this sense, and in this sense only, I do promise to be true and faithful to the present government, as it is now established without king or house of lords.”

, a miscellaneous writer of some note in his day, was born in Ireland, and bred to the law, in which we do not find that he ever made any great figure. From thence he came over to London, in company with a Mr. Stirling, a dramatic poet of little note, to seek his fortune; and finding nothing so profitable, and so likely to recommend him to public notice, as political writing, he soon commenced an advocate for the government. There goes a story of him, however, but we will hope it is not a true one, that he and his fellow-traveller, who was embarked in the same adventure, for the sake of making their trade more profitable, resolved to divide their interests; the one to oppose, the other to defend the ministry. Upon which they determined the side each was to espouse by lots, or, according to Mr. Reed’s account, by tossing up a halfpenny, when it fell to Concanen’s part to defend the ministry. Stirling afterwards went into orders, and became a clergyman in Maryland. Concanen was for some time concerned in the “British” and “London Journals,” and in a paper called “The Specnlatist,” which last was published in 1730, 8vo. In these he took occasion to abuse not only lord Bolingbroke, who was naturally the object of it, but also Pope; by which he procured a place in the Dvwiciad. In a pamphlet called “A Supplement to the Profound,” he dealt very unfairly by Pope, as Pope’s commentator informs us, in not only frequently imputing to him Broome’s verses (for which, says he, he might seem in some degree accountable, having corrected what that gentleman did), but those of the duke of Buckingham and others. His wit and literary abilities, however, recommended him to the favour of the duke of Newcastle, through whose interest he obtained the post of attorney-general of the island of Jamaica in 1732, which office he filled with the utmost integrity and honour, and to the perfect satisfaction of the inhabitants, for near seventeen years; when, having acquired an ample fortune, he was desirous of passing the close of his life in his native country; with which intention he quitted Jamaica and came to London, proposing to pass some little time there before he went to settle entirely in Ireland. But the difference of climate between that metropolis and the place he had so long been accustomed to, had such an effect on his constitution, that he fell into a consumption, of which he died Jan. 22, 1749, a few weeks after his arrival in London. His original poems, though short, have considerable merit; but much cannot be said of his play, entitled “Wexford Wells.” He was also concerned with Mr. Roome and other gentlemen in altering Richard Broome’s “Jovial Crew” into a ballad opera, in which shape it is now frequently performed. Concanen has several songs in “The Musical Miscellany, 1729,” 6 vols. But a memofable letter addressed to him by Dr. Warburton will perhaps be remembered longer than any writing of his own pen. This letter^ which Mr. Malone first published (in his Supplement to Shakspeare, vol. I. p. 222), shews that, in 1726, Warbtirton, then an attorney at Newark, was intimate with Concanen, and an associate in the attacks made on Pope’s fame and talents. In 1724, Concanen published 3, volume of “Miscellaneous Poems, original and translated,” by himself and others.

, chevalier de St. Lazare, member of a great number of academies, and a celebrated traveller, was born at Paris in 1701. He began his journey to the east very young; and after having coasted along the shores of Africa and Asia in the Mediterranean, he was chosen, in 1736, to accompany M. Godin to Peru, for the purpose of determining the figure of the earth at the equator. The difficulties and dangers he surmounted in this expedition are almost incredible; and at one time he had nearly perished by the imprudence of one of his companions, M. Seniergues, whose arrogance had so much irritated the inhabitants of New Cuenca, that they rose tumultuously against the travellers; but, fortunately for the rest, the offender was the only victim. On his return home, la Condamine visited Rome, where pope Benedict XIV. made him a present of his portrait, and granted him a dispensation to marry one of his nieces, which he accordingly did, at the age of fifty-five. By his great equanimity of temper, and his lively and amiable disposition, he was the delight of all that knew him. Such was his gaiety or thoughtlessness, that two days before his death he made a couplet on the surgical operation that carried him to the grave; and, after having recited this couplet to a friend that came to see him, “You must now leave me,” added he, “1 have two letters to write to Spain; probably, by next post it will be too late.” La Condamine had the art of pleasing the learned by the concern he shewed in advancing their interests, and the ignorant by the talent of persuading them that they understood what he said. Even the men of fashion sought his company, as he was full of anecdotes and singular observations, adapted to amuse their frivolous curiosity. He was, however, himself apt to lay too much stress on trifles; and his inquisitiveness, as is often the case with travellers, betrayed him into imprudencies. Eager after fame, he loved to multiply his correspondences and intercourse; and there were few men of any note with whom he had not intimacies or disputes, and scarcely any journal in which he did not write. Replying to every critic, and flattered with every species of praise, he despised no opinion of him, though given by the most contemptible scribbler. Such, at least, is the picture of him, drawn by the marquis de Condorcet in his eloge. Among his most ingenious and valuable pieces are the following 1 “Distance of the tropics,” London, 1744. 2. “Extract of observations made on a voyage to the river of the Amazons,” 1745. 3. “Brief relation of a voyage to the interior of South America,” 8vo. 1745. 4. “Journal of the voyage jnade by order of the king to the equator; with the supplement,” 2 vols. 4to. 1751, 1752. 5. On the Inoculation of the Small-pox,“12mo, 1754. 6.” A letter on Education,“8vo. 7.” A second paper on the Inoculation of the Small pox,“1759. 8.” Travels through Italy,“1762, 12mo. These last three were translated and published here. 9.” Measure of the three first degrees of the meridian in the southern hemisphere,“1751, 4to. The style of the different works of la Condamine is simple and negligent; but it is strewed with agreeable and lively strokes that secure to him readers. Poetry was also one of the talents of our ingenious academician; his productions of this sort were, <e Vers de societe,” of the humorous kind, and pieces of a loftier style, as the Dispute for the armour of Achilles and others, translated from the Latin poets; the Epistle from an old man, &c. He died the 4th of February 1774, in consequence of an operation for the cure of a hernia, with which he had been afflicted.

, of Ripa Transona, the most obscure of modern artists, though a biographer of some celebrity, owes that and a place here to his connexion with Michael Angelo, whose life he published in 1553. If we believe Vasari, his imbecility was at least equal to his assiduity in study and desire of excelling, which were extreme. No work of his exists in painting or in sculpture. Hence Gori, the modern editor of his book, is at a loss to decide on his claim to either, though from the qualities of the writer, and the familiarity of M. Angelo, he surmises that Condivi must have had merit as an artist. From the last no conclusion can be formed; the attachment of M. Angelo, seldom founded in congeniality, was the attachment of the strong to the weak, it was protection; it extended to Antonio Mini of Florence, another obscure scholar of his, to Giuliano Bugiardini, to Jacopo L'Indaco: all men unable to penetrate the grand motives of his art, and more astonished at the excrescences of his learning in design, than elevated by his genius. Condivi intended to publish a system of rules and precepts on design, dictated by Michael Angelo, a work, if ever he did compose it, now perhaps irretrievably lost; from that, had destiny granted it to us, we might probably have formed a better notion of his powers as an artist, than we can from a biographic account, of which simplicity and truth constitute the principal merit. Condivi published this life, consisting of fifty pages, under the title “Vita de Michelagnolo Buonarroti, raccolta per Ascanio Condivi da la Ilipa Transone. In Roma appresso Antonio Blado Stampatore Canierale nel M. D. LIII. alii XVI. di Luglio.” According to Beyero, in his “Memoriae Historico-criticae, lib. rariorum,” this is one of the scarcest books in Europe. In 1746, Gori republished it in folio, and as it was originally published ten years before the death of Michael Angelo, continued it to that period. Gori’s work is a small folio, printed at Florence, 1746.

In 1765 he published his first work “Sur le Calcul Integrel,” in which he proposed to exhibit a general method of determining the finite integral of a given differential equation, either for differences infinitely small, or finite differences. D'Alembert and Bezout, the commissioners of the academy, employed to examine the merits of this performance, bestowed high praises on it as a work of invention, and a presage of talents worthy of encouragement. In 1767 he published a second work, the problem of three bodies, “Probleme des Trois corps,” in which he presented the nine differential equations of the movement of the bodies of a given system, supposing that each of these bodies should be propelled by a certain force, and that a mutual attraction subsisted among them. He also treated of the movement of three bodies of a given figure, the particles of which attracted each other in the inverse ratio of the square of the distance. In addition to this, he explained a new method of integers, by approximation, with the assistance of infinite series; and added to the methods exhibited in his first work, that which M. de la Grange had convinced him was still wanting. Thus Condorcet, says his eulogist La Lande, was already numbered with the foremost mathematicians in Europe. “There was not,” he adds, “above ten of that class; one at Petersburgh, one at Berlin, one at Basle, one at Milan, and five or six at Paris; England, which had set such an illustrious example, no longer produced a single geometer that could rank with the former.” It is mortifying to us to confess that this remark is but too much founded on truth. Yet, says a late writer of the life of Condorcet, we doubt not but there are in Great Britain at present mathematicians equal in profundity and address to any who have existed since tho illustrious Newton but these men are not known to the learned of Europe, because they keep their science to themselves. They have no encouragement from the taste of the nation, to publish any thing in those higher departments of geometry which have so long occupied the attention of the mathematicians on the continent.

In 1768, under the title of the first part of his “Essais d'Analyse,” he published a letter to D'Alembert, in which he resumed the subjects treated of in his two former works, and endeavoured, by means of new exhibitions, to extend his methods of integral calculation, in the three hypotheses of evanescent differences, finite differences, and partial differences. He there also gave the application of infinite or indefinite series to the integration; the methods of approximation, and the use of all the methods for the dynamic problems, especially the problem of three bodies: these modes might have become an useful help, that would have led to important discoveries, but he only pointed out the road necessary to be followed, without pursuing it,

He was received into the French academy on the 8th of March, 1769, and in the course of the same year he published a memoir on the nature of infinite series, on the extent of solutions afforded by this mode, and on a new method of approximation for the differential equations of all the orders. In the volumes of 1770, and the following years, he presented the fruits of his researches on the equations with partial and finite differences; and in 1772 he published “L‘Essai d’une methode pour distinguer les Equations differentielles possibles en termes finis de celies qui ne le sont pas,” an essay on a method to distinguish possible differential equations in finite terms, from those which are not so. The mode of calculation here presented, although an admirable instrument, is still very far distant from that degree of perfection to which it may be brought. In the midst of these studies, he published an anonymous pamphlet, entitled “A Letter to a Theologian,” in which he replied with keen satire to the attacks madfc by the author of “The Three Centuries of Literature,” against the philosophic sect. “But (subjoins the prudent La Lande) he pushed the matter somewhat too far, for, even, supposing his system demonstrated, it would be advantageous to confine those truths within the circle of the iniliated, because they are dangerous, in respect to the greater part of mankind, who are unable to replace, by means of principles, that which they are bereaved of in the shape of fear, consolation, and hope.” Condorcet was now in fact leagued with the atheists; and La Lande, who wished well to the same sect, here censures not his principles, but only regrets his rashness. In 1773 he was appointed secretary to the academy of sciences, when he composed eulogies upon several deceased members who had been neglected by Fontenelle; and in 1782 he was received into the French academy, on which occasion he delivered a discourse concerning the influence of philosophy. In the following year he succeeded D'Alembert as secretary to that academy, and pronounced an able eulogy to the memory of his deceased friend, whose literary and scientific merits are set forth with great ability. The death of Euler afforded Condorcet another opportunity of displaying his own talents by appreciating those of the departed mathematician. The lives of Turgot and Voltaire, and the eulogy pronounced upon the death of the celebrated Franklin, were decided testimonies to the abilities of Condorcet as a biographical writer. Turgot had occupied much of his time and attention with moral and political sciences, and was particularly anxious that the certainty of which different species of knowledge are susceptible, might be demonstrated by the assistance of calculation, hoping that the human species would necessarily make a progress towards happiness and perfection, in the same manner as it had done towards the attainment of truth. To second these views of Turgot, Condorcet undertook a work replete with geometrical knowledge. He examined the probability of an assembly’s rendering a true decision, and he explained the limits to which our knowledge of future events, regulated by the laws of nature, considered as the most certain and uniform, might extend. If we do not possess a real, yet he thought, we ha\ 7 e at least a mean probability, that the law indicated by events, is the same constant law, and that it will be perpetually observed. He considered a forty-five thousandth part as the value of the risk, in the case when the consideration of a new law comes in question and it appears from his calculation, that an assembly consisting of 6 1 votes, in which it is required that there should be a plurality of nine, will fulfil this condition, provided there is a probability of each vote being equal to four-fifths, that is, that each member voting shall be deceived only once in five times. He applied these calculations to the creation of tribunals, to the forms of elections, and to the decisions of numerous assemblies; inconveniences attendant on which were exhibited by him. This work, says his eulogist, furnished a grand, and at the same time, an agreeable proof of the utility of analysis in important matters to which it had never before been applied, and to which we may venture to assert it never will be applied while human reason is allowed any share in human transactions. There are many of these paradoxes in geometry, which, we are told, it is impossible to resolve without being possessed of metaphysical attainments, and a degree of sagacity not always possessed by the greatest geometricians; but where such attainments and sagacity are to be found, even Condorcet himself has not exemplified. In his “Euler’s Letters,” published in 1787-89, he started the idea of a dictionary, in which objects are to be discovered by their qualities or properties, instead of being searched for under their respective names; he also intimated a scheme for constructing tables by which ten milHards of objects might be classed together, by means of only ten different modifications.

The political labours of Condorcet entirely occupied the last years of his existence. Among them were, his work, “Sur les assemblies provinciales,” and his “Reflexions sur le commerce des bk-s,” two of the most harmless. In 1788, Roucher undertook to give a new translation of an excellent English work by Smith, entitled “The Wealth of Nations,” with notes by Condorcet, who, however, had but little concern with it, and on this and other occasions he was not unwilling to sell his name to the booksellers to give a reputation to works with which he had no concern. Chapelier and Peissonel announced a periodical collection, entitled “Bibliotheque de I'liomme Public, &c.” (The statesman’s library, or the analysis of the best political works.) This indeed was one way of enabling the deputies of the assembly to learn what it was important for them, to become acquainted with; it was supposed that the name of Condorcet might be useful on this occasion also, and it was accordingly made use of. The work itself contained one of his compositions which had been transmitted to the academy at Berlin. The subject discussed was, “Est il permis de tromper le peuple r” (Ought the people to be deceived?) This question, we presume, must have always been decided in the affirmative by such politicians as Condorcet, since what amounts to the same effect) almost all his writings tended to pave the way for a revolution in which the people were completely deceived. He was afterwards a member of the popular clubs at Paris, particularly that of the jacobins, celebrated for democratic violence, where he was a frequent but by no means a powerful speaker. He was chosen a representative for the metropolis, when the constituent assembly was dissolved, and joined himself to the Brissotine party, which finally fell the just victims to that revolutionary spirit which they had excited. Condorcet at this period was the person selected to draw up a plan for public instruction, which he comprehended in two memoirs, and which it is acknowledged were too abstract for general use. He was the author of a Manifesto addressed from the French people to the powers of Europe, on the approach of war; and of a letter to Louis XVI. as president of the assembly, which was dictated in terms destitute of that respect and consideration to which the first magistrate of a great people has, as such, a just claim. He even attempted to justify the insults offered to the sovereign by the lowest, the most illiterate, and most brutal part of a delirious populace. On the trial of the king, his conduct was equivocal and unmanly; he had declared that he ought not to be arraigned, yet he had i^t courage to defend h\s opinion, or justify those sentiments which he had deliberately formed in the closet.

, or Con-Fu-Tsee, the celebrated Chinese philosopher, was born in the kingdom of Lou, which is at present the province of Chan Long, in the 2 1 st year of the reign of Ling van, the 23d emperor of the race of Tcheou, 551 years B. C. He was contemporary with Pythagoras, and a little before Socrates. He was but three years old when he lost his father Tcho leang he, who had enjoyed the highest offices of the kingdom of Long; but left no other inheritance to his son, except the honour of descending from Ti ye, the 27th emperor of the second race of the Chang. His mother, whose name wasChing, and who sprung originally from the illustrious family of the Yen, lived twenty-one years after the death of her husband, Confucius did not grow in knowledge by degrees, as children ordinarily do, but seemed to arrive at reason and the perfect use of his faculties almost from his infancy. Taking no delight in amusements proper for his age, he had a grave and serious deportment, which gained him respect, and was joined with an appearance of unexampled artd exalted piety. He honoured his relations; he endeavoured in all things to imitate his grandfather, who was then alive in China, and a most holy man: and it was observable, that he never ate any thing but he prostrated himself upon the ground, and offered it first to the supreme Lord of heaven. One day, while he was a child, he heard his grandfather fetch, a deep sigh; and going up to him with many bowings and much reverence, “May I presume,” says he, “without losing the respect I owe you, to inquire into the occasion of your grief? perhaps you fear that your posterity should degenerate from your virtue, and dishonour you by their vices.” “What put this thought into your head,” says Coum-tse to him, “and where have you learnt to speak after this manner?” “From yourself,” replied Confucius: “I attend diligently to you every time you speak; and I have often heard you say, that a son r who does not by his virtue support thfe glory of his ancestors, does not deserve to bear their name.” After his grandfather’s death he applied himself to Tcem-se, a celebrated doctor of his time; and, under the direction of so great a master, soon made a surprising progress in antiquity, which he considered as the source from whence all genuine knowledge was to be drawn. This love for the ancients very nearly cost him his life when he was not more than sixteen years of age. Falling into discourse one day about the Chinese books with a person of high quality, who thought them obscure, and not worth the pains of searching into, “The books you despise,” says Confucius, “are full of profound knowledge, which is not to be attained but by the wise and learned: and the people would think cheaply of them, could they comprehend them of themselves. This subordination of spirits, by which the ignorant are dependent upon the knowing, is very useful, and even necessary in society. Were all families equally rich and equally powerful, there could not subsist any form of government; but there would happen a yet stranger disorder, if mankind were all equally knowing, viz. every one would be for governing, and none would think themselves obliged to obey. Some time ago,” added Confucius, “an ordinary fellow made the same observation to me about the books as you have done, and from such a one indeed nothing better could be expected: but I wonder that you, a doctor, should thus be found speaking like one of the lowest of the people.” This rebuke had indeed the good effect of silencing the mandarin, and bringing him to a better opinion of the learning of his country; yet vexed him so at the same time, as it came from almost a boy, that he would have revenged it by violence, if he had not been prevented.

He passed through the kingdoms of Tsi, Guci, and Tson, but met with insurmountable difficulties every where, as at that time, rebellion, wars, and tumults, raged throughout the empire, and men had no time to listen to his philosophy, and were in themselves ambitious, avaricious, and voluptuous. Hence he often met with ill treatment and reproachful language, and it is said that conspiracies were formed against his life: to which may be added, that his neglect of his own interests had reduced him to the extremest poverty. Some philosophers among his contemporaries were so affected with the state of public affairs, that they had rusticated themselves into the mountains and deserts, as the only places where happiness could be found; and would have persuaded Confucius to have followed them. But, “I am a man,” says Confucius, “and cannot exclude myself from the society of men, and consort with beasts. Bad as the times are, I shall do all I can to recall men to virtue: for in virtue are all things, and if mankind would but once embrace it, and submit themselves to its discipline and laws, they would not want me or any body else to instruct them. It is the duty of a good man, first to perfect himself, and then to perfect others. Human nature,” said he, “came to us from heaven pure and perfect; but in process of time, ignorance, the passions, and evil examples have corrupted it. All consists in restoring it to its primitive beauty; and to be perfect, we must re-ascend to that point from which we have fallen. Obey heaven, and follow the orders of him who governs it. Love your neighbour as yourself. Let your reason, and not your senses, be the rule of your conduct: for reason will teach you to think wisely, to speak prudently, and to behave yourself worthily upon all occasions.” Confucius in the mean time, though he had withdrawn himself from kings and palaces, did not cease to travel about and do what good he could among the people, and among mankind in general. He had often in his mouth the maxims and examples of their ancient heroes, Yao, Chun, Yu, Tischin tang, &c. who were thought to be revived in the person of this great man; and hence he proselyted great numbers, who were inviolably attached to his person. He is said to have had at least 3000 followers, 72 of whom were distinguished above the rest by their superior attainments, and ten above them all by their comprehensive view and perfect knowledge of his whole philosophy and doctrines. He divided his disciples into four classes, who applied themselves to cultivate and propagate his philosophy, each according to his particular distinction. The first class were to improve their minds by meditation, and to purify their hearts by virtue: The second were to cultivate the arts of reasoning justly, and of composing elegant and persuasive discourses: The study of the third class was, to learn the rules of good government, to give an idea of it to the mandarins, and to enable them to fill the public offices with honour t The last class were concerned ip delivering the principles of morality in a concise and polished style to the people; and these chosen disciples were the flower of Confucius’s school.

Confucius did not trust altogether to the memory of his disciples for the preservation of his philosophy; but composed several books: and though these books were greatly admired for the doctrines they contained, and the fine principles of morality they taught, yet such was the unparalleled modesty of this philosopher, that he ingenuously ponfessed, that the doctrine was not his own, but was much more ancient; and that he had done nothing more than collect it from those wise legislators Yao and Chun, who lived 1500 years before him. These books are held in the liighest esteem and veneration, because they contain all that he had collected relating to the ancient laws, which are looked upon as the most perfect rule of government. The number of these classical and canonical books, for so it seems they are called, is four. The first is entitled “Ta Hio, the Grand Science, or the School of the Adults.” It is this that beginners ought to study first, as the porch of the temple of wisdom and virtue. It treats of the care we ought to take in governing ourselves, that we may be able afterwards to govern others: and of perseverance in the chief good, which, according to him, is nothing but a conformity of our actions to right reason. It was chiefly designed for princes and grandees, who ought to govern their people wisely. “The whole science of princes,” says Confucius, “consists in cultivating and perfecting the reasonable nature they have received from Tien, and in restoring that light and primitive clearness of judgment, which has been weakened and obscured by various passions, that it may be afterwards in a capacity to labour the perfections of others. To succeed then,” says he, “we should begin within ourselves; and to this end it is necessary to have an insight into the nature of things, and to gain the knowledge of good and evil; to determine the will toward a love of this good, and an hatred of this evil: to preserve integrity of heart, and to regulate the manners according to reason. When a man has thus renewed himself, there will be less difficulty in renewing others: and by this means concord and union reign in families, kingdoms are governed according to the laws, and the whole empire enjoys peace and tranquillity.”

The second classical or canonical book is called “Tchong Yong, or the Immutable Mean;” and treats of the mean which ought to be observed in all things. Tchong signifies meanS) and by Yong is understood that which is constant, eternal, immutable. He undertakes to prove, that every wise man, and chiefly those who have the care of governing the world, should follow this mean, which is the essence of virtue. He enters upon his subject by defining human nature, and its passions; then he brings several examples of virtue and piety, as fortitude, prudence, and filial duty, which are proposed as so many patterns to be imitated in keeping this mean. In the next place he shews, that this mean, and the practice of it, is the right and true path which a wise man should pursue, in order to attain the highest pitch of virtue. The third book, “Yun Lu, or the Book of Maxims,” is a collection of sententious and moral discourses, and is divided into 20 articles, containing only questions, answers, and sayings of Confucius and his disciples, On virtue, good works, and the art of governing well; the tenth article excepted, in which the disciples of Confucius particularly describe the outward deportment of their master. There are some maxims and moral sentences in this collection, equal to those of the seven wise men of Greece, which have always been so much admired. The fourth book gives an idea of a perfect government it is called “Meng Tsee, or the Book of Mentius;” because, though numbered among the classical and canonical books, it is more properly the work of his disciple Mentius. To these four books they add two others, which have almost an equal reputation; the first is called “Hiao King,” that is, “of Filial Reverence,” and contains the answers which Confucius made to his disciple Tseng, concerning the respect which is due to parents. The second is called “Sias Hio,” that is, “the Science, or the School of Children;” which is a collection of sentences and examples taken from ancient and modern authors. They who would have a perfect knowledge of all these works, will find it in the Latin translation of father Noel, one of the most ancient missionaries of China, which was printed at Prague in 1711.

We must not conclude our account of this celebrated philosopher, without mentioning one most remarkable particular relating to him, which is this; viz. that in spite of all the pains he had taken to establish pure religion and sound morality in the empire, he was nevertheless the innocent occasion of their corruption. There goes a tradition in China, that when Confucius was complimented upon the excellency of his philosophy, and his own conformity thereto, he modestly declined the honour that was done him, and said, that “he greatly fell short of the most perfect degree of virtue, but that in the west the most holy was to be found.” Most of the missionaries who relate this are firmly persuaded that Confucius foresaw the coming of the Messiah, and meant to predict it in this short sentence; but whether he did or not, it is certain that it has always made a very strong impression upon the learned in China: and the emperor Mimti, who reigned 65 years after the birth of Christ, was so touched with this saying of Confucius, together with a dream, in which he saw the image of a holy person coming from the west, that he fitted out a fleet, with orders to sail till they had found him, and to bring back at least his image and his writings. The persons sent upon this expedition, not daring to venture farther, went a-shore upon a little island not far from the Red Sea, where they found the statue of Fohi, who had infected the Indies with his doctrines 500 years before the birth of Confucius. This they carried back to China, together with the metempsychosis, and the other reveries of this Indian philosopher. The disciples of Confucius at first oppossed these newly imported doctrines with all the vigour imaginable; inveighing vehemently against Mimti, who introduced them, and denouncing the judgment of heaven on such emperors as should support them. But all their endeavours were vain; the torrent bore hard against them, and the pure religion and sound morality of Confucius were soon corrupted, and in a manner overwhelmed, by the prevailing idolatries and superstitions which were introduced with the idol Fohi.

By his sage counsels, says Brucker, his moral doctrine, and his exemplary conduct, Confucius obtained an immortal name, as the reformer of his country. After his death, his name was held in the highest veneration; and his doctrine is still regarded, among the Chinese, as the basis of all moral and political wisdom. His family enjoys by inheritance the honourable title and office of Mandarins and religious honours are paid to his memory. It is nevertheless asserted by the missionaries of the Franciscan and Dominican orders, that Confucius was either wholly unacquainted with, or purposely "neglected, the doctrine of a future life, and that in his moral system he paid little regard to religion.

, an English dramatic writer and poet, the son of William Congreve ofBardsey Grange, about eight miles from Leeds, was born in Feb. 1669-70. He was bred at the school of Kilkenny in Ireland, to which country he was carried over when a child by his father, who had a command in the army there. In 1685 he was admitted in the university of Dublin, and after having studied there some years, came to England, probably to his father’s house, who then resided in Staffordshire. On the 17th of March 1690-1, he became a member of the society of the Middle Temple; but the law proving too dry for him, he troubled himself little with it, and continued to pursue his former studies. His first production as an. author, was a novel, which, under the assumed name of Cleophil, he dedicated to Mrs. Catherine Leveson. The title of it was, “Incognita, or Love and Duty reconciled,” which has been said to have considerable merit as the production of a youth of seventeen, but it is certain he was now full twenty-one, and had sense enough to publish it without his name, and whatever reputation he gained by it, must have been confined within the circle of a few acquaintance.

Soon after, he applied himself to dramatic composition, and wrote a comedy called “The Old Bachelor;” of which Dryden, to whom he was recommended by Southerne, said, “That he never saw such a first play in his life; and that it would be a pity to have it miscarry for a few things, which proceeded not from the author’s want of genius or art, but from his not being acquainted with the stage and the town.” Dryden revised and corrected it; and it was acted in 1693. The prologue, intended to be spoken, was written by lord Falkland; the play was admirably performed, and received with such general applause, that Congreve was thenceforward considered as the prop of the declining stage, and as the rising genius in dramatic poesy. It was this play, and the very singular success that attended it upon the stage, and after it came from the press, which recommended its author to the patronage of lord Halifax: who, being desirous to place so eminent a wit in a state of ease and tranquillity, made him immediately one of the commissioners for licensing hacknej'-coaches, which was followed soon after by a place in the Pipe-office; and the office of a commissioner of wine licenses, worth 600l. per annum. After such encouragement as the town, and even the critics, had given him, he quickly made his appearance again on the stage, by bringing on “The Double Dealer;” but this play, though highly approved and commended by the best judges, was not so universally applauded as his last, owing, it is supposed, to the regularity of the performance; for regular comedy was then a new thing.

It has been observed of Congreve, that no man ever passed through life with more ease and less envy than he. No change of ministries affected him in the least, nor was he ever removed from any post that was given him, except to a better. His place in the Custom House, and his office of secretary in Jamaica, are said to have brought him in upwards of 1200l. per annum; and though he lived suitably to such a fortune, yet by his economy he raised from thence a competent estate. He was always upon ^ood terms with the wits of his time, and never involved ii/ any of their quarrels, nor did he receive from any of them the least mark of distaste or dissatisfaction. On the contrary, they were solicitous for his approbation, and received it as the highest sanction of merit. Addison testified his personal regard for him, and his high esteem of his writings, in many instances. Steele considered him as his patron upon one occasion, in dedicating his Miscellanies to him, and was desirous of submitting to him as an umpire on another, in the address prefixed to Addison s “Drummer.” Even Pope, though jealous, it is said, of his poetical character, has honoured him with the highest testimony of deference and esteem in the postscript to his translation of Homer’s Iliad, and he preserved a high respect for him. About two years after his death, in a conversation with Tonson the bookseller, who happened to mention Congreve, Pope said with a sigh, “Ay, Mr. Tonson, Congreve was ultimus Romanorum * /”

“Congreve,” says Dr. Johnson, " has merit of the highest kind he is an original writer, who borrowed neither the models orf his plot, nor the manner of his dialogue. Of his plays I cannot speak distinctly, for since I inspected them many years have passed; but what remains upon my memory is, that his characters are commonly fictitious and artificial, with very little of nature, and not much of life. He formed a peculiar idea of comic excellence, which he supposed to consist in gay remarks and unexpected answers; but that which he endeavoured, he seldom failed of performing. His scenes exhibit not much of humour, imagery, or passion his personages are a kind of intellectual gladiators every sentence is to ward or strike; the contest of smartness is never intermitted his wit is a meteor playing to and fro with alternate corruscations. His comedies have therefore, in some degree, the operation of tragedies; they surprise rather than divert, and raise admiration oftener than merriment. But they are the works of a mind replete with images, and quick in combination. Of his miscellaneous poetry I cannot say any thing very favourable. The powers of Congreve seem to desert him when he leaves the stage, as Antaeus was no longer strong than he could touch the ground. It cannot be observed without wonder, that a mind so vigorous and fertile in dramatic compositions, should on any other occasion discover nothing but impotence and poverty. He has in these little pieces neither elevation of fancy, selection of language, nor skill in versification; yet if I were required to select from the whole mass of English poetry the most poetical paragraph, I know not what 1 could prefer, to an exclamation in ‘ The Mourning Bride:’

Alm. It was thy fear, or else some transient wind

“His petty poems are seldom worth the cost of criticism sometimes the thoughts are false, and sometimes common. In his * Verses on Lady Gethin,‘ the latter part is an imitation of Dryden’s ’ Ode on Mrs. Killigrew;‘ and * Doris,’ that has been so lavishly flattered by Steele, has indeed some lively stanzas, but the expression might be mended; and the most striking part of the character had been already shewn in * Love for Love.‘ His ’ Art of Pleasing‘ is founded on a vulgar but perhaps impracticable principle, and the stateness of the sense is not concealed by any novelty of illustration or elegance of diction. This tissue of poetry, from which he seems to have hoped a lasting name, is totally neglected, and known only as it is appended to his plays. While comedy or while tragedy is regarded, his plays are likely to be read; but, except what relates to the stage, I know not that he has ever written a stanza that is sung, or a couplet that is quoted. The general character of his ’ Miscellanies’ is, that they shew little wit and little virtue. Yet to him it must be confessed that we are indebted for the correction of a national error, and the cure of our Pindaric madness. He first taught the English writers that PinJar’s odes were regular; and though certainly he had not the fire requisite for the higher species of lyric poetry, he has shewn us that enthusiasm has its rules, and that in mere confusion there is neither grace nor greatness.” We will conclude our account of Congreve, with the character given of him by Voltaire; who has not failed to do justice to high merit, at the same time that he has freely animadverted on him, for a foolish piece of affectation. “He raised the glory of comedy,” says Voltaire, “to a greater height than any English writer before or since his time. He wrote only a few plays, but they are excellent in their kind. The laws of the drama are strictly observed in them. They abound with characters, all which are shadowed with the utmost delicacy; and we meet with not so much as one low or coarse jest. The language is every where that of men of fashion, but their actions are those of knaves; a proof, that he was perfectly well acquainted with human nature, and frequented what we call polite company. He was infirm, and come to the verge of life when I knew him. Mr. Congreve had one defect, which was his entertaining too mean an idea of his first profession, that of a writer; though it was to this he owed his fame and fortune. He spoke of his works as of trifles that were beneath him; and hinted to me, in our first conversation, that I should visit him upon no other foot than that of a gentleman, who led a life of plainness and simplicity. I answered, that had he been so unfortunate as to be a mere gentleman, I should never have come to see him; and I was very much disgusted at so unseasonable a piece of vanity.”

, a physician and learned writer, was descended of an ancient family in Ireland, and born in the county of Kerry about 1666. His family being of the popish religion, he was not educated regularly in the grammar-schools or university, but was assisted by private tutors, and when he grew up, applied himself to the study of physic. About 1686 he went to France, and resided for some time in the university of Montpelier; and from thence to Paris, where he distinguished himself in his profession, particularly in the branches of anatomy and chemistry. He professed himself desirous of travelling; and as there were two sons of the high chancellor of Poland then on the point of returning to their own country, it was thought expedient that they should take that long journey under the care and inspection of Connor. He accordingly conducted them very safely to Venice, where, having an opportunity of curing the honourable William Legge, afterwards earl of Dartmouth, of a fever, he accompanied him to Padua; whence he went through Tyrol, Bavaria, and Austria, down the Danube, to Vienna; and after having made some stay at the court of the emperor Leopold, passed through Moravia and Silesia to Cracow, and thence in eight days to Warsaw. He was well received at the court of king John Sobieski, and was afterwards made his physician, a, very extraordinary preferment for a young man of only twenty-eight. But his reputation in the court of Poland was raised by the judgment he made of the duchess of Radzevil’s distemper, which the physicians of the court pronounced to be an ague, from which she might easily be recovered by the bark; and Connor insisted, that she had an abscess in her liver, and that her case was desperate. As this lady was the king’s only sister, his prediction made a great noise, more especially when it was justified by the event; for she not only died within a month, but, upon the opening of her body, the doctor’s opinion of her malady was fully verified. Great as Connor’s fame was in Poland, he did not propose to remain longer there than was requisite to finish his inquiries into the natural history, and other curiosities of that kingdom; and foreseeing the king’s decease, and that he had no prospects of advantage afterwards, he resolved to quit that country, and to return to England, for which a very advantageous opportunity occurred. The king had an only daughter, the princess Teresa Cunigunda, who hud espoused the Elector of Bavaria by proxy in August 1694. As she was to make a journey from Warsaw to Brussels, of near 1000 miles, and in the midst of winter, it was thought necessary that she should be attended by a physician. Connor procured himself to be nominated to that employment; and, after reaching Brussels, took leave of the princess, set out for Holland^ and thence to England, where he arrived in Feb. 1695.

Conon had some disputes with Nicoteles, who wrote against him, and treated him with too much contempt. Apollonius confesses it; though he acknowledges that Colion was not fortunate in his demonstrations. Conon invented a kind of volute, or spiral, different from that of Dynostratus; but because Archimedes explained the properties of it more clearly, the name of the inventor was forgotten, and it was hence called Archimedes’s volute or spiral. As to Conon’s astrological or astronomical knowledge, it may in some measure be gathered from the poem of Catullus, who describes it in the beginning of his. verses on the hair of Berenice, the sister and wife of Ptolomy Euergetes, upon the occasion of Conou having given out that it was changed into a constellation among the stars, to console the queen for the loss, when it was stolen out of the temple, where she had consecrated it to the gods.

, an English poet of the 16th century, is said to have been born, or at least descended from a family of that name, in Yorkshire, and was for some time educated at Oxford, but took his bachelor’s degree at St. John’s college, Cambridge, in 1579. Edmund Bolton, in his “Hypercritica,” says, “Noble Henry Constable was a great master of the English tongue; nor had any gentleman of our nation a more pure, quick, or higher delivery of conceit: witness, among all other, that sonnet of his before his Majesty’s Lepanto.” He was the author of “Diana, or the excellent conceitful sonnets of H. C. augmented with divers quatorzains of honorable and learned personages, divided into eight decads,” 1594, 8vo. Of these sonnets Mr. Ellis has given three specimens, but which he thinks can hardly entitle him to be denominated “the first sonneteer of his time.” The most striking of his productions is that entitled “The Shepheard’s song of Venus and Adonis,” which is elegantly and harmoniously expressed. Mr. Malone, who reprinted it in the notes to the 10th volume of his Shakspeare, p. 74, thinks it preceded Shakspeare’s poem on the same subject, which it far excels, at least in taste and natural touches. Of his life, no memorials have been discovered. Dr. Birch, in his Memoirs of queen Elizabeth, thought him to be the same Henry Constable, who was a zealous Roman Catholic, and whose religion seems to have obliged him to live in a state of banishment from England. Sir E. Brydges is inclined to the same opinion. Constable afterwards came privately to London, but was soon discovered, and imprisoned in the Tower of London, whence he was released in the latter end of the year 1604. There was another of the name in the early part of the 16th century, a John Constable, the son of Roger Constable, who was born in London, and educated under the celebrated William Lilye. From thence he was sent to Byham Hall, opposite Merlon college, Oxford, where, in 1515, he took the degree of M.A. and was accounted at that time an excellent poet and rhetorician. He obtained some preferment, but of that, or of his subsequent history, we have no account. He published, in Latin, “Querela veritatis,”and “Epigrammata,” 1520, 4to. Like Henry Constable, he was of the Roman Catholic persuasion.

Such appear to be the general sentiments of modern historians on this subject. Others, however, find it more difficult to dispute the fact. “He,” says Mr. Milner, who is determined not to believe Christianity to be divine, will doubtless disbelieve this miracle, from the same spirit which has induced him to harden his heart against much more striking evidence. With such a one 1 would not converse on the subject. But to those who admit the divine origin of Christianity, if any such doubt the truth of the miracle, I would say, that it seems to me more reasonable to admit a divine interposition in a case like this, especially considering the important consequences, than to deny the veracity of Eusebius or of Constantine. On the former view, God acts like himself, condescending to hear prayer, leading the mind by temporal kindness to look to him for spiritual blessings, and confirming the truth of his own religion; on the latter, two men not of the best, but surely by no means of the worst character, are unreasonably suspected of deliberate perjury or falsehood." Much of this passage must be supposed to allude personally to Gibbon; but on the other hand, there are certainly many who believe Christianity to be divine, and yet cannot acquiesce in this miracle; not from a doubt that such might have taken place in the order of providence, but from a want of ample testimony that it really did take place.

After Constantine had settled the affairs of Rome, he went to Milan, where he celebrated the marriage of his sister with the emperor of the East, Licinius. In this town it was that these two emperors issued out the first edict in favour of the Christian religion, by which they granted liberty of conscience to all their subjects: and a second soon after, by which they permitted the Christians to hold religious assemblies in public, and ordered all the places, where they had been accustomed to assemble, to be given up to them. A war broke out in 314, between Constantine and Licinius, which subjected the Christians to a persecution from the latter; but after a battle or two, in which neither had any reason to triumph, a peace ensued, and things returned to their usual course. Constantine now applied himself entirely to regulate and adjust the affairs of the church. He called councils, heard disputes and settled them, and made laws in favour of the Christians. In 324, another war broke out between these two emperors; the result of which was, that Constantine at length overcame Licinius, and put him to death. He was now sole master of the empire, without any controul, so that the Christians had every thing to hope, and apparently nothing to fear: nor were they disappointed. But the misfortune was, that the Christians were no sooner secure against the assaults of enemies from without, but they fell to quarrelling among themselves. The dispute between Arius and Alexander was agitated at this time; and so very fiercely, that Constantino was forced to call the council of Nice to put an end to it. He assisted at it himself, exhorted the bishops to peace, and would not hear the accusations they had to offer against each other. He banished Arius and the bishops of his party, ordering at the same time his books to be burnt; and made the rest submit to the decision of the council. He had founded innumerable churches throughout the empire, and ordered them to be furnished and adorned with every thing that was necessary. He went afterwards to Jerusalem, to try if he could discover the sepulchre of Jesus Christ; and caused a most magnificent church to be built at Bethlehem. About this time he gave the name of Constantinople to the town of Byzantium, and endowed it with- all the privileges of ancient Rome. After this he laboured more abundantly than ever he had done yet, in aggrandizing the church, and publishing laws against heretics. He wrote to the king of Persia in favour of the Christians, destroyed the heathen temples, built a great many churches, and caused innumerable copies of the Bible to be made. In short, he did so much for religion, that he might be called the head of the church, in things which concerned its exterior policy. The orthodox Christians have nevertheless complained of him a little for listening to the adversaries of Atbanasius, and consenting, as he did, to banish him: yet he would not suffer Arius or his doctrines to be re-established, but religiously and constantly adhered to the decision of the council of Nice.

It must needs, however, seem extraordinary, that this emperor, who took such a part in the affairs of the Christians, who appeared to be convinced of the truth and divinity of their religion, and was not ignorant of any of its doctrines, should so long defer being initiated into it by the sacrament of baptism. “Whether,” says Dupin, “he thought better not to be baptized till the time of his death, with a view of washing away, and atoning for all his sins at once, with the water of baptism, and being presented pure and unspotted before God, or whatever his reasons were, he never talked of baptism till his last illness.” When that began, he ordered himself to be baptized; and Eusebius of Csesarea relates, that the ceremony was performed upon him by Eusebius bishop of Nicomedia.