WOBO: Search for words and phrases in the texts here...

Mr. Bezout lived thus several years beloved of his family and friends, and respected by all, enjoying the fruits and the credit of his labours. But the trouble and fatigues of his offices, with some personal chagrins, had reduced his strength and constitution; he was attacked by a malignant fever, of which he died Sept. 27, 1783, in the 54th year of his age, regretted by his family, his friends, the young students, and by all his acquaintance in general. The books published by him were, 1. “Course of Mathematics for the use of the Marine, with a treatise on Navigation,” Paris, 1764, 6 vols. 8vo, reprinted 1781—2. 2. “Course of Mathematics for the Corps of Artillery,” 1770—1772, 4 vols. 8vo. 3. “General Theory of Algebraic Equations,” 1779, 4to. His papers printed in the volumes of the Memoirs of the academy of sciences are, 1. On Curves whose rectification depends on a given quantity, in the vol. for 1758. 2. On several classes of Equations that admit of an algebraic solution, 1762. 3. First vol. of a course of Mathematics, 1764. 4. On certain Equations, &c. 1764. 5. General resolution of all Equations, 1765. 6. Second vol. of a course of Mathematics, 1765. 7. Third vol. of the same, 1766. 8. Fourth vol. of the same, 1767. 9. Integration of Differentials, &c. vol. 3, Sav. Etr. 10. Experiments on Cold, 1777.

, an Italian scholar of the last century, was born at Parma, March 12, 1673. Aftertaking ecclesiastical orders, he was engaged in 1702 by the illustrious house of Sanvitali, both as domestic chaplain and tutor to the two young sons of that family, and at his leisure hours cultivated the study of history, chronology, and antiquities. One of his works was written while in this family, a very elaborate treatise, “Trattinemento Istorico e Chronologico,” &c. Naples, 2 vols. 4to, in which he endeavours to prove that Josephus’s history is neither false nor contrary to scripture, positions which had been denied in a treatise written on the subject by father Cæsar Calino, a Jesuit. When he had completed this work, the elder of his pupils, who by the death of his father bad succeeded to the estate, and was very much attached to the Jesuits, informed Biacca that the publication of it would not be agreeable to him. On this Biacca entrusted his manuscript to the celebrated Argelati, at Milan, and either with, or without his consent, it was printed at Naples in 1728. This provoked Sanvitali to forget his own and his father’s attachment to Biacca, who had resided twenty-six years in the family, and he ordered him to leave his house. Biacca, however, was received with respect into many other families, who each pressed him to take up his abode with them. After having lived at Milan for some years, he died at Parma, 8ept. 15, 1735. Being a member of the Arcadians, he, according to their custom, assumed the name of Parmindo Ibichense, which we find prefixed to several of his works. Besides his defence of Josephus, he wrote, 1. “Ortographia Manuale, o sia arte facile di correttamento Scrivere e Parlare,” Parma, 1714, 12mo. 2. “Notizie storiche di Rinuccio cardinal Pallavicino, di Pompeo Sacco Parmigiano, di Cornelio Magni, e del conte NiccoloCicognari Parmigiano,” printed in vols. I. and II. of the “Notizie istoriche clegli Arcadi morti,” Rome, 1720, 8vo. 3. “Le Selve de Stazio, tradotte in verso sciolto.” He translated also Catullus, and both make part of the collection of Italian translations of the ancient Latin authors, printed at Milan. In the poetical collections, there are many small pieces by Biacca.

, a native of Venice, deserves some notice in a work of this description, on account of his poems, which were the production of nature, without any aid from instruction or cultivation. He lived about the middle of the last century, and was a gondolier or waterman’s boy when he wrote, 1. “II Davide, re d'Israele, poema-eroico-sagro, di Antonio Bianchi, servitor di gondola Veneziano, canto XII.” Venice, 1751, fol. and reprinted the same year with an oratorio entitled “Elia sur Carmelo,” ibid. 8vo. In this, although we do not find a strict attention to the laws of the epic, nor the most perfect purity of language, yet there are many truly poetical, nervous, and highly animated passages. The same may be said of his, 2. “II Tempio owero il Salomone, canti X.” Venice, 1753, 4to, with historical and theological notes, which are believed to be from the same pen. In his first poem, he promised two others, one a heroi-comic, under the title of “Cuccagna distrutta,” the other “La Formica contro il Leone,” but it does not appear that either was published. He gave, however, a specimen of his critical talents, in a volume entitled “Osservazioni contro-critiche di Antonio Bianchi, sopra un trattato della commedia Italiana, &c. Venice, 1752, 8vo. Joseph Antony Costantini, the author of this treatise on Italian comedy, wrote an answer, and asserted that the” Observations“were not written by Bianchi, and that the poem of David was not his. Bianchi, however, in the preface to his second poem,” The Temple of Solomon," offered every kind of proof that he was the author of both. We have no farther account of this extraordinary young man, although it is probable from the merit and character of his poems, that he found patrons who procured him leisure and competence.

, an Italian naturalist, more generally known by the name of Janus Plancus, under which he published several works, was born Jan. 3, 1693, at Rimini, where he died Dec. 3, 1775. In 1717 he went to Bologna, and studied botany, natural history, mathematics, and natural philosophy. Having taken the degree of doctor in medicine in 17 19, he returned to his country, but afterwards resided for some time at Bologna and Padua before he settled and began practice at Rimini. Here also he improved his acquaintance with botany, and in his different tours accumulated a very fine collection of specimens of natural history. In 1741, he was appointed professor of anatomy in the university of Sienna, but his attachment to las favourite studies induced him to return to Rimini, where he endeavoured to revive the academy of the Lincei, the members of which assembled at his house. He had formerly, when only twenty-two years of age, acted as their secretary, and gave a history of them in his edition of the Phytobasanos. In honour of his merits and services, the society caused a medal to be struck, with his portrait on one side, and on the other a lynx, with the words ~“Lynceis restitutis.” Biarichi was frequently involved in controversies respecting both himself and his works, the principal of which are, 1. “Lettere intorno alia cataratta,” Rimini, 1720, 4to. 2. “Epistola anatomica adJosephum. Puteum Bononiensem,” Bologna, 1726, 4to. 3. “Osservazioni intorno una sezione anatomica,” Rimini, 1731, 4to.

, called by Fabroni Blanchius, a religious of the order of the Minorites, was bora Oct. 2, 1686. For some years he taught philosophy and theology, and was afterwards provincial of his order in the Roman province, visitor of that of Bologna, one of the counsellors of the inquisition at Rome, and an examiner of the Roman clergy. He died Jan. 18, 1758. Amidst all these graver employments, he found leisure to indulge his taste for the belles lettres, and especially dramatic poetry, which procured him admission into the academy of the Arcadjans. His works were published under his assumed name of Farnabio Gioachino Annutini, a childish anagram of Fra Giovanni Antonio Bianchi. They are, principally, 1. “Tragedie sacre e morali,” four in number, one upon the history of sir Thomas More, and all in prose, Bologna, 1725, 8vo. 2. Other tragedies “La Dina,” “II Demetrio,” &c. published separately from 1734 to 1738. 3. “De‘ vizj e dei diflfeti del moderno teatro, e del modo di corregerli e d’emendarli, ragionamenti vi,” Rome, 17.53. In this, which he published under his academic name, Lauriso Tragiense, he defends the opinion of Maffei against that of Concilia, who had published a dissertation “De spectaculis theatralibus,” in which he maintained that dramatic exhibitions were unfriendly to religion and morals, an opinion which has not been confined, as usually said, to the puritans or methodists of England. 4. “Delia poteste e polizia deila Chiesa, trattati due contro le nuove opinion! di Pietro Giannone,” Rome, 1745 1751, 5 vols. 4to, a voluminous work in vindication of the temporal power of the pope, which had been attacked by Giannone in his History of Naples, and by Bossuet, whose principles Giannone adopted. He wrote some tragedies and comedies, which do not appear to have been printed, and left many other works in manuscript, which Fabroni has enumerated.

a celebrated Italian anatomist, was born at Turin, Sept. 12, 1681, and at the age of seventeen was honoured with a doctor’s degree. He was a long time professor of anatomy at Turin, where the king of Sardinia, in 1715, caused a very commodious amphitheatre to be built for his lectures. In 1718 he also taught pharmacy, chemistry, and the practice of physic, He was offered a professor’s chair in the university of Bologna, but refused it from an attachment to his native place, Turin. He died much esteemed, Jan. 2, 1761. He wrote a great many works; among which were, 1. “Ductus lacrymalis, &c. anatome,” Turin, 1715, 4to, Leyden, 1723. 2. “De lacteorum vasorum positionibus et fabrica,” Turin, 1743, 4to. 3. “Storia del mostro di due corpi,” Turin, 1719, 8vo. 4. “Lettera sull' insensibilita,” Turin, 1755, 3vo, in which he attacks Haller’s notions on sensibility. But Bianchi’s most celebrated works are, 5. His “Histofia hepatica, seu de Hepatis structura, usibus et morbis,” Turin, 1710, 4to. 1716, and again at Geneva, 1725, 2 vols. 4to. with plates, and six anatomical essays. 6. “De natural! in humane corpore, vitiosa, morbosaque generatione historia,” ibid. 1761, 8vo. Manget has some dissertations by Bianchi in his Theatrum Anatomicum, and the collection of fifty-four plates, containing two hundred and seventy anatomical subjects, published at Turin in 1757, was the work of Bianchi. He was unquestionably a man of learning and skill in his profession; but Morgagni, in his Adversaria, has pointed out many of his mistakes, and those which occur in his history of the liver, have been severely animadverted on by that able anatomist in his “Epistolas Anatomicse duse,” printed in 1727, but without his consent, by the friend to whom they were written. In this work Bianchi is charged with bad Latin, want of judgment, care, memory, and honour. These charges, however severe as they seem, were not thought to affect the general merit of Bianchi’s great work.

, an Italian lawyer, was born at Padua in 1498, and while eminent at the bar, and in consultation, was not less distinguished for learning and probity. In 1525 he was appointed, for the third time, professor of imperial law in the university of Padua in 1532, a second time, professor of the decretals and lastly in 1544 chief professor of criminal law, a situation which he retained until his death, Oct. 8, 1548. Among his works, which are all on professional subjects, and written in Latin, are his, I. “Tractatus de indiciis homicidii ex proposito conmiissi, &c.” Venice, 1545, fol. 1549, 8vo. 2. “Practica criminalis aurea,” with “Cautelse singulares ad reorum defensam,” ibid. 1547, 8vo. 3. “Tractatus de compromissis faciendis inter conjunctos, et de exceptionibus impeclientibus litis ingressum,” Venice, 1547, 8vo.

, a nobleman of Padua, was secretary of the senate of Venice at the commencement of the last century. After having been appointed resident from his republic at Milan, on the death of Charles II. king of Spain, he was sent into Swisserland in 1705, to treat of an alliance between the cantons of Zurich and Berne, which was accomplished by his means Jan. 12, 1706. Next month he went into the Orisons, and there concluded a treaty of alliance Dec. 17. On his return to Venice, the senate sent him as ambassador to England, where he resided about twenty months, to the satisfaction of both nations. After that he accompanied the procurator Carlo Rusini, as secretary, at the congress for concluding the treaty of Passarowitz. This and his negociation in Swisserland produced, 1. “Relazione del paese de‘ Svisseri e loro alleati, d’Arminio Dannebuchi (the anagram of Vendramino Bianchi), Venice, 1708, 8vo. This was translated into French and English, and often reprinted. 2.” Istorica relazione della pace di Passarowitz," Padua, 1718 and 1719, 4to.

, an Italian author of the end of the fifteenth century, was a native of Bologna, where he was much esteemed for his learning and moral character. His master Philip Beroaldo, in his commentary on Apuleius, speaks highly of him as a young man of many accomplishments, and distinguished for his taste in painting, and the knowledge of ancient medals. The time of his death is not known, but is supposed to have taken place before 1528. He published a life of Urceus Codrus, prefixed to that author’s works in various editions, and among others that of Basil, 1540, 4to; and a life of Philip Berualdo, printed with his commentary on Suetonius, Venice, 1510, fol. and in other editions of the same.

, a very learned Italian astronomer and philosopher, was born at Verona, Dec. 13, 1662. After being instructed in the elements of education in his own country, he removed to Bologna, where he went through a course of rhetoric and three years of philosophy, in the Jesuits’ college. He afterwards studied mathematics and design, and made a great progress in both. In 1680 he removed to Padua, where he studied divinity, and was admitted to the degree of doctor. His master in mathematics and natural philosophy was the learned Montanari, who became much attached to him, and bequeathed to him his collection of mathematical instruments. At Padua Bianchini learned also anatomy, and, with rather more pleasure, botany. His inclination being for the church, he went next to Rome, where he was kindly received by cardinal Peter Ottoboni, who knew his family, and appointed him his librarian. Here, as was usual for persons with his views, he went through a course of law, but without losing sight of his favourite studies, experimental philosophy, mathematics, and astronomy. He was admitted a member of the physico-mathematical academy, established by Ciampini, and read many learned papers at their sittings.

In 1686 he returned to his own country, and was very active in re-founding the academy of the Aletophili, or lovers of truth, recommending to them more attention to mathematical studies, and to assist them, he presented the society with the instruments which Montanari had bequeathed for him; but this academy entirely depended on his presence, and on his return to Rome two years after, gradually dissolved. Settled after this at Rome, he became connected with the most eminent men of his time, and enriched his stores of knowledge, by an acquaintance with Greek, Hebrew, and French. Antiquities likewise became one of his favourite pursuits. He often passed whole days among the splendid ruins of Rome, assisted at every research, and digging among them, visited all the museums, and made elegant and correct drawings of all the monuments of antiquity. On the death of Innocent XI. cardinal Ottoboni, his protector, being chosen pope by the name of Alexander VIII. continued to interest himself in the fortune of Bianchini, gave him a canonry in the church of St. Mary Rotunda, appointed him guardian and librarian to cardinal Peter Ottoboni his nephew, gave him two pensions, and would have promoted him yet farther, if he had lived, and if Bianchini would have taken orders but he had not made up his mind to take deacon’s orders until 1699, and never would proceed farther. On the death of Alexander VIII. in 1691, the cardinal, his nephew, continued his kindness, and besides bestowing a canonry on him in the cfiurch of St. Lawrence in Damaso, invited him to reside in his palace. Clement XI. who was elected pope in 1700, bestowed on him, the year following, the title of chamberlain of honour, authorized him to wear that dress of a prelate called the mantellone, and assigned him apartments in the palace of Monte-Cavallo.

In 1702, the pope appointed him, with the title of historiographer, to accompany cardinal Barberini the legate a latere to Naples, when the king of Spain, Philip V. came to take possession of that kingdom. Bianchini profiled by this opportunity to visit mount Vesuvius, and ascended to the summit of the crater. On his return to Rome, in 1703, the senate of Rome conferred upon him, his family, and descendants, the rank of the Roman nobility and the patrician order. At the same time the pope chose him secretary of the committee for the reformation of the calendar. In order to regulate with precision the course of the year, it was necessary to establish and fix with the greatest accuracy the equinoxial points. Bianchini being employed to trace a meridian line, and to construct a gnomon on one of the churches, performed this with great success, with the assistance of the learned PhiJip Maraldi. The pope commemorated the construction of the gnomon by a medal, and Bianchini wrote a treatise on both, “De Nunnnis et Gnomone Clementine.”

Having, in 1703, been appointed president of antiquities, he exhibited to the pope, a plan for forming a collection of sacred antiques, or an ecclesiastical museum, intended to furnish materials for ecclesiastical history but as this, would have been attended with very great expence, and the papal treasury was at this time very low, the scheme was abandoned. The pope, however, to console Bianchini, who had it very much at heart, gave him a canonry in the church of St. Mary Maggiore, and, in 1712, sent him to Paris with a cardinal’s hat for Armand de Rohan-Soubise, who was promoted to that dignity. The object was trifling, but the journey was important, as serving to introduce Bianchini to the literati of France, who received him with the utmost respect. At Paris he was constant in his attendance at the sittings of the academy of sciences, who had many years betore elected him an honorary member, and he presented them witii a very ingenious improvement in the construction of the larger telescopes, to prevent those of uncommon length from, bending in the middle, an inconvenience which had been thought without remedy. Reaumur wrote a description of this, which is inserted in the memoirs of the academy for 1713. Before returning to Rome, Bianchini took a trip to Lorraine, Holland, and Flanders, and thence into England, visiting and examining every museum and place where objects of curiosity were to be seen, and was every where received with the respect due to his talents. During his residence at Oxford, it is said that the university defrayed the expenses of his lodging such is his biographer’s ao count, by which is probably meant that he was invited to lodge in one of the colleges.

On his return to Rome in the month of June, 1713, he resumed his astronomical and antiquarian pursuits. When in France he conceived the idea of tracing a meridian line through Italy, from sea to sea, in imitation of that of Cassini through the middle of France. He accordingly began his operations, and pursued the object at his own expence, ‘ for eight years, but other plans and employments occurring, he never completed the design. The papal favours, however, were still conferred on him, purely as a man of science. Innocent XIII. the successor of Clement XI. appointed him referendary of the pontifical signatures, and domestic prelate, and in the council held at Home in 1725, he filled the office of first historiographer. Next year, his love for antiquities was highly gratified, although at the same time checked by an accident which had serious consequences. Tnere was discovered near Rome on the Appian way, a magnificent marble subterraneous building of three large halls, whose walls consisted of a great number of little cells like those of our modern pidgeon -houses. Most of these cells contained, each, four cinerary urns, accompanied with inscriptions of the name and office of the person whose ashes they contained, who were all slaves or freed-men and women of the household of Augustus, especially that of Livk. There were also in this place some exquisite specimens of mosaic ornaments. Biauchini’s joy on this discovery may be easily appreciated by genuine antiquaries; but one unfortunate day, while he was examining one of the chambers or halls, and preparing to make a drawing, the ground on which he stood gave way, and although his fall was broken by some earth which had been dug, one of his thighs received such a serious injury, that he was lame for the remainde’r of his iif and although he found some relief at the baths of Vignona near Sienna, where he went the following year, his health was never completely re-established.

This accident, however, tfkd not interrupt his literary pursuits. He travelled to Florence, to Parma, and to Colorno, where, in the ducal palace, he traced a meridian, which does not now exist and on his return to Rome resumed his astronomical labours, particularly his observations on the planet Venus, whom he had been studying for a great many years. He set out by endeavouring to ascertain her parallax by the ingenious method invented by Cassini for the parallax of Mars. This method consists in comparing the motion of the planet, whose parallax is wanted, with some fixed stars very near it, and that for some considerable space of time, but a fair opportunity of doing it seldom happens. It was, however, signer Bianchini’s good fortune to meet with one in the beginning of July, 1716, when Venus and Regulus came to the meridian so nearly together, that he could discover them both in the same field of his refracting telescope. In observing the spots of Venus, he employed the instrument before ipentioned, which he presented to the academy of Paris. His observations, however, on this planet, although very interesting to the astronomers of his age, have not been confirmed by the more recent observations of Herschel and others, with instruments of much greater power than he possessed. What he published on this subject, in 1728, was among the last of his efforts for the promotion of science, as he now contracted a dropsical complaint of which he died March 2, 1729. He left his property to his nephew Joseph Bianchini, the subject of our next article, and the greater part of his books and ecclesiastical antiquities to the library of the chapter of Verona. Great honours were paid to his memory by a monument in the cathedral of Verona, voted by the city, and other public marks of esteem. He was a man of extensive knowledge, particularly in natural philosophy, mathematics, botany, agriculture, history, and antiquities. He also cultivated polite literature, oratory, and poetry. His manners, easy, elegant, and accommodating, were rather those of the world than of the schools, and he appears to have been beloved, or respected, wherever he went.

His works were numerous: the following list of the principal is arranged, rather according to the connexion of the subjects, than the chronological order, which in general it is convenient to preserve. 1. Three memoirs in the “Acta eruditorum,” of Leipsic, for 1685 and 1686, on a comet observed at Rome in 1684; on Cassini’s method of observing the parallaxes and distances of the planets, and on a total eclipse of the moon at Rome, Dec. 10, 1685. 2. A memoir on the comet seen at Rome in April 1702, with other astronomical observations inserted in the “Memoirs of the academy of Paris,” 1702, 1766, and 1708. All the preceding, if we mistake not, are in Latin. 3. “Relazione della Hnea meridiana orizzontale e della ellissi polarefabbricata in Roma l'anno 1702,” without his name in the Journal “de‘ Letterati d’ltalia,” vol. IV. 4. “Epistola de eclipsi soils die Maii, 1724,” Rome, 1724. 5. “Hesperi et Phosphori nova phenomena, sive observationes circa planetam Veneris,” Rome, 1728, fol. 6. “Fr. Bianchini astronomicæ et geographicæ observationes selectæ ex ejus autographis, &c. cura et studio Eustachii Manfredi,” Verona, 1737, fol. 7. “De emblemate, nomine atque instituto Alethophilorum, dissertatio publice habita in eorundem academia,” Verona, 1687. 8. “Istoria universale provata con monument! e figurata con simboli degli antichi,” Rome, 1697, 4to. This curious volume, the plates of which were engraven by himself, and from his own designs, was to have been followed by several others, completing the series of ancient history, but this proceeds no farther than the ruin of the Assyrian empire. He will perhaps be thought to deal in paradox, in asserting here that the Iliad is no more than a real history under the form of an allegory, each of Homer’s heroes or deities being a country or a king. 9. “De Kalendario et Cyclo Ciesaris ac de Paschali canone S. Hippolyti martyris, dissertationes dusc,” Rome, 1703, 1704, fol. This also contains an account of the gnomon he constructed, and the pope’s medal struck on that occasion. 10. Two papers explanatory of ancient sculptures, inserted in the “Memorie concernenti la citta d'Urbino,” Rome, 1724, fol. 11. “Camera et iscrizioni sepolcrali, &c.” the history of the discoveries he made in the sepulchral building before mentioned, Rome, 1727, fol. 12. “Del palazzo de' Cesari, opera postuma,” Verona, 1738, published by his nephew who had accompanied it with a Latin translation. 13. “Dissertatio posthuma de tribus generibus instrumentorum musicse veterum orgatiicse,” Rome, 1742, 4to. 14. An edieion of Anastasius Bibliothecarius’ history of the Popes, Rome, 1718, 1723, and 1728, 3 vols, fol. The fourth was added by his nephew. 15. “Opuscula varia,” Rome, 1754, 2 vols. 4to. To these may be added his Italian poems in the collection of those of the “Academici concordi,” of Ravenna, published at Bologna, 1687, )2mo. and many scientific letters, disertations, &c. in the Paris “History of the Academy of the Sciences,” for the years 1704, 1706—8, 1713, and 1718.

, nephew of the preceding, priest of the oratory of St. Philip de Neri, was also a learned antiquary. He was born at Verona Sept. 9, 1704, the son of John Baptist, brother to Francis Bianchini, and was educated under the eye of his uncle in the college of Montefiascone. Before 1725, he was promoted to a canonry in the cathedral, and a prebendal stall in St. Luke, and was soon after appointed librarian to the chapter: but in 1732 he resigned that and his benefices, and entered into the congregation of the oratory at Rome, where he divided his time between the pious duties of that order, and his literary researches, particularly in what related to history and ecclesiastical antiquities. His first publication was, 1. The fourth and concluding volume of his uncle’s edition of Anastasius Bibliothecarius, Rome, 1735, fol. 2. “Viridiciae canonicarum Scripturarum vulgatse Latinoe editionis,” Rome, 1740, fol. This volume, the only one published, was to have been followed by six others, the plan of which is sketched in the preface, which, with the preliminary dissertations, contains the history of all the different books of the bible, the manuscript copies in various libraries, the translations, &c. 3. “Evangeliarum quadruplex Latinse versionis antiquoe, seu veteris Italicte, nunc primum in lucem editum ex codd. Mss. aureis, argenteis, &c. aliisque plusquam millenariae antiquitatis,” Rome, 1749, fol. This may be considered as a part of the preceding. 4. “Demonstratio historiae ecclesiasticse quadripartitae monumentis ad fidem temporum et gestorum,” ibid, 1752, fol. A second volume was afterwards published of this elegant collection of fragments of antiquity, inscriptions, medals, vases, &c. found in the different churches, cemeteries, and museums of Rome, or elsewhere, beautifully engraven, and accompanied with explanations and chronological tables. It extends, however, no farther than the first two centuries of the Christian iera. 5. “Delle porte e mura di Roma, con illustrazioni,” ibid. 1747, 4to. 6. “Parere sopra la cagione della morte della sig. contessa Cornelia Zangari, esposto in una lettera,” Verona, 1731, and an improved edition, Rome, 1743, 8vo. This curious dissertation relates to a lady of rank who was found in her room reduced to ashes, except her head, legs, and one of her fingers. As this could not be ascribed to external fire, the room being no wise damaged, it excited much attention, and gave rise to a variety of opinions. Bianchini maintains in this tract, that it was the effect of an internal and spontaneous fire occasioned by the excessive use of camphorated brandy, to which the lady had been much addicted. The time of Bianchini’s death is not mentioned.

, an Italian philosopher and physician of considerable reputation in the last century, was born, in 1720, at Chieti in the kingdom of Naples, where he studied, took his degrees, and for some years practised physic. He then went to Venice, but his growing reputation procured him the place of, first physician at Udina, where he resided from 1759 to 1777, and was then appointed first professor of the practice of physic in the university of Padua, and was admitted a member of the academy, as he had been of that of Udina. He was likewise one of the pensionaries of the academy of Padua, but did not enjoy these situations long, dying Sept. 2, 1779. He wrote many treatises on professional subjects, electricity, the force' of imagination in pregnant women, putrid fevers, worms, &c. a list of which may be seen in our authority.

, an Italian scholar of the last century, was born at Prato in Tuscany, Nov. 18, 1685. He had but just finished his education at Florence, when he was admitted a member of the academy of the Apatisti, and two years after, of that of Florence, nor was he more than twenty when he became known to and associated with the principal literati of that city. He went afterwards to Pisa, and studied philosophy and mathematics under Alexander Marchetti, the translator of Lucretius, and there he received the degree of doctor of laws, and the order of priesthood. There also the bishop of Prato appointed him to give public lectures on the works of the fathers, in the course of which he became particularly attached to those of St. Bernard and the bishop of Pistoia gave him the living of St. Peter at Ajolo, where he made himself very popular. Such also was his literary fame, that besides the academies we have mentioned, he was admitted a member of the Inlecundi of Prato, the Innominati of Bra in Piedmont, of the Rinvigoriti of Foligno, the Arcadians of Rome, the Columbarian society, and the della Crusca. His life was exemplary, his character loyal and ingenuous, although somewhat reserved. He loved retirement, yet was of a placid humour, and enjoyed effusions of wit but in his latter years he fell into a state of melancholy, aggravated by bodily disorder, which terminated in his death Feb. 17, 1749. His two most considerable works, were, 1. “De‘ gran duchi di Toscana della real casa de’ Medici,” Venice, 1741, fol. an account of the ancient sovereigns of Florence, as patrons of literature and the arts, but containing little new matter. 2. “Della satira Italiana, trattato,” Massa, 1714, 4to. Florence, 1729, 4to a critical work highly esteemed in Italy. To the second edition the author has annexed an Kalian dissertation, on the hypocrisy of men of letters, in which he exposes what would be called in this country the arts of puffing, which his biographer remarks, have made very gieat progress since his time. 3. “La Cantica de Cantici di Salomone tradotta in versi Toscani con annotazioni,” Venice, 1735. Various other small pieces of criticism, bibliography, &c. from his pen are inserted in the academical collections, particularly “Prose Fiorentine,” Venice, 1754, 4to.

, was born at Verona, March 10, 1697, of an eminent mercantile family, and as after completing his education he shewed no inclination for the church, his father brought him up to trade, which he carried on during the whole of his long life. In his youth he was particularly attached to music, played on several instruments, and even attempted composition, but neither this taste, nor his mercantile pursuits, interrupted his fondness for the study of the history and antiquities of his own country, which in the course of a few years beheld one of its merchants placed in the rank of men of letters and historians. His works entirely relate to the history of Verona, and although he appears rather as editor than author, yet his countrymen felt no small obligation to him for the care and expense which he bestowed in improving their ancient annalists. His first labour was a new edition and supplement, in 2 vols. 4to, 1745 and 1747, of Zagata’s “Chronicle of the City of Verona,” enriched with additions of great interest by Biancolini, particularly a plan of the ancient theatre of Verona, which the learned Maffei had thought it impossible to trace. 2. “Notizie storiche deliechiese di Verona,” four books, 1749—1752, 4to, afterwards reprinted and enlarged to 6 vols. 4to. 3. “Dei vescovi e governatori di Verona dissertazioni due,” Verona, 1757, 4to. He also contributed to the Italian translation of the Greek historians, “Collana degli storici Greci,” (begun in 1733 at Verona by, the bookseller Ramanzini) not only by literary, but pecuniary assistance of the most liberal kind. He died upwards of eighty-two years old, in 1780.

, a celebrated Italian philosopher and physician, was born at Bologna, Sept. 30, 1717. After having studied physic with great diligence and success, he was in his nineteenth year appointed medical assistant in one of the hospitals, and after four years, was, in 1742, admitted to the degree of doctor. In 1743 and 1744 he published a valuable translation into Italian of Winslow’s Anatomy, 6 vols. 8vo. In the last mentioned year, his reputation induced the landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt, prince and bishop of Augsburgh, to give him an invitation to reside with him, which Bianconi accepted, and remained there for six years. During this time he published “Due lettere di Fisica,” &c. Venice, 1746, 4to, addressed to the celebrated marquis MafFei, and wrote in French an “Essay on Electricity,” addressed to another learned friend, count Algarotti. He also began, in French, “Journal des nouveautes litteraires d' Italic,” printed at Leipsie, but with Amsterdam on the title, 1748, 1749, 8vo, which he continued to the end of a third volume. In 1730, he went to the court of Dresden, with a strong recommendation from pope Benedict XIV. to Augustus III. king of Poland, who received him into his confidence, and appointed him his aulic counsellor, and in 1760 sent him to France on a political affair of considerable delicacy, which he transacted with skill and satisfaction to his employer. In 1764, his majesty appointed him his resident minister at the court of Rome, where he felt his literary taste revive with its usual keenness, and was a contributor to various literary Journals. That of the “Effemeridi letterarie di Roma” owed its rise principally to him, and for sometime, its fame to his contributions. It was in this he wrote his eloges on Lupacchini, Piranesi, and Mengs, which last was published separately, with additions, in 1780. In his twelve Italian letters on the history of Cornelius Celsus, printed at Rome in 1779, he restores that celebrated physician to the age of Augustus, contrary to the common opinion, and to that of Tirasboschi (to whom they were addressed), who places him in what is called the silver age. He was projecting a magnificent edition of Celsus, a life of Petrarch, and some other literary undertakings, when he died suddenly at Perugia, Jan. 1, 1781, universally regretted. He left ready for the press, a work in Italian and French, on the circus of Caracalla, which was magnificently printed at Rome in 1790, with nineteen beautiful engravings.

, called one of the wise men of Greece, was born at Priene, a small town of Caria, abqut 570 B. C. He was in great repute in Greece, under the reigns of Halyattes and Croesus, kings of Lydia. Though born to great riches, he lived without splendour, expending his fortune in relieving the needy, and although esteemed the most eloquent orator of his time, he desired to reap no other advantage from this talent, than that of glory to his country. In his pleadings he shewed such discrimination, as never to undertake any cause which he did not think just. It was usual to say of a good cause that it was one which Bias would have undertaken, yet we are not told by what means he knew that a cause was good before it was tried. On one occasion, certain pirates brought several young women to sell as slaves at Priene. Bias purchased them, and maintained them, until he had an opportunity to return them to their friends. This generous action could not fail to increase his popularity, and made him be styled “the prince of the wise men.”

When Halyattes laid siege to Priene, Bias, who wasthen chief magistrate, made a vigorous resistance for a long time, and when, owing to a scarcity of provisions, the city was in danger of being surrendered, Bias caused two beautiful mules to be fattened, and to be driven towards the enemy’s camp, as if they had escaped from the inhabitants of Priene. Halyattes, seeing these animals in so good plight, was afraid the town was in no danger of starving, but, in order to be certain, contrived to send a spy into the city. Bias, suspecting his design, caused great heaps of sand to be covered with wheat, and the messenger having reported this abundance, Halyattes made an alliance with the inhabitants of Priene, and left them in peace.

Bias is said to have composed above two thousand verses, containing prudential maxims, many of which may be found in Stanley, and other writers on the lives of the philosophers. The following have been selected by Brucker “It is a proof of a weak and disordered mind to desire impossibilities. The greatest infelicity is, not to be able to endure misfortunes patiently. Great minds alone can support a sudden reverse of fortune. The most pleasant state is, to be always gaining. Be not unmindful of the miseries of others. II you are handsome, do handsome things if deformed, supply the defects of nature by your virtues. Be slow in undertaking, but resolute in executing. Praise hot a worthless man for the sake of his wealth. Whatever good you do, ascribe it to the gods. Lay in wisdom as the store for your journey from youth to old age, for it is the most certain possession. Many men are dishonest; therefore love your friend with caution, for he may hereafter become your enemy.” This last, however, would have better become a Rochefoucault, or a Chesterfield. Bias happened to be at Priene, when it was taken and sacked, and when asked, why he did not, like the rest, think of saving something, answered, “So I do, for I carry my all with me.” The action by which his days were terminated was no less illustrious than those of h s former life. He caused himself to be carried into the senate, where he zealously defended the interest of one of his friends, but being now very old, it fatigued him much. He leaned his head on the breast of one of his daughter’s sons, who had accompanied him. When the orator, who pleaded for his opponent, had finished his discourse, the judges pronounced in favour of Bias, who immediately expired in the arms of his grandson.

, painter and architect, was born at Boulogne in 1657. He studied the elements of his art under Cignani, a distinguished artist, and when this master produced his disciple to the world, his talents for architecture, for theatrical decorations, and for perspective, obtained him a good reception. The duke of Parma and the emperor gave him the title of their first painter, and loaded him with favours. Several magnificent edifices were raised after his plans. His pieces of perspective are full of taste, but there have not been wanting som critics who have censured him for having a pencil more fantastic than natural and just. He died blind in 1743, leaving two books of architecture and sons worthy of their father. It is probable that to one of them (J. Galli Bibbiena) the public is indebted for the “History of the amours of Valeria and the noble Venetian Barbarigo,” translated into French, Lausanne and Geneva, 1751. He had also a brother, an architectural painter of considerable fame.

, an eminent Protestant divine, whose real name was Buchmarij which he changed into Bibliander, according to a custom very prevalent in his time, was born in 1500, or rather 1504, according to D. Clement and Saxius, at Bischotfzel near St. Gall, and in 1532, succeeded Zwinglius in the divinity- chair at Zurick. This he rilled a considerable time, until having adopted some opinions on the subject of predestination, which were hostile to those generally received in the reformed church, he was gently dismissed by being declared emeritus, and his place supplied by Peter Martyr. He died of the plague at Zurich in 1564. He was a man of great reputation for learning, especially in the oriental languages. He wrote, 1. “Apologia pro edit. Aleorani^ edita à J. Fabricio, cum testamento Mohamedis,” Rostock, 1638, 4to. 2. “Machumetis Saraceriorum principis, ejusque successorum vitae, doctrina, ac ipse Alcoran,” &c. Basil, 1543, fol. This work is divided into three parts the first contains a Latin translation of the Alcoran the second, many pieces in refutation of the doctrines and errors of the Alcoran and the third, some parts of the works of Paul Jovius, and others, on the history and manners of the Turks. The whole was reprinted at Basil in 1550, but with considerable alterations in the second part, and the addition of some articles to the third. 3. “Quomodo oporteat legere sacras scripturas, praescriptiones Apostolorum, Prophetarum, &c.” ibid. 1550, 8vo. 4. “Amplior consideratio decreti synodalis Trident, de authent. doct. eccl. Dei, &c.” 1551, 8vo. 5. “Sermo divin, majest. voce pronunciatus, seu Comment, in Decalog. et Sermon. Dom. in monte Sinai,” Basil, 1552, fol. 6. “Concilium sacrosanctum eccl. cathol. in quo demonstratur quomodo possit pereunti populo Christiano succurri,” 1552, 8vo. 7. “Vita B. Marci evangelists,” Bale, 1552. 8. “De ratione temp. Christ. c. liber,” ibid. 1551, 8vo. 9. “Temporum a condito mundo usque ad ultim. ipsiiis aetat. supputatio,” ibid. 1553, fol. 10. “Evangelica historia,” ibid. 1551.

, a very celebrated French physician, and whose labours have greatly promoted the study of physiology, was born Nov. 11, 1771, at Thoirette. His father was also a physician, and had probably initiated him in medical knowledge, which he studied at Lyons, where Petit, then surgeon of the Hotel-Dieu in that city, under whom he was taught anatomy and surgery, had such an opinion of his talents, that he made him his assistant, although then only in his twentieth year. When Lyons was besieged in 1793, he made his escape, and arrived at Paris about the end of that year. There, without any recommendations from friends, he resumed his studies and became one of the pupils of the celebrated Dussault, who discovering his uncommon talents, invited him to his house, treated him as his son, and found in him a most able assistant. Of this generous protector, however, he was deprived by death in 1795, and became in his turn the support of Dussault’s widow and children. He first completed the fourth volume of Dussault’s “Journal de Chirurgie.” In 1797 he published his “CEuvres chirurgicales,” 2 vols. 8vo. In the same year he hegan to give lectures on anatomy and operative surgery, to which, in 1798, he added a course of physiology, v.hich produced his “Traite des Membranes,” 1800, 8vo, and “Recherches physiologiques sur la vie et sur la mort,” 1800, 8vo, in both which he advances some of those original opinions which attracted the attention of the faculty both at home and abroad, and paved the way for the higher fame he acquired by his “Anatomic generale appliquee a la physiologic et a la medicine,” Paris, 1801, 4 vols. 8vo, one of the ablest works n the subject which France has produced. The year preceding, although only twenty-eight years old, he was appointed physician to the Hotel Dieu, and had begun a nevr treatise on descriptive anatomy, when the world was deprived of his labours, by a premature death, the consequence of a putrid fever, July 22, 1802. He was deeply regretted for his talents and virtues.

, a noted Socinian writer, was born in 1615, at Wotton-under-Edge, in Gloucestershire. He was educated at the free-school in that town and, being a promising youth, was noticed by George lord Berkeley, who made him an allowance of 10l. a year. While at this school, he translated Virgil’s eclogues, and the two first satires of Juvenal, into English verse, both which were printed at London in 1634, in 8vo. In 1634 he was sent to Oxford, and entered at Magdalen-hall. June 23, 1683, he took the degree of bachelor of arts, and soon after was invited to be master of the school of his native place, but declined it. May 20, 1691, he took his degree of master of arts; and the magistrates of Gloucester having chosen him master of the free-school of St. Mary de Crypt in that city, he went and settled there, and was much esteemed for his diligence. Falling, however, into some opinions concerning the Trinity, different from those commonly received, and having expressed his thoughts with too much freedom, he was accused of heresy: and being summoned before the magistrates, he exhibited in writing a confession, which not being thought satisfactory, he was obliged to make another more explicit than the former. When ha had fully considered this doctrine, he comprised it in twelve arguments drawn, as he pretended, froai the Scripture wherein the commonly-received opinion, touching the deity of the Holy Spirit, is attempted to be refuted . An acquaintance who had a copy of them, having shewed them, to the magistrates of Gloucester, and to the parliament committee then residing there, he was committed, Dec. 2, 1645, to the common gaol, till the parliament should take cognizance of the matter. However, an eminent person in Gloucester procured his enlargement, by giving security for his appearance when the parliament should send for him. June 1616, archbishop Usher, passing through Gloucester in his way to London, had a conference with our author, and endeavoured, but in vain, to convince him of his errors. Six months after he had been set at liberty he was summoned to appear at Westminster, and the parliament appointed a committee to examine him before whom he freely confessed, that he did not acknowledge the commonly-received notion of the divinity of the Holy Ghost, but, however, was ready to hear what could be opposed to him, and, if he could not make out his opinion to be true, honestly to own his error. But being wearied with tedious and expensive delays, he wrote a letter to sir Henry Vane, a member of the committee, requesting him either to procure his discharge, or to make a report of his case to the house of commons. The result of this was, his being committed to the custody of one of their officers, which restraint continued the five years following. He was at length referred to the assembly of divines then sitting at Westminster, before whom he often appeared, and gave them in writing his twelve arguments, which were published the same year. Upon their publication, he was summoned to appear at the bar of the house of commons; where being asked, “Whether he owned this treatise, and the opinions therein” he answered in the affirmative. Upon which he was committed to prison, and the house ordered, Sept. 6, 1747, that the book should be called in and burnt by the hangman, and the author be examined by the committee of plundered ministers. But Mr. Biddle drew a greater storm upon himself by two tracts he published in 1648, “A confession of faith touching the Holy Trinity according to the Scripture” and “The testimonies of Irenaeus, Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Novatianusy Theophilus, Origen, also of Arnobius, Lactantius, Eusebius, Hilary, and Brightman, concerning that one God, and the persons of the Holy Trinity, together with observations on the same.” As soon as they were published, the assembly of divines solicited the parliament, and procured an ordinance, inflicting death upon those that held opinions contrary to the received doctrine about the Trinity, and severe penalties upon those who differed in lesser matters. Biddle, however, escaped by a dissension in the parliament, part of which was joined by the army; many of whom, both officers and soldiers, being liable to the severities of the ordinance above-mentioned, it therefore from that time lay unregarded for several years. Biddle had now more liberty allowed him by his keepers who suffered him, upon security given, to go into Staffordshire, where he lived some time with a justice of peace, who entertained him with great hospitality, and at his death left him a legacy. Serjeant John Bradshaw, president of the council of state, having got intelligence of this indulgence granted him, caused him to be recalled, and more strictly confined. In this confinement he spent his whole substance, and was reduced to great indigence, till he was employed by Roger Daniel of London, to correct an impression of the Septuagint Bible, which that printer was about to publish and this gained him for some time a comfortable subsistence.

In 1654 the parliament published a general act of oblivion, when Biddle was restored to his liberty. This he improved among those friends he had gained in London, in meeting together every Sunday for expounding the Scripture, and discoursing thereupon; by which means his opinions concerning the unity of God, Christ his only son, and his holy spirit, were so propagated, that the presbyterian ministers became highly offended. The same year he published his “Twofold scripture catechism,” which was ably answered by Dr. Owen in his “Vindicise Evangelicae,” Oxford, 1655; but a copy coming into the hands of some of the members of Cromwell’s parliament, meeting Sept. 3, 1654, a complaint was made against it in the house of commons. Upon this, the author being brought to the bar, and asked “Whether he wrote that book?” answered by asking, “Whether it seemed reasonable, that one brought before a judgment seat as a criminal, should accuse himself?” After some debates and resolutions, he was, Dec. 13, committed close prisoner to the Gatehouse. A bill likewise was ordered to be brought in for punishing him but, after about six months imprisonment, he obtained his liberty at the court of king’s bench, by due course of law. About a year after, another no less formidable danger overtook him, by his engaging in a dispute with one Griffin, an anabaptist teacher. Many of Griffin’s congregation having embraced Biddle' s opinions concerning the Trinity, he thought the best way to stop the spreading of such errors would be openly to confute his tenets. For this purpose he challenges Biddle to a public disputation at his meeting in the Stone chapel in St. Paul’s cathedral, on this question, “Whether Jesus Christ be the most high, or almighty God?” Biddle would have declined the dispute, but was obliged to accept of it and the two antagonists having met amidst a ifumerous audience, Griffin repeats the question, asking “if any man there did deny that Christ was God most high” to which Biddle resolutely answered, “I do deny it” and by this open profession gave his adversaries the opportunity of a positive and clear accusation, which they soon laid hold of. But Griffin being baffled, the disputation was deferred till another day, when Biddle was to take his turn of proving the negative of the question. Meanwhile, Griffin and his party, not thinking themselves a match for our author, accused him of fresh blasphemies, and procured an order from the protector to apprehend him, July the 3d (being the day before the intended second disputation), and to commit him to the Compter. He was afterwards sent to Newgate, and ordered to be tried for his life the next sessions, on the ordinance against blasphemy. However, the protector not chusing to have him either condemned or absolved, took him out of the hands of the law, and detained him in prison; till at length, being wearied with receiving petitions for and against him, he banished him to St. Mary’s castle, in the isle of Scilly y where he was sent Oct. 1655. During this exile, he employed himself in studying several intricate matters, particularly the Revelation of St. John, and after his return to London, published an essay towards explaining it. In 1658, the protector, through the intercession of many friends, suffered a writ of habeas corpus to be granted out of the king’s bench, whereby the prisoner was brought back, and, nothing being laid to his charge, was set at liberty. Upon his return to London, he became pastor of an independent meeting but did not continue long in town for, Cromwell dying Sept. 3, 1658, his son Richard called a parliament, consisting chiefly of presbyterians, whom, of all men, Biddle most dreaded he therefore retired privately into the country. This parliament being soon dissolved, he returned to his former employment till the restoration of king Charles the Second, when the liberty of dissenters was taken away, and their meetings punished as seditious. Biddle then restrained himself from public to more private assemblies, but, June 1, 1662, he was seized in his lodging, where he and some few of his friends had met for divine worship, and was, with them, carried before a justice of peace, who committed them all to prison, where they lay till the recorder took security for their answering to the charge brought against them at the next session. But the court not being then able to find a statute whereon to form, any criminal indictment, they were referred to the session following, and proceeded against at common law; each of the hearers was fined 20l. Biddle, 100l., and to lie in prison till paid. By his confinement, however, he contracted a disease which put an end to his life, Sept. 22, 1662, in the 47th year of his age. He was buried in the cemetery near Old Bethlem, in Moorfields and a monument was erected over his grave, with an inscription. His life was published in Latin at London, 1682, by Mr. Farrington, of the Inner Temple, who gives him a high character for piety and morals, and by the Rev. Joshua Toulmin, in 1789, 8vo, who styles him the Father of the English Unitarians.

, a very learned and voluminous German writer, was born at Naumberg, April 5, 1705, and studied at Wittemberg, where he was admitted to his master’s degree in 1717, and soon after made librarian to the city. In 1732 he returned to Naumberg, ancl was appointed co-rector of the public school, in which office he continued for nine years, and in 1741, on the death of John George Scutz, was promoted to be rector. In 1747, the place of rector of the school of Friedburg becoming vacant, he was invited to fill it, and accordingly, with the coiTsent of his patrons at Nauinberg, he removed thither, and added greatly to the reputation of' the school. He died there in 1772, leaving a vast number of works in Latin and German, published during his literary career, some of which involved him in controversies with his contemporaries, carried on in the German journals with a considerable degree of animosity. Harles enumerates above an hundred and fifty articles of his publication, separately, or in the literary journals, on subjects of sacred criticism, philology, the arts, poetical criticism, and some works of whim and imagination; the following selection will probably afford a sufficient specimen 1. “De insolentia titulorum librariorum,” Naumberg, 1743. 2. “De religione eruditorum,” ibid. 1744. 3. “Metelemata philologica,” ibid. 1746, with a continuation, 1748 50. 4. “Cur homines montani male audiant?” ibid. 1748. 5. “De Latinitate maccaronica,” ibid. 6. “De Isopsephis,” ibid. 7. “Fabulosa de septem dormientibus historia,” ibid. 1752. 8.“DearteObliviscendi,”ibid. 1752. 9.“De primis rei metallicae inventoribus,” ibid. 1763. 10. “De antiquitate sodinarum metallicarum,” ibid. 1764. 11.“Acta scholastica,” 1741, &c. 8 vols. a collection of programmes and academical dissertations, continued afterwards under the title of “Nova acta scholastica.” 12. “Selecta scholastica,” 1744 46, 2 vols. 13. “Otia litteraria,” Freiburgh, 1751. In a dissertation which he published in 1749, “De vita musica ad Plauti Mostellarium,” act III. sc. 2. v. 40, he has collected all that the ancients and moderns have advanced against music and musicians but, as this was founded on mistaking the sense of Plautus, it ocsasioned a long literary contest, in which Bidermann did not appear to the best advantage. Harles, indeed, allows that his judgment did not always keep pace with his learning.

, a famous anatomical writer, was born at Amsterdam March 12, 1649. After he had passed through his academical studies, he applied himself to physic and anatomy, and took his degree of M. D. He soon acquired considerable practice; in 1688 was made professor of anatomy at the Hague, which he quitted in 1694 for the professorship of anatomy and chirurgery at Leyden; and afterwards William III. of England appointed him his physician, which he accepted on condition of holding his professorship. The king died in 1702, and Bidloo returned to his former employments, in which he had been interrupted by his constant attendance upon that prince. He died at Ley den, April 1713, being 64 years of age. His chief work was his “Anatomia humani corporis,” in 105 plates drawn by Lairesse, Amst. 1685, fol. very beautiful, but not entirely correct, a circumstance which being pointed out by the celebrated Ruysch, drew from Bidloo a reply not very temperate, entitled “Vindiciae quorundam Delineationum Anatomicarum contra ineptasAnimadversionesF. Ruyschii, &c.” 1697,4to. Bidloo also published 1. “A letter to Anthony Leeuvvenhoek concerning the animals which are sometimes found in the liver of sheep or some other animals.” This was published in Low Dutch, Delft, 1698, 4to. 2. “Gulielmus Cowper criminis Literarii citatus coram tribunali nobiliss. ampliss. Societatis Britanno-Regiae,” Leyden, 1700, 4to, pagg. 4. This piece contains a very severe accusation against Mr. Cowper, a surgeon of London, and fellow of the royal society. Dr. Bidloo being informed that Mr. Cowper was engaged in translating his anatomy into English, had a conversation with him while he was at London, and offered him that in case he had such a design, he would communicate several additions and remarks, which he had made since the publication of that work. Mr. Cowper assured him, that he had no intention of that kind, as he did not understand Latin sufficiently to execute such a task. In the mean while he procured three hundred copies of the cuts of Dr. Bidloo’s book to be bought for him in Holland, upon which he caused the references to be written very artfully, in order to change, and add to, and frequently to spoil the doctor’s explication of the cuts. He had, likewise, an English title-page pasted upon the Latin one, in which, instead of the real author’s name his own was inserted, and he placed his own picture in the room of Dr. Bidloo’s. And although he occasionally mentioned our author in the preface, and added a few cuts at the end, Bidloo affirms, that the preface was inserted afterwards, when Mr. Cowper found that this piece of plagiarism would be resented. He observes, also, that the figures in the appendix were not drawn from the life, since there was no proportion observed in them, as is evident to those who understand the first principles of anatomy. Mr. Cowper wrote an answer to this piece, wherein he charged Dr. Bidloo likewise with plagiarism, and several mistakes, which he had committed; and this affair gave occasion to his publishing afterwards his great work upon the muscles. 3. “Exercitationum Anatomico-Chirurgicarum Decades dua”,“Leyden, 1708, 4to. 4. He published likewise a small piece upon the disease of which king William III. of England died. 5.” Letters of the Apostles who were martyred,“Amsterdam, 1698, 4to, in Low Dutch verse, of which, as well as of Latin, he was very fond, and was thought to have succeeded. He supposes jn this book, that the apostles wrote these letters before they suffered, martyrdom, and addressed them to their disciples, in order to inform them of their last desires, and to instruct them in what manner they ought to act after themselves were removed from this world. There was published at Leyden, 1719, a miscellaneous collection of our author’s poems in Low Dutch. His brother, Lambert Bidloo, an apothecary at Amsterdam, was the author of some Dutch poetry, and of a work” De re herbaria,“printed at the end of the” Catalogue of the Garden of Amsterdam," by Commelin, Leyden, 1709, 12mo. Lambert’s son, Nicholas, became first physician to the Czar Peter I., and inspector of the hospital of St. Petersburgh.

, an ingenious artist, was born at Liere, in Brabant, in 1594, and at first learned the rudiments of the art from Wouter Abts, afterwards became the disciple of Rodolph Schoof, a painter of considerable reputation at that time at Paris, and when he had practised under that master for a sufficient time to form his hand, he sought to obtain still greater improvement by travelling to Rome and there he spent six years in studying the works of the best masters, devoting his whole time to his profession. His industry was then rewarded with proportionable success; for he found encouragement among the most honourable persons at Rome, and in every part of Italy. His penciling was so exceedingly neat, and his touch and colouring so very delicate, that he was frequently employed to paint on jasper, agate, porphyry, and other precious materials, His master-piece is St. Eloi, in the principal church at Liere. The time of his death is Mot known his son, Cornelius de Bie, wrote the lives of the painters, &c. under the title “Guide Cabinet, &c.” in Flemish verse, with their portraits.

Another de Bie (Jacob or James), who was born at Antwerp, in 1581, was an eminent engraver of antiquities, coins, &c. and published, 1. “Imperatorum Roman. Numismata,” from Julius Caesar to Heraclius, Ant. 1615, 4to. 2. “Numismata Graecise,” ibid. foi. 3. “La France Metallique, &c.” Paris, 1636; also the portraits for Mezeray’s history, and other works of a similar kind. His style resembles that of the Collaerts, and he drew correctly, and executed his plates entirely with the graver, in a neat clear determined manner, and upon the whole, his prints may rank with those of the best early Flemish masters.

, one of the ablest scholastic divines of his time, was born at Spire, and preached with great reputation at Mentz, until Eberhard, duke of Wittemberg, having founded the university of Tubingen, invited him thither in 1477, to fill the theological chair. Towards the end of his days he retired to a convent of regular canons, where he died very old, in 149.5. His principal writings were: I. “Collectorium super libros sententiarum G. Occami,” Tubingen, 1501, fol. 2. “Lectura super canonem Missae,” Rutlingen, 1488, fol.; and 3. “Sacri canonis Missae, &.c. expositio,” Tubingen, 1499, fol., and thrice reprinted. He is also said to have written “De monetarum potestate simul et utilitate,” Nuremberg, 1542, Cologn, 1574, and Lyons, 1605.

, a Lutheran divine of the last century, was born at Brunswick, in 1687, and died in 1745. He was the author of a great many theological dissertations inserted in Ugolin’s “Thesaur. antiquitat. sacr.” and of a valuable work published after his death by E. H. Mutzenbecher, under the title of “Novus Thesaurus Philologicus, sive Lexicon in LXX- et alios interpretes et scriptoresapocryphosVeteris Testament!,” Hague, 1779 80, 3 vols. 8vo, to which Schleussneradded the supplements.

, was born at Hamburgh March 31, 1717. Jn a journey which he made to Brunswick, he became acquainted with Frederick II. then prince royal, who, on coming to the throne, took him into his service, and sent him, as secretary of legation, with count de Truchses, Prussian ambassador to the court of St. James’s, but discovering that the baron’s talents were not calculated for diplomatic affairs, h, in 1745, appointed him preceptor to prince Augustus Ferdinand his brother; after that, in 1747, curator of the universities, and in 1748 he created him a baron, with the rank of privy-counsellor. The last years of his life he spent in study and retirement at Treban, in the country of Altenburgh, where he died April 5, 1770. He wrote

, in Latin Benenatus, was a bookseller and printer at Paris, in the sixteenth century, and celebrated for the beauty and correctness of his editions. He became a printer in 1566, and married in that year the widow of Morel, likewise a Greek and Latin printer, of distinguished reputation. Bienne by this alliance becoming possessed of Morel’s printing-house, completed the works which his predecessor had begun, particularly the Greek Demosthenes of 1570, fol. and published also various very excellent editions, particularly “Lucretius,” by Lambin, 1570, 4to “Synesii Hymni,” 1570, 8vo and “Theodoretus de providentia,” Gr. and Lat. 1569, 8vo. He died Feb. 15, 1588. It is said he left a daughter so accomplished in Greek and Hebrew, as to be able to conduct the printing of works in these languages.

, an able naturalist, and a Clergyman at Gresbach in Westgothland, was born in 1735, and died in 1795. He published in the Memoirs of the Academy of Stockholm, of which he was a member, a great number of papers on insects, which he had made his particular study, and on the transpiration of plants, the burning of vegetables, the effect of cold on vegetables, &c. all in the Swedish language.

, garter principal king at arms, was born in 1711, the son of Richard Bigland, of Kendal, in Westmoreland, the descendant of a family originally seated at Bigland, Lancashire. The subject of this brief notice, after going through all the offices in the College of Arms, and executing also the office of registrar, to which he was appointed in 1763, became the head of it in 1780, but enjoyed his elevation a very short time, dying in James-street, Bedford-row, March 27, 1784. He was buried with his parents at Stepney. He was deservedly esteemed and regretted, as a man of much skill in heraldry and other branches of antiquities. The great collections he had made for a history of Gloucestershire were intended to have been arranged and given by him to the public, and have since been partly published by his son Richard Bigland, of Frocester, esq. under the title of “Historical, monumental, and genealogical collections, relative to the county of Gloucester,” &c. fol. 1792, to which a second volume will probably be added by Mr. Nichols.

, and not de la Vigne, as he is generally called by writers who have occasion to name him [for it is thus he gives his own name in his “Roman des Oiseaux”], was born of a noble family of the diocese of Bayeux, about 1428. He was chaplain to king John, and followed that prince into England after the battle of Poletiers. Being at Rochefort in 1459, he began a poem on the chace, entitled “Le Roman des Oiseaux,” which he finished on his return to France. This he did at the command of the king for the instruction of his son Philip duke of Burgundy. The abbé Goujet attributes this poem to Gaston de Foix, from its being printed at the end of the “Miroir de la Chasse” by that prince, but greatly different from the manuscripts. Gaston’s work printed by Trepperel at Paris, fol. without a date, and again in 1520, consists of two parts, the first Gaston’s, and the second by Bigne. Bigne is supposed, from some passages in his work, to have been alive in 1475. The personages in this poem, or romance, are allegorical, and dispute which species of the chace has the pre-eminence, appealing to the king, who, after having advised with his counsellors, wisdom, reason, and truth, (not very usually called in) sends away the disputants perfectly satisfied. The style is easy, and the author’s quaintness will be agreeable to the lovers of early poetry.

, a priest, of the same family with the preceding, doctor of the Sorbonne, and dean of the church of Mans, was born in 1546 at Bernieresle-Patry, and studied at the college of Caen. He published in 1575 a “Bibliotheca patrum,” 3 vols. folio, which he re-published in 1589, 9 vols. being the first that undertook a work of that kind. The most copious edition we have of it is in 27 vols. folio, Lyons, 1677. There is also one in 16 vols. folio, of 1644, which is much esteemed, as containing the lesser Greek fathers. Another was published at Cologne in 1-694, and Pere Philip de St. Jacques gave an abridgment of it in 1719, 2 vols. fol. To the Bibiioth. pp. are generally added, “Index locorum scripture sacra,” Genoa, 1707, fol., and the “Apparatus of Nourri,” Paris, 1703, and 1715, 2 vols. fol. Such is the completest edition. La Bigne distinguished himself also by his harangues and his sermons. He gave a collection of synodal statutes in 1578, 8vo. and an edition of Isidore of Seville, in 1580, fol. He was a very studious man; and, having got into some disputes that were referred to the magistrates of Bayeux, he rather chose to give up his benefices than his literary pursuits. He retired to Paris, where it is supposed he died, about 1590.

, a counsellor of the presklial of Rheims, was born there in 1709, and died at Paris in 1775. He was well versed in ancient and modern, literature We have by him, 1. “A collection of Latin and French poems,” 1767, 12mo; which are short, and in an easy and natural style. His epigrams are very much in the manner of the chevalier de Cailli and he has one singularity in all his poetieal productions, that he has not one piece, either in Latin or French, that exceeds twenty lines. Some of his countrymen have compared them to those of Catullus, and several writers in the journals have extolled them as productions of extraordinary merit. But M. Bignicourt is best known for his 2. “Pensees et reflections philosophiques,” 1755, 12mo. This work, which was afterwards published under the title of “L‘homme du. Monde & L’homme de Lettres,” has, however, its admirers and its censurers, with respect to the method of writing set phrases, and giving them as thoughts and maxims.

, a French writer, was born at Paris Aug. 24, 1589. His father took the care of his education upon himself, and taught him the languages, philosophy, mathematics, civil law, and divinity. Jerome acquired so much knowledge in a very short time, that at ten years of age he published his description of the Holy Land, entitled “Chorographie, ou Description de la TerreSainte,” Paris, 1600, 12mo; and three years after, two other works, which gained him great reputation in France. The first was, “Discours de la ville de Rome, principales antiquitez & singularitez d'icelle,” 1601-, 8vo; the other work is “Traite sommaire de Pelection des papes,” 1605, 8vo, in which piece he gives an account of the different manner of electingthe popes formerly. Henry IV. appointed him page of honour to the dauphin, afterwards Lewis XIII. He wrote also a treatise on the precedency of the kings of France, entitled “De l‘excellence des rois & du royaume de France, traitant de la preseance& des prerogatives des rois des France par dessus tous les antres, & de causes d’icelles.” This book was written in order to confute what Diego Valdes, counsellor of the royal chamber of Granada, had published in favour of the precedency of the kings of Spain, under the title of “De dignitate re gum Hispania?,” Granada, 1602, fol. This he dedicated to the king, who ordered him to continue his researches upon the subject; but the death of this prince interrupted his design, and made him leave the court; whither he was soon recalled at the solicitation of Mr. le Fevre, preceptor to Lewis XIII. and continued there till the death of his friend. In 1613 he published an edition of the Formulae of Marculphus and the year following took a journey to Italy, where he received many marks of esteem from Paul V. Father Paul likewise being pleased w with. his conversation, detained him some time at Venice.

Upon his return from his travels, he applied himself to the practice of the bar with great success. His father procured for him the post of advocate general in the grand council; which office he discharged with such reputation, that the king nominated him some time after counsellor of state, and at last advocate general in the parliament. In 1641 he resolved to confine himself entirely to his business in the council of state, and therefore resigned his place of advocate-general to Mr. Briquet his son -in- law,. The year following he was appointed the king’s librarian. His sonin-law dying in 1645, he was obliged to resume his post of advocate- general, in order to preserve it for his son. He had also a considerable share in the ordinance of the year 1639; and he discharged with great integrity various commissions with which he was intrusted at different times. Queen Anne of Austria, during her regency, sent for him to council upon the most important occasions. He adjusted the differences between Mr. d‘Avaux and Mr. Servien, plenipotentiaries at Minister and he had a share, with M. de Brienne and d’ Emery, in making the treaty of alliance with the states of Holland in 1649. He was appointed, in 1651, to regulate the great affair of the succession of Mantua; and in 1654, to conclude the treaty with the Hans Towns. Mr. Bignon died, aged 66, on the 7th of April, 1656, of an asthma, with which he waa seized the autumn before. In 1757, the abbé Perau published Bignon’s life, two parts, 12mo. His grandson, John Paul Bignon, was librarian to the king, a man of great erudition, and a writer of great powers of invention, if he could compose, as we are told he did, four panegyrics on St. Louis, all different, two of which were pronounced the same day, one at the French academy, and the other at the academy of inscriptions. He wrote also “Vie de Francois Levesque,” 1684, 12mo; and “Les Aventures d‘Abdalla, fils d’Hanif.” 1713, 2 vols. 12mo. often reprinted. He had also a hand in the medallic history of the jreign of Louis XIV. and the Journal des Savans. He warmly patronized Tournefort, who named a plant after him Bignonia. He died May 14, 1743.

, an eminent patron of literature, was born at Rouen in 1626, of an ancient family, and having no inclination to rise in the offices of magistracy, as many of his ancestors had done, nor to enter into the church, he determined to devote his time and fortune to the study and advancement of polite literature. His father, dean of the court of aids in Normandy, left him a library of six thousand volumes, including upwards of five hundred manuscripts, to which he made so many additions, that at his death it was valued at forty thousand franks and that it might not be scattered, he entailed it on his family, with handsome funds for the support and enlargement of it. It was, however, sold in July 1706, and the catalogue, which was printed, is in considerable request among bibliographers. During his life-time this library was the resort of a number of men of letters, who held frequent meetings here, in which Bigot presided. His travels in Holland, England, Germany, and Italy, procured him the acquaintance and correspondence of most of the literati of Europe, who frequently consulted him, and paid great regard to his opinions. His sole passion was to contribute by his wealth and studies to the perfection and illustration of the best Greek and Latin authors, and he employed these advantages with the utmost liberality and modesty. Having discovered in the library at Florence, the Greek text of the “Life of St. Chrysostom by Palladius, he published it at Paris in 1680, 4to, with some other ancient Greek remains, hitherto in manuscript, the whole accompanied with a Latin translation by Ambrose of Camaldoli. To this he added St. Chrysostom’s epistle to Cesarius, but it being discovered that this was an attack on the doctrine of transubstantiation, the licensers refused its being published, and caused the leaves on which it was printed to be cut out. A copy of these leaves, however, having fallen into the hands of Mr. (afterwards archbishop) Wake, was published by him in his” Defence of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England against the exceptions of M. de Meaux, &c.“Lond. 1686, 4to. In this Wake has given a curious account not only of the suppression of this letter, but of the controversy to which it gave rise in archbishop Cranmer’s time. Du Pin says, that after Bigot’s death, some of his literary correspondence was published but this appears a mistake, if we except a letter of his written, in 1672, to the bishop of Trulle against the abbé de St. Cyran’s book” Le Cas Royal," and printed at Basil in 1690. Menage and Heinsius were among his most intimate friends, and such was his general knowledge and communicative disposition, that he was consulted by every one fond of literary history and anecdote. He died Oct. 18, 1689.

, an eminent German philosopher and statesman, was born at Camstadt in Wirtemberg, Jan. 23, 1693; his father was a Lutheran minister. By a singular hereditary constitution in this family, Biliinger was born with twelve fingers and eleven toes, which, in his case, is said to have been remedied by amputation when he was an infant. From his earliest years, he showed an uncommon capacity for study, joined to a retired and thinking turn of mind. Happening, when studying at Tubingen, to learn mathematics in the works of Wolf, he imbibed likewise a taste for the sceptical philosophy of that writer, and for the system of Leibnitz, which for a time took off his attention from his other studies. When entered on his theological course, he found himself disposed to connect it with his new ideas on philosophy, and with that view wrote a treatise, “De Deo, anima, et mundo,” which procured him considerable fame, and was the cause of his being chosen preacher at the castle of Tubingen, and repeater in the school of divinity. But fancying Tubingen a theatre too contracted, he obtained of one of his friends a supply of money, in 1719, which enabled him to go to Halle to study more particularly under Wolf himself. This, however, did not produce all the good consequences expected. When after two years he returned to Tubingen, the Wolfian philosophy was no longer in favour, his patrons were cold, his lessons deserted; himself unable to propagate his new doctrines, and his promotion in the church was likely to suffer. In this unpleasant state he remained about four years, when, by Wolf’s recommendation, he received an invitation from Peter I. to accept the professorship of logic and metaphysics in the new academy at St. Petersburgh. Thither accordingly he went in 1725, and was received with great respect, and the academical memoirs which he had occasion to publish increased his reputation in no small degree. The academy of sciences of Paris having about that time proposed for solution the famous problem, on the cause of gravity, Bilfinger carried off the prize, which was one thousand crowns. This made his name be known in every part of Europe, and the duke Charles of Wirtemberg having been reminded that he was one of his subjects, immediately recalled him home. The court of Russia, after in vain endeavouring to retain him, granted him a pension of four hundred florins, and two thousand as the reward of a discovery he had made in the art of fortification. He quitted Petersburgh accordingly in 1731, and being re-established at Tubingen, revived the reputation of that school not only by his lectures, but by many salutary changes introduced in the theological class, which he effected without introducing any new opinions. His greatest reputation, however, rests on his improvements in natural philosophy and mathematics, and his talents as an engineer seem to have recommended him to the promotion which the duke Charles Alexander conferred upon him. He had held many conversations with Bilfinger on the subject of fortifications, and wished to attach him to government by appointing him a privy-councillor in 1735, with unlimited credit. For some time he refused a situation which he thought himself not qualified to fill, but when he accepted it, his first care was to acquire the knowledge necessary for a member of administration, endeavouring to procure the most correct information respecting the political relations, constitution, and true interests of the country. By these means, he was enabled very essentially to promote the commerce and agriculture of his country, and in other respects to improve her natural resources, as well as her political connections, and he is still remembered as one of the ablest statesmen of Germany. The system of fortification which he invented is yet known by his name, and is now the chief means of preserving it, as he died unmarried, at Stuttgard, Feb. 18, 1750. He is said to have been warm in his friendships, but somewhat irascible; his whole time during his latter years was occupied in his official engagements, except an hour in the evening, when he received visits, and his only enjoyment, when he could find leisure, was in the cultivation of his garden. To his parents he was particularly affectionate, and gratefully rewarded all those who had assisted him in his dependent state. His principal works are 1. “Disputatio de harmonia praestabilita,” Tubinguen, 1721, 4to. 2. “De harmonia animi et corporis humani maxime prsestabilita commentatio hypothetica,” Francfort, 1723, 8vo. This was inserted among the prohibited books by the court of Rome in 1734. 3. “De origine et permissione Mali, &c.” ibid. 1724, 8vo. 4. “Specimen doctrinae veterum Sinarum moralis et politicae,” ibid. 1724, 8vo. 5. “Dissertatio historico-catoptrica de speculo Archimedis,” Tubingen, 1725, 4to. 6. “Dilucidationes philosophies; de Deo, anima, &c.” before mentioned, ibid. 1725, 4to. 7. “Bilfingeri et Holmanni epistolae de barmonia praestabilita,” 1728, 4to. 8. “Disputatio de natura et legibus studii in theologica Thetici,” ibid. 1731, 4to. 9. “Disputatio de cuku Dei rationali,” ibid. 1731. 10. “Notae breves in Spinosae methodum. explicandi scripturas,” ibid. 1732, 4to. 11. “De mysteriis Christianae fidei generatim spectatis sermo,” ibid. 1732, 4to. 12. “La Citadelle coupee,” Leipsic, 1756, 4to. 13. “Elementa physices,” Leipsic, 1742, 8vo; besides many papers in the memoirs of the Petersburgh academy, of which, as well as of that of Berlin, he was a member.

, a surgeon, born at Coire in Swisserland, in 1720, studied at Strasburgh and Paris, and afterwards served in the Prussian army, and became surgeon-general. He received a doctor’s degree at Halle in 1761, and was admitted a member of various learned societies and to these honours the emperor of Germany added titles of nobility, of which, however, Bilguer never made any use. His fame abroad, as well as in this country, principally rests on his famous inaugural thesis, entitled, “Dissertatio inauguralis medico-chirurgica de membrorum Amputatione rarissime administranda aut quasi abroganda,” Berlin, 1761,4to. This Tissot translated into French, and enriched it with notes, under the title “Dissertation sur l‘inutilite de l’Amputation,” Paris, 1764, 12mo; from the Latin it was translated into English, 1761. The author’s object is to prove how very seldom amputation can be necessary, particularly in the case of gun-shot wounds received in battle. The first able answer to this mistaken effort of humanity was by M. Martiniere, principal surgeon to the French king; our eminent surgeon Pott has likewise shewn its danger; but in 1780 Bilguer’s doctrine found a supporter in Dr. Kirkland of Edinburgh, in his “Thoughts on Amputation.” Bilguer published also, in German, “Instructions for the practice of Surgery in army-hospitals,” Leipsic, 1763; “Advice to Hypochondriacs,” &c. He died in 1796.

, known under the name of Maitre Adam, a joiner at Nevers, about the close of the reign of Louis XIII. and the beginning of that of Louis XIV. was called by the poets of his time Le Virgile au rabot. He made verses amidst his tools and his bottles. Cardinal Richelieu and the duke of Orleans settled pensions on him, and Corneille was among his panegyrists. His “Chevilles,” 1644, 4to; his “Villebrequin,” 1663; his “Rabot,” in 12mo, &c. had a great run. Among a considerable number of dull frivolities we meet with some happy lines. He died in 1662 at Nevers, which he never could be brought to quit for a lodging at Versailles. He had a just notion of greatness, and was capable of feeling and inspiring the charms of friendship. An epicurean without libertinism, and a stoic without supersition, he so associated these two sects as to have it said, that if Epicurus and Zeno had lived in his time, he would have brought them to drink together. He stuck to his mediocrity in order to preserve his happiness. The poets his contemporaries were his friends, and not envious of his fame. Mainard says, that the muses ought never to be seated but on tabourets made by the hand of this poetical joiner. St. Amand proved that he understood the art of poetry as well as that of making boxes. The duke de St. Aignan tells him, in some very agreeable lines, that, by his verses and his name, he is the first of men. Such praises were probably offered in ridicule; but Billaut knew how to make the most of his friends, and is said to have tried the sincerity of their friendship with very little ceremony. A new edition of his works was published in 1806, 12mo, Paris, and the year before a comedy was acted on the Paris stage, with some success, called “Chevilles de Maitre Adam.” Two poetical tradesmen, in his time, endeavoured to rival him, but without success, Ragueneau, a pastry-cook, and Reault, a locksmith. Each addressed a sonnet to him that of the pastrycook concludes with a point quite in character:

, a Swedish astronomer, was born about the middle of the seventeenth century. He became professor of mathematics at Upsal in 1679, but his zeal for the Cartesian system made him be considered as a dangerous innovator, and he might have been a serious sufferer from the prejudices raised against him, if he had not met with a kind protector in Charles XL This prince having travelled to Torneo, was so struck with the phenomena of the sun at the spring solstice, that he sent Biilberg and Spola to make observations on it, in the frontiers of Lapland, and their observations were confirmed by those of the French mathematicians sent thither by Louis XV. Under king Charles’s protection, Biilberg received considerable promotion, and having studied divinity, was at last made bishop of Strengnes. 'He died in 1717, leaving, 1. “Tractatus de Cometis,” Stockholm, 1682. 2. “Elementa Geometrices,” Upsal, 1687. 3. “Tractatus de refractione solis inoccidui,” Stockholm, 1696. 4. “Tractatus de reformatione Calendarii Juliani et Gregoriani,” Stockholm, 1699, and many other philosophical and theological dissertations.

, was born at Guise in Picardy, of which place his father was governor, in 1535, and died at Paris at the house of Genebrard his friend, the 25th of December 1581. He presided over the abbey of St. Michel en PLerm, which John his brother had ceded to him in order to become a Carthusian monk. There are of his several pieces both in verse and prose; and especially translations of the Greek fathers into Latin. The most esteemed of them are, those of St. Gregory of Nazianzen, of St. Isidore of Pelusium, and of St. John Damascenus. Few of the learned have been more masters of the Greek tongue. He distinguished himself in other departments of literature. He composed several pieces of French poetry, 1576, in 8vo, and published learned “Observationes sacrse,” 1585, in folio. His life was written in Latin by Chatard, Paris, 1582, in 4to. It is also found at the end of the works of St. Gregory Nazianzenus, of the edition of 1583.

, a Jesuit, who was born at Compiegne in 1602, and died at Dijon in 1679, aged seventyseven published a great number of mathematical works, of which the “Opus astronomicon,” Paris, 1661, in 4to, is the most known.

, an excellent mathematician, and lord-mayor of London in the reign of queen Elizabeth, was son to Roger Biilingsley of Canterbury. He spent near three years in his studies at the university of Oxford, during which time he contracted an acquaintance with an eminent mathematician, whose name was Whitehead, and who had been an Augustin friar at Oxford, but Biilingsley being removed from the university, and bound apprentice to an haberdasher in London, he afterwards raised himself so considerable a fortune by trade, that he was successively chosen sheriff, alderman, one of the commissioners of the customs for the port of London, and at last lord mayor of that city in 1597, and received the honour of knighthood. He made a great progress in the mathematics, by the assistance of his friend Mr. Whitehead, who being left destitute upon the dissolution of the monasteries in the reign of king Henry VIII. was received by Mr. Biilingsley into his family, and maintained by him in his old age in his house at London and when he died, he gave our author all the mathematical observations, which he had made and collected, with his notes upon Euclid’s Elements, which he had drawn up and digested with prodigious pains. He was one of the original society of antiquaries. Sir Henry Billingsley died very much advanced in years, Nov. 22, 1606, and was interred in the church of St. Catherine Coleman, London. He translated the Elements of Euclid into English, to which he added a great number of explanations, examples, scholia, annotations, and inventions, collected from the best mathematicians both of the former times, and those in which he lived, published under the title of “The Elements of Geometry of the most antient philosopher Euclid of Megara, faithfully translated into the English tongue. Whereunto are added certain scholia, annotations,” &c. London, 1570, fol. Dr. John Dee prefixed to this work a long preface, full of variety of learning relating to the mathematics.

, a learned writer, and bishop, in the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth century, was born in the city of Winchester, being the son of Harman Bilson, the same probably who was fellow of Merton-college in 1536, and derived his descent by his grandmother, or great-grandmother, from the duke of t>avaria. He was educated in Winchester school and in 1565 admitted perpetual fellow of New-college, after he had served two years of probation. October 10, 1566, he took his degree of bachelor, and April 25, 1570, that of master of arts; that of bachelor of divinity, June 24, 1579; and the degree of doctor of divinity on the 24th of January 1580. In his younger years, he was a great lover of, and extremely studious in, poetry, philosophy, and physic. But when he entered into holy orders, and applied himself to the study of divinity, which his genius chiefly led him to, he became a most solid and constant preacher, and one of the most accomplished scholars of his time. The first preferment he had was that of master of Winchester-school he was then made prebendary of Winchester, and afterwards warden of the college there. To this college he did a very important service, about the year 1584, by preserving the revenues of it when they were in danger of being swallowed up by a notorious forgery, of which, however, we have only an obscure account. In 1585, he published his book of “The true difference betweene Christian Subjection and unchristian Rebellion,” and dedicated it to queen Elizabeth a work, which, although it might answer her immediate purpose, was of fatal tendency to Charles I. few books being more frequently quoted by the mal-contents to justify their resistance to that prince. In 1593, he published a very able defence of episcopacy, entitled, “The perpetuall Government of Christes Church: wherein are handled, the fatherly superioritie which God first established in the patriarkes for the guiding of his Church, and after continued in the tribe of Levi and the Prophetes and lastlie confirmed in the New Testament to the apostles and their successors: as also the points in question at this day, touching the Jewish Synedrion: the true kingdome of Christ: the Apostles’ commission: the laie presbyterie: the distinction of bishops from presbyters, and their succession from the apostles times and hands: the calling and moderating of provinciall synods by primates and metropolitanes the allotting of dioceses, and the popular electing of such as must feede and watch the flock and divers other points concerning the pastoral regiment of the house of God.” On the 20th of April, 15y6, he was elected v confirmed June the llth, and the 13th of the same month consecrated bishop of Worcester and translated in May following to the bishopric of Winchester, and made a privy-counsellor. In 1599, he published “The effect of certaine Sermons touching the full Redemption of Mankind by the death and bloud of Christ Jesus wherein, besides the merite of Christ’s suffering, the manner of his offering, the power of his death, the comfort of his crosse, the glorie of his resurrection, are handled, what paines Christ suffered in his soule on the crosse together with the place and purpose of his descent to hel after death” &c. Lond. 4to. These sermons being preached at Paul’s Cross in Lent 1597, by the encouragement of archbishop Whitgift, greatly alarmed most of the Puritans, because they contradicted some of their tenets, but they are not now thought consonant to the articles of the church of England. The Puritans, however, uniting their forces, and making their observations, sent them to Henry Jacob, a learned puritan, who published them under his own name. The queen being at Farnham-castle, and, to use the bishop’s words, “taking knowledge of the things questioned between him and his opponents, directly commanded him neither to desert the doctrine, nor to let the calling which he bore in the church of God, to be trampled under foot by such unquiet refusers of trueth and authoritie.” Upon this royal command, he wrote a learned treatise, chiefly delivered in sermons, which was published in 1604, under the title of “The survey^of Christ’s sufferings for Man’s Redemption and of his descent to hades or hel for our deliverance,” Lond. fol. He also preached the sermon at Westminster before king James I. and his queen, at their coronation on St. James’s day, July 28, 1603, from Rom. xiii. L. London, 1603, 8vo. In January 1603-4, he was one of the speakers and managers at the Hampton-Court conference, in which he spoke much, and, according to Mr. Fuller, most learnedly, and, in general, was one of the chief maintainers and supports of the church of England. The care of revising, and putting the last hand to, the new translation of the English Bible in king James Ist’s reign, was committed to our author, and to Dr. Miles Smith, afterwards bishop of Gloucester. His last public act, recorded in history, was the being one of the delegates that pronounced and signed the sentence of divorce between Robert Devereux, earl of Essex, and the lady Frances Howard, in the year 1613 and his son being knighted soon after upon this very account, as was imagined, the world was so malicious as to give him the title of sir Nullity Bilson. This learned bishop, after having gone through many employments, departed this life on the 18th of June, 1616, and was buried in Westminsterabbey, near the entrance into St. Edmund’s chapel, on the south side of the monument of king Richard II. His character is represented to the utmost advantage by several persons. Sir Anthony Weldon calls him “an excellent civilian, and a very great scholler” Fuller, “a deep and profound scholar, excellently well read in the fathers” Bishop Godwin, “a very grave iman and how great a divine (adds he), if any one knows not, let him consult his learned writings” Sir John Harrington, “I find but foure lines (in bishop Godwin’s book) concerning him and if I should give him his due, in proportion to the rest, I should spend foure leaves. Not that I need make him better known, being one of the most eminent of his ranck, and a man that carried prelature in his very aspect. His rising was meerly by his learning, as true prelates should rise. Sint non modo labe mali sed suspicione carentes, not onely free from the spot, but from the speech of corruption.” He wrote in a more elegant style, and in fuller and betterturned periods, than was usual in the times wherein he lived. It is related of our prelate, that once, when he was preaching a sermon* at St. Paul’s Cross, a sudden panic, occasioned by the folly or caprice of one of the audience, seized the multitude there assembled, who thought that the church was falling on their heads. The good bishop, who sympathized with the people more from pity than from fear, after a sufficient pause, reassumed and went through his sermon with great composure.

, the writer of several tracts on theological subjects, and author of that laborious performance, “Origines ecclesiastic, or the Antiquities of the Christian church,” was the son of Mr. Francis Bingham, a respectable inhabitant of Wakefield in Yorkshire, where our author was born in September, 1668. He learned the first rudiments of grammar at a school in the same town, and on the 26th of May 1684, was admitted a member of University college in Oxford. There he applied with persevering industry to those studies which are generally considered as most laborious. Though he by no means neglected the writers of Greece or Rome, yet he employed most of his time in studying the writings of the fathers. How earnestly he devoted himself to these abstruse inquiries, he had an early opportunity of giving an honourable testimony, which will presently be mentioned more at large. He took the degree of B. A. in 1688, and on the 1st of July 1689 was elected fellow of the above-mentioned college. His election to this fellowship was attended with some flattering marks of honour and distinction. On the 23d of June, 1691, he was created M. A. about four years after which a circumstance occurred which eventually occasioned him to leave the university. Being called on to preach before that learned body, he would not let slip the opportunity it gave him of evincing publicly his intimate acquaintance with the opinions and doctrines of the fathers, and at the same time of displaying the zeal with which he was resolved to defend their tenets concerning the Trinity, in opposition to the attacks of men in much more conspicuous stations than himself. Having heard what he conceived to be a very erroneous statement of that subject delivered by a leading man from the pulpit at St. Mary’s, he thought it his duty on this occasion to point out to his hearers what the fathers had asserted to be the ecclesiastical notion of the term person. In pursuance of this determination he delivered a very long discourse on the 28th of October, 1695, from the famous words of the apostle, “There are three that bear record in heaven, &c.” This sermon, though containing nothing more than an elaborate defence of the term person, in opposition to the explanation which he had lately heard, drew a heavy censure on the preacher from the ruling members of the university, charging him with having asserted doctrines false, impious, and heretical, contrary to those of the catholic church. This censure was followed by other charges in the public prints, viz. those of Arianism, Tritheism and the heresy of Valentinus Gentilis. These matters ran so high, that he found himself under the necessity of resigning his fellowship, and of withdrawing from the university the former of which took place on the 23d of November 1695. How wholly unmerited these accusations were, not only appears from the sermon itself, now in the possession of the writer of this article, but also from the whole tenor of his life and writings, constantly shewing himself in both a zealous defender of what- is called the orthodox notion of the Trinity. However, that such a censure was passed, is most certain, as well from domestic tradition, as from the mention which is repeatedly made of it in the manuscript papers of our author but we are assured that no traces thereof are now to be found in the books of the university.

About this time our author was presented, without any solicitation on his part, by the famous Dr. Radcliffe, to the rectory of Headbourne- Worthy, a living valued at that time at about one hundred pounds a year situated near Winchester. Within a few months after his settling in this country, being called on to preach at a visitation held in the cathedral of Winchester, on the 12th of May, 1696, he seized that opportunity of pursuing the subject which he had begun at Oxford, and of exculpating himself from those charges which had been brought against him. How little our divine had deserved those imputations in the opinion of his brethren, before whom he preached, may in some degree be judged from his having been, at no greater distance of time than the 16th of September, 1697, again appointed to preach before them on a similar occasion. He then brought to a conclusion what he wished farther to say on that subject, his manner of treating which had exposed him to the censure of the university and having done so, he prepared to commit his three sermons to the press. Why this intention was not fulfilled cannot be gathered from any of his papers, though there exists among them a long preface to the sermon preached at Oxford, explaining and justifying his motives for having preached and published it; and a second preface annexed to the first of those preached at Winton, in which he dedicates the two visitation sermons to the clergy of the deanery before whom they were delivered; wherein he tells them, that he has been induced to do so not only from the subject contained in them being such as was their immediate concern, but also that he might have an opportunity of giving a more full account of the motives and circumstances which had occasioned him to write or to publish them.

About six or seven years after our author had taken up his residence at Worthy, he married Dorothea, one of the daughters of the rev. Richard Pococke, at that time rector of Colmer in Hampshire. By this lady, before he had any other preferment than the small living above-mentioned, he became the father of ten children yet neither did he suffer the rapid increase of his family, nor the consequent narrowness of his finances, to depress his spirits, or impede the progress of his studies. On the contrary, he appears to have applied to his literary pursuits with a closer and more persevering industry; and by those means, in the course of what cannot be considered as a long life, he was enabled to complete in this country retirement, besides several other single volumes, a most learned and laborious work, closely printed in ten volumes in octavo, under the title of “Origines Ecclesiastics, or the Antiquities of the Christian Church,” the first volume of which he published in 1708. He committed the last volume to the press in 1722. Of the various difficulties with which our author had to contend in the prosecution of his labours, he frequently speaks in such pointed terms as cannot but excite both our sympathy and regret. He tells us that he had to struggle with an infirm and sickly constitution, and constantly laboured under the greatest disadvantages, for want of many necessary books, which he had no opportunity to see, and no ability to purchase. At the same time he does not omit to express his gratitude to Providence, which had so placed him, that he could have recourse to a very excellent library, that of the cathedral church of Winchester, left by bishop Morley though even that vyas deficient in many works to which he had occasion to refer; and yet when we turn to ^he Index auct^ruai at the end of his work, we shull perhaps be astonished at the vast number of books which he appears to have consulted. But to such straits was he driven for want of books, that he frequently procured imperfect copies at a cheap rate, and then employed a part of that time, of which so small a portion was allotted him, and which therefore could so ill be spared, in the tedious task of transcribing the deficient pages instances of which are slill in being, and serve as memorials of his indefatigable industry on all occasions.

In 1712, sir Jonathan Trelawny, at that time bishop of Winchester, was pleased to collate our learned divine to the rectory of Havant, near Portsmouth, as a reward for his diligence which preferment, together with the sums he was daily receiving from the sale of his works, seemed i n some measure to have removed the narrowness of his circumstances, and to promise a comfortable maintenance for his numerous family; but this pleasing prospect shortly disappeared he lost almost or quite the whole of his hardly earned gains in 1720, by the bursting of the wellknown South Sea bubble. Yet such was the tranquillity of his disposition, that he continued his studies without intermission almost to the very end of his life for though but a few months elapsed between the publication of the last volume of Origines and his death, yet that short time was employed in preparing materials for other laborious works, and in making preparations for a new edition of Origiaes. With this view he inserted many manuscript observations, in a set of the Antiquities which he preserved for his own use, and which are now in the possession of the furnisher of this article. But from this and all other employments he was prevented by death. His constitution, which was by nature extremely weak and delicate, could not be otherwise than much impaired by so unremitted a course of laborious studies, in a life wholly sedentary and recluse, which brought on at an early period all the symptoms and infirmities of a very advanced age. The approach of his dissolution being clearly visible both to himself and friends, it was settled between the then bishop of Winchester, Dr. Trimnell, and himself, that he should resign Havant to enable his lordship to appoint some friend of the family to hold it, till his eldest son, then about years of age, could be collated to it. As this however was not carried into execution, it is probable that his death came on more hastily than had been expected, and prevented Dr. Trimnell from giving him what he fully intended, the first vacant prebend in Winchester.

After a life thus spent in laborious pursuits, Mr. Bingham died on the 17th of August, 1723, it may truly be said of old age, though he was then only in his 55th year. His body was buried in the church-yard of Headbourue Worthy but, as he frequently expressed a dislike to monuments and pompous inscriptions, nothing of that sort was erected to his memory.

At the time of his decease only six of his ten children, two sons and four daughters, were living these, with their widowed mother, were left in very contracted circumstances. Mrs. Bingham was therefore induced to sell the copy-right of her late husband’s writings to the booksellers, who immediately republished the whole of his works in two volumes in folio, without making any alterations whatsoever and though the eldest son undertook the office of correcting the press, he did not insert any of the manuscript additions which his father had prepared as he was then so very young, that he probably had not had an opportunity of examining his father’s books and papers sufficiently to discover that any such preparations for a new edition had been made. Of the four daughters, one married a gentleman of Hampshire the other three died single. The second son will be mentioned in the succeeding article. The widow died in a very advanced age, in bishop Warner’s college for clergymen’s widows, at Bromley, in Kent, in 1755.

Of such importance have the works of this eminent writer been esteemed in foreign countries, that they have all been correctly translated into Latin by Grichow, a divine of Halle in Germany, 11 vols. 4to, 1724 38, and were reprinted in 1751—61. But he did not live to receive this flattering mark of approbation, for he died in 1723. Here it may not be amiss to observe how frequently it occurs that the merits of an eminent ancestor derive honour and emolument on their posterity. It is presumed that the character of the person whose life we have been writing, was the means of procuring the living of Havant for his eldest son, and the late learned and excellent bishop of London, Dr. Lowth, expressly assigns that reason for bestowing a comfortable living on his grandson. “I venerate (says he in a letter which conveyed the presentation) the memory of your excellent grandfather, my father’s particular and most intimate friend. He was not rewarded as he ought to have been I therefore give you this living as a small recompense for his great and inestimable merits.” We shall conclude this article by giving the general character of this divine As a writer his learning was extensive and acute his style zealous and persuasive, and his application uncommonly persevering. His temper, on all common and indifferent occasions, was mild and benevolent and to these he united great zeal in the cause in which he was engaged. Though his passions were so wholly subject to the guidance of religion and virtue, that no worldly losses were sufficient to discompose him, yet whenever he believed the important interests of the church to be in danger, he was always eager to step forth in its defence.

, the second son of the eminent writer before mentioned, was the last of his numerous family, and consequently extremely young at the time of his father’s death. Though he died in very early life, yet during the short period of his existence, he pursued his studies with such unremitting 'perseverance, and gave such early proofs of genius and sound understanding, and so strongly evinced his determination to tread in the footsteps of his father, as fully entitle him to a few lines from the pen of the biographer. This young man received his education on the foundation at the Charter-house, from whence he was at the usual age removed to Corpus college in Oxford. In the university he was a most exemplary and persevering student, and was preparing to give public proofs of his diligence, having actually printed every part, except the title-pruge and preface, of a very valuable edition of the Theban story, which was completed and published after his death by a gentleman, into whose hands his papers had fallen, as a security for a sum of money which had been borrowed to facilitate the publication. Whilst he was thus usefully employed, and just as he was on the point of being ordained, with every prospect of promotion from the patronage of archbishop Potter, he was suddenly brought to his grave, at the immature age of 22, by an illness wholly occasioned by -too sedentary a life, and too close an application to his studies. He lies buried in the cloisters of Corpus college, without either monument, inscription, or stone erected to his memory, though it might most truly be said of him, that he fell a martyr to application, industry, and learning.

, the sixth son of Richard Bingham, esq. and Philadelphia, daughter and heir of John Potinger, esq. by Philadelphia, daughter of sir John Erule, bart. chancellor of the exchequer, was born, in 1715, at Melcomb Bingham, in the county of Dorset, where that antient and respected family have resided for many centuries.

Patronized by Mr. Potinger, his grandfather, who very early discovered his promising talents and amiable disposition, he was at 12 years of age sent to the king’s college at Westminster and by his unremitting industry so improved his abilities, that he was elected, before he had reached his 17th year, student of Christ-church in Oxford. Being here valued on account of his literary attainments, and justly beloved for the urbanity of his manners, he was within four years from his matriculation, elected fellow of All Souls’ college, where he had an opportunity of cultivating a sincere and unalterable friendship with many gentlemen of the most distinguished reputation and it has been justly remarked to'-his honour and credit, that he never made an acquaintance by whom he was not highly respected, or formed an intimacy that was not permanent. The late excellent judge, sir William Blackstone, who was his friend and contemporary, and whom he not a little assisted in his “Stemmata Chicheliana,” well knew his worth, and kept up a correspondence with him, with a sincerity and fervour unaltered and undiminished, to the last hour of his life. In 1745-6, when party ran high, and the Pretender had made incursions into England, he served the office of proctor in the university, and conducted himself in those troublesome times with a proper spirit and resolution, as became an upright magistrate and a good man. Being a few years after, on the death of the rev. Christopher Pitt, the excellent translator of Virgil’s Æneid, presented by George Pitt, esq. (the late lord Rivers) to the rectory of Pimpern, Dorset, he married a lady to whom he had been some time engaged, by whom he had three children, a daughter and two sons but his wife, whom he doated on, with the tenderest affection, was, after the death of her youngest child, seized with an illness which terminated in a dropsy, and brought her to the grave in the 36th year of her age. She was buried, in 1756, in the chancel of the parish-church of Pimpern.

Being now a widower, he divided his time between theological studies and the education of his children; but having been presented by sir Gerard Napier to the living of More Critchil, he changed his residence from Pimpern to his new preferment, that he might by absence alleviate the severe stroke he had sustained, and might enjoy the acquaintance and friendship of his hospitable and worthy patron. His patron did not long survive, nor was he allotted to continue long in his new-chosen habitation for being seized with a violent ague and fever, from which he with the greatest difficulty recovered by the skill of his physician and strength of his constitution, he was obliged again to return to the rectory at Pimpern.

His two sons were now entered on the foundation at the college near Winchester, and had both of them made such rapid progress in their education, that they gave him every possible satisfaction. The eldest was the senior scholar at 16 years of age, and was certain of succeeding at the next election to that goal of Wiccamical hope, a fellowship of New college, in Oxford; when, a few days prior to that sera, as he was bathing in the navigable river Itchin, in a place well known to every Winchester boy by the name of The Pot, he was seized with a cramp within two yards of the shore, in the presence of more than 100 expert swimmers, and his unfortunate younger brother, who was close to him at the moment, and sunk beneath the water never to appear again. His lifeless body was not found till half an hour had expired. All arts to re-animate him were tried in vain; and he was buried a few days after in the cloisters of Winchester college, amidst the tears of his afflicted companions.

Mr. Bingham was inconsolable at this event; and his most intimate friends observed, that it cast a gloom over his countenance during the remainder of his long life but so silent is real sorrow, that he was never heard to mention his loss, nor was any account of it found among his papers, except an insertion in a Family Bible.

When the author of the Antiquities of the County of Dorset first offered his labours to the public, Mr. Bingham, who was not ignorant how much care and study had been bestowed in collecting those valuable materials, gave him every assistance in his power. By examining with indefatigable attention the numerous Roman tumuli and causeways that abound in that country, and by a knowledge of many circumstances that had escaped the observation of others, he enriched the collection with a treasure of many curious accounts, and made no small addition to the numerous list of subscribers, by soliciting his friends in behalf of Mr. Hutchins. The author expressed his acknowledgments in many private letters; but Mr. Bingham would never permit him to make known from what hand he received his communications, nor is the name of G. B. once mentioned in the work, except after the marvellous account of Sadler’s prophecy, attested by Cuthbert Bound at the end of the first volume it is added, “this narrative was communicated by the rev. G. Bingham, of Pimpern.” The original paper, signed by C. Bound, which has been long preserved in the family, is now in the possession of the rev. P. Bingham, as are also many observations, corrections, tt additamenta, never yet published.

Mr. Bingham died at Pimpern, beloved and regretted, Oct. 11, 1800, aged eighty-five, and was buried in the chancel of Pimpern church, wh'ere on a marble monument is engraved a classical and characteristic epitaph by his son, the rev. Peregrine Bingham, rector of Radclive, Bucks. As an author, Mr. Bingham acquired a considerable share of fame in his life-time by his “Vindication of the Doctrine and Liturgy of the Church of England.” occasioned by Mr. Theophilus Lindsey’s Apology for quitting his living, 1774, 8vo and his essay on the “Millenium,” entitled “T %iMa eln” “Dissertationes Apocalypticae” “Paul at Athens,” an essay a “Commentary on Solomon’s Song,” and some sermons, all which were published by his son above-mentioned in 2 vols. 1804, 8vo, with Memoirs of the author, in which it is said, that Mr. Bingham united the profoundest erudition with the most consummate piety, and had a perfect knowledge of the Hebrew tongue, an intimate acquaintance with the earliest fathers of the church, and an accurate skill in classic literature, and in history ancient and modern, sacred and profane. His opinions, however, on some points, differed much from those of his brethren particularly in contending that Mahomet and his religion are the sole objects of the prophecies of Daniel and St. John, which so many able divines have uniformly applied to papal Home. Upon this account, when the Warburtonian lecture was offered him in 1781, he declined preaching it, because the object of the founder was to prove the truth of Christianity from the completion of the prophecies which relate to the Christian church, especially the apostacy of papal Rome. Mr. Bingham conceived that the church of Rome is a part, though a corrupt part, of the Christian church, and which, agreeing with us in fundamentals, may be still capable of reformation. In his sentiments on the Millenium, he restricts that state to the enjoyment of uninterrupted peace by the church for a determined time, and therefore neither admits that the Millenium is already past, which Hammond and a few more thought, nor that it will be, what the majority of writers have described, the literal reigning of the saints on earth, with Christ, for a thousand years.

, in Latin Binius, was born at Randelraidt, in the country of Juliers, and became canon and professor of divinity at Cologn, where he died in 1641. He is known, and not much to his credit, as the editor of a “Collection of the Councils,” Cologne, 1606, 4 vols. fol. 1618, 9 vols. and Paris, 1636, 10 vols. with notes from Baronius, Beilarmin, Suarez, &c. but he has taken so many liberties in capriciously altering these councils in, many parts, that it becomes necessary to caution the reader against the purchase of his work. Usher calls him “Contaminator Conciliorum.”

, a Scotch divine, was born in the shire of Air, 1627, and educated in the university of Glasgow, where he took his degrees, and in his nineteenth year was appointed regent and professor of moral philosophy, and was among the first in Scotland that began to reform philosophy from the barbarous terms and jargon of the school-men. As a preacher his talents were extremely popular, and after he had preached some time as a probationer, he was elected minister of Govan, near Glasgow. In his ministerial conduct and character few excelled him, and the sweetness of his temper was such, that all seemed to know his worth but himself. At last his incessant labours brought on a consumption, which put a period to his life at Govan, 1654, aged 29. He once had an interview with Cromwell when the latter was in Scotland, and had appointed a meeting of the presbyterians and independents to dispute before him. Mr. Binning was present on this occasion, and managed the cause of presbyterianism with so much skill as to puzzle Cromwell’s independent ministers. After the dispute, Oliver asked the name of that “learned and bold young man,” and being told his name was Hugh Binning, he said, with a wretched play on words, “He hath bound well indeed, but,” clapping his hand on his sword, “this will loose all again.” His tracts, sermons, and commentaries on the epistle to the Romans, were published separately but they have been since collected into one volume, 4to, and printed at Edinburgh, 1735.

, a Swedish traveller of considerable note, was born in the province of Sudermania, in 1731. After completing his studies at Upsal, he was engaged as tutor in the family of baron de Rndbeck, with whose son he travelled in England, France, Italy, Germany, &c. During his residence at Paris, he applied himself eagerly to the study of the oriental languages, for which he had always had a strong predilection. On his return, Gustavus III. employed him on a voyage to Greece, Syria, and Kgypt, and at the same time appointed him titular professor of the university of Lunden. He departed accordingly in 1776 for Constantinople, where he remained some time to acquire the Turkish language and was afterwards pursuing his journey, when he was seized with the plague, and died at Salonichi, or Salonica, July 12, '1779. His letters, containing an account of his travels, were published in Swedish at Stockholm, 1778, 3 vols. 8vo. They contain many curious particulars respecting medals, manuscripts, scarce books, and some interesting anecdotes of Voltaire, whom he visited, yet he is accused of inaccuracy in many points but it ought to be added, that these letters were not intended for publication.

, a Greek philosopher, who flourished 300 B.C. was born at Borysthenes, a Greek town on the borders of the river of that name, now the Dneiper. Of his family, he is said to have given the following account to king Antigonus, who had heard something of his mean birth, and thinking to embarrass him, demanded his name, his country, his origin, &c. Bion, without being in the least disconcerted, answered, “My father was a freed-man, whose employment was to sell salt-fish. He had been a Scythian, born on the banks of the Borysthenes. He got acquainted with my mother in a place of bad fame, and there the couple celebrated their hopeful marriage. My father afterwards committed some crime, with the precise nature of which I am unacquainted; and for this, he, his wife, and his children, were exposed to sale. I was then a sprightly boy. An orator purchased me and on his death, bequeathed to me all his effects. I instantly tore his will, threw it into the fire, and went to Athens, where I applied to the study of philosophy.” In this city he first attached himself to Crates, and became a cynic, and then embraced the opinions of Theodoras, the atheist, and Theophrastus, and at last became a philosopher in his own way, without belonging to any sect. The name of philosopher, however, seems ill applied to him. He uttered, indeed, some wise and moral sayings, but his general conduct was that of extreme profligacy. He died at Chalcis, and during his last illness, is said to have repented of his libertinism, for which he endeavoured to atone by superstitious observances. He wrote copiously on the subject of morals, and Stobeus has preserved a few fragments.

, was born in Liesena, an island in Dalmatia, in the Gulf of Venice, in 1572, and was introduced by the celebrated sir Henry Wotton, the ambassador there, to the notice of king James I. He was by that prince sent with a secret commission to the duke of Savoy, and was afterwards made a gentleman of the bedchamber, and received the honour of knigfithodct. His elegant “History of the Civil Wars betwixt the houses of York and Lancaster,” which was written in Italian, and translated into English by Henry Carey, earl of Monmouth, gained him great reputation. It should be observed that, like other foreign writers of our English story, he has strangely disfigured the proper names. His history was first printed at Venice, 1637, 3 vols. 4to, and at Bologna in 1647. The English translation appeared in 1641. The subsequent troubles in England prevented him from continuing it as he intended. He also wrote some Italian romances. He married a sister of sir Theodore Mayerne, and went from England to the canton of Berne, where he died in 1644.

, an Italian author of great authority in the science of which he may be said to have been professor, that which the Italians call Scienza cavalleresca, which embraces all questions relative to nobility, the profession of arms, the ancient customs of chivalry, and the laws of honour. He was born in 1562, of a noble Milanese family, and lived and wrote as late as the year 1637, but beyond that his history cannot be traced. Being the eldest of six brothers, he assumed, in his writings, the title of signor Metono and Siciano, two fiefs belonging to his family in the territory of Pavia. From Crescenzi, a contemporary, and author of a “treatise on the nobility of Italy,” we learn that Birago was arbitrator of all chivalrous disputes in Lombardy and that in all parts of Italy he was consulted as an oracle, and his opinions were decisive, being considered as a gentleman who united honourable spirit with high blood. He wrote several works on the subject, enumerated by Ginguene“, the principal of which were collected and published in one vol. 4to, under the title” Opere cavalleresche distinte in quattro libri, cioè in discorsi; consigli, libro I e II e decisioni," Bologna, 1686.

, an engraver on precious stones, was born at Milan, but exercised his art principally in Spain about the middle of the sixteenth century. He was the first who discovered a method of engraving on the diamond, which before was thought impenetrable by the graver. The first work he executed of this kind was a portrait of don Carlos the unfortunate son of Philip II. He also engraved, on diamond, the arms of Spain as a seal for that prince.

, a late valuable historical and biographical writer, was born in the parish of St. John’s Clerkenwell, on the 23d of November, 1705. His parents were both of them quakers, and his father, Joseph Birch, was a coffee-mill maker by trade. Mr. Joseph Birch endeavoured to bring up his son Thomas to his own business; but so ardent was the youth’s passion for reading, that he solicited his father to be indulged in his inclination, promising, in that case, to provide for himself. The first school he went to was at Hemel-hempsted in Hertfordshire, kept by John Owen, a rigid quaker, for whom Mr. Birch afterwards officiated, some little while, as an usher, but at present he made very little progress. The next school in which he received his education was taught by one Welby, who lived near Turnbull-street, Clerkenwell, a man who never had above eight or ten scholars at a time, whom he professed to instruct in the Latin tongue in the short space of a year and a half, and had great success with Mr. Birch, who afterwards lived with him as an usher; as he also afterwards was to Mr. Besse, the famous quaker in George’s court near St. John’s lane, who published the posthumous works of Claridge. It is farther said, that he went to Ireland with dean Smedley; but in what year he passed over to that country, and how long he resided with the dean, cannot now be ascertained. In his removals as an usher, he always took care to get into a still better school, and where he might have the greatest opportunity of studying the most valuable books, in which he was indefatigable, and stole many hours from sleep to increase his stock of knowledge. By this unremitting diligence, though he had not the happiness of an university education, he soon became qualified to take holy orders in the church of England; and as his early connections were of a different kind, his being ordained was a matter of no small surprise to his old acquaintance. In 1728, he married the daughter of one Mr. Cox, a clergyman to whom he was afterwards curate and in this union he was singularly happy but his felicity was of a short duration, Mrs. Birch dying in less than twelve months after their marriage. The disorder which carried her off was a consumption accelerated by childbearing, and almost in the very article of her death she wrote to her husband the following letter:

How much Mr. Birch was affected by this calamity appears from some verses written by him, August 3d, 1729, on his wife’s coffin, and inserted in Mrs. Rowe’s Miscellaneous Works. That Mrs. Birch was a woman of very amiable accomplishments, is not only evident from the verses now mentioned, but from two Latin epitaphs drawn up for her one by her husband, and the other by Dr. Dale, which last was translated into English by Mr. James Ralph. In both these epitaphs, she is celebrated as having- possessed an uncommon share of knowledge and taste, and many virtues. After this melancholy event, he was ordained deacon by the bishop of Salisbury, Dr. Hoadly, Jan. 17, 1730, and priest by the same prelate, Dec. 21, 1731, and at the same time was presented to the rectory of Siddington St. Mary, and the vicarage of Siddington St. Peter, in Gloucestershire. He had been recommended, by a common friend, to the friendship and favour of the late lord high chancellor Hardwicke, then attorney-general; to whom, and to the late earl of Hardwicke, he was indebted for all his preferments. The chancellor gave him the living of Ulting in the county of Essex, to which he was instituted by Dr. Gibson, bishop of London, on the 20th of May, and he took possession of it on the day following. In 1734, he was appointed one of the domestic chaplains to William earl of Kilmarnock, the unfortunate nobleman who was afterwards beheaded, on the 18th of August, 1746, for having been engaged in the rebellion of 1745. The earl of Kilmarnock was, we believe, in more early life, understood to be a whig; and under no other character could Mr. Birch have been introduced to his lordship’s notice. On the 20th of February, 1734-5, Mr. Birch had the honour of being chosen a member of the royal society, sir Hans Sloane taking a leading part in the election. The same honour was done him on the llth of December 1735, by the society of antiquaries of which he afterwards became director. A few weeks before he was chosen into the latter, the Marischal college of Aberdeen had conferred on him, by diploma, the degree of master of arts. In the Spring of 1743, by the favour of his noble patron before mentioned, he received a more substantial benefit; being presented by the crown to the rectory of Landewy Welfrey in the county of Pembroke. To this benefice, which was a sinecure, he was instituted on the 7th of May, by Dr. Edward Willes, bishop of St. David’s. On the 24th of February, 1743-4, he was presented to the rectories of St. Michael, Wood-street, and St. Mary, Staining, united. His next preferment was likewise in the city of London; being to the united rectories of St. Margaret Pattens, and St. Gabriel, Fenchurch-street, to which he was presented in the beginning of February, 1745-6. In January, 1752, he was elected one of the secretaries of the royal society, in the room of Dr. Cromwell Mortimer, deceased. In January 1753, the Marischal college of Aberdeen created him doctor of divinity and in that year, the same honour was conferred on him by that excellent prelate, Dr. Thomas Herring, archbishop of Canterbury. Our author was also a trustee of the British Museum. The last preferment given to Dr. Birch, was the rectory of Depden in Essex; for which he was indebted to the late earl of Hardwicke. Depden itself, indeed, was in the patronage of Mr. Chiswell, and in the possession of the rev. Dr. Cock. But the benefice in lord Hardwicke’s gift, being at too great a distance from town, to be legally held by Dr. Birch, he obtained an exchange with Dr. Cock. Dr. Birch was instituted to Depden by the late eminent bishop Sherlock, on the 25th of February 1761; and he continued possessed of this preferment, together with the united rectories of St. Margaret Pattens, and St. Gabriel, Fenchurch-street, till his decease. In 1765, he resigned his office of secretary to the royal society, and was succeeded by Dr. Maty. Dr. Birch’s health declining about this time, he was ordered to ride for the recovery of it but being a bad horseman, and going out, contrary to advice, on a frosty day, he was unfortunately thrown from his horse, on the road betwixt London and Hampstead, and killed on the spot. Dr. William Watson, of Lincoln’s Inn Fields, as soon as he heard of the accident of the fall, hastened to the relief of his friend, but in vain. It is not known whether Dr. Birch’s fall might not have been occasioned by an apoplexy. This melancholy event happened on the 9th of January 1766, in the 61st year of his age, to the great regret of the doctor’s numerous literary friends. Some days after his death, he was buried in the chancel of his own church of St. Margaret Pattens. Dr. Birch had, in his life-time, been very generous to his relations; and none that were near to him being living at his decease, he bequeathed his library of books and manuscripts, many of which are valuable, to the British Museum. He, likewise, left the remainder of his fortune, which amounted to not much more than five hundred pounds, to be laid out in government securities, for the purpose of applying the interest to increase the stipend of the three assistant librarians. Thus manifesting at his death, as he had done during his whole life, his respect for literature, and his desire to promote useful knowledge.

Having related the more personal and private circumstances of Dr. Birch’s history, we proceed to his various publications. The first great work he engaged in, was “The General Dictionary, historical and critical” wherein a new translation of that of the celebrated Mr. Bayle was included and which was interspersed with several thousand lives never before published. It was on the 29th of April, 1734, that Dr. Birch, in conjunction with the rev. Mr. John Peter Bernard, and Mr. John Lockman, agreed with the booksellers to carry on this important undertaking; and Mr. George Sale was employed to draw up the articles relating to oriental history. The whole design was completed in ten volumes, folio; the first of which appeared in 1734, and the last in 1741. It is universally allowed, that this work contains a very extensive and useful body of biographical knowledge. We are not told what were the particular articles written by Dr. Birch but there is no doubt of his having executed a great part of the dictionary neither is it, we suppose, any disparagement to his coadjutors, to say, that he was superior to them in abilities and reputation, with the exception of Mr. George Sale, who was, without controversy, eminently qualified for the department he had undertaken. The next great design in which Dr. Birch engaged, was the publication of “Thurloe’s State Papers.” This collection, which comprised seven volumes in folio, came out in 1742. It is dedicated to the late lord chancellor Hardwicke, and there is prefixed to it a life of Thurloe but whether it was written or not by our author, does not appear. The same life had been separately published not long before. The letters and papers in this collection throw the greatest light on the pe'riod to which they relate, and are accompanied with proper references, and a complete index to each volume, yet was a work by which the proprietors were great losers. In 1744, Dr. Birch published, in octavo, a “Life of the honourable Robert Boyle, esq” which hath since been prefixed to the quarto edition of the works of that philosopher. In the same year, our author began his assistance to Houbraken and Vertue, in their design of publishing, in folio, the “Heads of illustrious persons of Great Britain,” engraved by those two artists, but chiefly by Mr. Houbraken. To each head was annexed, by Dr, Birch, the life and character of the person represented. The first volume of this work, which came out in numbers, was completed in 1747, and the second in 1752. Our author’s concern in this undertaking did not hinder his prosecuting, at the same time, other historical disquisitions: for, in 1747, appeared, in octavo,“His inquiry into the share which king Charles the First had in the transactions of the earl of Glamorgan.” A second edition ef the Inquiry was published in 1756, and it was a work that excited no small degree of attention. In 1751, Dr. Birch was editor of the “Miscellaneous works of sir Walter Raleigh” to which was prefixed the life of that unfortunate and injured man. Previously to this, Dr. Birch published “An historical view of the negociations between the courts of England, France, and Brussels, from 1592 to 1617; extracted chiefly from the ms State Papers of sir Thomas Edmondes, knight, embassador in France, and at Brussels, and treasurer of the household to the kings James I. and Charles I. and of Anthony Bacon, esq. brother to the lord chancellor Bacon. To which is added, a relation of the state of France, with the character of Henry IV. and the principal persons of that court, drawn up by sir George Carew, upon his return from his embassy there in 1609, and addressed to king James I. never before printed.” This work, which consists of one volume, in octavo, appeared in 1749; and, in an introductory discourse to the honourable Philip Yorke, esq. (the late earl of Hardwicke), Dr. Birch makes some reflections on the utility of deducing history from its only true and unerring sources, the original letters and papers of those eminent men, who were the principal actors in the administration of affairs; after which he gives some account of the lives of sir Thomas Edmondes, sir George Carew, and Mr. Anthorry Bacon. The “Historical View” is undoubtedly a valuable performance, and hath brought to light a variety of particulars relative to the subjects and the period treated of, which before were either not at all, or not so fully known. In 17.51, was published by our author, an edition, in two volumes, 8vo, of the “Theological, moral, dramatic, and poetical works of Mrs. Catherine Cockburn” with an account of her life. In the next year came out his “Life of the most reverend Dr. John Tillotson, lord archbishop of Canterbury. Compiled chiefly from his original papers and letters.” A second edition, corrected and enlarged, appeared in 1753. This work, which was dedicated to archbishop Herring, is one of the most pleasing and popular of Dr. Birch’s performances; and he has done great justice to Dr. Tillotsou’s memory, character, and virtues. Our biographer hath likewise intermixed with his narrative of the good prelate’s transactions, short accounts of the persons occasionally mentioned; a method which he has pursued in some of his other publications. In 1753, he revised. the quarto edition, in two volumes, of Milton’s prose works, and added a new life of that great poet and writer. Dr. Birch gave to the world', in the following year, his “Memoirs of the reign of queen Elizabeth, from the year 1581, till her death. In which the secret intrigues of her court, and the conduct of her favourite, Robert earl of Essex, both at home and abroad, are particularly illustrated. From the original papers of his intimate friend, Anthony Bacon, esq. and other manuscripts never before published.” These memoirs, which are inscribed to the earl of Hardwicke, give a minute account of the letters and materials from which they are taken and the whole work undoubtedly forms a very valuable collection in which our author has shewn himself (as in his other writings) to be a faithfnl and accurate compiler and in which, besides a full display of the temper and actions of the earl of Essex, much light is thrown on the characters of the Cecils, Bacons, and many eminent persons of that period. The book is now becoming scarce, and, as it may not speedily be republished, is rising in its value. This is the case, likewise, with regard to the edition of sir Walter Raleigh’s miscellaneous works. Dr. Birch’s next publication was “The history of the Royal Society of London, for improving of natural knowledge, from its first rise. In which the most considerable of those papers, communicated to the society, which have hitherto not been published, are inserted in their proper order, as a supplement to the Philosophical Transactions.” The twq first volumes of this performance, which was dedicated to his late majesty, appeared in 1756, and the two other volumes in 1757. The history is carried on to the end of the year 1687 and if the work had been continued, and had been conducted with the same extent and minuteness, it would have been a very voluminous undertaking. But, though it may, perhaps, be justly blamed in this respect, it certainly contains many curious and entertaining anecdotes concerning the manner of the society’s proceedings at their first establishment. It is enriched, likewise, with a number of personal circumstances relative to the members, and with biographical accounts of such of the more considerable of them as died in the course of each year. In 1760, came out, in one volume, 8vo, our author’s “Life of Henry prince of Wales, eldest son of king James I. Compiled chiefly from his own papers, and other manuscripts, never before published.” It is dedicated to his present majesty, then prince of Wales. Some have objected to this work, that it abounds too much with trifling details, and that Dr. Birch has not given sufficient scope to such reflections and disquisitions as arose from his subject. It must, nevertheless, be acknowledged, that it affords a more exact and copious account than had hitherto appeared of a prince whose memory has always been remarkably popular; and that various facts, respecting several other eminent characters, are occasionally introduced. Another of his publications was, “Letters, speeches, charges, advices, &c. of Francis Bacon, lord viscount St. AJban, lord chancellor of England.” This collection, which is comprised in one volume, 8vo, and is dedicated to the honourable Charles Yorke, esq. appeared in 1763. It is taken from some papers which had been originally in the possession of Dr. Rawley, lord Bacon’s chaplain, whose executor, Mr. John Rawley, having put them into the hands of Dr. Tenison, they were, at length, deposited in the manuscript library at Lambeth. Dr. Birch, speaking of these papers of lord Bacon, says, that it can scarcely be imagined, but that the bringing to light, from obscurity and oblivion, the remains of so eminent a person, will be thought an acquisition not inferior to the discovery (if the ruins of Herculaneum should afford such a treasure) of a new set of the epistles of Cicero, whom our immortal countryman most remarkably resembled as an orator, a philosopher, a writer, a lawyer, and a statesman. Though this, perhaps, is speaking too highly of a collection, which contains many things in it seemingly not very material, it must, at the same time, be allowed, that nothing can be totally uninteresting which relates to so illustrious a man, or tends, in any degree, to give a farther insight into his character. To this catalogue we have still to add “Professor Greaves’s miscellaneous works,” 1737, in two vols. 8vo. Dr. Cud worth’s “Intellectual System,” (improved from the Latin edition of Mosheim) his discourse on the true notion of the Lord’s Supper, and two sermons, with an account of his life and writings, 1743, in two vols. 4to. An edition of Spenser’s “Fairy Queen,” 1751, in three Vols. 4to, with prints from designs by Kent. “Letters between col. Robert Hammond, governor of the Isle of Wight, and the committee of lords and commons at Derbyhouse, general Fairfax, lieut.-general Cromwell, commissary general Ireton, &c. relating to king Charles I. while he was confined in Carisbrooke-castle in that island. Now first published. To which is prefixed a letter from John Ashburnham, esq. to a friend, concerning his deportment towards the king, in his attendance on his majesty at Hampton-court, and in the Isle of Wight,” 1764, 8vo. Dr. Birch’s last essay, “The life of Dr. Ward,” which was finished but a week before his death, was published by Dr. Maty, in 1766.

Mr. Ayscough has extracted, from a small pocket-book belonging to Dr. Birch, the following memoranda of some pieces written by him, of which he was not before known to be the author. 1726, “A Latin translation of Hughes’s Ode to the Creator.” 1727, “Verses on the General history of Printing” published in the General history of Printing. Collections for Smedley’s View. 1728, “Abelard to Philotas.” 1732, Began the General History. 1739, “Account of Alga,” published in the Works of the Learned for July. “Account of Milton,” published in the Works of the Learned. 1741, Wrote the letter of Cleander to Smerdis, in the Athenian Letters. 1742, Wrote an account of Orr’s sermon, in the Works of the Learned. 1743, Wrote the preface to Boyle’s works. 1760, By a letter from Dr. Stonhouse, it appears that Dr. Birch was the author of the Life of the rev. Mr. James Hervey, which is prefixed to that gentleman’s writings. He was employed, likewise, in correcting a great number of publications, and among the rest Murden’s State Papers. At the time, of the doctor’s death, he had prepared for the press a collection of letters, to which he had given the title of “Historical Letters, written in the reigns of James I. and Charles I. containing a detail of the public transactions and events in Great Britain during that period with a variety of particulars not mentioned by our historians. Now first published from the originals in the British Museum, Paper-office, and private collections.” These are all the separate publications, or intended works, of Dr. Birch that have come to our knowledge, excepting a Sermon on the proof of the wisdom and goodness of God, from the frame and constitution of man, preached before the college of Physicians, in 1749, in consequence of lady Sadlier’s will to which we may add, that he revised new editions of Bacon’s, Boyle’s, and Tillotson’s works. The lives of Boyle and Tillotson, though printed by themselves, were drawn up partly with a view to their being prefixed to these great men’s writings. It would swell this article too much, were we to enter into a detail of our author’s communications to the royal society, and of the papers transmitted by him to that illustrious body. Whoever looks into his history of the early proceedings of the society, will have no doubt of the assiduity and diligence with which he discharged his peculiar duty as secretary. But there is nothing which sets Dr. Birch’s industry in a more striking light than the vast number of transcripts which he made with his own hands. Among these, not to mention many other instances, there are no less than sixteen volumes in quarto, of Anthony Bacon’s papers, transcribed from the Lambeth library and other collections; and eight more volumes of the same size, relative to history and literature. Our author’s correspondence, by letters, was, likewise, very large and extensive; of which numerous proofs occur in the British Museum. What enabled Dr. Birch to go through such a variety of undertakings, was his being a very early riser. By this method, he had executed the business of the morning before numbers of people had begun it and, indeed, it is the peculiar advantage of rising betimes, that it is not in the power of any interruptions, avocations, or engagements whatever, to deprive a man of the hours which have already been well employed, or to rob him of the consolation of reflecting, that he hath not spent the day in vain. With all this closeness of application, Dr. Birch was not a solitary recluse. He was of a cheerful and social temper, and entered much into conversation with the world. He was personally connected with most of the literary men of his time, and with some of them he maintained an intimate friendship, such as sir Hans Sloane, Dr. Mead, Dr. Salter, Mr. Jortin, and Dr. Maty Daniel Wray, esq. Dr. Morton, Dr. Ducarel, Dr. William Watson, &c. &c. With regard to the great, though perhaps he stood well with many of them, his chief connection was with the earls of Hardwicke, and with the rest of the branches of that noble and respectable family. No one was more ready than Dr. Birch to assist his fellow- creatures, or entered more ardently into useful and laudable undertakings. He was particularly active in the Society for promoting literature by the printing of books, to which we are indebted for the publication of Tanner’s Bibliotheca Britannico-Hibernica, and some few other valuable works. In short, Dr. Birch was entitled to that highest praise, of being a good man, as well as a man of knowledge and learning. His sentiments with respect to subjects of divinity resembled those of bishop Hoadly.

We have seen that it has been objected to Dr. Birch, that he was sometimes too minute in his publications, and that he. did not always exercise, with due severity, the power of selection. The charge must be confessed not to be totally groundless. But it may be alleged in our author’s favour, that a man who has a deep and extensive acquintance with a subject, often sees a connection and importance in some smaller circumstances, which may not immediately be discerned by others and, on that account, may have reasons for inserting them, that will escape the notice of superficial minds. The same circumstance is noticed in the following character of Dr. Birch by one of our predecessors in this Dictionary, Dr. Heathcote, who knew Dr. Birch well, and consorted with him, for the last thirteen years of his life. Dr. Heathcote “believes him to have been an honest, humane, and generous man warm and zealous in his attachments to persons and principle, but of universal benevolence, and ever ready to promote the happiness of all men. He was cheerful, lively, and spirited, in the highest degree; and, notwithstanding the labours and drudgery he went through in his historical pursuits, no man mixed more in company but he was a very early riser, and thus had done the business of a morning before others had begun it. He was not a man of learning, properly so called he understood the Latin and French languages, not critically, but very well of the Greek he knew very little. He was, however, a man of great general knowledge, and excelled particularly in modern history. As a collector and compiler, he was in the main judicious in the choice of his materials but was sometimes too minute in uninteresting details, and did not always exercise, with due severity, the power of selection. He had a favourite position, that we could not be possessed of too many facts and he never departed from, it, though it was often urged to him, that facts, which admit of no reasoning, and tend to no edification, which can only serve to encumber, and, as it were, smother useful intelligence, had better be consigned to oblivion, than recorded. And indeed, in this very way of biographical compilation, we have always been of opinion, that, if it were less fashionable to relate particulars of every man, which are common to almost all men, we should be equally knowing, and our libraries would be by far less crowded. In his manners, Dr. Birch was simple and unaffected; very communicative, and forward to assist in any useful undertaking; and of a spirit perfectly disinterested, and (as his friends used to tell him) too inattentive to his own emolument.”

, or Bryckinton, or Brickington, so called from Birchington, in the isle of Thanet, where he was born, was a Benedictine monk, belonging to the church of Canterbury, into which order he entered about the year 1382. He wrote a history of the archbishops of Canterbury to the year 1368, which forms the first article in the first volume of Wharton’s Anglia Sacra, who copied it from the ms. in the Lambeth library. Other historical Mss. in the same library are attributed to him, but remain unpublished. He is supposed to have died in 1407.

, an English divine of the seventeenth century, was born in 1S84, and in 1600 became a student in Queen’s college, Oxford, where he took his master’s degree, and obtained a fellowship. In 1607 he went into holy orders, and acquired much reputation for his preaching, and among the learned, for his acquaintance with the fathers and schoolmen. In 1616 he was admitted to the reading of the sentences, and the year following became vicar of the church of Gilling, and the chapel of Forcet, near Richmond, in Yorkshire, where he increased his popularity by his punctual discharge of the pastoral office, and by his exemplary life. During the usurpation he was not ejected from this living, and died Sept. 1656. His principal work, which was highly valued by Selden and other learned men, is entitled “The Protestant’s evidence, shewing that for 1500 years next after Christ, divers guides of God’s church have in sundry points of religion taught as the church of England now doth,” London, 1634, 4to, and in 1657, folio, much enlarged. Some histories ol the church, particularly that of Milner, seem to be written on this plan.

, an eminent musician and composer, was one of the children of the chapel in the reign of Edward VI. and, as asserted by Wood in the Ashmolean ms. was bred up under Tallis. It appears, that in 1575 Tallis and Bird were both gentlemen and also organists of the royal chapel but the time of their appointment to this latter office cannot now be ascertained with any exactness. The compositions of Bird are many and various those of his younger years were mostly for the service of the church. He composed a work entitled “Sacrarurn Cantionum, quinque vocum, printed in 1589 among which is that noble composition” Civitas sancti tui,“which for many years past has been sung in the church as an anthem, to the words” Bow thine ear, O Lord!“He was also the author of a work entitled” Gradualia, ac Cantiones sacrae, quinis, quaternis, trinisque vocibus conciunatae, lib. primus.“Of this there are two editions, the latter published in 1610. Although it appears by these works, that Bird was in the strictest sense a church musician, he occasionally gave to the world compositions of a secular kind and he seems to be the first among English musicians that ever made an essay in the composition of that elegant species of vocal harmony, the madrigal the” La Verginella“of Ariosto, which he set in that form for five voices, being the most ancient musical composition of the kind to be met with in the works of English authors. Of his compositions for private entertainment, there are extant,” Songs of sundry natures, some of gravitie, and others of myrth, fit for all companies and voyces, printed in 1589;' and two other collections of the same kind, the last of them printed in 1611. But the most permanent memorials of Bird’s excellences are his motets and anthems; to which may be added a fine service in the key of D with the minor third, the first composition in Dr. Boyce’s Cathedral Music, vol. III. and that well-known canon of his, “Non nobis, Dornine.” Besides his salaries and other emoluments of his profession, it is to be supposed that Bird derived some advantages frotn the patent granted by queen Elizabeth to Tallis and him, for the sole printing of music and music-paper Dr. Ward speaks of a book which he had seen with the letters T. E. for Thomas East, Est, or Este, who printed music under that patent. Tallis dying in 1585, the patent, by the terms of it, survived to bird, who, no doubt for a valuable consideration, permitted East to exercise the right of printing under the protection of it and he in the titlepage of most of his publications styles himself the “assignee of William Bird.” Bird died in 1623.

, an Italian mathematician, was born at Sienna about the end of the fifteenth century, and died about the middle of the sixteenth. After having served in the wars under the dukes of Parma and Ferrara, and the republic of Venice, he employed himself in studying the art of fusing and casting metal for cannon, and improving the quality of gunpowder. He was the first of his nation who wrote upon these subjects. The work in which he laid down his experience and practice, was entitled “Pirotecnia, nella quale si tratta non sole della diversita delle minere, ma anco di quanto si ricerca alia pratica di esse, e che s’appartienne all‘arte della fusione o getto de’ metalli,” Venice, 1540, 4to, often reprinted and translated.

, a priest of Rome, who in the year 634 obtained leave of pope Honorius to preach the gospel to the idolaters in Britain, at which the pope was so much pleased, that he caused him to be ordained bishop. This missionary landing in the kingdom of the West Saxons, with many others baptised king Cynegilsus, who began to reign in the year 6 11, and filled the throne thirty-one years. St. Birinus fixed his see at Dercis, now Dorchester, in Oxfordshire, in the windows of which beautiful church are still some remains of painting relative to the history of his mission. He built and consecrated many churches, and had great success in converting the natives, until his death, about the year 650. November 29 is his day in the calendar. He was first buried at Dorchester, but his remains were afterwards translated to Winchester.

, a political author in the seventeenth century, was the son of Richard Birkenhead, of Northwych, in the county of Cheshire, an honest saddler, who, if some authors may deserve credit, kept also a little ale-house. Our author was born about 1615, and having received some tincture of learning in the common grammar-schools, came to Oxford, and was entered in 1632, a servitor of Oriel college, under the tuition of the learned Dr. Humphrey Lloyd, afterwards bishop of Bangor. Dr. Lloyd recommended him to Laud, archbishop of Canterbury, as his amanuensis, and in that capacity he discovered such talents, that the archbishop, by his diploma, created him A. M. in 1639, and the year following, by letter commendatory from the same great prelate, he was chosen probationary fellow of All-souls college. This preferment brought him to reside constantly in Oxford, and on king Charles I. making that city his head-quarters during the civil war, our author was employed to write a kind of journal in support of the royal cause, by which he gained great reputation; and his majesty recommended him to be chosen reader in moral philosophy, which employment he enjoyed, though with very small profit, till 1648, when he was expelled by the parliament visitors. He retired afterwards to London, where adhering steadily to his principles, he acquired, among those of his own sentiments, the title of “The Loyal Poet,” and suffered, from such as had then the power in their hands, several imprisonments, which served only to sharpen his wit, without abating his courage. He published, while he thus lived in obscurity, and, as Wood says, by his wits, some very tart performances, which were then very highly relished, and are still admired by the curious. These were, like his former productions, levelled against the republican leaders, and were written with the same vindictive poignancy that was then fashionable. Upon the restoration of king Charles II. he was created April 6, 1661, on the king’s letters sent for that purpose, D. C. L. by the university of Oxford and in that quality was o'ne of the eminent civilians consulted by the convocation on the question “Whether bishops ought to be present in capital cases?” and with the rest, Keb. 2, 1661-2, gave it under his hand, they ought and might. He was, about the same time, elected a burgess, to serve in parliament for Wilton, in the county of Wilts, and continuing his services to his master, was by him promoted, on the first vacancy, to some office at court, which he quitted afterwards, and became master in the Faculty office. He was knighted November 14, 1662, and upon sir Richard Fanshaw’s going with a public character to the court of Madrid, sir John Birkenhead succeeded him as master of requests. He was also elected a member of the royal society, an honour at that time conferred on none who were not well known in the republic of letters, as men capable of promoting the truly noble designs of that learned body. He lived afterwards in credit and esteem with men of wit and learning, and received various favours from the court, in consideration of the past, and to instigate him to other services; which, however, drew upon him some very severe attacks from those who opposed the court. Anthony Wood has preserved some of their coarsest imputations, for what reason is not very obvious, as Wood is in general very partial to the loyalist writers. He died in Westminster, December 4, 1679, and was interred at St. Martin’s in the Fields, leaving to his executors, sir Richard Mason, and sir Muddiford Bamston, a large and curious collection of pamphlets on all subjects.

Sir John’s newspaper which he wrote at Oxford, was entitled “Mercurius Aulicus, communicating the intelligence and affairs of the court to the rest of the kingdom.” It was printed weekly in one sheet, and sometimes more, in 4to and was chiefly calculated to raise the reputation of the king’s friends and commanders, and ridicule those who sided with the parliament. They came out regularly from the beginning of 1642, to the latter end of 1645, and afterwards, occasionally. When Birkenhead was otherwise engaged, Dr. Peter Heylyn supplied his place, but was not thought so capable of that species of writing, as he did not excel in popular wit, which is necessary to render such kind of pieces acceptable to the public. The parliament thought fit to oppose this court -journal by another on their side of the question, under the title of “Mercurius Britannicus,” written by Marchmont Nedham, to whom the royalists gave the name of “foul-mouthed Nedham” who, finding himself somewhat unequal to the Oxford writer, thought fit to ascribe the “Mercurius Aulicus” to several persons, that his deficiency might do the less prejudice to his party. Jacob blunderingly calls the ^ Mercurius Aulicus,“a poem. Sir John’s other satirical works were 1.” The Assembly-man,“written in 1647, but printed, as Wood tells us, 1662-3. 2.” News from Pembroke and Montgomery or, Oxford Manchestered,“c. 1648. 3.” St. Paul’s church-yard libri theologici, politici, historic!, nundinis Paulinis (una cum templo) prostant venales, &c.“printed in three sheets, 1649, 4to. These sheets were published separately, as if they had been parts of one general catalogue. An account of them is in the Cens. Lit. vol. IV. 4.” The four-legged Quaker, a ballad, to the tune of the dog and elder’s maid,“5.” A new ballad of a famous German prince, without date," &c.

Our author has also several verses and translations extant, set to music by Mr. Henry Lawes as particularly Anacreon’s ode, called the Lute, translated from the Greek, and to be sung by a bass alone; and an Anniversary on the nuptials of John earl of Bridgwater, 22d July, 1652. He wrote, likewise, a poem on his staying in London after the Act of Banishment for cavaliers and another called the Jolt, made upon Cromwell the protector’s being thrown out of his coach-box in Hyde-Park. He published Mr. Robert Waring’s “Effigies Amoris, sive quid sit Amor efflagitanti responsum,” London, 1649, 12mo, from the original, at the author’s desire, who was willing to be concealed. The third edition was published after the restoration, by William Griffith, of Oxford, with an epistle before it, written by him to sir John Birkenhead wherein he gives the character of that gentleman, as well as of the author. This was the same piece afterwards translated into English by the famous Mr, Norris of Bemerton, and published under the title of “The Picture of Love unveiled.” We meet also with several copies of verses written by this gentleman, and prefixed to the works of the most eminent wits and greatest poets of his time but satire was his principal excellence, and in genuine powers of ridicule he had no superior, at a time when those powers were called forth, and well rewarded by both parties.

, a modern Latin poet, was born in 1617, near St. Paul’s cathedral, in London, and after having been educated under the famous Farnaby, was entered a commoner at Trinity college, Oxford, in 1633; admitted Scholar there, May 28, 1635, and soon after was seduced to become a member of the college of Jesuits, at St. Omer’s. He soon, however, returned to the church of England, and by the patronage of archbishop Laud, was elected fellow of All Souls, in 1638, being then bachelor of arts, and esteemed a good philologist. He proceeded in that faculty, was made senior of the act celebrated in 1641, and entered on the law faculty. He kept his fellowship during the usurpation, but resigned it after the restoration, when he became registrar of the diocese of Norwich. This too he resigned in 1684, and resided first in the Middle Temple, and then in other places, in a retired condition for many years. The time of his death is not mentioned but in the title of Trapp’s “Lectures on Poetry,” Henry Birkhead, LL. D. some time fellow of All Souls college, is styled “Founder of the poetical lectures,” the date of which foundation is 1707. He wrote 1. “Poemata in Elegiaca, lambica, Polymetra, &c. membranatim quadripartite,” 1656, 8vo. 2. “Otium Literarium, sive miscellanea quaedam Poemata,” 16=6, 8vo. He also published in 4to, with a preface, some of the philological works of his intimate friend Henry Jacob, who had the honour of teaching Selden the Hebrew language; and he wrote several Latin elegies on the loyalists who Suffered in the cause of Charles I. which are scattered in various printed books, and many of them subscribed H. G.

, a celebrated Italian scholar of the last century, was born at Florence, Aug. 14, 1674. After finishing his studies, he taught a school, which produced Bottari, the prelate, and some other eminent men. The grand duke Cosmo III. having given him some benefices, he took priest’s orders, and the degree of doctor in the university of Florence, and spent several years in preaching, particularly in the cathedral church of St. Laurence. The chapter, in 1713, appointed him keeper of the Mediceo-Laurentian library, and to this office he was re-elected in 1725, 1729, and 1739, but he could not, with all his endeavours, prevail on the chapter to grant it him for life. While here, however, he began a new course of studies, learned Greek, Hebrew, and other oriental languages, and applied himself particularly to the Tuscan here also he found a very useful patron in Nicolas Panciatichi, a very opulent Florentine nobleman, who received him into his house, where he remained eleven years, and made him his children’s tutor, his librarian, secretary, archivist, &c. and amply rewarded him for his services in all thi’se departments. He was also appointed apostolic prothonotary, synodal examiner at Florence and Fiesola, and reviser of cases of conscience in these dioceses. At length, in 174-1, the grand duke of his own accord made him royal librarian of the Laurentian library, and in 1745, gave him a canonry of St. Laurence. In his place as librarian, he was of essential service to men of letters, and was engaged in many literary undertakings which were interrupted by his death, May 4, 1756. He left a very capital collection of rare editions and manuscripts, which the grand duke purchased and divided between the Laurentian and Magliabechian libraries. Biscioni during his life-time was a man of great reputation, and many writers have spoken highly in his praise. He published very little that could be called original, his writings consisting principally of the notes, commentaries, prefaces, letters, and dissertations, with which he enriched the works of others such as the preface and notes to his edition of the “Prose di Dante Alighieri e di Gio. Boccaccio,” Florence, 1713 1723, 4to his notes on “Menzini’s Satires” his preface and notes on the “Riposo” of Raphael Borghini, Florence, 1730, 4to, &c. &c. The only work he published not of this description, was a vindication of the first edition of the “Canti Carnascialeschi,” against a reprint of that work by the abbé Bracci, entitled “Parere sopra la seconda edizione de' Canti Carnascialeschi e in difesa della prima edizione,” &c. Florence, 1750, 8vo. He had begun the catalogue of the Mediceo- Laurentian library, of which the first volume, containing the oriental manuscripts, was magnificently printed at Florence, 1752, folio, and the rest continued by the canon Giulanelli, many years after, who added the Greek Mss. Biscioni left many notes, critical remarks, &c. on books, a history of the Panciatichi family, and of his own family, and some satires on those who had so long prevented him from being perpetual keeper of the Laurentian library, an injury he seems never to have forgotten.

, an English divine, probably the son or grandson of the rev. John Biscoe of New Inn hall, Oxford, a nonconformist, was himself educated at a dissenting academy kept by Dr. Benion at Shrewsbury, and was ordained a dissenting minister, Dec. 19, 1716. In 1726, he conformed and received deacon’s and priest’s orders in the church of England, and in 1727 was presented to the living of St. Martin Outwich, in the city of London, which he retained until his death, July 1748. He held also a prebend of St. Paul’s, and was one of his majesty’s chaplains in ordinary. He is now chiefly known for a learned and elaborate work, entitled “The History of the Acts of the Holy Apostles confirmed from other authors and considered as full evidence of the truth of Christianity, with a prefatory discourse upon the nature of that evidence” being the substance of his sermons preached at Boyle’s lecture, in 1736, 1737, 1738, and published in 2 vols. 1742, 8vo. Dr. Doddridge frequently refers to it, as a work of great utility, and as shewing “in the most convincing manner, how incontestably the Acts of the Apostles demonstrates the truth of Christianity.”

, late head-master of Merchant Taylors’ school, and a poet of considerable merit, was descended from a respectable family, originally of Worcestershire, and was born in St. John’s street, London, his father’s residence, Sept. 21, O. S. 1731. He was tender and delicate in his constitution, yet gave early indications of uncommon capacity and application, as appears from his having been called, when only nine years old, to construe the Greek Testament for a lad of fourteen, the son of an opulent neighbour. With this promising stock of knowledge, he was sent to Merchant Taylors’ school, June 1743, when between eleven and twelve years of age, and soon evinced a superiority over his fellows which attracted the notice and approbation of his masters. He read with avidity, and composed with success. His first essays, however imperfect, shewed great natural abilities, and an original vein of wit. History and poetry first divided his attention, but the last predominated. He not only acquired that knowledge of the Latin and Greek classics, which is usually obtained in a public seminary, but also became intimately acquainted with the best authors in our own language and some of his writings prove that he had perused Milton, Dryden, Pope, and Swift, at an early age, with much discrimination and critical judgment. In June 1750, he was elected to St. John’s college, Oxford, and admitted a scholar of that society, on the 25th of the same month. During his residence here, he not only corrected his taste by reading with judgment, but also improved his powers by habitual practice in composition. Besides several poetical pieces, with which he supplied his friends, he wrote a great number of college exercis.es, hymns, paraphrases of scripture, translations from the ancients, and imitations of the moderns.

In June 1753, he was admitted fellow of St. John’s, and in April 1754, he took the degree of B. A. and about the same time was ordained to holy orders. He was then settled in the curacy of Headley in Surrey, whither he had removed on account of a declining state of health, but change of air soon restored him, and he continued to dividehis time between Headley and the university, till 1758, when he took the degree of M. A. He then quitted Headley, and came to reside entirely in London, on being elected under-master of Merchant Taylors’ school, July 26. He was appointed also curate of St. Mary Abchurch, and some time afterwards lecturer of St. Christopher-leStocks, a church since taken down for the enlargement of the Bank. In 1762, he published “An Ode to the earl of Lincoln on the duke of Newcastle’s Retirement,” without his name. In 1763 and 1764, he wrote several essays and poems, printed in the Public Ledger, and soon after a volume of Latin poems, partly translated, and partly original, under the title of “Feriae poeticse.” This was published by subscription, beyond which the sale was not considerable. He also appears to have tried his talents for dramatic composition, but not meeting with sufficient encouragement, he very wisely relinquished a pursuit that could have added little dignity to the character of a clergyman and a public teacher. From this period he devoted his talents to the amusement of a few friends, and the laborious duties of his profession, which he continued to discharge with the utmost fidelity, during the prime of his life.

In January 1783, he was elected head-master of Merchant Taylors, the duties of which important station entirely occupied his attention, and in 1789, the company of Merchant Taylors presented him to the living of St. Martin Outwich, as a reward for his long and faithful services. Dr. Warren, bishop of Bangor, a few years before had obtained for him, from the earl of Aylesford, the rectory of Ditton in Kent. But he did not long enjoy these preferments bodily infirmities grew fast upon him, and repeated fits of the gout undermined his constitution. In the beginning of 1795, he was alarmed by an oppression on his breath, which proved to be occasioned by water on the chest, and terminated in his death, Nov. 17, 1795. He left a widow, whose virtues he has affectionately commemorated in many of his poems, and one daughter. The year following his death, his “Poetical Works” were published by subscription, in 2 vols. 4to, with Memoirs of the Life of the Author, by the rev. Thomas Clare, M. A. now vicar of St. Bride’s, Fleet-street, from which the present sketch is taken and in 1798, the same editor published a volume of Mr. Bishop’s “Sermons, chiefly upon practical subjects.” The poems entitle Mr. Bishop to a very distinguished rank among minor poets, and among those who write with ease and elegance on familiar subjects; but we doubt whether his talents could have reached the higher species of the art. He is sometimes nervous, sometimes pathetic, but never sublime yet his vein of humour was well calculated for the familiar verses, epigrams, &c. which are so plentiful in these volumes. His style is always pure, and his imagination uncommonly fertile in those lesser poems which require a variety of the grave, gay, the witty and the instructive.

, vicar apostolical in England, and the first popish bishop that was sent thither after the reformation, was born in 1553, at Brayles in Warwickshire. He studied in the university of Oxford; Wood thinks, either in Gloucester-hall (now Worcester college), or in Lincoln college, the heads of both which were secret favourers of popery from Oxford he went to Rheims and Rome, and having been sent back to England, as a missionary, he was arrested at Dover, and confined in prison in London until the end of the year 1584. Being then released, he went to Paris, took his degree of licentiate, and came again to England in 1591. In two years he returned to Paris, completed his degree of doctor, and soon after his arrival in England, a dispute arising among the popish clergy here, he was sent to Rome with another missionary to appeal to the pope. In 1612 we find him again in England, and in confinement, on account of the oath of allegiance, to which, however, he was not so averse as many of his brethren. He had, in fact, written against the bull of pope Pius V. to prove that the catholics were bound to be faithful to their sovereigns, and in 1602 he had signed a declaration of the same principle, without any equivocacation or mental reservation, which gave great offence to the Jesuits. Out of respect, however, to the authority of the pope, who had proscribed that oath, he refused to take it, and was committed to prison. On his release he went to Paris, and wrote some tracts against those eminent protestant divines, Perkins and Abbot. Since the death of Watson, bishop of Lincoln, the last of the popish bishops who outlived the reformation, it had often been intended to re-establish the episcopal government in England; and the marriage of the prince Charles, afterwards Charles I. with the Infanta of Spain, seemed to offer a fair opportunity for carrying this scheme into execution, the hopes of the catholics being considerably raised by that match. Accordingly, Dr. Bishop was consecrated at Paris, in 1623, by the title of bishop of Chalcedon, and being sent to England, began his career by forming a chapter, appointing grand vicars, archdeacons, and rural deans, &c. but did not enjoy his promotion long, as he died April 16, 1624. His party speak liberally of his zeal, virtues, and learning, and he undoubtedly was the more useful to their cause in England, as he contrived to exercise his functions without giving much offence to government. Dodd and Wood have given a list of his controversial writings, which are now in little request, but it must not be forgot that he was the publisher of Pits’ s very useful work, “De illustribus Anglic Scriptoribus,” 1623, to which he wrote a verylearned preface.

, professor of canon law in the university of Bononia in Italy, in the sixteenth century, was descended from the earls of Fife in Scotland, and born in that county in the reign of James V. He was educated at St. Andrew’s, from whence he removed to Paris, and, having spent some time in that university, proceeded to Bononia, where he commenced doctor of laws, and was afterwards appointed professor of canon law. He continued in that office several years with great reputation, and died in 156S. He is said to have been not only a learned civilian, but an excellent poet, orator, and philosopher. He wrote “P. Bissarti opera omnia viz. poemata, orationes, lectiones feriales, &c.” Venice, 1565, 4to.

, an English divine, was educated at Corpus Christi college, Oxford, where he proceeded M.A. in 1698, B. D. in 1708, and D. D. in 1712. In 1715 he was chosen preacher at the Rolls, and in 1716, on the deprivation of John Harvey, A. M. a nonjuror, he was presented to the chancellorship of Hereford, by his brother Dr. Philip Bisse, bishop of that diocese. He was also a prebendary of Hereford, and rector of Crudley and Weston. He died April 22, 1731. He was a frequent and eloquent preacher, and published several of his occasional sermons. Those of most permanent reputation are, 1. “The Beauty of Holiness in the Common Prayer, as set forth in four Sermons preached at the Rolls chapel,” 1716, and often reprinted. 2. “Decency and order in public worship, three Sermons,” 1723. 3. “A course of Sermons on the Lord’s Prayer,” 1740, 8vo. Some “Latin Poems” were published by him in 1716, which we have not seen.

, an ingenious physician, was born at Glenalbert, near Dunkeld in Perthshire, Scotland, in 1717. After a course of medical studies at Edinburgh, he was appointed in 1740, second surgeon to the military hospital in Jamaica, and spent several years in the West India islands, and in admiral Yemen’s fleet, where he acquired a knowledge of the diseases of the torrid zone. Having in 1745, contracted a bad state of health at New Greenwich in Jamaica, he was under the necessity of resigning his place of second surgeon to the hospital, and returning to England. In May 1746, he purchased an ensigncy in the forty-second regiment, commanded by lord John Murray; and by this transition, his attention being turned from medical pursuits to military affairs, fortification became his favourite study. After a fruitless descent on the coast of Brittany in France in September 1746, and passing a winter at Limerick in Ireland, they were, in the beginning of the next campaign, brought into action at Sandberg, near Hulst in Dutch Flanders, where one Dutch regiment and two English suffered very much. Here, having drawn a sketch of the enemy’s approaches, with the environs, and some time after, a pretty correct one of Bergen-op-Zoom, with the permanent lines, the environs, and the enemy’s first parallel, which were presented by lord John Murray to his royal highness the late duke of Cumberland, his highness ordered Mr. Bisset to attend the siege of that fortress, and give due attention daily to the progress of the attack, and to the defence, in order to take accurate journals of them. These journals, illustrated with plans, were delivered daily to lord John Murray, who forwarded them to the duke, by whose application to the duke of Montague, then master of the ordnance, Mr. Bisset received a warrant as engineer extraordinary in the brigade of engineers which was established to serve in the Low Countries during the war and he was also promoted to a lieutenancy in the army. The brigade of engineers being re-formed at the end of the war, and he being at the same time put upon the half-pay list as lieutenant, he continued to employ great part of his time in the study of fortification and in 1751, after visiting France, published his work “On the Theory and Construction of Fortifications,” 8vo, and some time after, being unemployed, he resumed the medical profession to which he had been originally destined, and retired to the village of Skelton, in Cleveland, Yorkshire, where, or in the vicinity, he ever after continued,

In 1755, when a French war was impending, he published a “Treatise on the Scurvy, with remarks on the cure of scorbutic ulcers,” 8vo, and in 1762, an “Essay on the Medical Constitution of Great Britain.” In 1,765 the university of St Andrew’s conferred upon him the degree of M. D. In 1766, he published a volume of “Medical Essays and Observations,” Newcastle, 8vo, containing various papers on the climate and diseases of the West Indies. A few years before his death, he deposited in the library of the infirmary at Leeds, a manuscript volume of 700 pages of medical observations; and presented a treatise on fortification to his royal highness the prince of Wales. He published also a small tract on the naval art of war, which, with some political papers and Mss. in the possession of his widow, form the whole of his works published and unpublished. He died at Knayton, near Thirsk, in May 17il, in the seventy-fifth year of his age.

, a French poet and miscellaneous writer, was born at Konigsberg, Nov. 24, 1732, of a family of French refugees, of the protestant religion. After completing his education, he became a clergyman of that communion, and appears to have formed his taste for oratory and poetry from a frequent perusal of the Bible, the style of the historical part of which he much admired. He was a no less warm admirer of Homer. Although a Prussian by birth, he was a Frenchman at heart, and having accustomed himself to the language of his family, he felt a strong desire to reside in what he considered as properly his native country, conceiving at the same time that the best way to procure his naturalization would be through the medium of literary merit. As early as 1762, he published at Berlin a translation of the Iliad, which he called a free translation, and was in fact an abridgment and this served to introduce him to D'Alembert, who recommended him so strongly to the king, Frederick II. that he was admitted into the Berlin academy, received a pension, and afterwards visited France in order to complete his translation of Homer. A first edition had been printed in 1764, 2 vols. 8vo, but the most complete did not appear until 1780, and was followed by the Odyssey in 1785. Such was the reputation of both among his countrymen, that the academy of inscriptions admitted his name on their list of foreign members. Modern French critics, however, have distinguished more correctly between the beauties and defects of this translation. They allow him to have been more successful in his “Joseph,” a poem published first in 1767, and with additions in 1786, and now become almost a classic in France. It was translated into English in 1783, 2 vols. 12mo, but is certainly not likely to become a classic in this country, or where a taste prevails for simplicity and elegance. His “Joseph” was followed by “Les Bataves,” a poem of which some detached parts had appeared in 1773, under the title of “Guillaume de Nassau,” Amsterdam. This was reprinted in 1775, and again in 1796. During the war in 1793, as he attached himself to the French interest, he was struck off the list of the academy of Berlin, and his pension withdrawn but on the peace of Bale, his honours and his pension were restored. If his sovereign punished him thus for acting the Frenchman, he was not more fortunate with his new friends, who imprisoned him because he was a Prussian. On the establishment of the institute, however, Bitaube was chosen of the class of literature and the fine arts but gave a very bad specimen of his taste in translating the “Herman and Dorothea” of Goethe, and comparing that author with Homer, whose works, from this opinion, we should suppose he had studied to very little purpose. Some time before his death, which happened Nov. 22, 1808, he was admitted a member of the legion of honour. His other works were 1. “Examen de la Confession de Foi du Vicaire Savoyard,” 1763, a very liberal expostulation with Rousseau on account of his scepticism. 2. “De l'influence cles Belles-lettres sur la Philosophic,” Berlin, 1767, 8vo; and 3. “Eloge de Corneille,” 1769, 8vo none of which are in the collection of his works published at Paris in 1804, 9 vols. 8vo. Bitaub cannot be ranked among writers eminent for genius, nor is his taste, even in the opinion of his countrymen, of the purest standard; but his works procured him a considerable name, and many of the papers he wrote in the memoirs of the Paris academy discover extensive reading and critical talents. His private character appears to have been irreproachable, and his amiable manners and temper procured him many friends during the revolutionary successions.

, one of the most eminent chemical philosophers of the last century, was born in France, on the banks of the Garonne, in 1728. His father, Mr. John Black, was a native of Belfast, in Ireland, but of a Scotch family, which had been some time settled there. Mr. Black resided most commonly at Bourdeaux, where he carried on the wine trade. He married a daughter of Mr. Robert Gordon of the family of Halhead, in Aberdeenshire, who was also engaged in the same trade at Bourdeaux. Mr. Black was a gentleman of the most amiable manners, candid and liberal in his sentiments, and of no common information. He enjoyed the particular intimacy and friendship of the celebrated president Montesquieu, who most likely acquired his knowledge of the constitution of Britain, for which he was known to have a strong partiality, from the information communicated by Mr. Black. Long before Mr. Black retired from business, his son Joseph was sent to Belfast, that he might have the education of a British subject. He was then twelve years of age, and six years after, in the year 1746, he was sent to continue his education in the university of Glasgow. Being required by his father to make choice of a profession, he preferred that of medicine, as most suited to the general bent of his studies.

It was fortunately at this time that Dr. Cullen had just entered upon his great career, was become conscious of his strength, and saw the great unoccupied field of philosophical chemistry open before him. He quickly succeeded in taking chemistry out of the hands of mere artists, and exhibited it as a liberal science. His pupils became zealous chemists, as well as refined physiologists. Young Black was particularly delighted with the science, and his great bias to the study was soon perceived by Dr. Cullen, who delighted to encourage and assist the efforts of his students. He soon attached Mr. Black to himself so closely, that the latter was considered as his assistant in all his operations, and his experiments were frequently referred to as good authority. Our young philosopher had laid down a very comprehensive plan of study, as appears from his note-books, which are still preserved. In these he wrote down every thing that occurred to him, and they exhibit the first germs and progress of his ideas, till the completion of those great discoveries which produced so complete a revolution in chemical science.

In 1750, he went to Edinburgh to finish his medical studies, and while in that city he lived with his cousingerman, Mr. Russel, professor of natural philosophy in that university. At this time the medical professors entertained different opinions concerning the action of lithontriptic medicine, particularly lime-water, and the students as usual entered eagerly into the controversy. It seems to have been this circumstance that led Mr. Black to investigate the cause of causticity, a property in which all the litnontriptics then in vogue agreed. At first he suspected that lime, during the burning of it, imbibes something from the fire, which it afterwards communicates to alkalies: this he attempted to separate and collect, but obtained nothing. This led him to the real cause, which he detected about the year 1752, and published soon after, in his inaugural dissertation on magnesia. Limestone he found a compound of lime and fixed air. Heat separates the air and leaves the lime. The common alkalies of commerce, are compounds of the pure alkaline substance and fixed air. Lime abstracts the fixed air from these bodies hence their causticity. This important discovery was detailed at full length in the above dissertation on magnesia and quick lime, published 1755.

At this time Dr. Cullen was removed to Edinburgh, and there being a vacancy in the chemical chair at Glasgow, it was immediately agreed that it could not be bestowed with greater propriety than upon the author of so important a discovery. Accordingly, Dr. Black was appointed professor of anatomy, and lecturer on chemistry in the university of Glasgow, in 1756, but not conceiving himself so well qualified for filling the anatomical chair, he obtained the concurrence of the university to exchange tasks with the professor of medicine. While in Glasgow, therefore, his chief business was delivering lectures on the institutes of medicine. His reputation as a professor increased every year, and he became a favourite practitioner in that large and active city. Indeed, the sweetness of his temper could not fail to make him a welcome visitor in every family. His countenance was no less engaging than his manner was attractive. The ladies regarded themselves as honoured by his attentions, particularly as they were exclusively bestowed on those who evinced a superiority of mental accomplishments or propriety of demeanour, and of grace and elegance of manner. This situation, and the anxious care which he took of his patients, may in some measure account for the little progress made by Dr. Black in that fine career of experimental investigation which he had so auspiciously opened. Yet his inactivity must be lamented as highly injurious to science it displayed an indolence or carelessness of reputation not altogether to be justified.

But perhaps the other regions of chemistry held out temptations too captivating not to engage his attention. It was between the years 1759 and 1763, that he brought to maturity his speculations concerning heat, which had occupied his attention at intervals, from the very first dawn of his philosophical investigations. His discoveries in this department of science were by far the most important of all that he made, and perhaps indeed the most valuable which appeared during the busy period of the eighteenth century. To enter fully into the nature of his investigations would be improper in this place; but the sum of them all was usually expressed by him in the following propositions.

1. When a solid body is converted into a fluid, there enters into it, and unites with it, a quantity of heat, the presence of which is not indicated by the thermometer, and this combination is the cause of the fluidity which the body assumes. On the other hand, when a fluid body is converted into a solid, a quantity of heat separates from it, the presence of which was not formerly indicated by the thermometer. And this separation is the cause of the solid form which the fluid assumes.

2. When a liquid body is raised to the boiling temperature by the continued and copious application of heat, its particles suddenly attract to themselves a great quantity of heat, and by this combination their mutual relation is so changed, that they no longer attract each other, but are converted into an elastic fluid-like air. On the other hand, when these elastic fluids, either by condensation, or by the application of cold bodies, are reconverted into liquids, they give out a vast quantity of heat, the presence of which was not formerly indicated by the thermometer.

Dr. Black having established this discovery by simple and decisive experiments, drew up an account of the whole investigation, and read it to a literary society which met every Friday in the faculty- room of the college, consisting of the members of the university, and several gentlemen of the city, who had a relish for philosophy and literature. This was done April 23, 1762, as appears by the registers. This doctrine was immediately applied by its author to the explanation of a vast number of natural phenomena, and in his experimental investigations he was greatly assisted by his two celebrated pupils Mr. Watt and Dr. Irvine.

The investigations of Lavoisier and Laplace concerning heat, published many years after, were obviously borrowed from Dr. Black, and indeed consisted in the repetition of the very experiments which he had suggested. Yet these philosophers never mention Dr. Black at all: every thing in their dissertation assumes the air of originality; and, indeed, they appear to have been at great pains to prevent the opinions and discoveries of Dr. Black from being known among their countrymen. But perhaps the most extraordinary procedure was that of Mr. Deluc this philosopher had expressed his admiration of Dr. Black’s theory of latent heat, and had offered to become his editor. Dr. Black, after much entreaty, at last consented, and the proper information was communicated to Mr. Deluc. At last the “Idées sur la Meteorologie” of that philosopher appeared in 1788. But what was the astonishment of Dr. Black and his friends, when they found the doctrine claimed by Deluc as his own, and an expression of satisfaction at the knowledge which he had acquired of Dr. Black’s coincidence with him in opinion!

Dr. Black continued in the university of Glasgow from 1756 to 1766, much respected as an eminent professor, much employed as an able and most attentive physician, and much beloved as an amiable and accomplished gentleman, and happy in the enjoyment of a small but select society of friends. Often, however, says Dr. Robison, have I seen how oppressive his medical duties were on his spirits, when he saw that all his efforts did not alleviate the sufferings of the distressed. When his dear friend Dr. Dick, professor of natural philosophy, was carried off, Dr. Black’s distress indeed was exceedingly great, particularly as he thought that another mode of treatment might have been more successful.

In 1766 Dr. Cullen was appointed professor of medicine in the university of Edinburgh, and thus a vacancy was made in the chemical chair of that university. Dr. Black was with universal consent appointed his successor. In this new scene his talents were more conspicuous, and more extensively useful. He saw this, and while he could not but be highly gratified by the great concourse of pupils, which the high reputation of the medical school of Edinburgh brought to his lectures, his mind was forcibly impressed by the importance of his duties as a teacher. This had an effect which, perhaps, was on the whole rather unfortunate. He directed his whole attention to his lectures, and his object was to make them so plain that they should be adapted to the capacity of the most illiterate of his hearers. The improvement of the science seems to have been laid aside by him altogether. Never did any man succeed more completely. His pupils were jiot only instructed, but delighted. Many became his. pupils merely in order to be pleased. This contributed greatly to extend the knowledge of chemistry. It became in Edinburgh a fashionable part of the accomplishment of a gentleman.

Perhaps, also, the delicacy of his constitution precluded him from exertion; the slightest cold, the most trifling approach to repletion, immediately affected his breast, occasioned feverishness, and, if continued for two or three days, brought on a spitting of blood. Nothing restored him but relaxation of thought and gentle exercise. The sedentary life to which study confined him was manifestly hurtful, and he never allowed himself to indulge in any intense thinking without finding these complaints sensibly increased.

So completely trammeled was he in this respect, that, although his friends saw others disingenuous enough to avail themselves of the novelties announced by Dr. Black in his lectures, and therefore repeatedly urged him to publish an account of what he had done; this remained unaccomplished to the last. Dr. Black often began the task, but was so nice in his notions of the manner in which it should be executed, that the pains he took in forming a plan of the work, never failed to affect his health, and oblige him to desist. Indeed, he peculiarly disliked appearing as an author. His inaugural dissertation was the work of duty. His “Experiments on Magnesia, Quicklime, and other alkaline substances,” was necessary to put what he had indicated in his inaugural dissertations on a proper foundation. His “Observations on the more ready Freezing of water that has been boiled,” published in the Philosophical Transactions for 1774, was also called for; and his “Analysis of the Waters of some boiling Springs in Iceland,” made at the request of his friend T. I. Stanley, esq. was read to the royal society of Edinburgh, and published by the council. And these are the only works of his which appeared in print before the publication of his lectures after his death, by professor llobison, in 1803, 2 vols. 4to.

The aspect of Dr. Black was comely and interesting. His countenance exhibited that pleasing expression of inward satisfaction, which, by giving ease to the beholder, never fails to please. His manner was unaffected and graceful. He was affable, and readily entered into conversation, whether serious or trivial. He was a stranger to none of the elegant accomplishments of life. He had a fine musical ear, with a voice which would obey it in the most perfect manner; for he sung and performed on the flute with great taste and feeling, and could sing a plain air at sight, which many instrumental performers cannot do. Without having studied drawing, he had acquired a considerable power of expressing with his pencil, and seemed in this respect to have the talents of a history painter. Figure, indeed, of every kind, attracted his attention. Even a retort, or a crucible, was to his eye an example of beauty or deformity. He had the strongest claim to the appellation of a man of propriety and correctness. Every thing was done in its proper season, and he ever seemed to have leisure in store. He loved society, and felt himself beloved in it; never did he lose a single friend, except by the stroke of death. His only apprehension was that of a long continued sick bed -less, perhaps, from any selfish feeling, than from the consideration of the trouble and distress which it would occasion to attending friends: and never was this generous wish more completely gratified. On the 26th Nov. 1799, and in the seventy-first year of his age, he expired without any convulsions, shock, or stupor, to announce or retard the approach of death. Being at table with his usual fare, some bread, a few prunes, and a measured quantity of milk diluted with water, and having the cup in his hand, when the last stroke of the pulse was to be given, he set it down on his knees, which were joined together, and kept it steady with his hand, in the manner of a person perfectly at ease; and in this attitude expired, without spilling a drop, and without a writhe in his countenance, as if an experiment had been required to shew to his friends the facility with which he departed. His servant opened the door to tell him that some one had left his name; but getting no answer, stepped about half-way towards him, and seeing him in that easy posture, supporting his bason of milk with one hand, he thought that he had dropt asleep, which sometimes happened after his meals. He went back and shut the door; but before he went down stairs, some anxiety, which he could not account for, made him return again, and look at his master. Even then he was satisfied after coming pretty near him, and turned to go away but returning again, and coming up close to him, he found him without life.

To this sketch, abridged from professor Robison’s life for the Literary Journal, we have only to add, that Fourcroy, the eminent French chemist, used to call Dr. Black, the illustrious Nestor of the chemical revolution, and indeed, in every part of Europe, where chemistry has been studied, Dr. Black was named with peculiar veneration.

, an eminent English divine, was born in London, 1654, and educated at Catherine-hail, Cambridge. In 1690, he was inducted into the living of South Okenden, Essex, and four years afterwards to the rectory of St. Mary Aldermary, London and was successively chosen lecturer of St. Olave’s, and of St. Dunstan’s in the West. He was likewise appointed chaplain to king William. He preached before the house of commons Jan. 30, 1699, and in his sermon animadverted on Mr. Toland for his asserting in his life of Milton, that Charles I. was not the author of “Icon Basilike,” and for some insinuations against the authenticity' of the holy scriptures which drew him into a controversy with that author. In 1700, he preached a course of sermons at Boyle’s lecture, in the cathedral church of St. Paul, which were afterwards published. In 1707, he was consecrated to the bishopric of Exeter. Burnet, having mentioned him and sir William Dawes as raised to bishoprics, tells us, “that these divines were in themselves men of value and worth; but their notions were all on the other side. They had submitted to the government but they, at least Blackall, seemed to condemn the revolution, and all that had been done pursuant to it.” And it is asserted in an anonymous pamphlet, published in 1705, that he had refused for two years to take the oath of allegiance to king William. But what contributed most to his fame in his life- time was a controversy he had with Mr. (afterwards bishop) Hoadly, which was occasioned by his sermon upon Rom. xiii. 3, 4, entitled, “The Divine Institution of Magistracy, and the gracious design of its institution,” preached before the queen at St. James’s on Tuesday, March 8, 1708, being the anniversary of her majesty’s happy accession to the throne, and published by her majesty’s special command. The next year, 1709, Mr. Hoadly animadverted upon the bishop’s sermon, in a piece, entitled “Some Considerations humbly offered to the right reverend the lord bishop of Exeter, occasioned by his lordship’s sermon before her majesty, March 8, 1708.” Upon this the bishop published “An Answer to Mr. Hoadly’s Letter,” dated from Bath, May the 10th, 1709. Mr. Hoadly endeavoured to vindicate himself, in “An humble Reply to the right reverend the lord bishop of Exeter’s answer; in which the Considerations offered to his lordship are vindicated, and an apology is added for defending the foundation of the present government,” London, 1709, in 8vo. In this controversy, bishop Blackall defends the High-church, Tory, principles (as they usually are called), of the divine institution of magistracy, and unlimited passive obedience and non-resistance; which Mr. Hoadly opposes. There were several pamphlets written on the side of the bishop against Mr. Hoadly particularly one, entitled, “The best Answer that ever was made, and to which no answer will be made” supposed to be wi'itten by Mr. Lesley, a nonjuring clergyman, and which Mr. Hoadly animadverts upon in the postscript to his humble reply. The wits in the Tatler engaged in this controversy on the side of Hoadly, and with an illiberality not usual in the writers of that paper. He died at Exeter, Nov. 29, 1716, and was interred in the cathedral there. Archbp. Dawes, who had a long and intimate friendship with him, declares, that in his whole conversation he never met with a more perfect pattern of a true Christian life, in all its parts, than in him: so much primitive simplicity and integrity; such constant evenness of mind, and uniform conduct of behaviour; such unaffected and yet most ardent piety towards God such orthodox and steadfast faith in Christ such disinterested and fervent charity to all mankind such profound modesty, humility, and sobriety such an equal mixture of meekness and courage, of cheerfulness and gravity such an exact discharge of all relative duties and in one word, such an indifferency to this lower world and the things of it and such an entire affection and joyous hope and expectation of things above. He says also, that his “manner of preaching was so excellent, easy, clear, judicious, substantial, pious, affecting, and upon all accounts truly useful and edifying, that he universally acquired the reputation of being one of the best preachers of his time.” Felton, in his Classics, commends him as an excellent writer. M. de la Roche, in his memoirs of literature, tells us, that our prelate was one of those English divines, who, when they undertake to treat a subject, dive into the bottom of it, and exhaust the matter. His works were published by archbishop Dawes, in 2 vols. fol. 1723, consisting of Practical discourses on our Saviour’s Sermon on the mount, and on the Lord’s Prayer, together with his sermons preached at Boyle’s lecture, with several others upon particular occasions.

, a learned English divine of the last century, was born in 1683, and educated at Trinity college, Cambridge, where he took the degree of M. A. Whether he had any promotion in the church is not certain; but soon after the revolution, he refused to take the oaths, and consequently excluded himself from advancing in the church. From that time he lived a very exemplary and studious life, endeavouring to be useful to mankind, both as a scholar and divine. To preserve his independence, he became corrector of the press to Bowyer, the celebrated printer, and was one of the most accurate of his profession. The edition of lord Bacon’s works in 1740 was superintended by him; and he was also editor of the castrations of Holinshed’s Chronicle, and of Bale’s “Chrouycle concernynge syr Johan Oldecastell.” A handsome compliment is paid him in Maittaire’s Lives of the Paris printers, 1717; and again in his “Miscellanea aliquot 8criptorum carmina,” 1722. For some years before his death, he was a nonjuring bishop, but lived retired in Little Britain among his old books. What his hopes were of a second revolution will appear from the answer he gave a gentleman who asked him if he was in his diocese? “Dear friend, we leave the sees open, that the gentlemen who now unjustly possess them, upon the restoration, may, if they please, return to their duty and be continued. We content ourselves with full episcopal power as suffragans.” Mr, Blackbourne died Nov. 17, 1741, and his library was sold by auction in February 1742. He was buried in Islington church-yard, with an epitaph, which may be seen in our authority.

, an eminent surveyor and architect, was born in the borough of Southwark, on the 20th of December, 1750. His father was a respectable tradesman in St. John’s parish, and his mother was a native of Spain. The whole of his grammatical education was derived from a common seminary in the neighbourhood; and at a proper age he was placed under a surveyor of no eminence, but from whom he derived very few advantages in the knowledge of his profession. However, from the natural bent of an ardent mind, he sought the acquaintance of men of genius, several of whom belonged to the Jioyal Academy. Into that academy he was admitted as a student; and in 1773 he was presented with the medal for the best drawing of the inside of St. Stephen’s church in Walbrook. This prize he bore away from many competitors and, at the delivery of it, received a high compliment to his abilities from the late sir Joshua Reynolds, the president. About the same time he entered into business for himself in Southwark, and carried it on for some years with increasing success among his private connections, when an event occurred which brought him into public notice and reputation. An act of parliament had passed in 1779, declaring, that “if any offenders convicted of crimes for which transportation had been usually inflicted, were ordered to solitary imprisonment, accompanied by well regulated labour and religious instruction, it might be the means, under providence, not only of deterring others from the commission of the like crimes, but also of reforming the individuals, and enuring them to the habits of industry.” By this act his majesty was authorised to appoint three persons to be supervisors of the buildings to be erected; and the supervisors were to fix upon any common, heath, or waste, or any other piece of ground, in Middlesex, Essex, Kent, or Surrey, on which should be erected two plain strong edifices, to be called “Penitentiary Houses” one for the confinement and employment of six hundred males, the other of three hundred females. In the same year in which the act was passed, three supervisors were appointed to carry it into execution. These were John Howard, esq George Whatley, esq. and Dr. John Fothergill. This commission however was dissolved, first by the death of Dr. Fothergill, and soon after that event by the resignation of Mr. Howard, who found it not in his power to coalesce with his remaining colleague. Another set of supervisors was therefore appointed in 1781, being sir Gilbert Elliot, bart. sir Charles Bunbury, bart. and Thomas Bowdler, esq. One of the principal objects with these gentlemen was to provide that they should be constructed in the manner most conducive to the ends of solitary confinement, useful labour, and moral reformation. Accordingly, the supervisors proposed premiums for the best plans that should be produced of the penitentiary houses intended to be erected. The highest premium was a hundred guineas, which xvas unanimously assigned to Mr. Blackburn, in the month of March 1782. This preference, as a pecuniary consideration, was a matter of little consequence. The grand advantage that was to be expected from it, with regard to Mr. Blackburn, was, that he should be employed as the architect and surveyor of the buildings proposed. And in fact he was appointed by the supervisors to that office and the plan of a penitentiary house for male offenders was accordingly arranged by him, and proper draughts were made for the use of the workmen; and a great part of the work was actually contracted for by different persons. Yet the designs of government were not carried into execution the circumstances of the times having diverted the attention of public men from this important object nor has it ever since been resumed. Nevertheless, though Mr. Blackburn might in this respect be disappointed of his just expectations, he did not lose his reward, nor was the nation deprived of the benefit arising from his ingenuity. A spirit of erecting prisons in conformity to his plans was immediately excited and many county gaols, and other structures of the same nature, were built under his inspection. Besides the completion of several prisons, Mr. Blackburn was engaged in other designs of a similar nature, when he was arrested by the hand of death, in the fortieth year of his age. He departed this life on the 28th day of October, 1790, at Preston in Lancashire, being on a journey to Scotland, whither he was going at the instance of his grace the duke of Buccleugh, and the lord provost of Glasgow, with a view to the erection of a new gaol in that city. From Preston his remains were removed to London, and interred in the burying-ground of Bunhill-fields.

It was not to the erection of prisons only that Mr. Blackburn’s talents were confined. Three elegant designs were drawn by him for a new church at Hackney, one of which was intended to have been carried into execution but after his decease the scheme was laid aside, on account of the expence which the completion of it would occasion. He was employed, likewise, in preparing various designs for houses, villas, &c. In many of his drawings great taste is displayed, as well as a thorough knowledge of his favourite science of architecture. It was in contemplation, some time after his death, to engrave and publish his principal drawings; but the intention of doing it is dropped, at least for the present.

Being a dissenter of the presbyterian denomination, he was in the habits of intimacy with the principal persons of that persuasion both in town and country without however confining his regard and affection to any particular sect. But what confers peculiar honour on Mr. Blackburn’s memory is, that he enjoyed the intimate friendship and entire esteem of the excellent Mr. Howard; that he concurred with him in his ideas, and eminently promoted his benevolent designs. Mr. Blackburn frequently corresponded with Mr. Howard, when that gentleman was engaged, either at home or abroad, in his journeys and voyages of humanity. Of Mr. Blackburn Mr. Howard used to say, that he was the only man he ever met with, who was capable of delineating to his mind, upon paper, his ideas of what a prison ought to be.

The person of Mr. Blackburn was of the middle stature; and from his early youth he was so very corpulent, that his friends were filled with apprehensions, too unhappily verified, that his life would not be a long one. Till he became twenty-five years of age, he drank nothing but water. But at that time, in consequence of a severe fit of sickness, he was advised by the late Dr. John Fothergill to change his beverage for malt liquor, and occasionally to take a glass of wine. The affliction of another severe illness, later in life, was sustained by him with eminent and exemplary resignation and fortitude. Previously to his last journey he was considerably better, and entertained hopes that travelling might contribute to the restoration of his former health: but it was ordered otherwise by the supreme Disposer of events. By a sudden stroke he was for ever taken from his beloved wife and children; who, with a number of select friends, were left to lament a loss, which they must feel so long as they remain in this world. The character of Mr. Blackburn was, in every view of it, amiable and respectable. In discharging the duties and relations of life, he was uniform and consistent. He was very cheerful in his- temper, and affable and engaging in his behaviour. Being endued with a great flow of spirits, and much vivacity of mind, his conversation was at once agreeable and instructive. In February, 1783, Mr. Blackburn married Lydia, the daughter of Mr. Joshua Hobson, an eminent builder in his neighbourhood an amiable woman, with whom he lived in the most perfect harmony, and by whom he left four children.

, the celebrated author of the “Confessional,” was born at Richmond in Yorkshire, June 9, 1705. At the age of seventeen he was admitted pensioner of Catherine-hall, Cambridge, where his peculiar notions on civil and religious liberty rendered him obnoxious to his superiors, and occasioned the loss of a fellowship for which he was a candidate. In 1739, he was ordained by Dr. Gooch, bishop of Norwich, at Ely chapel, Holborn, and in a short time afterwards was inducted into the rectory of Richmond in Yorkshire, where he resided constantly for forty years, during which he composed all the pieces contained in the late edition of his works, besides a multitude of smaller ones. His first appearance as an author was on the following occasion. In 1749, the rev. John Jones, vicar of Alconbury, near Huntingdon, published his “Free and candid disquisitions relating to the Church of England,” containing many observations on the supposed defects and improprieties in the liturgical forms of faith and worship of the established church. As Mr. Blackburne corresponded with this gentleman, who had submitted the work to his perusal in manuscript, and as there were many of his opinions in which Mr. Blackburne coincided, it was not unnatural to suppose that he had a hand in the publication. This, however, Mr. Blackburne solemnly denied, and his biographer has assigned the probable reason. “The truth,” says he, “is, Mr. Blackburne, whatever desire he might have to forward the work of ecclesiastical reformation, could not possibly conform his style to the milky phraseology of the ‘ Disquisitions,’ nor could he be content to have his sentiments mollified by the gentle qualifications of Mr. Jones’s lenient pen. He was rather (perhaps too much) inclined to look upon those who had in their hands the means and the power of reforming the errors, defects, and abuses, in the government, forms of worship, faith and discipline, of the established church, as guilty of a criminal negligence, from which they should have been roused by sharp and spirited expostulations. He thought it became disquisitors, with a cause in hand of such high importance to the influence of vital Christianity, rather to have boldly forced the utmost resentment of the class of men to which they addressed their work, than, by meanly truckling to their arrogance, to derive upon themselves their ridicule and contempt, which all the world saw was the case of these gentle suggesters, and all the return they had for the civility of their application.” Animated by this spirit, which we are far from thinking candid or expedient, Mr. Blackburne published “An Apology,” for the “Free and candid disquisitions,” to which, whatever might be its superior boldness to the “milky phraseology” of Mr. Jones, he yet did not venture to put his name nor, although he was suspected to be the author, did he meet with any of that “arrogance,” which is attributed to those who declined adopting Mr. Jones’s scheme of church-reformation. On the contrary, in July, 1750, he was collated to the archdeaconry of Cleveland, and in August following to the prebend of Bilton, by Dr. Matthew Hutton, archbishop of York, to whom he had been for some years titular chaplain and when his friends intimated their suspicions that he would write no more “Apologies” for such books as “Free and candid Diquisitions,” he answered, “with a cool indifference,” that he had made no bargain with the archbishop for his liberty. His next publication, accordingly, was an attack on Dr. Butler bishop of Durham’s charge to his clergy in 1751, which, in Mr. Blackburne’s opinion, contained some doctrines diametrically opposite to the principles on which the protestant reformation was founded. This appeared in 1752, under the title of “A Serious Enquiry into the use and importance of external religion, &c.” but was not generally known to be his, until Mr. Baron, an enthusiast in controversies, republished it with Mr. Blackburne’s name, in his collection, entitled “The Pillars of Priestcraft and Orthodoxy shaken.”

His next publications were on the subjects of the new style Archdeacon Sharpe’s charges the Jew naturalization-bill a letter to archbishop Herring, on church reformation none of which require much notice. When in 1755, Dr. Law’s notion appeared concerning the soul and the state of death, or what was called “the soul-sleeping system,” Mr. Blackburne adopted, and defended it in a tract entitled “No proof in the Scriptures of an intermediate state of happiness or misery, between death and the resurrection,” and he urged the same opinion in a subsequent tract but as the Confessional is the publication on which his fame principally rests, the history of it is more interesting than any detail of his minor tracts. On Commencement Sunday 1757, Dr. Powell, an eminent tutor of St. John’s college, Cambridge, published a sermon on subscription to the Liturgy and XXXIX articles, in which he maintained that a latitude was allowed to subscribers, even, so far as to admit of the assent and conserit of different persons to different and even opposite opinions, according to their different interpretations of the propositions to be subscribed. Dr. Powell’s casuistry on the subject appeared to Mr. Blackburne so detestable, and so subversive of the principles of good faith among men, that he determined to expose and refute it to the best of his power, and accordingly published “Remarks on the rev. Dr. Powell’s Sermon in defence of Subscriptions, &c.” 1758. His sentiments on the subject of subscriptions are thus explained, in that part of his life which was written by himself. "When he took possession of the living of Richmond, he had been engaged in a way of life that did not give him time or opportunity to reflect upon subjects of that nature with precision; and though, upon taking his first preferment, he determined conscientiously to perform the duties of it, yet he was by no means aware of the difficulties that afterwards embarrassed him in qualifying himself for holding it. He, therefore, then subscribed as directed by law, without scruple, and without apprehending the obligation he laid himself under, according to the form, of giving his assent and consent to the whole system of the church. When the same form was to be subscribed to qualify him. to hold the archdeaconry and prebend, he consulted some of his friends, and particularly Dr. Law (afterwards bishop of Carlisle), who gave him his opinion at large, containing such reasons, as had occurred to himself on the several occasions he had to undergo that discipline. He was likewise referred to Dr. Clarke’s Introduction to his Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity and lastly, to the sixth article of the church of England all which appeared plausible enough to satisfy him, for that time, that with these salvos and modifications, he might safely subscribe to the prescribed forms. Some time afterwards, however, upon a prospect of farther advancement to a considerable preferment, he took occasion to re-consider these arguments, and thought they fell short of giving that satisfaction which an honest man would wish to have, when he pledges his good faith to society in so solemn a form as that prescribed by the 36th canon, enjoining subscription to the articles and liturgical forms of the church of England.

“In this situation of mind, he set himself to examine into the rise and progress of this requisition in protestant churches, and into the arguments brought in defence, or rather in excuse of it the result of which was the compilation since known by the name of the * Confessional, or a full and free enquiry into the right, utility, and success of establishing Confessions of Faith and Doctrine in Protestant churches.' This work lay by him in manuscript for some years. He had communicated his plan to Dr. Edmund Law, who encouraged him greatly in the progress of it, and appears by many letters in the course of their correspondence to have been extremely impatient to have it published. The fair copy, however, was never seen by any of the author’s acquaintance, one confidential friend excepted, who spoke of its existence and contents to the late patriotic Thomas Hollis, esq. to whom the author at this time was not personally known. Mr. Hollis mentioned this manuscript to Mr. Andrew Millar, the bookseller, who in 1763, intending a summer excursion to visit his friends in Scotland, was desired by Mr. Hollis to call upon Mr. Blackburne at Richmond, where, after some conversation, the manuscript was consigned to Mr. Millar’s care for publication, and accordingly came out in the spring of 1766. The only condition made with Mr. Millar was, that the author’s name should be concealed.”

Such is the author’s account of the origin of this celebrated work, which soon gave rise to a controversy of considerable length. We follow him with more reluctance in his account of its reception, in which he states that grievous offence was taken at it by that part of the clergy “who affect to call themselves orthodox” and archbishop Seeker is stated to have thrown off his mask of moderation at once. More calm reasoners, however, at this later period may be of opinion, that many of the opponents of the Confessional stood in no need of affectation to indicate the class to which they belonged and that the archbishop, as well as many of his brethren, might think themselves amply justified in considering the Confessional, as having a tendency to render the principles of the church of England a series of private opinions ending in ho general system, and affording encouragement to perpetual fluctuation and indecision, under pretence of regard for conscience. Nor, as the press was to be the medium of this controversy, can we, upon any principles of candour, conceive, why archbishop Seeker, or any of his brethren, should be censured for encouraging the best writers they could find.

This controversy lasted from 1766, the period of publishing the first edition of the Confessional, to 1779, when it was in part revived, or rather continued (for it had never been entirely dropt), in consequence of an application made to parliament for relief in the matter of subscription. During this time, between seventy and eighty pamphlets were published by the contending parties, of which not above ten or twelve appeared with the authors’ names. Some of these are supposed to have been furnished by Mr. Blackburne. One singular effect followed the first publication of the Confessional. It was supposed that the author of such a work could not possibly remain in the church after having made so many objections to her constitution and accordingly a congregation of dissenters in London sent a deputation to him, to know whether he was inclined to accept the situation of their pastor. But whatever objections the learned archdeacon had to certain points of discipline and doctrine peculiar to the church of England, which he wished to be reformed he never conceived that the best way to bring about such a reformation was to leave her entirely in the hands of those who were adverse to it and therefore, although he abstained from any open opposition to the principles and conduct of Mr. Lindsey and Dr. Disney (both his relations and friends), he does not appear to have approved either. His own words, however, will best illustrate his sentiments on this delicate subject;

“Mr. Blackburne had his objections to the liturgy and articles of the church of England, as well as Mr. Lindsey, and in some instances to the same passages, but differed widely from him on some particular points, which, he thought, as stated by Mr. Lindsey and his friends, could receive no countenance from scripture, unless by a licentiousness of interpretation that could not be justified. But Dr. Priestley and some of his friends having carried the obligation to secede from the church of England farther than Mr. Blackburne thought was either sufficiently candid, charitable, or modest, and had thereby given countenance to the reproach, thrown upon many moderate and worthy men, by hot and violent conformists, for continuing to minister in the church, while they disapproved many things in her doctrine and discipline, he thought it expedient, in justice to himself and others of the same sentiments, to give some check to the crude censures that had been passed upon them. And, accordingly, intending to publish ' Four Discourses’ delivered to the clergy of the archdeaconry of Cleveland, in the years 1767, 1769, 1771, and 1773, he took that opportunity to explain himself on this subject in a preface, as well on behalf of the seceders, as of those whose Christian principles admitted of their remaining in the church without offering violence to their consciences.” Of Dr. Priestley’s conduct he speaks yet more decidedly in a letter dated Jan. 4, 177O, to a dissenting minister, “I cannot think the dissenters will be universally pleased with Dr. Priestley’s account of their principles, not to mention that some degree of mercy seemed to be due to us, who have shown our benevolence to all protestant dissenters, and have occasionally asserted their rights of conscience with the utmost freedom. But no, it seems nothing will do but absolute migration from our present stations, in agreement with our supposed convictions though, perhaps, it might puzzle Dr. Priestley to find us another church, in which all of us would be at our ease, &c.” On the secession of Dr. Disney from the church, a circumstance which appears to have given him great uneasiness, he went so far as to draw up a paper under the title “An Answer to the Question, Why are you not a Socinian r” but this, although now added to his works, was not published in his life-time, from motives of delicacy. He had been suspected, from his relationship and intimacy with Mr. Lindsey and Dr. Disney, of holding the same sentiments with them, and his object in the above paper was to vindicate his character in that respect. Still, as it did not appear in his life-time, it could not answer that purpose, and although we are now told that some time before his death, he explicitly asserted to his relation, the Rev. Mr. Comber, his belief in the divinity of Christ, the suspicions of the public had undoubtedly some foundation in the silence which in all his writings he preserved respecting a point of so much importance. When considerably advanced in years, he formed the design of writing the life of Luther and had made some collections for the purpose, hut was diverted from it by being engaged to draw up a work of far less general interest, the Memoirs of Mr. Thomas Hollis. In 1787, he performed his thirty-eighth visitation in Cleveland, after which he was taken ill at the house of his friend the Rev. William Comber, but reached home a few weeks before his death, which took place Aug. 7, 1787, in his eightythird year. Mr. Blackburne left a widow (who died Aug. 20, 1799), and four children, Jane, married to the Rev. Dr. Disney the Rev. Francis Blackburne, vicar of Brignal, near Greta-bridge, Yorkshire Sarab, married to the Rev. John Hall, vicar of Chew Magna, and rector of Dundry in Somersetshire and William Blackburne, M. D. of Cavendish square, London.

“Without ever taking an active part in the disputes which in his time agitated, and are still agitating, the church of England, on the article of predestination, it is certain that Mr. Blackburne was, in the general sentiments of his creed, what he more than once declared himself to be, a moderate Calvinist; and his writings place it beyond a doubt, that he believed himself so much more a Protestant for being so. His Calvinism, however, was of the largest and most liberal east. This will be easily understood from what he thought of the great work of David Hartley on Man * a book,‘ writes Mr. Blackburne to a friend, in 1750, ’ to which, if I am not exceedingly mistaken, Christianity is, or will be, more beholden than to all the books besides of the two last centuries. But he has joined necessity and religion together. What of that Ask the church of England in her articles.' ”While engaged in the controversial field, and maintaining what he believed to be the cause of truth and liberty, Mr, Blackburne, like his admired Luther, pursued his adversary often with vehemence, and sometimes with asperity of attack and when either rank or eminence in the object of his animadversions was likely to lend a sanction to prejudice and superstition, or to give an imposing air to the encroachments of human authority in matters of religion, no writer ever more intrepidly encountered odium, by exposing error and bigotry if it were even found, where many good and gentle natures will hardly allow it to be looked for, under the lawn and the mitre. Yet, doubtless, in the execution of so critical an office, the most acute and honest judgment might at times fail in discernment, or carry severity too far. To say, therefore, that Mr. Blackburne never passed an unjust censure, or harboured an unworthy dislike, as a polemic, would be to suppose that he was perfect in the most difficult of all tasks the task of inquiring uito the justness of argument, the integrity of motives, and the rectitude of conduct of other men like himself.

"Of all this, in his last years, especially when he had retired from the business of controversy, and looked back on the scene which he had quitted for ever, Mr. Blackburne was duly sensible and one day, a few weeks before his death, conversing with a lady then resident at Richmond, one of the most amiable and excellent of her sex, he acknowledged, with great earnestness, that some things which he had written and published in the course of his life he was afraid might have been too warmly or too hastily advanced. Yet no scholar, perhaps, was ever more industrious and indefatigable in the investigation both of facts and of arguments, or less precipitate in delivering his researches to the public, than archdeacon Blackburne.

“Nor did mere difference of opinion, even on points of the highest political and religious consequence, or on speculative topics, where years of study had endeared conviction to him, operate as a bar to his approbation of the merits of his opponent and he readily acknowledged, and admired, literary talent and scriptural knowledge, or clear and able enforcements of the truths and obligations of religion, as well as personal virtue and eminent piety, in those from whom otherwise he differed widely, and whom, with no little eagerness, he had sometimes opposed. ”Mr. Blackburne’s cordial and eloquent compliment to the memory of Jortin, to whom, besides some specific disagreements, he was nearly as dissimilar in general characters as Luther to Erasmus, has been more than once repeated. His amanuensis testifies the genuine satisfaction which the reading of Dr. Johnson’s Prayers and Meditations appeared to afford his venerable friend and he well remembers with what delight Mr. Blackburne listened to the sermons of bishop Sherlock, which he had doubtless often himself perused before and with what frankness of heart he wished that it had been in his power to be equally useful as a preacher of the doctrines of Christianity.

"Amidst the calls of his public station, and the labours of private study, during the most active stages of his life, Mr. Blackburne had been always constant in the regular performance of family devotion and of solitary prayer. The contemplation too of some passage in the Old or New Testament, with the comments of the best early or later critics, was not forgotten in the habitual arrangement of his forenoon. In his latter days, these exercises and meditations, and a course of reading congenial to them, suited particularly well with the sober and serious cast of a mind like his, and with afflictions fast weaning to a better world. Towards the close of his life, retaining strong faculties of memory and intellect, his powers of cheerful and instructive conversation were little diminished by age or what they had lost, if any thing they had lost, in vigour, was abundantly compensated in that soft mellowness of temper, which, like the mild setting sun of an autumnal evening, gilds the declining day of a wise and virtuous old man.

“Such was Francis Blackburne y a believer of Christianity, from the deepest conviction of its truth a Protestant on the genuine principles of the reformation from popery; a strenuous adversary of superstition and intolerance, and of every corruption of the simplicity or the spirit of the gospel a zealous promoter of civil liberty a close and perspicuous reasoner a keen and energetic writer an attentive, benevolent, and venerable archdeacon an elegant and persuasive preacher; a faithful pastor and exemplary guide; of unblemished purity of life; of simple dignity of manners a sincere and cordial friend an affectionate husband, and an indulgent father in short, a just, humane, pious, temperate, and independent man.”

, esq. of Orford, near Warrington in Lancashire, deserves some notice in a work of this description, as a promoter of science. This gentleman died in 1786, at the advanced age of ninety-six, the reward of a very regular and temperate life, and a mind undisturbed by any violent emotions. His health and tranquillity were also not a little promoted by the turn he took in early life to the cultivation of plants. He was supposed to be the second gentleman in England who cultivated the pine-apple, and his garden always continued one of the chief objects of botanical curiosity for its products both foreign and domestic, in the north of England. Of this a catalogue was printed by his gardener, Mr. Neal, in 1779. He retained his faculties in very considerable perfection till within two or three years before his death. He was exemplary in the discharge of religious duties, and in charity to the poor. His daughter Anna, who died, advanced in years, in 1794, was also attached to scientific pursuits, particularly natural history, of which she formed a very extensive museum at her seat at Fairfield near Warrington. She was equally fond of botany, and was the friend and constant correspondent of Linnæus and many other celebrated botanists on the continent and at home. A plant which she discovered, Linnæus named in honour of her, Blackburniana. She bequeathed her museum to her nephew John Blackburne, esq. M. P. for Lancashire.

, a very extraordinary poet, was born in 1721, at Annan in the county of Dumfries, in Scotland. His parents were natives of Cumberland, of the lower order, but industrious and well-informed. Before he was six months old he lost his sight by the small-pox, and therefore, as to all purposes of memory or imagination, may be said never to have enjoyed that blessing. His father and friends endeavoured to lessen the calamity by reading to him those books which might convey the instruction suitable to infancy, and as he advanced, they proceeded to others which he appeared to relish and remember, particularly the works of Spenser, Milton, Prior, Pope, and Addison. And such was the kindness which his helpless situation and gentle temper excited, that he was seldom without some companion who carried on this singular course of education, until he had even acquired some knowledge of the Latin tongue. It is probable that he remembered much of all that was read to him, but his mind began very early to make a choice. He first discovered a predilection for English poetry, and then, at the age of twelve, endeavoured to imitate it in various attempts, one of which is preserved in his works, but rather with a view to mark the commencement than the perfection of his talent.

In this manner his life appears to have passed for the first nineteen years, at the end of which he had the misfortune to lose his father, who was killed by the accidental fall of a malt-kiln. For about a year after this, he continued to live at home, and began to be noticed as a young man of genius and acquirements, such as were not to be expected in one in his situation. His poems, which had increased in number as he grew up, were now handed about in manuscript, with confidence that they were worthy of the attention of the discerning, and some of them having been, shewn to Dr. Stevenson, an eminent physician of Edinburgh, he formed the benevolent design of removing the author to that city, where his genius might be improved by a regular education. He came accordingly to Edinburgh in the year 1741, and continued his studies in the university, under his kind patron, till the year 1745. In 1746 a volume of his poems, in octavo, was published, but with what effect we are not told. The rebellion, however, which then raged in Scotland, disturbed arts and learning, and our author returned to Dumfries, where he found an asylum in the house of Mr. M'Murdo, who had married his sister, and who, by company and conversation, endeavoured to amuse his solitude, and keep up his stock of learning. At the close of the rebellion he returned to Edinburgh, and pursued his studies for six years longer.

He now obtained the acquaintance of Hume, the celebrated historian, who interested himself with great zeal in his behalf, and among other services, promoted the publication of the quarto edition of his poems in 1756; but previously to this a second edition of the octavo had been published at Edinburgh in 1754. In this last mentioned year he became known to the Rev. Joseph Spence, poetry professor of Oxford, who introduced him to the English public by “An Account of the Life, Character, and Poems of Mr. Blacklock, student of philosophy in the university of Edinburgh.” In this pamphlet Mr. Spence detailed the extraordinary circumstances of his education and genius with equal taste and humanity, and a subscription was immediately opened at Dodsley’s shop for a quarto edition, to be published at a guinea the large, and half a guinea the small paper.

Having completed his education at the university, he began a course of study, with a view to give lectures on oratory to young gentlemen intended for the bar or the pulpit, but by Hume’s advice he desisted from a project which the latter thought unlikely to succeed, and determined to study divinity, which promised to gratify and enlarge the pious feelings and sentiments that had grown up with him. Accordingly, after the usual probationary course, he was licensed a preacher of the gospel, agreeably to the rules of the church of Scotland, in 1759. In this character he attained considerable reputation, and was fond of composing sermons, of which he has left some volumes in manuscript, and a treatise of morals, both of which his friends once intended for the press. Two occasional sermons are said to have been published in his lifetime, but probably never reached this country, as no notice of them occurs in our literary journals.

“His manner of life (says that gentleman) was so uniform, that the history of it during one day, or one week, is the history of it during the seven years that our personal intercourse lasted. Reading, music, walking, conversing, and disputing on various topics, in theology, ethics, &c. employed almost every hour of our time. It was pleasant to hear him engaged in a dispute, for no man could keep his temper better than he always did on such occasions. I have known him frequently very warmly engaged for hours together, but never could observe one angry word to fall from him. Whatever his antagonist might say, he always kept his temper. ‘ Semper paratus et refellere sine pertinacia, et refelli sine iracundia.’ He was, however, extremely sensible to what he thought ill usage, and equally so whether it regarded himself or his friends. But his resentment was always confined to a few satirical verses, which were generally burnt soon after.”

"The late Mr. Spence (the editor of the quarto edition of his poems) frequently urged him to write a tragedy and assured him that he had interest enough with Mr. Garrick to get it acted. Various subjects were proposed to him, several of which he approved of, yet he never could be prevailed on to begin any thing of that kind*. It may seem remarkable, but as far as I know, it was invariably the case, that he never could think or write on any subject proposed to him by another.

“I have frequently admired with what readiness and rapidity he could sometimes make verses. I have known him dictate from thirty to forty verses, and by no means bad ones, as fast as I could write them but the moment he was at a loss for a rhyme or a verse to his liking, he stopt altogether, and could very seldom be induced to finish what he had begun with so much ardour.”

To this his elegant biographer adds “All those who ever acted as his amanuenses, agree in this rapidity and ardour of composition which Mr. Jameson ascribes to him in the account I have copied above. He never could dictate till he stood up; and as his blindness made walking about without assistance inconvenient or dangerous to him, he fell insensibly into a vibratory sort of motion of his body, which increased as he warmed with his subject, and was pleased with the conceptions of his mind. This motion at last became habitual to him, and though he could sometimes restrain it when on ceremony, or in any public appearance, such as preaching, he felt a certain uneasiness from the effort, and always returned to it when he could indulge it without impropriety.”

In 1762, he married miss Sarah Johnston, daughter of Mr. Joseph Johnston, surgeon in Dumfries, a connexion which formed the great solace of his future life. About the same time he was ordained minister of the town and parish of Kircudbright, in consequence of a presentation from the crown, obtained for him by the earl of Selkirk; but the parishioners having objected to the appointment, after a legal dispute of nearly two years, his friends advised him to resign his right, and accept of a moderate annuity in its stead. If their principal objection was to his want of sight, it was certainly not unreasonable. He would probably in the course of a few years have found it very in­* Mr. Jameson was probably igno- cannot recollect. The manuscript was

from whom I received the intelligence, been recovered. Mackenzie. convenient, if not painful, to execute all the duties of the pastoral office. With the slender provision allowed by this parish, he returned to Edinburgh in 1764, and adopted the plan of receiving a limited number of young gentlemen into his house, not only as boarders, but as pupils whose studies he might occasionally assist. And this plan succeeded so well that he continued it till 1787, when age and infirmity obliged him to retire from active life. In 1767, the degree of D. D. was conferred upon him by the university and Marischal college of Aberdeen, doubtless at the suggestion of his friend and correspondent, Dr. Beattie, to whom he had in the preceding year sent a present of his works, accompanied by some verses. Dr. Beattie returned a poetical epistle, which is now prefixed to Blacklock’s poems, and ever after maintained a correspondence with him, and consulted him upon all his subsequent works, particularly his celebrated “Essay on Truth.”

In the same year, he published “Paraclesis or consolations deduced from natural and revealed Religion in two dissertations the first, supposed to have been composed by Cicero now rendered into English the last originally written by Dr. Blacklock.” The plan of the original dissertation is to prove the superiority of the consolations to be derived from the Christian revelation: but it is painful to find by his preface that his motive for writing it, was “to alleviate the pressure of repeated disappointments to sooth his anguish for the loss of departed friends, to elude the rage of implacable and unprovoked enemies; in a word, to support his own mind, which, for a number of years, besides its literary difficulties, and its natural disadvantages, had maintained an incessant conflict with fortune.” Of what nature his disappointments were, or who could be implacable enemies to such a man, we are not told. His biographer, indeed, informs us that he “had from nature a constitution delicate and nervous, and his mind, as is almost always the case, was in a great degree subject to the indisposition of his body. He frequently complained of a lowness and depression of spirits, which neither the attentions of his friends, nor the unceasing care of a most affectionate wife, were able entirely to remove.” Let us hope, therefore, for the honour of mankind, that his complaints were those, not of a man who had enemies, but of one who was sensible that, with strong powers of mind, and well-founded consolations, he was yet excluded from many of the rational delights of which he heard others speak, and of which, if he formed any idea, it was probably disproportionate and distressing.

In 1768 he published a translation, from the French of the rev. James Armand, minister of the Walloon church in Hanau, of two discourses on the spirit and evidences of Christianity, with a long dedication from his own pen, caU culated for the perusal of the clergy of the church of Scotland. In this, as in all his prose writings, his style is elegant, nervous, and animated, and his sentiments such as indicate the purest zeal for the interests of religion. His last publication, in 1774, was “The Graham, an heroic ballad in four cantos,” intended to promote harmony between the inhabitants of Scotland and England. As a. poem, however, it added little to his reputation, and has been excluded from the collection of his works formed by Mr. Mackenzie, and adopted in the late edition of the English poets.

In 1791 he was seized with a feverish disorder, which at first seemed of a slight, and never rose to a very violent kind but his weak frame was unable to support it, and he died after about a week’s illness, July 7, 1791, in th seventieth year of his age. A monument was afterwards erected to his memory, with an elegant Latin inscription from the pen of Dr. Beattie.

With respect to his personal character, his biographer, and indeed all who knew him, have expatiated on the gentleness of his manners, the benignity of his disposition, and that warm interest in. the happiness of others which led him so constantly to promote it in the young people who were committed to his charge. In their society he appeared entirely to forget the loss of sight, and the melancholy which, at other times, it might produce. “He entered,” says his biographer, " with the cheerful playfulness of a young man, into all the sprightly narrative, the sportive fancy, the humorous jest that rose around him. It was a sight highly gratifying to philanthropy, to see how much a mind endowed with knowledge, kindled by genius, and above all, lighted up with innocence and piety, like Blacklock’s, could overcome the weight of its own calamity, and enjoy the content, the happiness, and the gaiety of others. Several of those inmates of Dr. Blacklock’s house retained, in future life, all the warmth of that impression which his friendship at this early period had made upon them and in various quarters of the world he had friends and correspondents from whom no length of time or distance of place had ever estranged him.

“Music, which to the feeling and the pensive, in whatever situation, is a source of extreme delight, but which to the blind must be creative, as it were, of idea and of sentiment, he enjoyed highly, and was himself a tolerable performer on several instruments, particularly on the flute. He generally carried in his pocket a small flageolet , on which he played his favourite tunes; and was not displeased when asked in company to play or to sing them; a natural feeling for a blind man, who thus adds a scene to the drama of his society.”

, physician to king William III. and queen Anne, and a very voluminous writer, was son of Mr. Robert Blackmore, an attorney at law. He received the first part of his education at a country school, from whence he was removed to Westminster in the thirteenth year of his age. He was afterwards sent to St. Edmund’shall, in the university of Oxford, where he continued thirteen years. He is said to have been engaged for some time in the profession of a school -master but it is probable he did not long continue in that situation and, says Dr. Johnson, to have been once a schoolmaster, is the only reproach which all the perspicacity of malice, animated by wit, has ever fixed upon his private life. It appears that he travelled afterwards into Italy, and took the degree of doctor in physic, at the university of Padua. He also visited France, Germany, and the Low Countries, and having spent about a year and a half abroad, he returned again to England. On his arrival in London, he engaged in the practice of physic there, and was chosen, fellow of the royal college of physicians. He early discovered his attachment to the principles of the revolution; and this circumstance, together with the eminence which he had attained in his profession, recommended him to the notice and favour of king William. Accordingly, in 1697, he was appointed one of his majesty’s physicians in ordinary he had also a gold medal and chain bestowed on him by that prince, and received from him the honour of knighthood. Upon the king’s death, he was one of the physicians who gave their opinions at the opening of his majesty’s body. When queen Anne ascended the throne, he was appointed one of her physicians, and continued in that station for some time. Sir Richard Blackmore was the author of a variety of pieces both in prose and verse and the generality of his productions had many admirers in his own time for the third edition of his “Prince Arthur, an heroic poem in ten books,” was published in 1696, fol. The following year he also published in folio “King Arthur, an heroic poem, in twelve books.” In 1700 he published in folio, in verse, “A Paraphrase on the book of Job as likewise on the songs of Moses, Deborah, David on four select Psalms some chapters of Isaiah and the third chapter of Habbakuk.” He appears to have been naturally of a very serious turn, and therefore took great offence at the licentious and immoral tendency of many of the productions of his contemporary authors. To pass a censure upon these was the design of his poem, entitled “A Satire upon Wit,” or rather the abuse of it, which was first published in 1700. But this piece was attacked and ridiculed by many different writers, and there seemed to be a kind of confederacy of the wits against him. How much, however, they felt his reproof, appears from the following circumstance. In Tom Brown’s works are upwards of twenty different satirical pieces in verse against Blackmore, said to be written by colonel Codrington, sir Charles Sedley, colonel Blount, sir Samuel Garth, sir Richard Steele, Dr. Smith, Mr. William Burnaby, the earl of Anglesea, the countess of Sandwich, Mr. Manning, Mr. Mildmay, Dr. Drake, colonel Johnson, Mr. Richard Norton, &c. and most of these pieces are particularly levelled at our author’s “Satire upon Wit.” One topic of abuse against Blackmore was, that he lived in Cheapside. He was sometimes called the “Cheapside Knight,” and the “City Bard;” and Garth’s verses, in the collection just cited, are addressed “to the merry Poetaster at Sadlers Hall in Cheapside.” In Gibber’s lives we are also told, that “sir Richard had, by the freedom of his censures on the libertine writers of his age, incurred the heavy displeasure of Dryden, who takes all opportunities to ridicule him, and somewhere says, that he wrote to the rumbling of his chariot-wheels. And as if to be at enmity with Blackmore had been hereditary to our greatest poets, we find Mr. Pope taking up the quarrel where Dryden left it, and persecuting this worthy man with yet a severer degree of satire. Blackmore had been informed by Curl, that Mr. Pope was the author of a Travestie on the first Psalm, which he takes occasion to reprehend in his ‘ Essay on PoJite Learning,’ vol. II. p. 270. He ever considered it as the disgrace of genius, that it should be employed to burlesque any of the sacred compositions, which, as they speak the language of inspiration, tend to awaken the soul to virtue, and inspire it with a sublime devotion.”

On the 16th of November 1713, he began a paper, printed three times a week, called the “Lay Monk.” Only forty numbers of it were published, which, in 1714, were collected into a volume, under the title of the “Lay Monastery.” The Friday’s papers in this collection were written by Hughes, and the rest by sir Richard. In a letter to Mr. Hughes, he declared that he was not determined to the undertaking by a desire of fame or profit, hut from a regard to the public good. In 1716, he published in 2 vols. 8vo, “Essays upon several subjects,” and in 1718, “A collection of poems,” in 1 vol. 8vo. But the work which procured him the greatest reputation, was his “Creation, a philosophical poem, demonstrating the Existence and Providence of a God, in seven books.” This passed through several editions, and was greatly applauded by Mr. Addison. Mr. Locke also formed a very favourable opinion of sir Richard Blackmore; although perhaps he estimated his poetical talents too highly. In 1721, our author published in 12mo, “A new version of the Psalms of David, fitted to the tunes used in churches.” This was recommended by public authority, as proper to be used in the churches and chapels of England, but it does not appear to have been generally adopted. Towards the close of his life, his practice as a physician is said to have declined which might probably arise from the numerous attempts which were made to lessen his reputation. He died on the 8th of October, 1729, in an advanced age; and manifested in his last illness the same fervent piety, which had distinguished him in his life. He was certainly a man of considerable learning and abilities, and a most zealous advocate for the interests of religion and virtue. He wrote, indeed, too much, and was deficient in point of taste nor did he take sufficient time to polish his compositions. But he was far from being destitute of genius; and it is sufficiently manifest, that it was not his dullness, which excited so much animosity against him. Hardly any author has ever been more satirized than sir Richard Blackmore, and yet, so far as we can judge from his writings, there have been few, perhaps none, who have had better intentions. He had very just ideas of the true ends of writing and it would have been happy for the world, if such ideas had been adopted by, and really influenced, authors of more brilliant genius. And though his historical and epic poems exposed him to some degree of ridicule, yet he was far from being a proper object of the extreme contempt with which he was treated. The merit of his poem on Creation, and the excellency of his life, might have procured him better usage. And whatever were the defects of his compositions, he was justly entitled to commendation for the morality of their tendency. He who labours to reform mankind is more deserving of our esteem, than he who would corrupt them, whatever may be the powers of genius possessed by the latter, or whatever reputation his wit may have procured him. The fashion of the times, or the mutual jealousies and animosities of contemporary wits and authors, often occasion great injustice to be done to worthy men and useful writers. But time will, generally, in a great degree, remove such prejudices; and those who form an impartial estimate of the character and various productions of Blackmore, will acknowledge, that as a writer, with all his faults, he had considerable merit; that as a man, he was justly entitled to great applause. For, numerous as his enemies and opponents were, they seem to have been incapable of fixing the least imputation upon his character; and those who personally knew him spoke highly of his virtues. We think it an act of justice to endeavour to remove from a worthy man some part of that load of obloquy with which his memory has been overwhelmed. To this character, from the Biog. Britannica, we may add, that Dr. Johnson has increased the number of those liberal-minded men who have endeavoured to rescue sir Richard Blackmore’s name from the contempt with which it has been treated, and to do justice to his abilities as well as his virtues. To his “Creation” the doctor has given high praise, and has drawn the character of it with singular precision and elegance. From the inaccuracy with which Blackmore in his poems has pronounced the ancient, names of nations or places, Dr. Johnson has inferred, that the thirteen years he spent at the university, seem to have passed with very little attention to the business of the place. A strong testimony, however, to his diligence whilst at Edmund-hall, has lately been produced in the Gentleman’s Magazine, from Turner’s “Book of Providence.” “Dr. Richard Blackmore,” says Turner, “my contemporary and colleague (fellow collegian) at Oxon, now living, and one of the college in London, was, in his first years, one of the most eager and diligent students I ever knew sitting up at his book till twelve, one, two, and sometimes three o'clock in the morning, and then lying down only upon his chairs till prayer-time, till his health broke, and he was constrained by necessity to retire into the country, to repair himself by physic.”

1721, 8vo. 3. “King Alfred, in twelve books,” 1723, 8vo. 4. “History of the Conspiracy against king William the Third,” 1723, 8vo, 5. “A discourse on the Plague, with a preparatory account of malignant fevers, in two parts containing an explication of the nature of those diseases, and the methods of cure,” 1720, 8vo. 6. “A treatise on the Small-pox, in two parts and a dissertation upon the modern practice of Inoculation,” 1722, 8vo. 7. “A treatise on Consumptions and other distempers belonging to the breast and lungs,” 1724, 8vo, 8. “A treatise on the Spleen and Vapours, or hypochonclriacal and hysterical affections; with three discourses on the nature and cure of the Cholic, Melancholy, and Palsy,” 1725, 8vo. 9. “A critical dissertation upon the Spleen,” 1725. 10. “Discourses on the Gout, Rheumatism, and the King’s Evil,” 1726, 8vo. 11. “Dissertations on a Dropsy, a Tympany, the Jaundice, the Stone, and the Diabetes,” 1727, 8vo. 12. “Just prejudices against the Arian hypothesis,” 1725, 8vo. 13. “Modern Arians unmasked,” 1721, 8vo. 14. “Natural Theology, or moral Duties considered apart from positive: with some observations on the desirableness and necessity of a supernatural revelation,” 1728, 8vo. 15. “The accomplished Preacher; or, an essay upon divine eloquence,” 1731, 8vo. This last piece was published after the author’s death, in pursuance of his express order, by the rev. Mr. John White, of Nayland, in Essex who attended sir Richard during his last illness, and bore testimony to the elevated piety with which he prepared for his approaching dissolution.

, knight, and LL. D. an illustrious English lawyer, was born July 10, 1723, in Cheapside, in the parish of St. Michael-le-Querne, at the house of his father, Mr. Charles Blackstone, a silkman, and citizen and bowyer of London, who was the third son of Mr. John Blackstone, an eminent apothecary, in Newgate-street, descended from a family of that name in the west of England, at or near Salisbury. His mother was Mary, eldest daughter of Lovelace Bigg, esq. of Chilton Foliot, in Wiltshire. He was the youngest of four children, of whom, John died an infant, Charles, the eldest, and Henry, the third, were educated at Winchester-school, under the care of their uncle Dr. Bigg, warden of that society, and were afterwards both fellows of New college, Oxford. Charles became a fellow of Winchester, and rector of Wimering, in Hampshire; and Henry, after having practised physic for some years, went into holy orders, and died in 1778, rector of Adderbury, in Oxfordshire, a living in the gift of New-college. Their father died some months before the birth of the subject of this article, and their mother died before he was twelve years old. from his birth, the care both of his education and fortune was kindly undertaken by his maternal uncle, Mr. Thomas Bigg, an eminent surgeon in London, and afterwards, on the death of his eldest brothers, owner of the Chilton estate, which, if we mistake not, is still enjoyed by that family. The affectionate care of this uncle, in giving all his nephews a liberal education, supplied the great loss they had so early sustained, and compensated, in a great degree, for their want of more ample fortunes, and it was always remembered by them with the sincerest gratitude. In 1730, being about seven years of age, he was put to school at the Charter-house, and in 1735 was, by the nomination of sir Robert Walpole, on the recommendation of Charles Wither, of Hall, in Hampshire, esq, his cousin by the mother’s side, admitted upon the foundation.

In this excellent seminary he applied himself to every branch of youthful education, with the same assiduity which accompanied his studies through life. His talents and industry rendered him the favourite of his masters, who encouraged and assisted him with the utmost attention; so that at the age of fifteen he was at the head of the school, and, although so young, was thought well qualified to be removed to the university and he was accordingly entered a commoner at Pembroke college, Oxford, ISov. 30, 1738, and was the next day matriculated. At this time he was elected to one of the Charter-house exhibitions, by the governors of that foundation, to commence from the Michaelmas preceding, but was permitted to continue a scholar there till after the 12th of December, being the anniversary commemoration of the founder, to give him an opportunity of speaking the customary oration, which he had prepared, and which did him much credit. About this time, also, he obtained Mr. Benson’s gold prize medal of Milton, for verses on that poet. Thus, before he quitted school, his genius received public marks of approbation and reward; and so well pleased was the society of Pembroke college with their young pupil, that, in the February following, they unanimously elected him to one of lady Holford’s exhibitions for Charter-house scholars in that house.

Here he prosecuted his studies with unremitting ardour, and, although the classics, and particularly the Greek and Roman poets, were his favourites, they did not entirely engross his attention logic, mathematics, and the other sciences were not neglected. From the first of these, (studied rationally, abstracted from the jargon of the schools), he laid the foundation of that close method of reasoning for which he was so remarkable and from the mathematics, he not only reaped the b'iiiefit of using his mind to a close investigation of every subject that occurred to him, till he arrived at the degree of demonstration which the nature of it would admit, but converted that dry study, as it is usually thought, into an amusement, by pursuing the branch of it which relates to architecture. This science he was peculiarly fond of, and made himself so far master of it, that at the early age of twenty, he compiled a treatise entitled “Elements of Architecture,” intended for his own use only, and not for publication, but esteemed by those judges who have perused it, in no respect unworthy of his maturer judgment, and more exercised pen.

Having -determined on his future plan of life, and made choice of the law for his profession, he was entered in the Middle Temple, Nov. 20, 1741, and found it necessary to quit the more amusing pursuits of his youth for the severer studies to which he had dedicated himself, and betook himself seriously to reading law. His sensations on this occasion are admirably expressed in some verses since published in Dodsley’s poems, vol. IV. entitled “The Lawyer’s Farewell to his Muse,” in which the struggle of his mind is expressed so strongly, so naturally, with such elegance of language, and harmony of versification, as must convince every reader, that his passion for the muses was too deeply rooted to be laid aside without much reluctance and that if he had pursued that flowery path, he would not, perhaps, have proved inferior to the best of our modern poets. Several little fugitive pieces, besides this, have at times been communicated by him to his friends, and he left (but not with a view to publication) a small collection of juvenile pieces, both originals and translations, which do him no discredit, inscribed with this line, from Horace,

In November 1743, he was elected into the society of All Souls college, and in the November following, he spoke the annual speech in commemoration of archbishop Chichele, the founder, and the other benefactors to that house of learning, and was admitted actual fellow. From this period he divided his time between the university and the Temple, where he took chambers in order to attend the courts: in the former he pursued his academical studies, and, on the 12th of June 1745, commenced B.C. L.; in the latter he applied himself closely to his profession, both in the half, and in his private studies, and on the 28th of November 1746, was called to the bar.

At Oxford his active mind had more room to display itself; and being elected into the office of Bursar, soon after he had taken his degree, and finding the muniments of the college in a confused, irregular state, he undertook and completed a thorough search, and a new arrangement, from whence that society reaped great advantage. He found also, in the execution of this office, the method of keeping accounts in use among the older colleges, though very exact, yet rather tedious and perplexed; he drew up, therefore, a dissertation on the subject, in which he entered into the whole theory, and elucidated every intricacy that might occur. A copy of this tract is still preserved, for the benefit of his successors in the Bursarship. But it was not merely the estates, muniments, and accounts of the college, about which he was usefully employed during his residence in that society. The Cpdrington, library had for many years remained an unfinished building. He hastened the completion of it, rectified several mistakes in the architecture, and formed a new arrangement of the books under their respective classes.

The late duke of Wharton, who had engaged himself by bond to defray the expence of building the apartments between the library and common room, being obliged soon after to leave his country, and dying in very distressed circumstances, the discharge of this obligation was long despaired of. It happened, however, in a course of years, that his grace’s executors were enabled to pay his debts; when, by the care and activity of Mr. Blackstone, the building was completed, the college thereby enabled to make its demand, and the, whole benefaction recovered. In May 1749, as a small reward for his services, and to give him further opportunities of advancing the interests of the college, he was appointed steward of their manors and in the same year, on the resignation of his uncle Seymour Richmond, esq. he was elected recorder of the borough of Wallingford, in Berkshire, and received the king’s approbation on the 30th of May.

The 26th of April, 1750, he commenced doctor of civil law, and thereby became a member of the convocation which enabled him to extend his views beyond the narrow circle of his own society, to the general benefit of the university at large. In this year he published “An essay on Collateral Consanguinity,” relative to the claim made by such as could by a pedigree prove themselves of kin to the founder of All-Souls college, of being elected preferably to all others into that society. Those claims became now so numerous, that the college, with reason, complained of being frequently precluded from making choice of the most ingenious and deserving candidates. In this treatise, which was his first publication, he endeavoured to prove, that as the kindred to the founder, a Popish ecclesiastic, could be only collateral, the length of time elapsed since his death must, according to the rules both of the civil and canon law, have extinguished consanguinity; or that the whole race of mankind were equally founders’ kinsmen. This work, although it did not answer the end proposed, or convince the then visitor, yet did the author great credit; and shewed that he had read much, and well digested what he had read. And most probably, the arguments contained in, it had some weight with his Grace the late archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Cornwallis, when about forty years ago, on application to him, as visitor of the college, he formed a new regulation, which gives general satisfaction, by limiting the number of founder’s kin; by which the inconvenience complained of was in a great measure removed, without annihilating a claim founded on the express words of the college statutes. In forming this new regulation, his Grace made choice of Mr. Blackstone as his common-law assessor, together with 'Dr. Hay the civilian.

After having attended the courts in Westminster-hall for seven years, and finding the profits of his profession very inadequate to the expence, in the summer of 1753, he determined to retire to his fellowship and an academical life, still continuing the practice of his profession, as a provincial counsel. He had previously planned, what he now began to execute, his “Lectures on the Laws of England,” a work which has so justly signalized his name. In the ensuing Michaelmas term he entered on his new province of reading these lectures; which, even at their commencement, such were the expectations formed from the acknowledged abilities of the lecturer, were attended by a very crowded class of young men of the first families, characters, and hopes. In July, 1755, he was appointed one of the delegates of the Clarendon press. On his entering on this office, he discovered many abuses which required correction; and much mismanagement which demanded new and effectual regulations. In order to obtain a thorough insight into the nature of both, he made himself master of the mechanical part of printing and to promote and complete a reform, he printed a letter on the subject, addressed to Dr. Randolph, then vice-chancellor. This and his other endeavours produced the desired effect; and he had the pleasure of seeing, within the course of a year, the reform he had proposed, carried into execution. About a year before this, he published “An Analysis of the Laws of England,” as a guide to those gentlemen who attended his lectures, on their first introduction to that study; in which he reduced that intricate science to a clear method, intelligible to the youngest student.

In 1757, on the death of Dr. Coxed, warden of Winchester, he was elected by the surviving visitors of Michel’s new foundation in Queen’s college into that body. This new situation afforded fresh matter for his active genius; and it was chiefly by his means that this donation, which had been for some years contested, became a very valuable acquisition to the college, as well as an ornament to the university, by completing that handsome pile of building towards the High-street, which for many years had been little better than a confused heap of ruins. The engrafting a new set of fellows and scholars into an old established society could not be an easy task, and in the present instance was become more difficult, from the many unsuccessful attempts that had been made, all of which had only terminated in disputes between the members of the old and the visitors of the new foundation; yet under these circumstances Dr. Blackstone was not disheartened, but formed and pursued a plan, calculated to improve Mr. Michel’s original donation, without departing from his intention and had the pleasure to see it completed, entirely to the satisfaction of the members of the old foundation, and confirmed, together with a body of statutes he drew for the purpose, by act of parliament, in 1769.

Being engaged as counsel in the great contest for knights of the shire for the county of Oxford in 1754-, he very accurately considered a question then much agitated, whether copyholders of a certain nature had a right to vote in county elections? He afterwards reduced his thoughts on that subject into a small treatise; and was prevailed on by sir Charles Mordaunt, and other members of parliament, who had brought in a bill to decide that controverted point, to publish it in March 175H, under the title of “Considerations on Copyholders.” And the bill soon after received the sanction of the legislature, and passed into a law.

Mr. Viner having by his will left not only the copy-right of his abridgement, but other property to a considerable amount, to the university of Oxford, to found a professorship, fellowships, and scholarships of common law, he was on the 20th of October, 1758, unanimously elected Vinerian professor; and on the 25th of the same month read his first introductory lecture; one of the most elegant and admired compositions which any age or country ever produced this he published at the request of the vice-chancellor and heads of houses, and afterwards prefixed to the first volume of his Commentaries. His lectures had now gained such universal applause, that he was requested by a noble personage, who superintended the education of our present sovereign, then prince of Wales, to read them to his royal highness; but as he was at that time engaged to a numerous class of pupils in the university, he thought he could not, consistently with that engagement, comply with this request, and therefore declined it. But he transmitted copies of many of them for the perusal of his royal highness who, far from being offended at an excuse grounded on so honourable a motive, was pleased to order a handsome gratuity to be presented to him.

In 1759 he published two small pieces merely relative to the university the one entitled, “Reflections on the opinions of Messrs. Pratt, Morton, and Wilbraham, relating to lord Litch field’s Disqualification,” who was then a candidate for the chancellorship the other, “A Case for the opinioji of counsel on the right of the University to make New Statutes.”

Having now established a reputation by his lectures, which he justly thought might entitle him to some particular notice at the bar, in June 1759, he bought chambers in the Temple, resigned the office of assessor of the vicechancellor’s court, which he had held about six years, and soon after the stewardship of All-Souls college; and in Michaelmas term, 1759, resumed his attendance at Westminster, still continuing to pass some part of the year at Oxford, and to read his lectures there, at such times as did not interfere with the London terms. The year before this he declined the honour of the coif, which he was pressed to accept of by lord chief justice Willes and Mr. justice (afterwards earl) Bathurst.

In November 1759, he published a new edition of the Great Charter, and Charter of the Forest; which added much to his former reputation, not only as 'a great lawyer, but as an accurate antiquary, and an able historian. It must also be added, that the external beauties in the printing, the types, &c. reflected no small honour on him, as the principal reformer of the Clarendon press, from whence no work had ever before issued, equal in those particulars to this. This publication drew him into a short controversy with the late Dr. Lyttelton, then dean of Exeter, and afterwards bishop of Carlisle. The dean, to assist Mr. Blackstone in his publication, had favoured him with the collation of a very curious ancient roll, containing both the Great Charter, and that of the Forest, of the 9th of Henry III. which he and many of his friends judged to be an original. The editor of the Charters, however, thought otherwise, and excused himself (in a note in hjs introduction) for having made no use of its various readings, “as the plan of his edition was confined to charters which had passed the great seal, or else to authentic entries and enrolments of record, under neither of which classes the roll in question could be ranked.” The dean, upon this, concerned for the credit of his roll, presented to the Society of Antiquaries a vindication of its authenticity, dated June the 8th, 1761 and Mr. Blackstone delivered in an answer to the same learned body, dated May the 28th, 1762, alleging, as an excuse for the trouble he gave them, “that he should think himself wanting in that respect which he owed to the society, and Dr. Lyttelton, if he did not either own and correct his mistakes, in the octavo edition then preparing for the press, or subijiit to the society’s judgment the reasons at large upon which his suspicions were founded.” These reasons, we may suppose, were convincing, for here the dispute ended .

A dissolution of parliament having taken place, he was in March 1761, returned burgess for Hindon, in Wiltshire, and on the 6th of May following had a patent of precedence granted him to rank as king’s counsel, having a few months before declined the office of chief justice of the court of common pleas in Ireland.

Finding himself not deceived in his expectations in respect to an increase of business in his profession, he now determined to settle in life, and on the 5th of May, 1761, he married Sarah the eldest surviving daughter of the late James Clitherow, of Boston-house, in the county of Middlesex, esq. with whom he passed near nineteen years in the enjoyment of the purest domestic and conjugal felicity, for which no man was better calculated, and which, he used often to declare, was the happiest part of his life by her he had nine children, the eldest and youngest of whom died infants seven survived him viz. Henry, James, William, Charles, Sarah, Mary, and Philippa the eldest not much above the age of 16 at his death.

His marriage having vacated his fellowship at All- Souls, he was, on the 28th of July 1761, appointed by the earl of Westmoreland, at that time chancellor of Oxford, principal of New-inn hall. This was ah agreeable residence during the time his lectures required him to be in Oxford, and was attended with this additional pleasing circumstance, that it gave him rank, as the head of an house in the university, and enabled him, by that means, to continue to promote whatever occurred to him, that might be useful and beneficial to that learned body. An attempt being made about this time to restrain the power given him, as professor, by the Vinerian statutes, to nominate a deputy to read the solemn lectures, he published a state of the case for the perusal of the members of convocation upon which it was dropped.

In the following year, 1762, he collected and republished several of his pieces, under the title of “Law Tracts,” in 2 vols. 8vo. In 1763, on the establishment of the queen’s family, Mr. Blackstone was appointed solicitor general to her majesty, and was chosen about the same time a bencher of the Middle Temple.

Many imperfect and incorrect copies of his lectures having by this time got abroad, and a pirated edition of them being either published, or preparing for publication in Ireland, he found himself under the necessity of printing a correct edition himself; and in November, 1765, published the first volume, under the title of “Commentaries on the Laws of England,” and in the course of the four succeeding years the other three volumes, which completed a work that will transmit his name to posterity among the first class of English authors, and will be universally read and admired, as long as the laws, the constitution, and the language of this country remain. Two circumstances respecting this great work, omitted by his biographer, we are enabled to add from unquestionable authority. So anxious was he that this work should appear with every possible advantage, that he printed three copies of the first volume, which he sent to three learned friends, for their opinion. The other circumstance does honour to his liberality. After reserving the copy-right in his own hands for some years, he disposed of it to Messrs. Strahan and Cadell for a considerable sum, but as, immediately after concluding the bargain, the decision passed the house of lords, which depreciated literary property, he offered Messrs. Strahan and Cadell, to cancel the agreement, and substitute another, by which he thought they would be less injured. These gentlemen, however, met his proposition with a corresponding liberality, and the original bargain stood; and every reader will be glad to hear thatthey were no losers, the work soon becoming, and yet remaining, in every sense, an English classic.

In 1766, he resigned, the Vinerian professorship, and the principality of New-inn hall finding he could not discharge the personal duties of the former, consistently with his professional attendance in London, or the delicacy of his feelings as an honest man. Thus was he detached from Oxford, to the inexpressible loss of that university, and the great regret of all those who wished well to the establishment of the study of the law therein. When he first turned his views towards the Vinerian professorship, he had formed a design of settling in Oxford for life he had flattered himself, that by annexing the office of professor to the principality of one of the halls (and perhaps converting it into a college), and placing Mr. Viner’s fellows and scholars under their professor, a society might be established for students of the common law, -similar to that of Trinity hall in Cambridge for civilians. Mr. Viner’s will very much favoured this plan. He leaves to the university “all his personal estate, books, &c. for the constituting, establishing, and endowing one or more fellowship or fellowships, and scholarship or scholarships, in any college or hall in the said university, as to the convocation shall be thought most proper for students of the common law.” But notwithstanding this plain direction to establish them in some college or hall, the clause from the delegates which ratified this designation, had the fate to be rejected by a negative in convocation.

In the new parliament chosen in 1768 he was returned burgess for Westbury in Wiltshire. In the course of this parliament, the question, “W 7 hether a member expelled was, or was not, eligible in the same parliament,” was frequently agitated in the house with much warmth and what fell from him in a debate being deemed by some persons contradictory to what he had advanced on the same subject in his Commentaries, he was attacked with much asperity, in a pamphlet supposed to be written by a baronet, a member of that house. To this charge he gave an early reply in print. In the same year, Dr. Priestley animadverted on some positions in the same work, relative to offences against the doctrine of the established church, to which he published an answer.

Mr. Blackstone’s reputation as a great andable lawyer was now so thoroughly established, that had he been possessed of a constitution equal to the fatigues attending the most extensive business of the profession, he might probably have obtained its most lucrative emoluments and highest offices. The offer of the solicitor generalship, on the resignation of Mr. Dunning, in Jan. 1770, opened the most flattering prospects to his view. But the attendance on its complicated duties at the bar, and in the house of commons, induced him to refuse it. But though he declined this path, which so certainly, with abilities like Mr. Blackstone’s, leads to the highest dignities in the law, yet he readily accepted the office of judge of the common pleas, when offered to him on the resignation of Mr. Justice Clive; to which he was appointed on the 9th of February 1770. Previous however to the passing his patent, Mr. Justice Yates expressed an earnest wish to remove from the king’s bench to the court of common pleas. To this wish Mr. Blackstone, from motives of personal esteem, consented but on his death, which happened between the ensuing Easter and Trinity terms, Mr. Blackstone was appointed to his original destination in the common pleas; and on his promotion to the bench, he resigned the recordership of Wallingford.

He seemed now arrived at the point he always wished for, and might justly be said to enjoy “otium cum dignitate.” Freed from the attendance at the bar, and what he had still a greater aversion to, in the senate, “where (to use his own expression) amid the rage of contending parties, a man of moderation must expect to meet with no quarter from any side,” although he diligently and conscientiously atcended the duties of the high office he was now placed in, yet the leisure afforded by the legal vacations he dedicated to the private duties of life, which, as the father of a numerous family, he now found himself called upon to exercise, or to literary retirement, and the society of his friends, at his villa, called Priory-place, in Wallingford which he purchased soon after his marriage, though he had for some years before occasionally resided at it. His connection with this town, both from his office of recorder, and his more or less frequent residence there, 'from about 1750, led him to form and promote every plan which could contribute to its benefit or improvement. To his activity it stands indebted for two new turnpike roads through the town; the one opening a communication, by means of a new bridge over the Thames at Shillingford, between Oxford and Reading the other to Wantage through the vale of Berkshire. He was indeed always a great promoter of the improvement of public roads: the new western road over Botley Causeway was projected, and the plan of it entirely conducted by him. He was the more earnest in this design, not merely as a work of general utility and ornament, but as a solid improvement to the estate of a nobleman, in settling whose affairs he had been most laboriously and beneficially employed. To his architectural talents, also, his liberal disposition, his judicious zeal, and his numerous friends, Wallingford owes the rebuilding that handsome fabric, St. Peter’s church. These were his employments in retirement; in London his active mind was never idle, and when not occupied in the duties of his station, he was ever engaged in some scheme of publifc utility. The last of this kind in which, he was concerned, was the act of parliament for providing detached houses of hard labour for convicts, as a substitute for transportation. Of this scheme we have just given some account in the life of Blackburn the architect. It has been put in practice in several counties, but the question as to the beneficial effects of solitary confinement, although frequently agitated, has not been so completely decided as to obviate many objections which have been lately offered.

It ought not to be omitted, that the last augmentation of the judges’ salaries, calculated to make up the deficiencies occasioned by the heavy taxes they are subject to, and thereby render them more independent, was obtained in a great measure by his industry and attention.

In this useful and agreeable manner he passed the last ten years of his life; but not without many interruptions Ly illness. His constitution, hurt by the studious midnight labours of his younger days, and an unhappy aversion he always had to exercise, grew daily worse not only the gout, with which he was frequently, though not very severely, visited from 1759, but a nervous disorder also, that frequently brought on a giddiness or vertigo, added to a corpulency of body, rendered him still more unactive than, he used to be, and contributed to the breaking up of his constitution at an early period of life. About Christmas 1779 he was seized with a violent shortness of breath, which the faculty apprehended was occasioned by a dropsical habit, and water on the chest. By the application of proper remedies that effect of his disorder was soon removed, but the cause was not eradicated for on his coming up to town to attend Hilary term, he was seized with afresh attack, chiefly in his head, which brought on a drowsiness and stupor, and baffled all the art of medicine the disorder increasing so rapidly, that he became at last for some days almost totally insensible, and expired on the 14th of Feb. 1780, in the fifty-sixth year of his age.

A few weeks before he died, he was applied to by the trustees for executing the will of the late sir George Downing, bart. who had bequeathed a large estate for the endowing a new college in Cambridge, to give his assistance in forming a proper plan for this society, and framing a body of statutes for its regulation. This was a task to which his abilities were peculiarly adapted and it may be difficult to determine, whether the application reflected more, honour on the trustees, or on him. He had mentioned to some of his most intimate friends, his undertaking this business with great pleasure, and seemed to promise himself much satisfaction in the amusement it would afford him but, alas his disorder was then coming on with such hasty strides, that before any thing could be done in it, death put an end to this and all his labours, and left the university of Cambridge, as well as that of Oxford, to lament the loss of Mr. Justice Blackstone. He was buried, by his own direction, in a vault he had built for his family, inliis parish church of St. Peter’s in Wallingford. His neighbour And friend Dr. Barrington, bishop of Landaff, now of Durham, at his own particular request, performed the funeral service, as a public testimony of his personal regard and highest esteem.

In his public line of life he approved himself an able; upright, impartial judge perfectly acquainted with the laws of the country, and making them the invariable rule of his conduct. As a senator, he was averse to party violence, and moderate in his sentiments. Not only in parliament, but at all times, and on all occasions, he was a firm supporter of the true principles of our happy constitution in church and state on the real merits of which few men were so well qualified to decide. He was ever an active and judicious promoter of whatever he thought useful or advantageous to the public in general, or to any particular society or neighbourhood he was connected with; and having not only a sound judgment, but the clearest ideas, and the most analytical head that any man, perhaps, was ever blessed with; these qualifications, joined to an unremitting perseverance in pursuing whatever he thought right, enabled him to cany many beneficial plans into execution, which probably would have failed, if they had been attempted by other men.

He was a believer in the great truths of Christianity, from a thorough investigation of its evidence: attached to the church of England from conviction of its excellence, his principles were those of its genuine members, enlarged and tolerant. His religion was pure and unaffected, and his attendance on its public duties regular, and those duties always performed with seriousness and devotion.

His professional abilities need not be dwelt upon. They will be universally acknowledged and admired, as long as his works shall be read, or, in other words, as long as the municipal laws of this country shall remain an object of study and practice and though his works will only hold forth to future generations his knowledge of the law, and his talents as a writer, there was hardly any branch of literature he was unacquainted with. He ever employed much time in reading, and whatever he had read and once digested, he never forgot. He was an excellent manager of his time and although so much of it was spent in an application to books, and the employment of his pen, yet this was done without the parade or ostentation of being a hard student. It was observed of him, during his residence at college, that his studies never appeared to break in upon the common business of life, or the innocent amusements of society; for the latter of which few men were better calculated, being possessed of the happy faculty of making iis own company agreeable and instructive, whilst he enjoyed, without reserve, the society of others. Melancthon himself could not have been more rigid in observing the hour and minute of an appointment. During the years in which he read his lectures at Oxford, it could not be remembered that he had ever kept his audience waiting for him, even for a few minutes. As he valued his own time, he was extremely careful not to be instrumental in squandering or trifling away that of others, who, he hoped, might have as much regard for theirs, as he had for his. Indeed, punctuality was in his opinion so much a virtue, that he could not bring himself to think favourably of any who were notoriously defective in it.

The virtues of his private character, less conspicuous in their nature, and consequently less generally known, endeared him to those he was more intimately connected with, and who saw him in the more retired scenes of life. He was, notwithstanding his contracted brow (owing in a great measure to his being very near-sighted), a cheerful, agreeable, and facetious companion. He was a faithful friend, an affectionate husband and parent, and a charitable benefactor to the poor *, possessed of generosity, without affectation, bounded by prudence and ceconomy. The constant accurate knowledge he had of his income and expences (the consequence of uncommon regularity in his accounts) enabled him. to avoid the opposite extremes of meanness and profusion.

Being himself strict in the exercise of every public and private duty, he expected the same attention to both in others and, when disappointed in his expectations, was apt to animadvert with some degree of severity on those who, in his estimate of duty, seemed to deserve it. This rigid sense of obligation, added to a certain irritability of temper, derived from nature, and increased in his latter years by a strong nervous affection, together with his countenance and figure, conveyed an idea of sternness, which occasioned the unmerited imputation, among those who did not know him, of ill-nature but he had a heart as benevolent and as feeling as man ever possessed. A natural reserve and diffidence which accompanied him from his earliest youth, and which he could never shake off, appeared to a casual observer, though it was only appearance, like pride especially after he became a judge, when he thought it his duty to keep strictly up to forms (which, as he was wont to observe, are now too much laid aside), and not to lessen the respect due to the dignity and gravity of his office, by any outward levity of behaviour.

For this excellent memoir of Judge Blackstone, we are indebted to the Preface prefixed to his “Reports,” 1780, 2 vols. folio, written by James Clitherow, esq. his brother-­in-law. For its length no apology can be necessary, for Blackstone may justly be ranked among the illustrious characters of the eighteenth century, and as possessing a claim to permanent reputation which it will not be easy to lessen. It was not long after his death, before the sons of Oxford paid the honours due to the memory of so eminent a scholar and benefactor. In 1781, a portrait was presented to the picture-gallery, by R. Woodeson, D. C. L. professor; T. Milles, B. C. L.; T. Plumer, A. M.; and H. Addington, A. M. (now lord Sidmouth), scholars upon Viuer’s foundation: and in 1784, by the liberality of Dr. Buckler, and a few other members of All Souls, a beautiful statue, by Bacon, was erected in the hall of that college, and may be considered as one of its most striking ornaments. His arms are likewise in one of the north windows of the elegant chapel of All Souls.

, a native of Derbyshire, born in 1674, was admitted sizer in Emannel college, Cambridge, Sept. 13, 1690; proceeded B. A. in 1694, and went out M. A. 1698. He was appointed head master of the free-school at Derby, and lecturer of All-hallows there, where in 1706 he distinguished himself in the literary world by “Theognidis Megarensis sententise morales, nova Latina versione, notis et emendationibus, explanatæ et exornatae una cum variis lectionibus, &c.” 8vo. Whilst at Derby he also published “An Introduction to the Classics containing a short discourse on their excellences, and directions how to study them to advantage with an essay on the nature and use of those emphatical and beautiful figures which give strength and ornament to writing,” 1718, 12mo; in which he displayed the beauties of those admirable writers of antiquity, in a very instructive, concise, and clear manner. In 1722 he was appointed head master of the free-school at Market-Bosworth in Leicestershire and in 1725 appeared, in quarto, his greatest and most celebrated work, “The Sacred Classics defended and illustrated.” A second volume (completed but a few weeks before his death) was published in 1731, under the title of “The Sacred Classics defended and illustrated. The second and last volume.” To this volume was prefixed a portrait of the author by Vertue, from an original painting. Both volumes were reprinted in 4to, Lipsix, 1736. In many respects this is a work of great merit. It displays a fund of genuine learning, and contains a number of useful and important observations. In a great variety of instances it is shewn, that several of the words and phrases in the New Testament which have been condemned as barbarous, are to be found in Greek writers of the best reputation. But it is the opinion of some judicious critics, that he has not succeeded in proving the general purity and elegance of language in which the evangelists and apostles wrote. Among these Dr. Campbell appears to be Mr. Blackwall’s most formidable adversary, in his “Four Gospels translated from the Greek,” 4to edit. vol. I. p. 13 17.

Mr. Blackwall, in his seminaries at Derby and Bosworth, had the felicity of bringing up a number of excellent scholars besides Mr. Dawes. Among these was sir Henry Atkins, bart. who, being patron of the church of Clapharn. in Surrey, as a mark of his gratitude and esteem, presented our author, on the 12th of October, 1726, to that rectory, which was then supposed to be worth three hundred pounds a year. The grammar which Mr. Blackwall made use of, for the purpose of initiating the young people under his care into the knowledge of the Latin tongue, was of his own composition; and it was considered as so well adapted to that end, that he was prevailed upon to publish it in 1728. Such, however, was his modesty, that it would not permit him to fix his name to it, because he would not be thought to prescribe to other instructors of youth. The title of it is, “A 'New Latin Grammar; being a short, clear, and easy introduction of young scholars to the knowlege of the Latin tongue containing an exact account of the two first parts of grammar.” It is probable, that Mr. Blackwall’s situation at Clapham did not altogether suit his disposition; for, early in 1729, he resigned the rectory of that place, and retired to Market- Bosworth, where his abilities and convivial turn of mind rendered him generally respected. At the school-house of this town he died, ou the 8th of April, 1730. He left behind him two children, a son and a daughter. The son was an attorney at StokeGolding, in the neighbourhood of Bosworth, where he died July 5, 1763; and the daughter was married to a Mr. Pickering.

, an ingenious lady, to whom physic was indebted for the most complete set of figures of the medicinal plants, was the daughter of a merchant of Aberdeen, and born, probably about the beginning of the last century. Her husband, Dr. Alexander Blackwell (brother of Dr. Thomas, the subject of our next article) received an university education, and was early distinguished for his classical knowledge. By some he is said only to have assumed the title of doctor after his successful attendance on the king of Sweden, but the other report is more probable, that when he had regularly studied medicine, he took his degree at Leyden under Boerhaave. Having failed in his attempt to introduce himself into practice, first in Scotland, and afterwards in London, he became corrector of the press for Mr. Wilkins, a printer. After some years spent in this employment, he set up as a printer himself, and carried on several large works, till 1734, when he became bankrupt. To relieve his distresses, Mrs. Blackwell, having a genius for drawing and painting, exerted all her talents: and, understanding that an herbal of medicinal plants was greatly wanted, she exhibited to sir Hans Sloane, Dr. Mead, and other physicians, some specimens of her art in painting plants, who approved so highly of them as to encourage her to prosecute a work, by the profits of which she is said to have procured her husband’s liberty, after a confinement of two years.

Mr. Rand, an eminent apothecary, was at that time demonstrator to the company of apothecaries, in the garden at Chelsea, and by his advice she took up her residence opposite the physic garden, in order to facilitate her design, by receiving the plants as fresh as possible. He not only promoted her work with the public, but, together with Mr. Philip Miller, afforded her all possible direction and assistance in the execution of it. After she had completed the drawings, she engraved them on copper, and coloured the prints with her own hands. During her abode at Chelsea, she was frequently visited by persons of quality, and many scientific people who admired her performances, and patronized her undertaking. On publishing the first volume in 1737, she obtained a recommendation from Dr. Mead, Dr. Sherard, Mr. Rand, and others, to be prefixed to it. And being allowed to present, in person, a copy to the college of physicians, that body made her a present, and gave her a public testimonial of their approbation; with leave to prefix it to her book. The second volume was finished in 1739, and the whole published under the title, “A curious Herbal, containing 500 cuts of the most useful plants whicih are now used in the practice of physic, engraved on folio copperplates, after drawings taken from the life. By Elizabeth Blackwell. To which is added, a short description of the plants, and their common uses in physic,” 2 vols. fo!.

This ill-fated man, after his failure in physic and in printing, became an unsuccessful candidate for the place of secretary to the society for the encouragement of learning. He was then made saperintendant of the works belonging to the duke of Chandos at Cannons, and experienced those disappointments incident to projectors. He also formed schemes in agriculture, and wrote a treatise on the subject, which, we are told, was the cause of his being engaged in Sweden. In that kingdom he drained marshes, practised physic, and was even employed in that capacity for the king. At length he was involved in some state cabals, or, as some accounts inform us, in a plot with count Tessin, and was put to the torture, which not producing a confession, he was beheaded, Aug. 9, 1747. The British ambassador was recalled from Sweden in the same year, among other reasons, for the imputations thrown on his Britannic majesty in the trial' of Dr. Blackwell. Soon after this event, appeared “A genuine copy of a Letter from a merchant in Stockholm, to his correspondent in London, containing an impartial account of Dr. Alexander Blackwell, his plot, trial, character, and behaviour, both under examination and at the place of execution, together with a copy of a paper delivered to a friend upon the scaffold,” in which he denied the crime imputed to him. When Mrs. Blackwell died does not appear. An improved edition of her Herbal was published by Trew, the text in Latin and German, Nuremberg, 1750 1760, fol. and at Leipsic was published in 1794, 8vo, “Nomenclator Linnaeanus in Blackvellianum Herbarium per C. G. Greening,” a proof of the estimation in which this work is still held on the continent.

, an ingenious and very learned writer of the last century, was born August 4, 1701, in the city of Aberdeen. His father, the rev. Mr. Thomas Blackwell, was minister of Paisley in Renfrewshire, from whence he was removed in 1700 to be one of the ministers of Aberdeen. He was afterwards elected professor of divinity in the Marischal college of that city, and in 1717 was presented by his majesty to be principal of the college, in both which offices he continued until his death in 1728. His mother’s name was Johnston, of a good family near Glasgow, and sister to Dr. Johnston, who was many years professor of medicine in the university of Glasgow. Our author received his grammatical education at the grammarschool of Aberdeen, studied Greek and philosophy in the Marischal college there, and took the degree of master of arts in 1718; which, as he was at that time only seventeen years of age, must be regarded as a considerable testimony of his early proficiency in literature. A farther proof of it was his being presented, on the 28th of November 1723, by his majesty king George the First, to the professorship of Greek, in the college in which he had been educated. He was admitted into this office on the 13th of December in the same year; and after that continued to teach the Greek language with great applause. His knowledge of that language was accurate and extensive, and his manner of communicating it perspicuous and engaging. He had a dignity of address which commanded the attention of the students, a steadiness in exacting the prescribed exercises which enforced application, and an enthusiasm for the beauties of the ancients, and utility of classical learning, which excited an ardour of study, and contributed much to diffuse a spirit for Grecian erudition far superior to what had taken place before he was called to the professorship. Together with his lessons in the Greek tongue, he gave, likewise, lessons on some of the Latin classics, chiefly with a view to infuse a relish for their beauties. To his zeal and diligence in discharging the duties of his station, it is probable that the world was, in part, indebted for such men as Campbell, Gerard, Reid, Beattie, Duncan, and the Fordyces, who have appeared with so much eminence in the republic of letters. When the celebrated Dr. Berkeley was engaged in the scheme of establishing an American university in the Summer Islands, Mr. Blackwell was in treaty with him for going out as one of his young professors; but the negociation did not take effect. In 1735 was published at London, in octavo, without the name of the bookseller, and without his own name, our author’s “Enquiry into the Life and Writings of Homer” a work, the great ingenuity and learning of which will be acknowledged by all who have perused it. It was embellished with plates, designed by Gravelot, and executed by different engravers. This we apprehend to be the most esteemed, and it is, in our opinion, the most valuable, of Mr. Blackwell’s performances. The second edition appeared in 1736; and, not long after, he published “Proofs of the Enquiry into Homer’s Life and Writings, translated into English being a key to the Enquiry with a curious frontispiece.” This was a translation of the numerous Greek, Latin, Spanish, Italian and French notes which had been subjoined to the original work. In 1748, came out, in London, “Letters concerning Mythology,” in a large octavo, but without the bookseller (Andrew Millar’s) name. On the 7th of October, in the same year, our author was appointed by his late majesty, George II. to be principal of the Marischal college in Aberdeen, and was admitted to the office on the 9th of November following. He continued, also, professor of Greek till his death. He is the only layman ever appointed principal of that college, since the patronage came to the crown, by the forfeiture of the Marischal family in 1716 all the other principals having been ministers of the established church of Scotland. When Robert and Andrew Foulis, printers at Glasgow, intended to publish an edition of Plato, Mr. Blackwell proposed to furnish them with several critical notes for it, together with an account of Plato’s Life and Philosophy but the printers not acceding to the terms which he demanded for this assistance, he promised, by a Latin advertisement in 1751, himself to give an edition of Plato. His design, however, was not carried into execution nor did it appear, from any thing found among his papers after his death, that he had made any considerable progress in the undertaking. On the 3d of March, 1752, he took the degree of doctor of Laws. In the following year, appeared the first volume of his “Memoirs of the Court of Augustus,” in 4to. The second volume came out in 1755 and the third, which was posthumous, and left incomplete by the author, was prepared for the press by John Mills, esq. and published in 1764. At the same time, was published the third edition of the two former volumes. This is a proof of the good reception the work met with from the public, though it must be acknowledged that the parade with which it was written, and the peculiarity of the language, exposed it to some severity of censure, particularly to a most acute, and in some respects humourous, criticism by Dr. Johnson, written for the Literary Magazine, and now inserted in Johnson’s works. It cannot be denied that there is a considerable degree of affectation in Dr. Blackwell’s style and manner of composition and, unhappily, this affectation increased in him as he advanced in years. His “Enquiry into the Life of Homer” was not free from it it was still more discernible in his “Letters concerning Mythology” and was most of all apparent in his “Memoirs of the Court of Augustus.” We perceive in his various productions a mixture of pedantry but it is not the sober dull pedantry of the merely recluse scholar. In Dr. Blackwell it assumes a higher form. Together with the display of his erudition, he is ambitious of talking like a man who is not a little acquainted with the world. He is often speaking of life and action, of men and manners; and aims at writing with the freedom and politeness of one who has been much conversant with the public. But; in this he is unsuccessful: for though he was not destitute of genius or fancy, and had a high relish for the beauties of the ancient authors, he never attained that simplicity of taste, which leads to true ease and elegance in composition. It is probable, also, that, like many others at that time, he might be seduced by an injudicious imitation of lord Shaftesbury; a writer, whose faults have been found more easily attainable than his excellences.

Soon after Dr. Blackwell became principal of his college he married Barbara Black, the daughter of a merchant of Aberdeen, by whom he had no children, and who survived him so late as 1793. Several years before his death, his health began to decline so that he was obliged to employ an assistant for teaching his Greek class. His disorder was of the consumptive kind, and it was thought to be increased by the excess of abstemiousness which he imposed on himself and, in which, notwithstanding all the remonstrances of his physicians, he obstinately persisted, from an opinion of his own knowledge of his constitution, and of what he found by experience to suit it best. His disease increasing, he was advised to travel; and accordingly, in February 1757, he set out from Aberdeen, but was able to go no farther than Edinburgh, in which city he died, on the 8th of March following, in the fifty-sixth year of his age. Dr. Blackwell enjoyed an equable flow of temper, in which his intimate friends scarcely ever observed any variation. This he maintained during his whole illness. The day before he set out from Aberdeen, he desired to meet with all the professors of the college, and spent two hours with them with his usual vivacity. In Edinburgh he was visited, at his own desire, by Dr. Wallace, one of the ministers of that city, whose ingenuity and learning are well known. Dr. Blackwell, on the very day in which he died, wrote letters to several of his friends, and took leave of them with the greatest chee. fulness. In the April following our author’s decease, it being Dr. Gerard’s business, as (at that time) professor of moral philosophy and logic in the Marischal college, to preside at conferring the degree of master of arts on those whose standing entitled them to it, the doctor took that occasion to pronounce publicly, on the late principal, such an encomium as his literature deserved. It was a fault in Dr. Blackwell, that he too much assumed the appearance of universal knowledge; the consequence of which was that he sometimes laid himself open, by entering on subjects of philosophy and mathematics, without a sufficient acquaintance with them. With all the ancient, and with most of the modern languages, he was really acquainted and his reading, in the departments of history and the belles lettres, was very extensive. He had a ready and lively manner of introducing his knowledge of this kind, which made his conversation both instructive and entertaining and it was rendered still more so by being accompanied with great good humour, and an entire command of his passions, even when he was provoked. Though he had something of the stiffness of the recluse, he joined with it much of the confidence and good breeding that are found in men who converse much in the world. His life was private and studious: he did not wholly decline mixed companies, though it was but seldom that he came into them and at home he chose only the conversation of the learned, or that of persons of superior rank or fortune. At London he was known to several men of eminence. The late duke of Newcastle, and Mr. Henry Pelham, were his patrons, and procured for him the office of principal of the Marischal college. It is confidently said that they had intended him an establishment at Cambridge, and that the professorship of modern history was fixed upon for him, if he had not died a short time before it became vacant. A man of Dr. Blackwell’s abilities and reputation could not fail of having some valuable literary connexions and correspondents; among whom he had the honour of numbering the late celebrated Dr. Mead, and the no less celebrated Dr. Warburton, bishop of Gloucester. It is said that Mr. Blackwell, soon after the publication of his Enquiry, being at Cambridge, paid a visit to Dr. Bentley, and the discourse turning upon the book, the doctor, being asked his opinion of it, answered, “That when he had gone through half of it, he had forgotten the beginning; and that, when he had finished the reading of it, he had forgotten the whole.” Whatever truth is in this story, it is certain, at least, that a similar objection had been started by others, if not by Dr. Bentley.

In the first volume of the Archaeologia is a letter, written in 1748, by Dr. Blackwell, to Mr. Ames, containing an explanation of a Greek inscription, on a white marble, found in the isle of Tasso, near the coast of Romania, by captain Joseph Hales, in 1728. As Dr. Blackwell was singular in his style and sentiments, he likewise imbibed some religious opinions, little known at that time in the bosom of the Calvinistic church of Scotland. He was so much a Socinian, that he never read ttie first chapter of St. John in his class, but always began with the second. This on one occasion gave rise to a foolish report respecting his knowledge of Greek, which we shall have occasion to notice in the life of Dv. Gregory Sharpe. His widow, who, as alreadynoticed, died in 1793, bequeathed her estates partly to found a chemical professorship in the college over which her husband had so long presided, and partly for a premium for an English essay, and for the augmentation of the professors’ salaries.

, a learned English writer of the church of Rome, in the beginning of the seventeenth century, was born in the county of Middlesex, and admitted a scholar of Trinity college in Oxford at seventeen years of age, May 27, 1562, probationer in 1565, being then bachelor of arts, perpetual fellow the year following, and master of arts in 1567. But being more inclined to the Roman catholic than the Protestant religion, he left his fellowship, and retired to Gloucester hall, where he continued for some time, and was highly esteemed by Edmund Rainolds and Thomas Allen, two learned seniors of that hall. He afterwards went beyond sea, and spent some time in one of the English seminaries newly erected to receive the exiled English catholics andwas at last in 1598, with the permission of pope Clement VIII. constituted by Henry cardinal Cajetan, protector of the English nation at Rome, and superior of the English clergy, with the authority and name of Archpriest of England, and was appointed by that pope notary of the apostolic see. This affair being resented by the English catholic clergy, especially as they imagined that our author was absolutely under the influence of Henry Garnet, provincial of the Jesuits of England, it occasioned a warm contest between them in England. The Jesuits wrote and spoke against the secular priests in so virulent a manner, as to detract very much from BlackwelPs authority who upon this degraded them of their faculties, so that when they afterwards appealed to the pope, he caused them to be declared in a book schismatics and heretics. They vindicated themselves from this charge, and procured the censure“of the university of Paris in their favour; which was answered by our author. He also declared his abhorrence of the Powder Plot in 1605, and wrote two letters to dissuade the Roman catholics from all violent practices against the king and government. He held the office of archpriest till 1607, when he was succeeded by George Birket. The reason of this change was, because our author having been seized at London June 24 the same year, he was committed to prison, and consequently deprived of the liberty required to act in his office. He was released soon after upon his taking the oath of allegiance. An account of this aft'air was published at London, 1607, in 4to, entitled” The examination of George Blackwell, upon occasion of his answering a letter sent by cardinal Bellarmine, who blamed him for taking the oath of allegiance." He died suddenly January 12, 1612-3, and was buried, as Mr. Wood supposes, in some church in London. He was esteemed by those of his own persuasion, and by others likewise, a man of great learning and piety, and a good preacher.

He was the author of “A letter to cardinal Cajetane io. commendation of the English Jesuits,” written in 1596. “Answers upon sundry examinations whilst he was a prisoner,” London, 1607, 4to. “Approbation of the Oath of Allegiance letters to the Romish priests touching the lawfulness of taking the Oath of Allegiance,” and another to the same purpose, all of which were printed with the “Answers upon sundry examinations,” &c. “Epistolae ad Anglos Pontificios,” London, 1609, 4to. “Epistolae ad Robertum cardinalem Bellarminum.” See the third volume of the Collections of Melchior Goldast, Francfort, 1613, fol. “Answer to the Censure of Paris in suspending the secular priests obedience to his authority,” dated May the 29th, 1600. This was replied to by John Dorel, or Darrel, dean of Agen the same year. “A treatise against lying and fraudulent dissimulations,” in manuscript, among those given to the Bodleian library by archbishop Laud. At the end of it is the approbation of the book written by Blackwell, and recommended by him as fit for the press; so that no other name being put to it, it has been ascribed to him whereas it is more justly supposed to have been written by Francis Tresham, esq. an English Catholic.

, professor of civil law at Poictiers, was born at Dumfermling, in Scotland, in 1539, descended of an ancient family. He was left an orphan in the tenth year of his age, and was sent by his uncle, the bishop of Orkney, to the university of Paris. On his uncle’s death, by which he seems to have lost the means of being able to remain at Paris, he returned to Scotland, but finding no encouragement there, he went again to Paris, where, by the liberality of Mary, queen of Scotland, he was enabled to pursue his studies in philosophy, mathematics, and the oriental languages. He then went to the university of Tholouse, where he studied civil law for two years and having obtained the patronage of Beaton, archbishop of Glasgow, he was chosen by the parliament of Poictiers one of their counsellors, and afterwards professor of civil law. He died in 1623, and was interred at Poictiers in St. Porcharius church, near his brother George. As a writer, he was chiefly known for his vindication of his royal mistress, when put to death by queen Elizabeth, written with all that bitterness of resentment which is natural for a man of spirit to feel, who, by an act of flagrant injustice, was deprived of his mistress and his sovereign, his friend and his benefactress. He addresses himself, in a vehement strain of passion, to all the princes of Europe, to avenge her death; declaring, that they are unworthy of royalty, if they are not roused on so interesting and pressing an occasion. He laboured hard to prove that Henry VIII.' s marriage with Anne Bolen was incestuous a calumny too gross to merit a formal refutation. This work was entitled “Martyre de Maria Stuart Reyne d'Escosse,” Antwerp, 1588, 8vo. His other works were, 1. “Adversus G. Buchanani Dialogum de Jure Ilegni apud Scotos, pro regibus apologia,” Pict. 1580, 8vo. 2. “De Vinculo Religionis et Imperii,” Paris, 1575, 8vo. 3. “Sanctarum precationum prsemia,” a manual of devotions, Pict. 1598, 8vo. 4. “Varii generis poemata,” ibid. 1609, 8vo. 5. “Jacobi I. Magnse Britanniae inauguratio,” Paris, 1606, 4to. These and some other pieces by him, were collected and published, with a life, by Gabriel Naudeus, 1644, 4to.

, another brother of the preceding, was born probably about 1526, at Dumfermling in Fifeshire, and educated at St. Andrew’s. He was also sent by his uncle, the bishop of Orkney, to Paris, where in 1551, he taught philosophy. He afterwards applied himself to the study of physic, became a member of the college of physicians, and was finally honoured with the dignity of clean of the faculty, a place of considerable importance in the college of Paris. He was also appointed physician to the duke de Longueville, with a salary of 20O pistoles. During the plague at Paris, he had the resolute humanity to continue in that city, much to his own honour, and the consolation of the people. He is supposed to have died in 16 J 3, or 1614. He wrote several medical and philosophical treatises, of which we only know of two that were printed 1. “Hippocratis quaedam cum Mss. collata,” Paris, 1625, and 2. “Questio Medica, an visceribus nutritiis aestuantibus aquarum metal licarum potus salubris” ibid. 4to. He had a son of both his names, likewise a physician of eminence, of whom Moreri gives a short account.

, of Albro'-hatch, in the county of Essex, was early in life an officer in the army, bearing the commission of lieutenant-colonel in queen Anne’s reign, under the great duke of Marlborough. In 1714, he was made comptroller of the. Mint, and in 1717, one of the lords commissioners of trade and plantations. In the same year he was appointed envoy extraordinary to the court of Spain, but declined it, and retained the office he held until his death, Feb. 14, 1746. He satin the fifth, sixth, and seventh parliaments of Great Britain for Stockbridge, in the eighth for Maiden, and in the ninth for Portsmouth. Coxeter hints that he was secretary of state for Ireland, but this is doubtful. He wrote two very indifferent dramatic pieces, “Orpheus and Euridice,” and “Solon” which were printed in 1705, 4to, without his consent. He is best known, however, by his translation of Caesar’s Commentaries, which he dedicated to the duke of Marlborough. This book was in some estimation formerly, and Mr. Bowyer appears to have assisted in correcting it. He was buried in Stepney church, with a very handsome inscription to his memory. Pope introduces him in the Uunciad as a gamester, for what reason cannot now be ascertained. He was uncle to Collins the celebrated poet, to whom he left an estate, which poor Collins did not get possession of till his faculties were deranged, and he could not enjoy it.

, an eminent printer, and publisher of geographical maps and charts, was born at Amsterdam in 1571, and died there in 1638. He was the scholar and friend of Tycho-Brahe, and applied himself, besides his particular art, to the study of geography and astronomy. When he had formed the design of his celebrated “Atlas,” he gave liberal prices to the most experienced geographers and draughtsmen for original maps, which he procured to be engraved with great care, and all the elegance which the state of the arts in his time could admit. Eager, however, as he was to render this work perfect, as he was obliged to trust to the incomplete and dubious relations of travellers, the work is now valued chierly as a beautiful specimen of engraving, and bears a considerable price, especially when coloured. It was entitled the “Grand Atlas geographique,” or “Theatrum Mundi” and including the celestial and hydrographical maps, forms 14 vols. fol. 1663 67, very little of it having been published in his life-time, but. the whole completed by his sons. He published also, “Instruction astronomique de l'usage des globes et sphere celestes et terrestres,” Amst. 1642, 4to 1669, 4to. There was a neatness in all his publications of this description, which has been rarely imitated. An accidental fire which destroyed the greater part of the first edition of the atlas and of his other works, rendered them for some time in great demand. His “Theatrum urbium et munimentorum,” was another collection of views and maps in much esteem. These and other designs were pursued and completed by his sons John and Cornelius, and, the latter dying young, chiefly by John, who was also the printer of a great many classics, which yield in beauty only to the Elzevirs. Among the geographical works of John Blaeu, are, 1. “Novum ac magnum theatrum civitatum totius Belgiae,” 1649, 2 vols. fol. 2. “Civitates et admirandae Italiae,” 1663, 2 vols. fol. reprinted with a French text, Amst. 1704, 4 vols. fol. and Hague, 1724. 3. “Theatrum Sabaudise et Pedemontii,” 1682, 2 vols. fol. translated and published under the title “Theatre de Piemont e de la Savoie,” by James Bernard, Hague, 1735, 2 vols. fol. Vossius and Grotius speak in high terms of the talents and industry of John and Cornelius Blaeu. It may be noticed that John Blaeu sometimes concealed himself under a fictitious name. His edition of “Erythraei Pinacotheca,” a work to which we have sometimes referred, was published with Cologne in the title page, instead of Amsterdam, and Jodocus Kalcovius, instead of John Blavius, or Blaeu.

, an eminent mathematician, who flourished in the 16th and 17th centuries, was the son of John Blagrave, of Bulmarsh, esq. and was born at Reading, but in what year is not known. He acquired the rudiments of his education at Reading, whence he removed to St. John’s college, Oxford, but soon quitted the university, and retired to Southcote Lodge at Reading, where he devoted his time to study and contemplation. His genius seemed to be turned most to mathematics; and that he might study this science without interruption, he devoted himself to a retired life. He employed himself chiefly in compiling such works as might render speculative mathematics accurate, and the practical parts easy. He accordingly finished some learned and useful works, in all which he proposed to render those sciences more universally understood. He endeavoured to shew the usefulness of such studies, that they were not mere amusements for scholars and speculative persons, but of general advantage, and absolutely indispensable in many of the necessaries and conveniences of life with this view he published the four following works: 1. “A Mathematical Jewel, shewing the making and most excellent use of an instrument so called: the use of which jewel is so abundant, that it leadeth the direct path-way through the whole art of astronomy, cosmography, geography,” &c. 1582, folio. 2. “Of the making and use of the Familiar Staff, so called for that it may be made useful and familiarly to walk with, as for that it performeth the geometrical mensuration of all altitudes,” 1590, 4to. 3. “Astrolabium uranicum generale a necessary and pleasant solace and recreation for navigators in their long journeying containing the use of an instrument, or astrolabe,” &c. 1596, 4to. 4. “The art of Dialling, in two parts.” 1609, 4to.

Blagrave was a man of great beneficence in private life. As he was born in the town of Reading, and had spent most of his time there, he was therefore desirous of leaving in that place some monuments of his beneficent disposition and such too as might have reference to each of the three parishes of Reading. He accordingly bequeathed a legacy for this purpose, of which we have an account by Ashmole, in the following words: “You are to note, that he doth devise that each church-warden should send on Good-Friday one virtuous maid that has lived five years with her master: all three maids appear at the town-hall before the mayor and aldermen, and cast dice. She that throws most has 10l. put in a purse, and she is to be attended with the other two that lost the throw. The next year come again the two maids, and one more added to them. He orders in his will that each maid should have three throws before she loses it; and if she has no luck in the three years, he orders that still new faces may come and be presented. On the same Good-Friday he gives eighty widows money to attend, and orders 10s. for a good sermon, and so he wishes well to all his countrymen. It is lucky money, for I never heard but the maid that had the lOl. suddenly had a good husband.” Blagrave died at his own house near Reading, August 9, 1611, and lies interred near his mother in the church of St. Lawrence; with a fine monument to his memory, and an inscription; the following account of which is given by Mr. Ashmole, and remains still nearly correct. On the north against the wall is a noble monument, representing a man under an arch to the middle, holding one hand on a globe, the other on a quadrant. He is habited in a short cloak,- a cassock, and a ruff, surrounded with books on each side of him. On one side is the figure of a woman to the breasts, naked, holding an instrument in her hand, as offering it to him, and under her feet the word Cubus. On the other side is another woman, somewhat naked, though with a scarf thrown closely round her, and offering in like manner; under her feet, Τετραεδρον. On the top are two women leaning on their arms, inscribed Οκταεδρον, Αδοδεκαεδρον. In the middle, a person armed, cap-a-pee, but now almost defaced, entitled Εικοσεδρον. And under the first figure mentioned, an inscription, in an oval: celebrating his virtues in homely rhimes.