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, chancellor of England, and famous for his ecclesiastical learning, as well as his knowledge in the law, was born in 1669 at Exeter, Devonshire, where his father, an eminent grocer and salter in that city, though a man of considerable substance, and descended from a good family, determined to bring up his son to his own trade. With this view, he took him into his business and kept him at his shop for some years however, the son’s inclination being strongly bent to learning, he took all opportunities of gratifying his passion, laying out all the money he could spare in books, and devoting every moment of his leisure hours to study; so that he became a scholar of very great accomplishments, which were hid under the appearance of an attention to the business of the shop. This, however, was discovered by the celebrated Locke, who was his uncle by his mother’s side, and who, after some discourse, being greatly surprised and pleased with the prodigious advances his nephew had made in literature, advised him to commence a regular course of study at Leyden: and it is said to have been by his advice, that Mr. King afterwards entered himself a student at the Inner-Temple, and applied himself to the law; in which profession his talents and industry soon rendered him celebrated.

Mr. King had not been many years at the Temple, when he had acquired as high a reputation for his knowledge in law, as he had before for his knowledge in divinity; and, in 1699, obtained a seat in the House of Commons, as representative for the borough of Beer- Alston, in. Devonshire; and the same honour was continued to him, not only in the ensuing and last parliament of king William, but in the five succeeding parliaments of queen Anne. In the mean time he published his inquiries into church history, and the history of early opinions, and having completed some collections he had already made, and digested them into proper order, he published, in 1702, “The History of the Apostles’ Creed, with critical Observations on its several articles,” 8vo; a treatise written with judgment and learning. Peter de Coste, who sent an abstract of it in French to Bernard, to be published in his “Nouvelles de la Republique de Lettres” for November and December, 1702, has related a very remarkable particular concerning it. He tells us that an English prelate, distinguished for his erudition, fancying it could only be a compilation from several discourses already printed, or perhaps an abridgment of Pearson’s “Exposition of the Creed,” who seemed to have exhausted the subject, began to read it with this disadvantageous prepossession; but was quickly convinced of his mistake, and surprized to find so many curious things, not to be met with in Pearson, and to observe so little borrowed from that writer’s “Exposition.”

, a learned archbishop of Dublin, was descended of an ancient family, and born at Antrim, in Ireland, May the 1st, 1650. At twelve years of age, he was sent to the grammar-school at Dungannon, in thu county of Tyrone; and at seventeen, to Trinity-college, near Dublin, where he took the degrees in arts, when he became of proper standing. In 1674 he was admitted into priest’s orders by abp. Parker of Tuam, who, taking him for his chaplain in 1676, presented him the same year to a prebend, and afterwards to the precentorship, of Tuam. In 1679, he was promoted by his patron, then archbishop of Dublin, to the chancellorship of St. Patrick, and to the parish of St. Warburgh in Dublin. He had the reputation of uncommon abilities and learning; and a season was now approaching which gave him a fair opportunity of displaying them. Accordingly, in the reign of James II. when popery began to raise her head, he, following the example of his English brethren, boldly undertook the defence of the Protestant cause in Ireland, against Peter Manby, the dean of Londonderry, who had lately gone over to the Catholic faith. In 1687, Manby having published a pamphlet in vindication of his conduct, entitled “Considerations which obliged him to embrace the Catholic religion,” our author drew up “An Answer,” and printed it at Dublin the same year in quarto. Manby, encouraged by the court, and assisted by the most learned champions of the church of Rome, published a reply, called “A reformed Catechism, &c.” and our author soon after rejoined, in “A Vindication of the Answer to the Considerations, 1688,” 4to. Manby dropped the controversy, but dispersed a sheet of paper, artfully written, with this title, “A Letter to a Friend, shewing the vanity of this opinion, that every man’s sense and reason are to guide him in matters of faith;” but our author did not suffer this to pass without confuting it, in “A Vindication of the Christian Religion and Reformation, against the attempts of a late letter, &c. 1681,” 4to.

The deanery of St. Patrick’s becoming vacant at this time, Dr. King was elected to it; and appeared so active in supporting the Revolution, which had now taken place, that, after the landing of king James in Ireland in 1689, he was twice confined in Dublin-castle. He was attacked, not long after, in a weekly “paper called” The Abhorrence,“with an intent to render him more obnoxious; and was also assaulted in the street, where a musket with a lighted match was levelled at him. He was likewise disturbed in the performance of divine service at his church several times, particularly on Candlemas-day; when seven officers who were there swore aloud that they would cut his throat. All this did not discourage him; but he still persisted, and took his doctor’s degree this same year, 1689. Upon king James’s retreat to France, after the battle of the Boyne in 1690, he preached a thanksgiving-sermon on that occasion in November; and, January following, was promoted to the bishopric of Derry. In 169 1 he published at London in 4to,” The State of the Protestants in Ireland, under the late King James’s Government; in which their carriage towards him is justified; and the absolute necessity of their endeavouring to be freed from his government, and of submitting to their present majesties, is demonstrated.“The third edition, with additions, was printed at London the year after, in 8vo. Burnet speaks of this book in the following terms:” This copious history is so well received, and so universally acknowledged to be as truly as it is finely written, that I refer my readers to the account of those matters, which is fully and faithfully given by that learned and zealous prelate.“It was attacked, however, the same year, by Mr. Charles Lesley; who asserted, that” there is not one single fact he has inquired into, but he found it false in whole or in part, aggravated or misrepresented, so as to alter the whole face of the story, and give it perfectly another air and turn; insomuch that, though many things he says were true, yet he has hardly spoke a true word, that is, told truly and nakedly, without a warp." Though few 7 as we imagine, will form their judgment of King’s book from this account of it by Lesley yet all may allow, that there is a kind of colouring peculiar to, and characteristic of, each party and that the very same facts, when related by an historian of different political principles, shall have a very different appearance, and also make a very different impression upon a reader.

In 1702 he published at Dublin, in 4to, his celebrated treatise “De Origine Mali,” which was republishecl the same year at London in 8vo; in which he endeavours to shew how all the several kinds of evil with which the world abounds, are consistent with the goodness of God, and may be accounted for without the supposition of an evil principle. We do not find that any exceptions were made at first to this work at home; but it fell under the cognizance of some very eminent foreigners. Mr. Bernard having given an abridgment of it in his “Nouvelles de la Republique des Lettres” for May and June 1703, that abridgment fell into the hands of Mr. Bayle, who, observing his Manichean system to be in danger from it, did not tay till he could see and consult the book itself, but examined the hypothesis of our author as it was represented in Bernard’s extracts, and in a passage cited by the writers of the “Acta Eruditorum Lipsiae,” which had been omitted by Bernard. Bayle was blamed for this by Bernard, and not without reason, as he had manifestly mistaken the prelate’s meaning in many particulars, and attacked him upon principles which he would have denied but the dispute did not end so Bayle afterwards replied to Bernard and, having procured the bishop’s book, made several new observations upon it, which were published in the fifth tome of his “Reponse,” &c. Leibnitz also wrote “Remarks” on this work, which, however, he styles “a work full of elegance and learning.” These remarks, which are in French, were published by DeMaizeaux, in the third volume of the “Recueil de diverses Pieces sur la Philosophic, &c. par Mess. Leibnitz, Clarke, Newton, &c.” at Amsterdam, 1720, in three vols. 12mo. In the mean time, the bishop, though he did not publicly and formally reply to these writers, left a great number of manuscript papers, in which he considered their several objections to his system, and laboured to vindicate it. These papers were afterwards communicated to Mr. Edmund Law, M. A. fellow of Christ’s college in Cambridge, afterwards bishop of Carlisle, who had translated the bishop’s book, and written notes upon it; and who then printed a second edition of his translation, in the notes to which he inserted the substance of those papers. The whole came out with this title, “An Essay on the Origin of Evil, by Dr. William King, late lord archbishop of Dublin: translated from the Latin, with Notes, and a Dissertation concerning the Principle and Criterion of Virtue, and the Origin of the Passions. The second edition. Corrected and enlarged from the author’s manuscripts. To which are added, two Sermons by the same author the former concerning Divine Prescience the latter on the Fall of Man.” Lond. 1732, 2 vols. 8vo. A third edition was published in 1739, and it was for some years a book in great vogue at Cambridge, but its reputation has been declining for a much longer period.

In 1697 he took a share with his fellow-collegians at Christ-church, in the memorable dispute concerning the authenticity of Phalaris’s Epistles. His first appearance in that controversy was owing to his being accidentally present at a conversation between Dr. Bentley and Mr. Bennet the bookseller, concerning the ms. of Phalaris in the King’s library. Mr. Boyle, when answering Bentley’s Dissertation, applied to our author for the particulars of what passed on that occasion; which he received in the short but expressive letter which Boyle has printed in his book, in 1698, with the testimonies of Mr. Bennet and Mr. Gibson (who had been employed as the collator). Stung by these stubborn facts, Dr. Bentley, in the enlarged edition of his Dissertation, 1699, endeavoured to invalidate their force, by an attempt to weaken the credibility of the witnesses. On Dr. King, in particular, he has condescended to bestow near eight pages of his preface, a short specimen of which is annexed to the Letter we have last referred to. In a second letter to Mr. Boyle, our author with great modesty refutes the groundless calumny, and proves that Dr. Bentley himself has confirmed his testimony in every particular, except having omitted the great critic’s beautiful similitude of “a squeezed orange.”

Early in 1701, Dr. King was recalled to the busy scenes of life. His friend James the third earl of Anglesea (who had succeeded to that title April 1, 1690), married Oct. 28, 1699, the lady Catharine Darnley, natural daughter to king James II. by Catharine countess of Dorchester, and had by her one daughter. After living together little more than a year, a dispute arose between them, which ended in a separation. Lord Anglesea solicited the assistance of Dr. King; and the force of friendship prevailed over his natural aversion to the wrangling of the bar. He complied with the request took abundant pains for his old friend, more than he was ever known to do and distinguished himself so in the earl’s defence, as shewed him to have had abilities in his profession equal to any occasion that might call for them, and effectually established his reputation in the character of a civilian, as he had already done in that of a polite writer.

Notwithstanding the reputation acquired by Dr. King in this cause, he never afterwards attained any striking eminence in a profession where constant assiduity and a long course of years are requisites for the acquisition of fame. Captivated by the rnuses, he neglected business, and by degrees, as is natural to such tempers, began to dread and abhor it. Heedless of those necessary supplies which a due attention would actually have brought to his finances, they were so much impaired by his neglect, and by the gay course of life which he led, that he gladly accepted the offer of preferment in Ireland; a sure sign that his practice was then not very considerable, as he is perhaps the only civilian that ever went to reside in Ireland after once having experienced the emoluments of a settlement in Doctors Commons. The exact period of his quitting this kingdom cannot now be ascertained. It has been generally supposed that he went with the earl of Pembroke, who was appointed lord lieutenant in April 1707. But he was certainly in Ireland much earlier, as we have a correct copy of “Mully of Mountown,” in 1704, from the author himself, with a complaint that, before that time, some spurious copies had crept into the world. It is probable, therefore, that his preferment was owing to the united interests of the earl of Rochester, his relation (lord-lieutenant of Ireland from Dec. 12, 1700, to Feb. 4, 1702-3), and his noble patron the earl of Pembroke (lord high admiral of England and Ireland from Jan. 1601-2 to May 1702). If this conjecture be allowed, the date is fixed clearly to the beginning of 1702, and the thread of the history is properly connected. Dr. King was now in a new scene of action. He was judge of the high court of admiralty in Ireland, sole commissioner of the prizes, and keeper of the records in Bermingham’s tower. The latter, indeed, was rather a matter of honour than profit; the salary being at that time but ten pounds a year, though afterwards advanced to 400. He was likewise appointed vicar-general to the lord primate, Dr. Narcissus Marsh. With these honours he was well received and countenanced by persons of the highest rank, and might have made his fortune, if the change of climate could have wrought a change in his disposition. But so far was he from treasuring up the money in a manner thrown into his lap, that he returned to England with no other treasure than a few merry poems and humourous essays. Such indeed was his profusion, that he might have said with Virgil’s shepherd, non unquam grams arc domum mihi dextra redibat.

On Aug. 3, 1710, appeared the first number of “The Examiner,” the ablest vindication of the measures of the queen and her new ministry. Swift be^an with No. 13, and ended by writing part of No. 45 when Mrs.Mauley took it up, and finished the first volume it was afterwards resumed by Mr. Oldisworth, who completed four volumes more, and published nineteen numbers of a sixth volume, when the queen’s death put an end to the work. The original institntors of that paper seem to have employed Dr. King as their publisher, or ostensible author, before they prevailed on their great champion to undertake that task. It is not clear which part of the first ten numbers were Dr. King’s; but he appears pretty evidently the writer of No. H, Oct. 12 No. 12, Oct. 19 and No. 13, Oct. 26 and this agrees with the account given by the publisher of his posthumous works, who says he undertook that paper about the 10th of October. On the 26th of October, no Examiner at all appeared; and the next number, which was published Nov. 2, was written by Dr. Swift. Our author’s warm zeal for the church, and his contempt for the whigs (“his eyes,” says Dr. Johnson, “were open to all the operations of whiggism”), carried him naturally on the side of Sacheverell; and he had a hand, in his dry sarcastic way, in many political essays of that period. He published, with this view, “A friendly Letter from honest Tom Boggy, to the Rev. Mr. Goddard, canon of Windsor, occasioned by a sermon preached at St. George’s chapel, dedicated to her grace the duchess of Marlborough,” 1710; and “A second Letter to Mr. Goddard, occasioned by the late Panegyric given him by the Review, Thursday, July 13, 1710.” These were succeeded by “A Vindication of the Rev. Dr. Henry Sacheverell, from the false, scandalous, and malicious aspersions, cast upon him in a late infamous pamphlet entitled ‘The Modern Fanatic;’ intended chiefly to expose the iniquity of the faction in general, without taking any particular notice of their poor mad fool, Bisset, in particular in a dialogue between a tory and a whig.” This masterly composition had scarcely appeared in the world before it was followed by “Mr. Bisset’s Recantation in a letter to the Rev. Dr. Sacheverell” a singular banter on that enthusiast, whom our author once more thought proper to lash, in “An Answer to a second scandalous book that Mr. Bisset is now writing, to be published as soon as possible.” Dr. White Kennel’s celebrated sermon on the death of the first duke of Devonshire, occasioned, amongst many other publications, a jeu d'esprit of Dr. King-, under the title of “An Answer to Clemens Alexandrinus’s Sermon upon * Quis Dives salvetur?‘ ’ What rich man can be saved' proving it easy for a camel to get through the eye of a needle.” In 1711, Dr. King very diligently employed his pen in publishing that very useful book for schools, his “Historical account of the Heathen Gods and Heroes, necessary for the understanding of the ancient Poets;” a work still in great esteem, and of which there have been several editions. About the same time he translated “Political considerations upon Refined Politics, and the Master-strokes of State, as practised by the Ancients and Moderns, written by Gabriel Naude, and inscribed to the cardinal Bagni.” At the same period also he employed himself on “Rufinus, or an historical essay on the Favourite Ministry under Theodosius and his son Arcadius with a poem annexed, called ' Rufinus, or the Favourite.” These were written early in 1711, but not printed till the end of that year. They were levelled against the duke of Marlborough and his adherents and were written with much asperity. Towards the close of 1711 his circumstances began to reassume a favourable aspect and he was recommended by his firm friend Swift to an office under government. “I have settled Dr. King,” says that great writer, “in the Gazette; it will be worth two hundred pounds a year to him. To-morrow I am to carry him to dine with the secretary.” And in another letter, he tells the archbishop of Dublin, “I have got poor Dr. King, who was some time in Ireland, to be gazetteer; which will be worth two hundred and fifty pounds per annum to him, if he be diligent and sober, for which I am engaged. I mention this because I think he was under your grace’s protection in Ireland.” From what Swift te,lls the archbishop, and a hint which he has in another place dropped, it should seem, that our author’s finances were in such a state as to render the salary of gazetteer no contemptible object to him. The office, however, was bestowed on Dr. King in a manner the most agreeable to his natural temper; as he had not even the labour of soliciting for it. On the last day of December, 1711, Dr. Swift, Dr. Freind, Mr. Prior, and some other of Mr. secretary St. John’s friends, came to visit him; and brought with them the key of the Gazetteer’s office, and another key for the use of the paper-office, which had just before been made the receptacle of a curious collection of mummery, far different from the other contents of that invaluable repository. On the first of January our author had the honour of dining with the secretary; and of thanking him for his remembrance of him at a time when he had almost forgotten himself. He entered on his office the same day; but the extraordinary trouble he met with in discharging its duties proved greater than he could long endure. Mr. Barber, who printed the gazette, obliged him to attend till three or four o'clock, on the mornings when that paper was published, to correct the errors of the press; a confinement which his versatility would never have brooked, if his health would have allowed it, which at this time began gradually to decline. And this, joined to his natural indisposition to the fatigue of any kind of business, furnished a sufficient pretence for resigning his office about Midsummer 1712. On quitting his employment he retired to the house of a friend, in the garden-grounds between Lambeth and Vauxhall, where he enjoyed himself principally in his library; or, amidst select parties, in a sometimes too liberal indulgence of the bottle. He still continued, however, to visit his friends in the metropolis, particularly his relation the earl of Clarendon, who resided in Somerset-house.

We have two publications of Dr. King, in the course of this year, besides his “Rufinus” already mentioned. One was “Britain’s Palladium; or lord Bolingbroke’s Welcome from France.” This was published Sept. 13, 1712. The other piece was, “Useful Miscellanies,” Part I. 1712. He seems to have intended a continuation, if his life had been prolonged. As autumn advanced, the doctor drooped insensibly, and then neither cared to see, or to be seen by, any one: and, winter drawing on, he shut himself up entirely from his nearest friends; and would not even see his noble relation, till his lordship, hearing of his weak condition, sent his sister to fetch him in a chair to a lodging he had provided for him opposite Somerset- house in the Strand, where, next day, about noon, being Chrisrmasday, 1712, he yielded up his breath, with the patience and resignation of a philosopher, and with the true devotion of a Christian hero; but would not be persuaded to go to rest the night before, or even to lie down, till he had made such a will as he thought was agreeable to the inclinations of lord Clarendon. After his death, this noble lord took care of his funeral; and had him decently interred in the North cloisters of Westminster-abbey, where he lies next to his master Dr. Knipe, to whom he had a little before dedicated his “Historical Account of the Heathen Gods.” In 1732, his “Remains,” with an account of his life and writings, were published. They were republished in 1734, under the new title of “Posthumous Works,” and with the addition of the editor’s name, “Joseph Brown, M. D.” who purchased the original manuscripts from Dr. King’s sister; and again, with a title to the same purport, in 1739. They are incorporated by Mr. Nichols in a complete edition of Dr. King’s “Original Works in verse and prose,” 1776, 3 vols. 8vo, in such places as were most suitable to the connexion of the respective pieces. The most striking parts of our author’s character are these: In his morals, he was religious and strictly virtuous. He was a man of eminent learning and singular piety, strictly conscientious in all his dealings, and zealous for the cause rather than the appearance of religion. His chief pleasure consisted in trifles and he was never happier than when he thought he was hid from the world yet he loved company, provided they were such as tallied with his humour (for few people pleased him in conversation). His discourse was chearful, and his wit pleasant and entertaining. His philosophy and good sense prevailed over his natural temper, which was sullen, morose, and peevish; but he was of a timorous disposition, and the least slight or neglect would throw him into a state of despondency. He would say a great many ill-natured things, but never do one. He was made up of tenderness and pity, and tears would fall from him on the smallest occasion. Of his poetry, Dr. Johnson says, that “it will naturally be supposed his poems were rather the amusements of idleness, than efforts of study that he endeavoured rather to divert than astonish that his thoughts seldom aspire to sublimity, and that, if his verse was easy and his images familiar, he attained what he desired.” His talent for humour, however, was his great excellence, and in that we know not where to find his equal.

, son of the rev. Peregrine King, was born at Stepney, in Mfddlesex, in 1685; and, after a school-education at Salisbury, was entered of Baliol-college, Oxford, July 9, 1701. Proceeding on the law line, he took his doctor’s degree in 1715; was secretary to the duke of Ormond and the earl of Arran, when chancellors of the university; and was made principal of St. Maryhall, in 1718. When he was candidate for the university, in 1722, he resigned his office of secretary; but his other preferment he enjoyed (and it was all he did enjoy) to the time of his death. Dr. Clarke, who opposed him, carried his election; and, after this disappointment, 1727, he went over to Ireland. With what design he went thither is to us unknown; but his enemies say, it was for the purposes of intrigue, and to expose himself to sale. But he says himself, and there are no facts alleged to disprove it, “At no time of my life, either in England or Ireland, either from the present or any former government, have I asked, or endeavoured by any means to obtain, a place, pension, or employment, of any kind. 1 could assign many reasons for my conduct; but one answer I have always ready: I inherited a patrimony, which I found sufficient to supply all my wants, and to leave me at liberty to pursue those liberal studies, which afforded me the most solid pleasures in my youth, and are the delight and enjoyment of my old age. Besides, I always conceived a secret horror of a state of servility and dependence: and I never yet saw a placeman or a courtier, whether in a higher or lower class, whether a priest or a layman, who was his own master.” During his stay in Ireland, he is said to have written an epic poem, called “The Toast,” bearing the name of Scheffer, a Laplander, as its author, and of Peregrine O' Donald, esq. as its translator; which was a political satire, and was printed and given away to friends, but never sold. Dr. Warton says that the countess of Newburgh was aimed at in this satire.

, an eminent dissenting divine and biographer, was born at Nottingham, March 28, 1725. His father, Mr. Robert Kippis, a silk- hosier at that town, was maternally descended from clergymen who were ejected for nonconformity, the principles of which were naturally conveyed to their posterity. His father dying when he was about five years of age, he was removed to his grandfather at Sleaford in Lincolnshire, where his talents and application during his grammatical education attracted the peculiar notice of Mr. Merrivaie, pastor of a congregation of dissenters in that town; and his views being, in consequence of his advice, directed to the profession of a dissenting minister, he was placed, at the age of sixteen, in the academy at Northampton, under the care of Dr. Doddridge. Here he prosecuted his studies with such diligence and improvement, and conducted himself with such exemplary propriety, as to conciliate the affectionate esteem and attachment of his tutor; and having completed his course, he was settled as minister of a dissenting congregation at Boston, in Lincolnshire, in September! 746. From Boston he removed to Dorking in Surrey, in 1750; and in 1753, he succeeded Dr. Hughes as pastor to the congregation in Prince’s-street, Westminster, which was his last charge. In the same year he married miss Elizabeth Bott, the daughter of a merchant at Boston, in whom he found a sensible, prudent, sprightly, and cheerful companion, and by whose attentions his mind was relieved from all family concerns; so that he was left at full leisure to prosecute the various duties which his numerous engagements devolved upon him. His settlement with the society in Westminster laid the foundation of that celebrity which he afterwards acquired, and of that extensive usefulness which distinguished his future life. Among his other public services among the dissenters, he was soon introduced into a connection with the presbyterian-fund, to the prosperity of which he was afterwards very ardently devoted and in June 1762, he became a member of Dr. Williams’s s trust, an appointment which afforded him an additional opportunity of being eminently and extensively useful in a variety of respects. His connection with the general body of Protestant dissenting ministers, belonging to the cities of London and Westminster, and with many charitable institutions belonging to the dissenters, gave him frequent occasion to exercise his talents to their advantage.

His literary abilities and attainments were acknowledged by all who knew him. It was, therefore, natural to imagine, that when a favourable opportunity offered, he would be employed in the department of public education. Accordingly, on the death of Dr. Jennings in 1763, one of the tutors of the academy supported in London by the funds of William Coward, esq. he was appointed classical and philological tutor to that institution. In 1767, he received the degree of doctor in divinity from the university of Edinburgh; an honour, in the unsolicited grant of which the principal and professors very cordially concurred. In March 1778, he was elected a fellow of the society of antiquaries; and in June 1779, a fellow of the royal society. He was a member of the council of the former society from 1782 to 1784, and of that of the latter from 1786 to 1787. In both these societies he was a regular attendant and useful member.

Soon after his admission into the Royal Society, he published a pamphlet, entitled “Observations on the late Contests in the Royal Society,” 1784, 8vo, with a view of allaying the animosities that subsisted in that body, which produced a good effect. His intimate connection with sir John Pringle, bart. who was formerly president of the royal society, led Dr. Kippis, after his decease, to republish his “Six Discourses, delivered at the assignment of sir Godfrey Copley’s medal,” to which he has prefixed a valuable life of the author, 1783, 8vo. At the close of the American war he published a political pamphlet, formed from materials which were communicated to him by persons in office, and designed to justify the peace, which was entitled “Considerations on the Provisional Treaty with America, and the Preliminary Articles of Peace with France and Spain.” He also published several single discourses, which were delivered on particular occasions; some of which are reprinted in his volume of sermons, 1794. His sentiments as a divine were originally Calvinistic, but approached in his latter days to those of the modern Socinians, or Unitarians as they affect to be called. To these works we may also add his account of the “Life and Voyages of captain Cook,” 1788, 4to his new edition of “Dr. Doddridge’s Lectures,” with a great number of additional references; his life of Doddridge, prefixed to a new edition of his Exposition of the New Testament, 1792; his “Life of Dr. Lardner,” prefixed to the complete collection of his works, in 11 vols. 8vo, 1788; “An Address delivered at the Interment of Richard Price, D. D. F. R. S. &c.” 1791 and an “Ordination Charge,” 1788, 8vo. He also assisted in selecting and preparing “A Collection of Hymns and Psalms, for public and private Worship,” 1795, 8vo and 12mo, which is used in some places of worship among the dissenters. But the work to which Dr. Kippis devoted his principal attention, for many of the last years of his life, was the “Biographia Britannica.” “His indefatigable industry in collecting materials for it, his access to the best sources of information, his knowledge of men and books, his judgment in selecting and marking every circumstance that could serve to distinguish talents and character, and the habit which he had acquired', by long practice, of appreciating the value of different works, qualified him in a very high degree, for conducting this elaborate performance.” He did not, however, live to carry on this edition of the “Biographia” farther than to about a third part of the sixth volume, which was destroyed in the fire at Mr. Nichols’s premises.

Notwithstanding those qualifications for this great undertaking just mentioned by his biographer, and for which we are as much disposed to give him credit as the most zealous of his admirers, we have often taken occasion, as our readers may perceive, to differ from him in his estimate of many eminent characters. Whether from timidity, or a false notion of liberality of sentiment, Dr. Kippis was accustomed to yield too much to the influence of connexion and of private friendship; to give the pen out of his own hand, and to suffer the relatives or interested admirers of certain persons to write lives according to their own views, in which opinions were advanced that we are certain could not have his sincere concurrence. Nor do we discern that judgment in the coriduct of this work for which he has been so highly praised, and for want of which, had he lived to so distant a period, it must necessarily have been protracted to an immense extent, if written upon the same plan. Instead of re-writing, or methodizing those lives which were injudiciously or incorrectly given in the first edition of the “Biographia,” his practice was to give the article verbatim as it stood in that edition, and then to make his additions and corrections; thus giving the whole the air of a tedious controversy between himself and the preceding editors. Many of his additions, likewise, were of that redundant nature, that no reasonable prospect could be entertained of the termination of the work. Indexes to volumes of sermons, with the texts, extracts of opinions from magazines and reviews (many of which he had himself written in these journals), and from every author that had incidentally mentioned the object of his narrative, threatened, what in fact took place, that this work, with all the assistance he had, was little more than begun after the lapse of twenty years from his advancing age became more irksome as he proceeded and at last was left in a state which forbids all hope of completion upon his plan. Had it, however, been entrusted to him at an earlier period of life and vigour, we are persuaded that his many qualifications for the undertaking would have been exerted in such a manner as to obviate some, at least, of these objections, which we notice with reluctance in the case of a man whom we knew personally and highly respected. We can cordially, therefore, as far as respects his personal character, acquiesce with his affectionate biographer, who states that “his mild and gentle temper, his polished manners, his easy and graceful address, and a variety of external accomplishments, prepossessed those who first saw him in his favour, and could not fail to conciliate esteem and attachment on a more intimate acquaintance. These qualities contributed very much to recommend him to persons in the higher ranks of life, to several of whom he had occasional access; and qualified him, in a very eminent degree, for the situation in which he exercised his ministerial office. But he was no less condescending, courteous, and affable to his inferiors, than to those who occupied superior stations. Dr. Kippis had nothing of that austerity and reserve, of that haughtiness and superciliousness, of that parade and self-importance, and ostentatious affectation of dignity, which forbid access, and which mar the freedom and the pleasure of all the social intercourses of life.”

, eminent for his talents in perspective, was the eldest son of Mr. John Kirby, who was originally a schoolmaster at Orforcl, and who is known to topographers by a map of Suffolk which he published, and by “The Suffolk Traveller,” 12mo, a new edition of which was published in 1764. He was born at Parham, near Wickham-market, in 1716, and settled as a house-painter at Ipswich about 1738. Me had a turn for drawing, and published, early in life, twelve prints of castles, ancient churches, and monuments, in Suffolk, with a small descriptive pamphlet. He afterwards became intimate with the celebrated artist Gainsborough, the contemplation of whose works increased his taste for painting, but he had very little leisure to cultivate it, and has left only a few landscapes in the possession of his family; one of which, a view of the old kitchen at Glastonbury-abbey, was exhibited at Spring-gardens in 1770.

On being admitted to the friendship and intimacy of sir Joshua Reynolds, Hogarth (who furnished the curious frontispiece to his perspective), and most of the other artists of the kingdom, he removed from Ipswich to London, where he obtained the patronage of the earl of Bute. This nobleman introduced him to his present majesty when prince of Wales, by whom he was ever after highly and deservedly honoured. He was made clerk of the works at Kew, and under his majesty’s patronage, who defrayed the expence of the plates, he published in 1761 his very splendid work, “The Perspective of Architecture,” 2 vols. folio. Tn this work Mr. Kirby wholly confined himself to architectural representations; and gave a variety of designs, elegantly drawn and engraved, which he submitted as “new principles for a complete system of the perspective of architecture, both as it relates to the true delineation of objects, and the doctrine of light and shadow.” Mr. Edwards, however, remarks, as a curious circumstance, that the plates of this work contain no example of architectural features disposed obliquely to the picture; a circumstance from which he would infer that Mr. Kirby was no great adept in architecture, and that his practice in perspective was not very comprehensive, especially as his first work is equally deficient with the last in what relates to mouldings, when inclined to the picture, which position, if not the most abstruse in theory, is yet among the most troublesome in operation, and therefore ought to have been demonstrated.

Before the appearance of this work he wrote a pamphlet in vindication of the fame of Dr. Brook Taylor, which was indirectly struck at in the translation of a treatise on perspective by a foreigner. This pamphlet (which has no date) was entitled “Dr. Brook Taylor’s Method of Perspective, compared with the examples lately published on the subject, as Sirigatti'i,” 4to. In 1766, in conjunction with his brother William, then of Witnesham, in the county of Suffolk, attorney at law (who died Sept. 25, 1791, aged seventy-two) he published an improved edition of their father’s map of Suffolk, on a larger scale, with engravings of the arms of the principal families in the county. In 1768 he published a third edition of his treatise on perspective, with a dedication to the earl of Bute. He was a member both of the royal aud antiquary societies; and when the chartered society of artists was disturbed by the illiberal conduct of some of the members, Mr. Kirby was elected president in the place of Hay man, but he soon resigned the chair. He died June 20, 1774, and his widow the following year, and were both buried in Kew churchyard. By his wife he had only two children, William, a promising artist, who died in 1771, and Sarah, afterwards the wife of Mr. James Trimmer, of Brentford, a lady justly celebrated for her numerous works for the religious instruction of the young.

, the first of a family of astronomers, of considerable note, was born at Guben, in Lower Lusatia, in 1640, and educated at Leipsic, where he acquired reputation by the almanacs which he published. In 1692 he married Mary Margaret Winckehnan, who rendered him much useful assistance by making astronomical observations for the construction of his Ephemerides. In 1701, on the establishment of the academy of sciences at Berlin by Frederic I. king of Prussia, that prince appointed him a member of the society, and astronomer in ordinary, with an honourable pension for his support. He died at Berlin in 1710, at the age of seventy-one years. He had been in the habit of corresponding with all the learned societies of Europe, and published a variety of astronomical treatises, which are in considerable estimation. His wife, Mary Margaret, the daughter of a Lutheran clergyman at Panitzsh, a village near Leipsic, where she was born in 1670, was early noticed for her astronomical talents, and in 1702, some years after her marriage, she first saw a comet, upon, which M. Kirch published his observations. In 1707 she discovered a peculiar aurora borealis, mentioned in the Memoirs of the academy of sciences at Paris for 1716. These exertions of her genius procured her the esteem of the learned at Berlin, notwithstanding which she was in very low circumstances when her husband died. She contrived to maintain herself and educate her children, by constructing almanacs; and, in 1711, she published a dissertation entitled “Preparations for observing the grand Conjunctions of Saturn, Jupiter, &c.” Soon after this she found a patron in the baron de Throsick, and on his death two years afterwards, removed to Dantzic, when Peter the Great wished to engage her to settle in his empire. She preferred her native country, and, in 1716, accompanied her son to Berlin, where she was appointed astronomer to the academy of sciences in that city, and died there in 1720. Their son Christian Fkederic, born at Guben in 1694, who also discovered an early and very strong bias for scientific pursuits, commenced his studies at Berlin, and afterwards continued them at Halle, whence he made excursions for improvement to Nuremberg, Leipsic, and Prussia. He was employed a considerable time in the observatory at Dantzic, and during his residence here, the czar, Peter the Great, offered him an establishment at Moscow; but his attachment to his mother, who was averse from leaving Germany, led him to decline it. In 1717 he was made member of the academy of sciences at Berlin, and in 1723 he was chosen a corresponding member of the royal academy of sciences at Paris, and he shewed himself worthy of that distinction by the frequent valuable contributions which he transmitted to them during the remainder of his life. He died in 1740, in the forty-sixth year of his age. He published several works connected with astronomy, which were in considerable reputation at the period in which he flourished.

, a learned German, was born in 1575, at Lubeck, where his father was a merchant. He studied in his native place till he was eighteen years of age, and then went to Francfort on the Oder, where he continued four years, in a constant attendance upon lectures, and close application to his books. He afterwards studied in the university of Jena, and then in that of Strasburg; and some time after, a burgo-master of Luneburg, who had received a great character of him, chose him to accompany his son as trasrelling tutor, into France and Italy. He returned to Germany in 1602; and, stopping at Rostock, acquired so much reputation, that the next year he was appointed professor of poetry. The work which he published in 1604, “De funeribus Romanorum,” added not a little to his fame. He afterwards published another work, “De annulis,” which was also much esteemed, as a correct illustration of those antiquities. He was much employed in education, and a great many scholars were sent to him from the other cities of Germany. At length the magistrates of Lubeck, wanting a new principal or rector for their college, desired him to take that office upon him; and he was accordingly installed into it in 1613. He performed the functions of it the remainder of his days with the greatest care, and it is unjustly that some have attributed the decline of the college, which happened in his time, to his negligence. He died, March 20, 1643; and the 4th of May, his funeral oration was pronounced at Lubeck, by James Stolterfhot, who had married his eldest daughter.

, professor of physic at Upsal, and physician extraordinary to Christina queen of Sweden, was born Dec. 25, 1577, at Breslaw, in Silesia, where his father was a merchant. He lost his parents when he was very young; but his guardians, as they intended him for his father’s profession, had him well instructed in such knowledge as might prepare him for it. Kirsteuius, however, had a turn for general literature, in which they thought it proper to indulge him. He accordingly learned the Greek and Latin tongues, and even Hebrew and Syriac; and with a view to his intended object, cultivated natural philosophy, botany, and anatomy, with the greatest care, in his native place. Afterwards he spent four years at the universities of Leipsic, Wittemberg, and Jena; and having made a great progress under the ablest professors, he took a journey into the Low-Countries, and into France. He had been told that a man could not distinguish himself in the practice of physic, unless he understood Avicenna; and, knowing the translation of that physician’s works to be very bad, he had a strong inclination to learn Arabic. To this he was urged by Joseph Scaliger and Isaac Casaubon, who thought he might do great service to the public of letters in that pursuit; and he resolved to read not only Avicenna, but also Mesue, Rhasis, Abenzoar, Abukasis, and Averroes. This course, however, did not hinder him from gratifying the inclination he had to travel, in which he spent seven years. He took a doctor of physic’s degree at Basil, in 1601; and then visited Italy, Spain, England, and even Greece and Asia. Soon after his return into Silesia, he went to Jena, and married a wife, by whom he had eight children. In 1610 he was appointed by the magistrates of Breslaw, to the direction of their college and schools; but a fit of sickness inclined him to resign that difficult employment, and he now applied himself entirely to the study of Arahic, and to the practice of physic. He succeeded greatly in his application to the Arabic, and was so zealous to promote the knowledge of it, that he employed all the money he could spare in printing Arabic books. For some reasons not stated by his biographers, he removed into Prussia, where he had an opportunity of entering into the family of chancellor Oxenstiern, whom he accompanied into Sweden; and in 1636 he was appointed professor of physic in the university of Upsal, and physician to the queen. His constitution, however, being much broken, he did not enjoy these advantages above four years, dying April 8, 1640. He was one of those few who joined piety to the practice of physic. It is observed in his epitaph, inscribed by Schroer to his memory, that he understood twenty-six languages.

, a celebrated Irish preacher, descended from an ancient Roman catholic family, was born in Galway, about 1754. He was sent in early youth to the college of the English'Jesuits at St. Omer’s; and at the age of seventeen embarked for the Danish island of St. Croix, in the West Indies, under the protection of his father’s cousin-german, who had large possessions there; but after enduring for six years a climate pernicious to his delicate constitution, and spectacles of oppression and cruelty shocking to his feelings, he returned to Europe in disgust. He then went to the university of Louvain, where he received priest’s orders, and was soon after honoured with the chair of natural and moral philosophy. In 177$ he was appointed chaplain to tfye Neapolitan ambassador at the British court, and at this time attained some fame as a preacher, and published some sermons, of which, however, we find no notice in any literary journal, and as his family could not discover any copies, we suspect his biographer has been mistaken in this point. In 1787 he resolved to conform to the established religion, for what reason we are not told, unless “a conviction that he should thus obtain more extensive opportunities of doing good.” He was accordingly introduced by the rev. Dr. Hastings, archdeacon of Dublin, to his first protestant congregation, in St. Peter’s church, where he preached on June 24th of that year. His audience was impatient to hear the causes of his conversion, but neither at this time, nor any other, either in the pulpit, or in his most confidential communications, did he “breathe a syllable of contempt or reproach against any religious persuasion whatever.”

Wonders are told of his popularity. Whenever he preached, such multitudes assembled that it was necessary to defend the entrance of the church by guards and palisadoes. He was presented with addresses and pieces of plate from every parish, and the freedom of various corporations; his portrait was painted and engraved by the most eminent artists, and the collections at his sermons far exceeded any that ever were known. F.ven in times of public calamity and distress, his irresistible powers of persuasion repeatedly produced contributions exceeding a thousand or twelve hundred pounds at a sermon; and his hearers, not content with emptying their purses into the plate, sometimes threw in jewels or watches, as earnest of further benefactions. He died, exhausted as we are told, by the fatigues of his mission, Oct. 27, 1805, leaving a widow with two sons and two daughters, to whom his majesty granted a pension of 30l. a year for the life of the widow, with reversion to the daughters. In 1814, a volume of his “Sermons” was printed for the benefit of his sons, who are not included in the above provision. From these it would be difficult to discover the causes of his extreme popularity. There are in them many animated and brilliant passages addressed to the feelings and passions, and these, we presume, were assisted by a manner suited to his audience, of which we can form no opinion. His talents, however, as directed to one point, that of recommending charity, were unquestionably successful beyond all precedent, and his private character well corresponded to his public sentiments. He was a man of acute reeling, amiable, humane, and beneficent.

, a German poet of the greatest renown, was born at Quedlinburg, July 2, 1724. He was the eldest of eleven children, and distinguished himself in his youth among his companions in bodily and mental exercises. At the age of sixteen he went to college, and being placed under Freitag, a very able tutor, he made himself familiar with the languages, and acquiring a taste for the beauties of the best classical authors, made attempts in composition both in prose and verse. In the latter he wrote some pastorals, but not contented with these humbler efforts, he formed at this early period the resolution of composing an epic poem, and fixed upon the “Messiah” as his subject. Such an effort was not known in the German language and the high opinion he had of Virgil, his favourite poet amongst the ancients the honour of being the first who should offer the Cerman public a work like the fiLneid; the warmth of patriotism that early animated him to raise the fame of German literature in this particular to a level with that of other European countries; the indignation he felt in reading the book of a Frenchman, who had denied the Germans every talent for poetry; all combined with the consciousness of his own superior powers, to spur him on to the execution of his exalted purpose. In 1745 he went to the university of Jena, where he commenced the study of theology; but in the midst of his academical pursuits he was planning his projected work, and sketched out his three first cantos, first in prose, but afterwards in hexameters, and was so pleased with having introduced a metre into German poetry, as ever afterwards to defend this mode of versification. In 1746, he removed from Jena to Leipsic, and became a member of a society of young men who had formed themselves into a literary club for mutual improvement. About this time he exercised his genius in lyric compositions. Several of his odes, together with the three first cantos of his Messiah, appeared in a periodical paper entitled “Bremen Contributions.” At length the publication of ten books of his Messiah made his name known throughout Germany, and raised his reputation very high. It found friends and enemies, admirers and critics, every where but its approbation was owing as much to the sacredness of the matter as the beauty of the poetry Christian readers loved it as a book that afforded them at length, amidst the themes of orthodoxy, some scope for devout feeling; young preachers quoted it in the pulpit, and coupled the name of Klopstock with that of the prophets. The stauncher class of divines, indeed, gave the poem the appellation of presumptuous fiction, contaminating the scripture-history with fables, and undermining the faith. The partisans of the German grammarian Gottsched raised the greatest clamour against the work, on the ground of the language, and sought by poor arguments and sorry wit to depreciate its merits. The Swiss critics, as opponents to the Saxons, on the other hand, extolled and defended it with all their might. Bodmer, in particular, the admirer and translator of Milton, embraced the cause of the German epic bard with enthusiastic ardour, and contributed very greatly, by his warm euloaium, to accelerate the universal celebrity of his poem. Klopstock heard and profited by the public disquisitions, but never engaged in any of the disputes.

Klopstock travelled into Switzerland in 1750, to pay a visit to Bodmer of Zurich, in consequence of an invitation, where he was received with every token of respect. The sublime scenery of that country, the simplicity of the inhabitants, and the freedom they enjoyed, were much suited to his taste. Here he intended to have spent the remainder of his life, but baron Bernstorff caused an invitation to be sent to him to reside at Copenhagen, with assurances of such a pension as would make him independent. Klopstock acceded to the proposal, and set out in 1751, by the way of Brunswick and Hamburgh, at which latter place he became acquainted with Miss Muller, a lady perfectly adapted to his own mind, whom he soon after married. They seemed destined to be one of the happiest couples, but he was soon deprived of her, for she died in childbed: her memory, however, was sacred to Kiopstock to the last moment of his existence. He lived chiefly at Copenhagen, till 1771, after which he resided at Hamburgh as Danish legate, and counsellor of the margrave of Baden, who gave him a pension. The latter part of his life was little varied by incidents, and after he had brought the Messiah to a conclusion, he continued to employ himself in composition, and in the correction and revision of his works. He died at Hamburgh, March 14, 1803, being seventy-nine years of age, and was interred with the greatest solemnity, not unmixed with superstitious and fanciful circumstances. By those who were intimate with him he is represented as a truly amiable man, happiest in a small circle of private friends, and particularly fond of the society of young persons. The character of Kiopstock, as a poet, is that of exuberance of imagination and sentiment. His sublimity is great, but he is apt to lose himself in mystical abstraction, and his excess of feeling sometimes betrays him into rant and extravagance. His odes and lyric poems have likewise been much admired by his countrymen, and his dramas display great force and dignity, but they are better adapted to the closet than the stage. The great merit of his works is in the diction; he enchants by his noble and energetic style, but their beauties cannot be preserved in a translation, and it is in Germany alone that they can be sufficiently appreciated. As an excellent specimen of his talents as a prose writer, we may notice his “Grammatical Dialogues,” which abound with judicious remarks.

, an eminent German critic, was born in 1738, at Bischofswerden, near Dresden, where his father was a clergyman. As to his first years, he used to tell Harles that he could not remember how they were spent, except that he was seven years old before his parents could by any means prevail on him to learn any thing. Soon after that, however, he was suddenly seized with such an attachment to letters, that his parents spared no expence to gratify his taste, and to enable him to cultivate his talents to the best advantage. He employed his leisure hours in composing and, reciting German verses, 'and profited very much under Foerstelius, who was his private preceptor, and afterwards at Misna, under Weiss and Cleman.nus. He studied afterwards at Gorlitz, under Baumeister, who taught him the classics, and lodged him in his house. Here Klotz used to say he spent more happy days than he was persuaded he should ever see again. During his stay here, which lasted two years, he gave a specimen of his powers in versification, by a poem composed on the “Destruction of Zittau,” which was laid waste in 1757. In 1758 he proceeded to Leipsic to study jurisprudence, and while here he published several papers in the “Acta Eruditorum,” and some separate pieces. In 1761 he published his “Opuscula Poetica,” containing twenty-three odes, three satires, and as many elegies. From Leipsic he repaired to Jena, where he opened a school, which was well attended. Having accepted of an invitation to a professorship at the university of Gottingen in 1762, he set off for that place, and almost immediately after his arrival he was attacked by a severe illness, from which, however, he recovered, and immediately published a treatise “De Verecundia Virgilii,” to which were added three dissertations relative to the eclogues of the poet. He also published “Miscellanea Critica,” and applied himself to the study of ancient gems and paintings, with which he became well acquainted. His celebrity had now increased so much, that he received two offers in the same day, one from the prince of Hesse Darmstadt, to be professor of the Oriental languages at Giessen, and the other from his Prussian majesty, to be professor of eloquence at Halle. While he was deliberating respecting the choice he should make, he was nominated by his Britannic majesty to be professor of philosophy at Gottingen, with an increased salary, which induced him to remain in that city, till some attempts were made to ruin his reputation. He then quitted Gottingen, and accepted an offer made him by his Prussian majesty, of being professor of philosophy and eloquence at Halle, with the rank and title of aulic counsellor. While preparing for his departure, he published “Historia Nummorum Contumeliosonini et Satyricorum,” containing a history of these coins; and on his removal to Halle he gave the public another work of the same kind, and at the same time he effected, what had been often attempted before without success, the institution of a new society, called the “Literary Society of Halle.” Here also the king conferred upon him the rank of privy-counsellor, and accompanied this mark of honour with a considerable addition to his salary. He died in 1771, and just before his death, revised every thing which he had written on coins, and published “Opuscula, nummaria quibus Juris Antiqui Historiceque nonnnila capita explicantur.” His other works, not already noticed, were, 1. “Pro M. T. Cicerone adversus Dionem Cassium et Plutarchum dissertatio,” Gorlitz, 1758, 4to. 2. “Ad virum doct. I. C. Reichelium epistola, qua de quibusdam ad Homerum pertinentibus disputatur,” Leipsic, 1758, 4to. 3. “Carminum liber unus,” ibid. 1759, 8vo. 4. “Mores Eruditorum,” Altenburgh, 1760, 8vo. 5. “Genius Sxculi,” ibid. 1760. 6, “Opuscula Poetica,” ibid. 1761, 8vo. 7. “Oratio pro Lipsii latinitate,” Jena, 1761, 8vo. 8. “Libellus de minutiarum studio et rixandi libidine grammaticorum quorundam,” ibid. 1761, 8vo. y. “Animadversiones in Theophrasti characteres Ethiros,” jbid. 8vo. 10.“Dissertatio de felici audacia Horatii,” I 762, 4to. 11. “Elegiae,” ibid. 8vo. 12. “Funus Petri Burmanni secundi,” Altenburgh, 8vo. This is a very complete account of the life, &c. of Burman. 13. “Uidicula Litteraria,” ibid. 8vo, a satirical work on useless studies and pursuits. 14. “Vindiciie Horatianae,” against Hardouin, Bremen, 1764, 8vo. 15. “Stratonis epigrammata, uunc primum edita,” Altenburgh, 1764, 8vo. 16. “Epistolae Homericae,” ibid. 1764, 8vo. 17. An edition of Vida, 1766, and of Tyrtacus, 1767. To these may be added many philosophical dissertations, theses, prefaces, &c. enumerated by Harles.

Kneller did not stay long in Italy, as in 1674 became to England with his brother, John Zachary, who assisted him in painting, without intending to reside here; but being recommended to Mr. Banks, a Hamburgh merchant, he painted him and his family. Mr. Vernon, secretary to the duke of Monmouth, saw them, and sat to Kneller; and persuaded the duke also to sit. His grace was delighted, and engaged the king his father to have his picture by the new artist, at a time when the duke of York had been promised the king’s picture by Lely. Charles, unwilling to have double trouble, proposed that both artists should paint him at the same time. Lely, as the established artist, chose his light and station: Kneller took the next best he could, and performed his task with so much expedition and skill, that he had nearly finished his piece when Lely’s was only dead-coloured. The circumstance gained Kneller great credit; and Lely obtained no less honour, for he had the candour to acknowledge and admire the abilities of his rival. This success fixed Kneller here; and the immense number of portraits he executed, prove the continuance of his reputation.

During the latter part of his time, that is, after the death of Lely, in 1680, Kneller stood at the head of the professors of his art in this country, and that most conspicuously. It is not therefore surprising that he experienced the encouragement he did. He has left some few good pictures behind him as proofs of the natural powers he possessed; but his most sincere admirers, who are judges, must acknowledge that the far greater portion of those he allowed to pass into the world under his name, are a disgrace to him and his patrons. His picture of the converted Chinese, at Windsor, he is said to be most proud of, as justly he might be. It exhibits that he really knew what was good, and could produce it if he chose. According to his own doctrine, he did as much and no more than was accessary to pass current among his employers. “History painters,” he said, “make the dead live, and don't begin to live till they are dead. I paint the living, and they make me live.”

A rapid pencil, and a ready talent of taking likenesses, were the foundation of his reputation; and a most fortunate ignorance of the art among the best informed even of the public, by whom he was employed, aided his progress. Not but that he was equal to the production of good works if he had been more carefully trained, and had lived amongst those who knew how to value works of art upon just principles; but he was amongst the most vain of mankind, and had no regard whatsoever for that posthumous fame which leads men to sacrifice present enjoyments to future glory. His motto was, “to live whilst he lived,” and, consequently, to make money was a matter of greater moment with him than to make good pictures; and he succeeded fully; for although he lost 20,000l. by the South Sea speculation, he left, at his death, an estate of 2000l. a year. His prices, whilst he painted here, were 15 guineas for a head; 20 if with one hand; 30 for a half, and 60 for a whole length.

, an English antiquary and biographer, was a native of London (where his father was freje of the Mercers’ company), and received the early part of his education at St. Paul’s school. He was thence admitted of Trinity college, Cambridge, where, having: taken his degree of B. A. in 1702, and of M. A. in 1706 he became chaplain to Edward earl of Orford, who presented him to the vicarage of Chippenham, and also to the rectory of Borough- green in Cambridgeshire, to which last he was instituted Nov. 3, 1707. He afterwards was collated by bishop Moore to a prebendal stall in the church of Ely, June 8, 1714 and presented by him to the rectory of Bluntesham in Huntingdonshire, June 22, 1717. He was made chaplain to George II. in Feb. 1730-1, and promoted by bishop Sherlock to the archdeaconry of Berks, 1735. He died December 10, 1746, in the 72d year of his age, and was buried in the chancel of Bluntesham church, where a neat monument of white marble is erected to his memory, with an inscription written by his friend Mr. Castle, dean of Hereford. His only son, Samuel, was fellow of Trinity college, Cambridge, and rector of Fulham, in Middlesex. With the ample fortune which his father left him, he purchased the manor of Milton near Cambridge, and died Jan. 1790.

, who flourished at the close of the 14th century, under Richard II. is celebrated as an ancient chronicler. He was a canon-regular of Leicesterabbey, and wrote a history of English affairs in five books, from the Conquest to the year 1395. He wrote likewise an account of the deposition of Richard II. His works are printed with the ten English historians published by Selden.

None of our writers, in the opinion of Dr. Johnson, can justly contest the superiority of Knolles, who, in his History of the Turks, has displayed all the excellencies that narration can admit. His style, though somewhat obscured by time, and sometimes vitiated by false wit, is pure, nervous, elevated, and clear. A wonderful multiplicity of events is so artfully arranged, and so distinctly explained, that each facilitates the knowledge of the next. Whenever a new personage is introduced, the reader is prepared by his character for his actions. When a nation is first attacked, or city besieged, he is made acquainted with its history or situation: so that a great part of the world is brought into view. Tfie descriptions of this author are without minuteness, and the digressions without ostentation. After other praises of the work, Dr. Johnson concludes with remarking, that nothing could have sunk Knolles into obscurity, but the remoteness and barbarity of the people whose story he relates. It is perhaps unnecessary to add that our great critic took the fable of his “Irene” from this work.

, a learned Jesuit and controversial writer, whose true name was Matthias Wilson, and who, in some of his works, takes the name of Nicholas Smith, was born at Pegsworth near Morpeth in Northumberland, 1580. He was entered among the Jesuits in 1606, being already in priest’s orders; and is represented in the “Bibliotheca Patrurn societatis Jesu,” as a man of low stature, but of great abilities: “vir magnis animi dotibus bumili in corpore praeditus.” He taught divinity a long time in the English college at Rome, and was a rigid observer of that discipline himself which he has as rigidly exacted from others. He was then appointed sub-provincial of the province of England; and, after he had exercised that employment out of the kingdom, he was sent thither to perform the functions of provincial. He was twice honoured with that employment. He was present, as provincial, at the general assembly of the orders of the Jesuits, held at Rome in 1646, and was elected one of the definitors. He died at London, January 4, 1655-6, and was buried in the church of St. Pancras, near that city.

This Jesuit was the author of several works, in all which he has shewn great acuteness and learning. In 1630, 'he published a small volume, called “Charity mistaken, with the want whereof Catholics are unjustly charged, for affirming, as they do with grief, that Protestancy, unrepented, destroys salvation.” This involved him in a controversy, first with Dr. Potter, provost of Queeu’s-college, Oxford, who, in 1633, wrote “Want of Charity justly charged Oh all such Romanists, as dare, without truth or modesty, affirm, that Protestancy destroyeth salvation;” and afterwards with Chillingworth, who, in answer to this Jesuit, wrote his “Religion of Protestants;” of which, as well as of his controversy with Knott, we have already given an account in his life (vol. IX.) It only remains to be added here, that Chillingworth’s latitude of principles afforded Knott many advantages, which, at that time, would be more apparent than now. Knott’s larger answer to Chillingworth did not appear until 1652, when it was printed at Ghent, under the title of “Infidelity unmasked; or, the confutation of a book published by W. Chillingworth, &c.” Knott was also the author of “Monita utilissima pro patribus missionariis Anglicanis,” or useful advice for the fathers of the English mission; but this work was never printed.

, the chief instrument and promoter of the reformation in Scotland, was descended of an ancient and honourable family, and born 1505, at Gifford, in the county of East Lothian, Scotland. His parents gave him a liberal education, which in that age was far from being common. He was first placed at the grammar-school of Haddington, and after acquiring the principles of the Latin tongue, was sent to the university of St. Andrew’s under professor John Major, the same who was Buchanan’s tutor, a very acute schoolman, and deep in theology. Knox, however, examining the works of Jerom and Austin, began to dis-relish this subtilizing method, altered his taste, and applied himself to plain and solid divinity. At his entrance upon this new course of study, he attended the preaching of Thomas Guillaume, or Williams, a friar of eminence, whose sermons were of extraordinary service to him; and he acquired still more knowledge of the truth from the martyr, George Wishart, so much celebrated in, the history of this time, who came from England in 1554, with commissioners from king Henry VIII. Knox, being of an inquisitive nature, learned from him the principles of the reformation; with which he was so well pleased, that he renounced the Romish religion, and having now relinquished all thoughts of officiating in that church, which had invested him with clerical orders, he entered as tutor into the family of Hugh Douglas of Long Niddrie, a gentleman in East Lothian, who had embraced the reformed doctrines. Another gentleman, in the neighbourhood, also put his son under his tuition, and these two youths were instructed by him in the principles of religion, as well as of the learned languages, and he taught the former in such a way as to allow the rest of the family, and the people of the neighbourhood, to reap advantage from it. He catechised them publicly in a chapel at Long Niddrie, in which be also read to them at stated times, a chapter of the Bible, accompanied with explanatory remarks. The memory of this has been preserved by tradition; and the chapel, the ruins of which are still apparent, is popularly called “John Knox’s kirk.” It was not, however, to be expected, that he would long be suffered to continue in this employment, under a government entirely at the devotion of cardinal Beaton (see Beaton); and although he was, in the midst of his tyranny, cut off by a conspiracy in 1546, Hamilton, successor to the vacant bishopric, sought Knox’s life with as much eagerness as his predecessor. Hence Knox resolved to retire to Germany, where the reformation was gaining ground; knowing that, in England, though the pope’s authority was suppressed, yet the greater part of his doctrine remained in full vigour. He was, however, diverted from his purpose, and prevailed on to return to St. Andrew’s, January 1547; where he soon after accepted a preacher’s place, though sorely against his will.

He now set openly, and with a boldness peculiar to his character, to preach the doctrines of the reformation, although he had received no ordination, unless such as the small band of reformers could give; a circumstance which, although objected to by some ecclesiastical historians, was not accounted any impediment to 1m afterwards receiving promotion at the hands of the English prelates. His first sermon was upon Dan. vii. 23 28; from which text he proved, to the satisfaction of his auditors, that the pope was Antichrist, and that the doctrine of the Romish church was contrary to the doctrine of Christ and his apostles; and he likewise gave the notes both of the true church, and of the antichristian church. Hence he was convened by his superiors; he was also engaged in disputes; but things went prosperously on, and Knox continued diligent in the discharge of his ministerial function tillJuly 1547, when the castle of St. Andrew’s, in which he was, was surrendered to the French; and then he was carried with the garrison into France. He remained a prisoner on. board the galleys, till the latter end of 1549, when being set at liberty, he passed into England; and, going to London, was there licensed, either by Cranmer, or Somerset the protector, and appointed preacher, first at Berwick, and next at Newcastle. During this employ, he received a summons, in 1551, to appear before Cuthbert Tonstall, bishop of Durham, for preaching against the mass. In 1552, he was appointed chaplain to Edward VI.; it being thought fit, as Strype relates, that the king should retain six chaplains in ordinary, who should not only wait on him, but be itineraries, and preach the gospel over all the nation. The sanje year he came into some trouble, on account of a bold sermon preached upon Christmas-day, at Newcastle, against the obstinacy of the papists. In 1552-3, he returned to London, and was appointed to preach before the king and council at Westminster; who recommended Cranmer archbishop of Canterbury to give him the living of Allhallows in London, which was accordingly offered him but he refused it, not caring to conform to the English liturgy, as it then stood. Some say, that king Edward would have promoted him to a bishopric; but that he even fell into a passion when it was offered him, and rejected it as favouring too much of Antichristianism.

While our reformer was thus occupied in Scotland, he received letters from the English congregation at Geneva, earnestly intreating him to come thither; accordingly, July 1556, he left Scotland, went first to Dieppe in France, and thence to Geneva. He had no sooner turned' his back than the bishops summoned him to appear before them; and, upon his non-appearance, passed a sentence of death upon him for heresy, and burnt him in effigy at the Cross at Edinburgh. Against this sentence, he drew up, and afterwards printed at Geneva, in 1558, “An Appellation from the cruel and unjust Sentence pronounced against him by the false bishops and clergy of Scotland,” &c. He had a call to Scotland in 1557; and having consulted Calvin and other persons as to the prudence and necessity of the step, he set out, and had proceeded as far as Dieppe, when he was advised that some of his best friends seemed, through timidity, to be abandoning their principles, and that therefore it would not be safe for him to proceed. He immediately wrote letters to those who had invited him, complaining of their irresolution, and even denouncing the severe judgments of God on all those who should betray the cause of truth and of their country, by weakness or apostacy. These letters made such an impression on those to whom they were immediately addressed, that they all came to a written resolution, “that they would followforth their purpose, and commit themselves, and whatever God had given them, into his hands, rather than suffer idolatry to reign, and the subjects to be defrauded of th^ only food of their souls.” To secure each other’s fidelity to the protestant cause, a common bond, or covenant, was entered into by them, dated at Edinburgh, December 3, 1557; and from this period they were distinguished by the name of “The Congregation.” In the mean time Mr. Knox returned to Geneva, where, in 1558, he published his treatise, entitled “The First Blast of the Trumpet against the monstrous Regiment of Women.” His chief motives to write this, were the cruel and bloody government of queen Mary of England, and the endeavours of Mary of Lorrain, queen-regent of Scotland, to break through the laws, and introduce tyrannical government. He designed to have written a subsequent piece, which was to have been called “The Second Blast:” but queen Mary dying, and he having a great opinion of queen Elizabeth, and great expectations to the protestant cause from her, went no farther.

Dr. Robertson, in describing this business, says, “While their minds were in that ferment which the queen’s perfidiousness and their own danger occasioned, Knox mounted the pulpit, and, by a vehement harangue against idolatry, inflamed the multitude with the utmost rage. The indiscretion of a priest, who, immediately after Knox’s discourse, was seen preparing to celebrate mass, and began to decorate the altar for that purpose, precipitated them into immediate action. With tumultuous, but irresistible violence, they fell upon the churches in that city, overturned the altars, defaced the pictures, broke in pieces the images, and proceeding next to the monasteries, laid those sumptuous fabrics almost level with the ground. This riotous insurrection was not the effect of any concert, or previous deliberation. Censured by the reformed preachers, and publicly condemned by the persons of most power and credit with the party, it must be regarded merely as an accidental eruption of popular rage.” From this time Mr. Knox continued to promote the reformation by every means in his power, sparingno pains, nor fearing any danger. Mr. Knox, by his correspondence with secretary Cecil, was chiefly instrumental in establishing those negotiations between “The Congregation” and the English, which terminated in the march of an English army into Scotland to assist the protestants, and to protect them against the persecutions of the queen-regent. This army, being joined by almost all the great men of Scotland, proceeded with such vigour and success, that they obliged the French forces, who had been the principal supports of the tyranny of the regent, to quit the kingdom, and restored the parliament to its former independency. Of that body, a great majority had embraced the protestant opinions, and encouraged by the zeal and number of their friends, they improved every opportunity in overthrowing the whole fabric of popery. They sanctioned the confession of faith presented to them by Knox, and the other reformed teachers: they abolished the jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical courts, and transferred the causes to the cognizance of the civil courts; and they prohibited the exercise of religious worship, according to the rites of the Romish church. In August 1561, the queen arrived from France, and immediately set up a private mass in her own chapel; which afterwards, by her protection and countenance, was much frequented. This excited the zeal of Knox, who expressed great warmth against allowing it: and, an act of the privy-council being proclaimed at Edinburgh the 25th of that month, forbidding any disturbance to be given to this practice, under pain of death, Knox openly, in his sermon the Sunday following, declared, that “one mass was more frightful to him than ten thousand armed enemies, landed in any part of the realm.' 1 This freedom gave great offence to the court, and the queen herself had a long conference with him upon that and other subjects. In 1563, he preached a sermon, in which he expressed his abhorrence of the queen’s marrying a papist; and her majesty, sending for him, expressed much passion, and thought to have punished him; but was prevailed on to desist at that time. The ensuing year, lord Darnley, being married to the queen, was advised by the protestants about the court, to hear Mr. Knox preach, as thinking it would contribute much to procure the good-will of the people he accordingly did so but was so much offended at his sermon, that he complained to the council, who silenced Knox for some time. His text was Isaiah xxiv. 13 and 17,” O Lord, our God, other lords than Thou have reigned over us.“From these words he took occasion to speak of the government of wicked princes, who, for the sins of the people, are sent as tyrants and scourges to plague them; and, among other things, he said, that” God sets over them, for their offences and ingratitude, boys and women."

In 1567, Knox preached a sermon at the coronation of James VI. of Scotland, and afterwards the First of Great Britain and also another at the opening of the parliament. He went vigorously on with the work of reformation but, in 1572, was greatly offended with a convention of ministers at Leith, where it was agreed that a certain kind of episcopacy should be introduced into the church. At this time his constitution was quite broken; and what seems to have given him the finishing stroke was the dreadful news of the massacre of the Protestants at Paris about this time. He had strength enough to preach against it, which he desired the French ambassador might be acquainted with; but he fell sick soon after, and died November 24, 1572, after having spent several days in the utmost devotion. He was interred at Edinburgh, several lords attending, and particularly the earl of Morton, that day chosen regent, who, as soon as he was laid in his grave, said, u There lies he who never feared the face of man, who hath been often threatened with dag and dagger, but yet hath ended his days in peace and honour. For he had God’s providence watching over him in a special manner, when his very life was sought."

Knox was twice married, and had children by both his wives; two sons by the first, who were educated at St. John’s college, in Cambridge, and chosen fellows of the same. He requested the general assembly which met at Edinburgh in 1566, for leave to visit these sons in England; but they were only at school then, being sent to the university after his death. As to his writings, they were neither numerous nor large: 1. “A faithful admonition to the Professors of the Gospel of Christ within the Kingdom of England,” 1554. 2. “A Letter to Queen Mary, Regent of Scotland,” 1556. 3. “The Appellation of John Knox,” &c. mentioned above, 1558. 4. “The First Blast,” &c. mentioned above, 1558. 5. “A brief Exhortation to England, for the speedy Embracing of Christ’s Gospel, heretofore by the Tyranny of Mary suppressed and banished,” 1559. After his death, came out, 6, His “History of the Reformation of Religion within the Realm of Scotland,” &c. at the end of the fourth edition of which, at Edinburgh, 1732, in folio, are subjoined all the forementioned works. He published also a few pieces in the controversial way, against the anabaptists, as well as papists; and also his sermon before lord Darnley.

, the son of capt, Robert Knox, commander of the Anne frigate, in the East India service, was born about 1641, and probably brought up to the sea service. He went with his father to Fort George in 1657, and returning thence to England in 1659, put into Ceylon on account of a storm, where he, his father, and fourteen others were made prisoners, and his father died in this captivity, Feb. 9, 1660. After a servitude of nineteen years and a half, the subject of this memoir escaped from the inland parts of the island, where he was prisoner at large, to Areppa, a Dutch settlement on the north-west coast. Here he was hospitably received, and carried in one of their ships to Batavia, and thence, in an English ship, to England. Many of his companions whom he left at Ceylon, had become reconciled to their fate, married, and had families; but captain Knox, although often solicited, preserved his repugnance to such connexions, and his love of liberty. After his return he wrote “An historical relation of the Island of Ceylon, in the East Indies,” with an account of his captivity and escape; illustrated with plates and a map of the island, London, 1681, fol. The preface is by Dr, Robert Hooke, who probably had some share in the compilation. It was long esteemed a book of authority, It is uncertain when captain Knox died. He was cousin to Strype the historian.

, who was born in the country of Holstein, acquired some celebrity in his day for an attempt to propagate atheistical tenets, and for undertaking long journeys on purpose to make proselytes. He first broached his impious notions at Koniugsberg, in Prussia, about 1673. He boasted that he had a great many followers in the chief cities of Europe; at Paris, at Amsterdam, at Leyden, in England, at Hamburgh, at Copenhagen, at Stockholm, at Rome; and that he had even seven hundred at Jena. His followers were called conscienciaries, because they asserted, that there is no other God, no other religion, no other lawful magistracy, but conscience. He gave the substance of his system in a short letter dated from Rome the contents of which may be reduced to the following heads “First, there is neither a God nor a devil; secondly, magistrates are not to be valued, churches are to be despised, and priests rejected; thirdly, instead of magistrates and priests, we have learning and reason, which, joined with conscience, teach us to live honestly, to hurt no man, and to give every one his due; fourthly, matrimony does not differ from fornication; fifthly, there is but one life, which is this, after which there are neither rewards nor punishments; sixthly, the holy scripture is inconsistent with itself.” The letter may be found in the edition of “Micraclii Syntagma Historitc Ecclesiastic, 1699.” Knutzen dispersed also some writings in the German tongue, but his opinions were amply refuted, in the same language, by a Lutheran professor, named John Musacus, who undertook that task in order to remove the suspicions that might be entertained to the prejudice of the university of Jena. When he died is not mentioned, nor does his history appear now of much importance.

, a learned philosopher and mathematician, was a Swiss by birth, and came early into eminence by his mathematical abilities. He was professor of philosophy and natural law at Franeker, and afterwards at the Hague, where he became also librarian to the stadtholder, and to the princess of Orange; and where he died in 1757. The academy of Berlin enrolled him among her members; but afterwards expelled him on the following occasion. Maupertuis, the president, had inserted in the volume of the Memoirs for 1746, a discourse upon the laws of motion; which Koenig not only attacked, but also attributed the memoir to Leibnitz. Maupertuis, stung with the imputation of plagiarism, engaged the academy of Berlin to call upon him for his proof; which Koenig failing to produce, he was struck out of the academy. All Europe was interested in the quarrel which this occasioned between Koenig and Maupertuis. The former appealed to the public; and his appeal, written with the animation of resentment, procured him many friends. He was author of some other works, and had the character of being one of the best mathematicians of the age. He had a brother, Daniel, who was murdered at the age of twenty-two, at Franekei 4 The populace, overhearing him talk in French, imagined that he was a French spy, and would have killed him on the spot, if the academicians had not rescued him from their fury: but the wounds which he received hurried him to the grave in a few months. He translated into Latin Dr. Arbuthnot’s “Tables of Ancient Coins,” which remained in ms. till 1756, when it was published at Utrecht, with a curious and useful preface, by professor Reitz.

, a celebrated traveller, was born in 1674, at Dorflas, in the principality of Baireuth, of which place his father was a judge, and afterwards a receiver of taxes. His early years were passed in poverty, until, in 1696, he was received into the* house of Eimart, an astronomer, under whose directions he made considerable progress in the sciences. He entered the university of Halle in 1700, and afterwards gave a course of lectures in mathematics and philosophy. He was introduced to baron von Krosie, privy counsellor to his Prussian majesty, to whom he became secretary, and whom he accompanied in his travels; and a proposal being made to him to go to the Cape of Good Hope, he gladly embraced the opportunity. Here he remained ten years, making observations on the country and the people, till he was afflicted with blindness, from which, however, on his return to Europe, he so far recovered as to be able to read with the assistance of glasses. In 1716 he inserted in the Acta Eruditorum a treatise “De aquis Capitis Bonse Spei.” This work introduced him into farther notice, and he was appointed rector of the school of Neustadt, where he died in 1726. His chief publication was “A Description of the Cape of Good Hope,” in folio, with twenty-four plates. This work was translated into Dutch in 1727; and at London, into English, in 1731, by Mr. Medley, who lopped o.'Fsome of its redundancies. It was afterwards abridged, and published in French in three vols. 12mo. The first attack on the veracity of tliis work was made by the abbe“de la Caille, who, in his Journal of the voyage to the Cape, said that he took Kolben’s description with him, but found it full of inaccuracies and falsehoods, and more resembling a series of fables than an authentic narrative. It has been also said that Kolben having passed the whole of his time with his bottle and his pipe, was perplexed to find that he had nothing to show in Europe, as the first fruits of his supposed labours, and therefore engaged some inhabitants of the Cape to draw up for him that description of the colony which he imposed upon the public as his own. Forstcr, on the other hand, in his” Voyage round the World," ascribes to La Caille certain interested motives in thus decrying Kolben' s work, and says it would be easy to refute almost every criticism which the abbe* has passed on that intelligent and entertaining voyager. These different opinions might perplex us, if more recent travellers had not rendered us independent both of Kolben and La Cailie.

, born in 1585, was one of the three fanatics whose visions were published at Amsterdam in 1657 (by Comenius, as noticed in his life), with the following title: “Lux in Tenebris.” He lived at Sprottow in Silesia; and his visions began in June 1616. He fancied he saw an angel, under the form of a man, who commanded him to go and declare to the magistrates, that, unless the people repented, the wrath of God would fall dreadfully upon them. His pastor and friends restrained him for some time, nor did he execute his commission, even though the angel had appeared six times; but in 1619, being threatened by the same spirit, he divulged his commission. This brought upon him some ridicule, but his visions continued, and were followed by extasies and prophetic dreams. He waited on the elector Palatine, whom the protestants had declared king of Bohemia, at Breslaw, in 1620, and informed him of his commission, and published it in other places, and, in 1625, at Brandenburg, He became acquainted, the same year, with Comenius, who greatly favoured his prophecies but, as they chiefly presaged happiness to the elector-palatine, and the reverse to the emperor, he became at length obnoxious, and, in 1627, was closely imprisoned, as a seditious impostor, afterwards set on the pillory, and banished the emperor’s dominions. Upon this he went to Lusatia, which was then subject to his electoral highness of Saxony; and lived there unmolested till his death, in 1647. Whether fool, or knave, he was not discouraged from prophesying, though his predictions were continually convicted of falsehood by the event.

, a celebrated fanatic, was born at Breslaw in Silesia in 1651, and gave great hopes by the uncommon progress he made in literature; but this was interrupted by a sickness he laboured under at eighteen years of age. He was thought to be dead on the third day of his illness, but had then, it seems, a most terrible vision. He fancied himself surrounded with all the devils in hell, and this at mid-day, when he was awake. This vision was followed by another of God himself, surrounded by his saints, and Jesus Christ in the midst; when he saw and felt things inexpressible. Two days after, he had more visions of the same kind; and when he was cured of his distemper, though he perceived a vast alteration with regard to these sights, yet he found himself perpetually encompassed with a circle of light on his left hand. He had no longer any taste for human learning, nor any value for university-disputes or lectures; he would have no other master but the Holy Ghost. He left his country at nineteen years of age. His desire to see Holland made him hasten thither, even in the midst of a desolating war; and he landed at Amsterdam, Sept. 3, 1673, which was but three days before the retaking the city of Naerden. He went to Leyden a few days after, and meeting with Jacob Behmen’s works, his disorder increased, for he now said he found that Behmen had prophesied of things, of which he thought nobody but himself had the least knowledge. There was at that time in Holland one John Hothe, a prophet likewise of the same stamp; for whom Kuhlman conceived a high veneration, and dedicated to him his “Prodromus quinquennii mirabilis,” printed at Leyden in 1674. This work was to be followed by two other volumes, in the first of which he intended to introduce the studies and discoveries he had made from the time of his first vision to 1674. He communicated his design to father Kircher; and, commending some books which that Jesuit had published, he let him know, that he had only sketched out what himself intended to carry much farther Kircher wrote him civil answers, in which he did not trouble himself to defend his works, but declared, that, having written only as a man, he did not pretend to equal those who wrote by inspiration. “I frankly own myself,” says he, “incapable of your sublime and celestial knowledge: what I have written, I have written after a human manner, that is, by knowledge gained by study and labour, not divinely inspired or infused. I do not doubt but that you, by means of the incomparable and vast extent of your genius, will produce discoveries much greater and more admirable than my trifles. You promise great and. incredible things, which, as they far transcend all human capacity, so I affirm boldly, that they have never been attempted, nor even thought of, by any person hitherto; and therefore I cannot but suspect, that you have obtained by the gift of God such a knowledge as the scriptures ascribe to Adam and Solomon: I mean, an Adamic and Solomonic knowledge, known to no mortal but yourself, and inexplicable by any other.” Our fanatic, not perceiving that his correspondent was jesting with him, carefully published Kircher’s answers, using capital letters in those passages where he thought himself praised. Kircher, however, gave him serious advice, when Kuhlman consulted him about writing to the pope: he told him with what circumspection and caution things were conducted at Rome; and assured him, that in his great work, which he proposed to dedicate to the pope, he must admit nothing which might offend the censors of books, and especially take care not to ascribe to himself an inspired knowledge.

, a celebrated chemist, was born at Husurn, in the duchy of Sleswick, in 1630. He was originally intended for the practice of pharmacy; but having applied himself with equal diligence to the study of chemistry and metallurgy, he obtained great reputation in. these sciences, and was appointed chemist to the elector of Saxony. He afterwards went to the court of Frederic William, elector of Brandenburg, with a similar appointment; and subsequently to that of Charles XI. king of Sweden, who, in 1693, granted him letters of nobility, under the name of Kunckel de Loewenstern. He was elected a member of the imperial Academia Naturae Curiosorum, under the name of Hermes III. He died in Sweden, in March 1703. Notwithstanding his advantages and fame, his theoretical knowledge was very imperfect; he was altogether destitute of the least tincture of philosophy, and was even said to have been one of the searchers for the philosopher’s stone. He is now principally known as the discoverer of phosphorus, which he prepared from urine, and which bears his name in the shops. He was the author of several works, written in German, in a very bad style, and with as little method as the rest of the alchemists. His treatise “On Phosphorus,” was printed at Leipsic in 1678, and his “Art of Glass-making” in 1689. Two or three of his essays have been translated into Latin.

, a learned critic, was born in the month of Feb. 1670 at Blomberg, a little town in Westphalia, where his father was a magistrate. He learned polite literature under his elder brother, who taught it in the college of Joachim at Berlin. He distinguished himself so early in life, that on the recommendation of baron Spanheim, he was appointed tutor to the two sons of the count de Schewerin, prime-minister of the king of Prussia. He had also the promise of a professorship in the college of Joachim at Berlin but, till that should be vacant, Kuster, who was then but about five-and-twenty, resolved to travel into Germany, France, England, and Holland. He went first to Francfort upon the Oder, where he studied the civil law for some time; and thence to Antwerp, Ley den, and Utrecnt, where he remained a considerable time, and wrote several works. In 1699, he passed over into England, and the year following into France, where his chief employment was to collate Suidas with three manuscripts in the king’s library. About the end of this year he returned to England, and in four years finished his edition of Suidas, on which he may be said to have meditated day and night. He relates himself, that, being one night awaked by thunder and lightning, he became so alarmed for this work, that he rose immediately, and carried it to bed with him, as his most valuable treasure. It was published at Cambridge in 1705, and is by far the best edition of that valuable Lexicon; and Le Clerc tells us, that the university furnished part of the expence of it. The Bodleian library has lately become possessed of a copy, covered from one end to the other with manuscript notes by D'Orville and others. Kuster was honoured with the degree of doctor by the university of Cambridge, and had several advantageous offers made him to continue there; but was obliged to wave them, being recalled to Berlin, to take possession of the professorship, which had been promised him. He afterwards resigned this place, and went to Amsterdam; where, in 1710, he published an edition of “Aristophanes,” in folio, whicb the public had been prepared some time to expect by an account as well as a specimen of that work, given by LeClerc in his “Bibliotheque choisie,” for 1708. This excellent edition, emphatically called editio optima, coi.'t.tins for the first time some new Scholia on the “Lysistrata,” some notes of Isaac Casaubon on the “Equites,” and of Spanheim and Bentley, on a few of the earlier plays. It is, upon the whole, a noble production, and has been long esteemed by the first literary characters abroad and at home. Kuster gave an edition also of “Mill’s Greek Testament” the same year; in which he had compared the text with twelve manuscripts which Mill never saw. Of these twelve there were nine in the king of France’s library; but, excepting one, which has all the books of the New Testament, the rest contain no more than the four Gospels. The tenth manuscript belonged to Carpzovius, a minister of Leipsic, and contains the four Gospels. The eleventh was brought from Greece by Seidel, of Berlin; but it has not the four Gospels. The last, which Kuster most highly valued, was communicated to him by Bornier, who bought it at the public sale of the library of Francius, professor of rhetoric at Amsterdam. After Kuster’s preface, follows a letter of Le Clerc concerning Mill’s work. From Amsterdam he removed to Rotterdam, and went some time after to Antwerp, to confer with the Jesuits about some doubts he had in religious matters; the consequence of this was his being brought over to the Roman catholic religion, and his abjuring that of the Protestants July 25, 1713, in the church of the noviciates belonging to the Jesuits. The king of France rewarded him with a pension of 2000 livres; and as a mark of "distinction, ordered him to be admitted supernumerary associate of the academy of inscriptions. But he did not enjoy this new settlement long; for he died October 12, 1716, of an abscess in the pancreas, aged only forty-six.

Kuster’s other works, not hitherto mentioned, were: 1. “Historia Critica Homeri,” Francfort, 1696, 8vo, a work which he did not value much afterwards, when he had made a greater progress in learning. He thought that he had begun too early the character of an author. In this tract he took upon him the name of Neocorus, which in Greek signifies a sexton, as Kuster does in High Dutch. 2. “Bibliotheca Librorum collecta a L. Neocoro, 77 Utrecht, 5 tomes in 8vo. This work was continued from the month of April 1697, to the end of 1699. Mr. Kuster was at.first employed alone in this journal; but took into his assistance Mr. Henry Sike, who was afterwards professor of Hebrew in the university of Cambridge. They wrote in conjunction till June 1699, when Mr. Kuster left this work to Mr. Sike, who continued it no longer than the last six months of that year. 3.” Jamblichi de Vita Pythagoras Liber, Grsece & Latine, cum nova Versione, Emendationibus, & Notis L. Kusteri. Accedit Porphyrius de Vit& Pythagoras cum notis L. Holstenii &-C. Hittershusii; itemque Anonymus apud Photium de Vita Pythagorse,“Amsterdam, 1707, in 4to. Dr. Kuster’s notes are merely criticd, in which he restores a prodigious number of passages in his authors. 4.” Diatriba L. K. in qu& Editio Suidae Cantabrigiensis contra Cavillationes J. G. Aristarchi Leydensis defenditur,“inserted in M. Le Clerc’s Bibliotheque Choisie, torn. XXIV. p. 49, & seqq. and published separately, in 12mo. A new edition of it, with additions, was published under the title of” Diatriba Anti-Gronoviana,“at Amsterdam, 1712, in 8vo. 5.” De Musseo Alexaudrino Diatriba,“inserted in the 8th tome of Gronovius’s collection of Greek Antiquities. 6.” Ludovici Savoti Dissertationes de Nummis antiquis lingua Gallica in Latinam translate a. L. Neocoro,“inserted in the llth tome of Graevius’s Roman Antiquities. 7.” Picturae antiquse sepulchri Nasoniorum in Via Flaminia delineate & incisee a Petro Sancto Bartaeriolo, explicates a Joanne Petro Hellene; ex Italics. Lingua in Latinam transtulit L. Neocorus,“inserted in the 12th volume of GraDvius. 8” Epistola, in qua Praefatio quarn v. c. J. P. [Jacobus Perizonius] novissimae Dissertationi suae de aere gravi praeposuit, refellitur,“Leyden, 1713, 8vi. 9.” De vero usu Verborum Mediorum apud Graecos, eorumque differentia u Verbis Activis & Passivis. Annexa est Epistola de Verbo Cerno ad virum clar. J. P. Auctore Ludolpho Kustero, Regias Inscriptionum Academiae socio,“Paris, 1714, in 12mo. 10.” Explication d'une Inscription Greque envoy^e de Smyrne,“inserted in the Memoirs de Trevoux for September, 1715. 11.” Examen Criticum Editionis novissimae Herodoti Gronovianae,“inserted in Le Clerc’s Bibliotheque ancienne &, moderne, torn. V. p. 383 & seqq. There has been published in Holland under the name of Graevius, and with the title of” Nova Conors Musarum," a little tract of Kuster, written in 1699, for the instruction of some young noblemen. Our author published a specimen of a new edition of Robert Stephens’s Thesaurus, with great improvements in La Roche’s Memoirs of Literature, vol. V. p. 298 & seqq

“Dr. Raster, a tall, thin, pale man, seemingly unable to bear fatigue, was nevertheless indefatigable, and of an uncommon application to letters. He formed himself under Graevius. I was acquainted with him from 1700 to 1714-. Upon my collecting the remains of Anacreon for Mr. Barnes, about 1702, he introduced me to Dr. Bentley. You must be known, says he, to that gentleman, whom I look upon, not only as the first scholar in Europe, but as the best of friends. I only hinted to him the difficulty I lay under in relation to the officers of the customs; and, presently after, he accommodated that troublesome affair to my entire satisfaction, without so much as once letting me know he had any hand in it till near a year after: unde satis compertum mihi Bentleium esse re officiosum non verbis. Many an excellent emendation upon Suidas have I received from him. I the rather mention this, says Mr. Wasse, because when that Lexicon was in the press, Kuster with indignation shewed me an anonymous letter in Latin, addressed to him, wherein he was advised not to treat the doctor with that distinction, if he intended his book should make its way in the learned world. But to proceed; when he came to write upon Suidas, he found himself under a necessity of making indices of all the authors mentioned by the ancients; Eustathius particularly, and nineteen volumes of Commentaries upon Aristotle, &c. of the history, geography, and chronological characters occasionally mentioned. Dr. Bentley prevailed upon me to give him some assistance. Those that fell to my lot were chiefly Eustathius on the Odyssey, seven or eight Scholiasts, Plutarch, Galen. You may judge of Kuster’s dispatch and application, when I tell you I could by no means keep pace with him, though I began the last author Jan. 9, 1703, and finished him March the 8th of the same year, and in proportion too, the remainder. Though I corrected all the sheets of the first volume, yet I never perceived he had omitted some less material words, nor ever knew the true reason. I have heard him blamed too for mentioning the names of one or two persons who sent him a few notes; but this was occasioned, I am confident, by the hurry he was always in, and the great number of letters, memorandums, and other papers he had about him. As I remember, he translated cle novo in a manner five or six sheets a week, and remarked upon them; so that the work was hastily executed, and would have been infinitely more perfect, had he allowed himself time. Some people thought they assisted him when they did not. A person of figure took him into his closet after dinner, and told him he would communicate something of mighty importance, a xfi/xiiMov, which in all difficulties had been his oracle. In an ill hour I met Kuster transported with delight. We found it was Bndaeus’s Lexicon, large paper, with only the names of the authors he quotes written in the margin, without one single remark or addition. Kuster, the best-natured man alive, was terribly put to it how to treat one that meant well, and continually inquired what service it did him, and triumphed that he was able to contribute so largely to the worthy edition of Suidas. Towards the close of the work, Kuster grew very uneasy, emaciated to the last degree, cold as a statue, and just as much alive as a man three parts dead. Sure I was to hear, every time I called upon him, * O utinam illuce.scat ille dies, quo huic operi manum ultimam imponam' It may now be proper to acquaint you in what manner this gentleman used to relax, and forget his labours over a bottle, for even Scipio and Luelius were not such fools as to be wise always; and that was generally in the poetical way, or in conversations that turned upon antiquities, coins, inscriptions, and obscure passages of the ancients. Sometimes he performed on the spinnet at our music-club, and was by the connoisseurs accounted a master. His chief companions were, Dr. Sike, famous in oriental learning; Davies and Needham; Mr. Oddy, who wrote Greek pretty well, and has left notes upon Dio, and a version of Apollonius Rhodius, which are reposited in lord Oxford’s library; he is the person whose conjectures upon Avienus were printed by Dr. Hudson at the end of his Geographers; and Mr. IJarnes, the Greek professor. Upon the publication of his Suidas, Kuster in a little time grew very fat; and, returning into Prussia, found his patrons retired from court, and his salary precarious. What is more, his principles, which inclined to what is now called Arianism, rendered him not very acceptable to some persons. In a little time measures were taken to make him uneasy, and he retired to Amsterdam. Here he reprinted Dr. Mill’s New Testament, and published Aristophanes, and some additional remarks upon Suidas, under Mr. Le Clerc’s cover. But his banker failing, he was reduced to extreme poverty; and, happening at that very juncture to be invited to Paris by his old friend l'abbe Bignon, was unfortunately prevailed upon to join himself to the Gallican church. He desired me to write to him, as usual, but never on the article of religion; declaring, at the same time, how he had not been obliged to make a formal recantation, or condemn the reformed by an express act of his, but merely to conform. How far this is true I know not; what is certain is, only that he was promised all the favour and distinction any convert could expect. He was presently admitted a member of the royal academy of inscriptions; and in 1714, in return for a paper of verses I sent him, made me a present of his book c De vero usu verborum mediorum; xpvesa %ataW The last 1 had from Kuster contained only queries upon Hesychius; on whom, before he left England, he had made about 5000 emendations. His queries were not over difficult and thence I guessed his health much impaired. And it proved so indeed for we heard soon after, that he had been blooded five or six times for a fever, and that, upon opening his body, there was found a cake of sand along the lower region of his belly. This, I take it, was occasioned by his sitting in a manner double, and writing on a very low table, surrounded with three or four circles of books placed on the ground, which was the situation we usually found him in. He had a clear head, cool and proper for debate: he behaved in a very inoffensive manner; and I am persuaded, the last error of his life was almost the only one, and by charitable persons will be placed in a good measure to the account of his deplorable circumstances; for if oppression, which only affects a part, will, why shall not the loss of all one’s fortunes, purchased with so much labour, ‘make a wise man mad.’”

, an English poet, son of sir Edward Kynaston, knt. was of an ancient family, whose seat was at Otely in Shropshire, where, probably, he was born in 1587. In 1601 he entered as a gentleman- commoner of Oriel college, Oxford, which he left after taking his bachelor’s degree, being then, as Wood says, “more addicted to the superficial parts of learning, poetry and oratory (wherein he excelled), than logic and philosophy.” He afterwards, however, went to Cambridge, and after taking his master’s degree, returned in 1611 to Oxford, and was admitted ad eundem. He then became a courtier, admired for his talents, and had the honour of knighthood conferred upon him, and was afterwards made esquire of the body to Charles I. He was the first regent of a literary institution called the Musaum Minerv& 9 of which he drew up and published “The Constitutions,” Lond. 4to, 1636. It was an academy instituted in the eleventh year of the reign of Charles I. and established at a house in Coventgarden, purchased by Sir Francis, and furnished by him with books, Mss. paintings, statues, musical and mathematical instruments, &c. and every requisite for polite and liberal education: but the nobility and gentry only were admissible. Sir Francis was chosen regent, and professors were appointed to teach the various arts and sciences. It probably, owing to the rebellion, did not survive its founder, who died about 1642. He translated Chaucer’s 46 Troilus and Cresseide“into Latin, published at Oxford, 1635, 4to; but is better known to the lovers of our early poetry by his” Leoline and Sydanis,“with” Cinthiades,“1641, of which Mr. Ellis has given some beautiful specimens, and the story is analized by Mr. Gilchrist, with additional extracts, in the” Censtira."

, a French enthusiast, was born at Bourg, in Guienne, Feb. 13, 1610; and, being sent to the Jesuits college at Bourdeaux at seven years of age, he made so quick a progress in his studies, that his masters resolved to take into their society a youth, who gave such promising hopes of being an honour to it. The spirit of piety, with which he was animated, brought him easily into their views; but, being opposed in this by his father, who was gentleman of the bedchamber to Lewis XIII. he could not then carry his design into execution. On his father’s death, however, he entered into the order; and, having finished his course of rhetoric and philosophy in three years, he took upon himself the office of a preacher before he was ordained priest. He continued among the Jesuits till 1639; when his frequent infirmities, and the desire he had of attaining to greater perfection, engaged him to quit that society, as he asserts, while others aver, that he was expelled for some singular notions, and for his hypocrisy. Whatever was the cause, he went immediately to Paris, where he preached with great zeal, and procured the friendship of father Gondren, general of the oratory; and Coumartin, bishop of Amiens, being present at one of his sermons, was so much pleased, that he engaged him to settle in his diocese, and gave him acanonry in his cathedral-church.

He was no sooner fixed at Amiens, than he endeavoured to become a director of consciences, and presently saw himself at the head of a vast number of devotees; but it is said that his enthusiasm led him to practices more of a carnal than a spiritual nature; and that the discovery of some love-intrigues, in a nunnery, obliged him to seek a retreat elsewhere. For that purpose he chose first PortRoyal; but, as his doctrines or practices were not acceptable, his stay there was short. He therefore removed to Bazas, and afterwards to Toulouse, where M. de Montchal, archbishop of the city, gave him the direction of a convent of nuns; but here, likewise, the indecency of his familiarities with his pupils, under pretence of restoring the notions of primitive purity, and unsuspicious innocence, obliged the bishop, apprehending the consequences of such a converse, to disperse those who had been seduced into different convents, to be better instructed. Labadie endeavoured to inculcate the same practices elsewhere, but, despairing at length to make disciples any longer among the catholics, by whom he was by this time suspected and watched, he betook himself to the reformed, and resolved to try if he could not introduce among them the doctrine and practice of spirituality and mental prayer; with which view, he published three manuals, composed chiefly to set forth the excellence and necessity of that method. But an attempt which he is said to have made upon the chastity of mademoiselle Calonges lost him the esteem and protection of those very persons for whose use his books were particularly written.

Some time afterwards, an accusation was preferred at court against him, for raising a sedition respecting the corpse of a woman which the curate of Montauban thought proper to inter in the church-yard of the catholics, because she had changed her religion. Labadie denied the priest’s right to the corpse, and his party appeared in arms to dispute it. But the cause being brought before the court, it was there decided in favour of the catholics, and Labadie condemned to quit the church of Montauban as a seditious person. His banishment however caused a dangerous division. D'Arbussy, his colleague, was charged with promoting his condemnation, out of a spirit of jealousy. Two parties were formed in the town, almost wholly consisting of the reformed. They proceeded to the last extremities, though the chieftains of each party bore so bad a character as to be equally detested by all who had followed them. Labadie, thus driven out of Montauban, went to seek an asylum at Orange; but, not finding himself so safe there as he imagined, he withdrew privately to Geneva, in June 1659. In the mean time, his departure was much regretted at Orange, where he had imposed upon the people by his devout manner, and by his preaching; and he was not long at Geneva before he excited great commotions. Those that joined him built a large mansion, in which proper cells were provided for his most zealous followers; while the rest of the citizens, consulting how to get rid of him, contrived to procure him an invitation toMiddleburg, which was accepted; and accordingly he repaired thither in 166-6, and presently began to declare his opinions more explicitly than he had ever done before.

His peculiar tenets were these: 1. He believed that God could and would deceive, and that he had sometimes actually done it. 2. He held the holy scriptures not to be absolutely necessary to salvation, since the Holy Spirit acted immediately upon the soul, and gave it new degrees of revelation; and, when once struck with that divine light, it was able to draw such consequences as would lead to a perfect knowledge of the truth. 3. Though he did not deny the lawfulness of infant-baptism, yet he maintained that it ought to be deferred to riper years. 4. He put this difference between the old and new covenant: The first he said was carnal, loaded with ceremonies, attended with temporal blessings, and open to the wicked as well as the good, provided they were descendants of Abraham; whereas the new covenant admitted only spiritual persons, who were freed thereby from the law, from its curse, and from its ceremonies, and put into a state of perfect liberty. 5. He held the observation of the sabbath to be an indifferent thing; maintaining, that in God’s account all days were alike. 6. He distinguished the church into the degenerate and regenerate; and held, that Christ would come and reign a thousand years upon earth, and actually convert both Jews, Gentiles, and Christians, to the truth. 7. He maintained the eucharist to be nothing more than a bare commemoration of Christ’s death; and that, though the signs were nothing in themselves, yet Christ was received therein spiritually by the worthy communicant. 8. He taught, that the contemplative life was a state of grace and of divine union in this world, the fullness of perfection, and the summit of the Christian mountain, elevated to that height, that it touched the clouds, and reached up very near to heaven. 9. That a person whose heart was perfectly content and calm, was almost in possession of God, discoursed familiarly with him, and saw every thing in him: that he took all things here below with indifference, beholding the world beneath him, and whatever passed therein; its mutability not touching him; all the storms, to which the world is subject, forming themselves under his feet, just as rain and hail form themselves under the tops of mountains, leaving upon the summit a constant calm and quietude. 10. That this state was to be obtained by an entire self-denial, mortification of the senses, and their objects, and by the exercise of mental prayer.

It is evident that some of these opinions are not peculiar to Labadie, and that others of them are rather wildly expressed than erroneous in themselves; but ^it is equally evident that they are inconsistent one with another, and that in order to be a Labadist, a man must be as great an enthusiast as the founder himself. It was, however, owing to this practice of spirituality, accompanied with an apparent severity of manners, that Labadie acquired a very great authority in a little time. Those who charged him with hypocrisy were looked on as worldlings, sold to the present life; while his followers were esteemed as so many saints. Even mademoiselle Schurman, so famous in the republic of letters, was persuaded, that she chose the better part, in, putting herself under his directions; she became one of the most ardent chiefs of his sect, and had the power to bring over to her way of thinking Elizabeth, princess Palatine, who opened an asylum to all the wandering and fugitive disciples of that preacher, esteemed it an honour to collect what she called the true church, and declared her happiness in being delivered from a masked Christianity, with which she had till then been deceived. She extolled Labadie to the skies. He was the man, she said, who talked to the heart, and it is this kind of talking, wh ch means no more than an influence on weak minds, through the medium of the passions, which has promoted religious impo ture in all ages.

The followers of Labadie, who were now distinguished by the title of Labadists, became so numerous, and so many persons of each sex abandoned the reformed to close with them, that the French church in the United Provinces set themselves in earnest to stop the desertion, which was daily increasing. But Labadie, perceiving their designs against him, aimed to ward off the blow, by turning it upon them. Mr. de Wolzogue, professor and minister of the Walloon church at Utrecht, had lately published a piece, several passages of which had given great offence to the protestants . Labadie therefore took this opportunity to accuse him of heterodoxy, in the name of the Walloon church at Middleburgh, to a synod which was held at Naerden. But, upon hearing the matter, Wolzogue was unanimously declared orthodox, the church of Middleburg censured, and Labadie condemned to make a public confession before the synod, and in the presence of Wolzogue, that he had been to blame in bringing the accusation, by which he had done him an injury. This judgment reaching the ears of Labadie, he resolved not to hear it pronounced and, lest it should be signified to him, he withdrew privately from Naerden and, returning to Middleburgh, raised such a spirit against the synod in his church as even threatened no less than a formal schism. Several synods endeavoured, by their decrees, to cut up the mischief by the root but in some of these Labadie refused to appear he disputed the authority of others, and appealed from the definitive sentences which they pronounced against him. At length commissaries were nominated by the synod, to determine the affair at Middleburgh, but they had no sooner arrived than the people rose against them, possessed themselves of the assemblyhouse, and locked the church-doors to keep them out. The magistrates supported Labadie, and the estates of the province contented themselves with proposing an accommodation; which being haughtily rejected by Labadie, the states were so provoked, that they confirmed the sentence passed by the commissaries, by which he was forbidden to preach, &c. And because Labadie exclaimed loudly against being condemned without a hearing, the decision of the synod to be held at Dort was sent to him, summoning him to appear there. Labadie was deposed by this synod, and cut off from all hopes of mercy on any other condition, except that of thorough repentance, of which he never gave any proofs. On the contrary, he procured a crowd of devotees to attend him to Middleburgh, where they broke open the church-doors; which done, he preached, and distributed the eucharist to such as followed him. The burgo- masters, apprehensive of consequences, sent him an order to quit the town and the boundaries of their jurisdiction. He obeyed the order, and withdrew to Ter-Veer, a neighbouring town, where he had some zealous partisans, among the rich merchants and traders, who had settled, and drawn a large share of commerce thither. They received him joyfully, and procured him a protection from the magistrates. However, the states of Zealand, being resolved to drive him from this fort, made an order to expel him the province. The magistrates of Ter-Veer took his part against the states, alledging three reasons in his favour: first, that he lived peaceably in their town, and had done nothing worthy of banishment secondly, that it was enough to interdict him from preaching in public and lastly, that they had reason to apprehend danger from the populace, who would not quietly be deprived of so edifying a person. The province was obliged to have recourse to the prince of Orange, who was marquis of Ter-Veer; and who ordered Labadie to submit, forbidding at the same time any of the inhabitants to harbour him.

In this exigence, he resumed the attempt he had vainly made before, of associating with madam Bourignon in Noordstrand; but not thinking him refined enough in the mystic theology to become her colleague, nor supple enough to be put in the number of her disciples, she rejected his overtures; and now he formed a little settlement betwixt Utrecht and Amsterdam, where he set up a printingpress, and published many of his works. Here the number of his followers increased, and would have grown very large, had he not been betrayed by some deserters, who, publishing the history of his private life, and manner of teac hing, took care to inform the public of the familiarities he took with his female pupils, under pretence of uniting them more closely to God. From this retreat he sent his apostles through the great towns in Holland, in order to make proselytes, especially in the richest houses; but, not being able to secure any residence where he might be set above the fear of want, he went to Erfurt; and, being driven thence by the wars, was obliged to retire to Altena in Holstein, where a violent colic carried him off, 1674, in his 64th year. He died in the arms of mademoiselle Schurman, who, as a faithful companion, constantly attended him wherever he went. This is the most generally received account of his death; yet others tell us, that he went to Wievaert, a lordship of Frizeland, belonging to the house of Sommersdyck; where four ladies, sisters of that family, provided him a retreat, and formed a small church, called “The Church of Jesus Christ retired from the World.” His works are numerous, amounting to upwards of thirty articles, but surely not worthy to be recorded.

, surnamed the Beautiful Ropemaker, was born about 1526, at Lyons. Her father’s name was Charly, called Labbe. She married Ennemond Perrin, a rope-maker, who lived at Lyons, in the street which still retains the name of Belle Cordiere; and dying 1565, without children, left her all he had, only entailing it on his nephews, James and Peter Perrin, which put a stop to the disadvantageous reports which had been circulated respecting her chastity. She died in 1566. She was the wonder of all the learned of her time, a mechanic’s wife, who understood Latin, Italian, and Spanish, and wrote verses in those three languages, being considered as an extraordinary phenomenon. Her poems were printed at Lyons, 1556, and at Rouen, 1610; but these have been eclipsed in every thing but price, by the edition of Lyons, 1762, 8vi.

, an ancient Roman knight, who excelled in writing Mimes, or little satirical productions for the stage, died in 46 A. C. Though in his time men of birth made no scruple to furnish entertainments of the theatrical kind, yet it was highly disgraceful to represent them in their own persons. Julius Caesar, however, ordered Laberius to act one of his own Mimes; and though he made all the opposition he could, yet Caesar compelled him. The prologue to the piece is still extant, and Rollin thinks it one of the most beautiful morsels of antiquity. Laberius bemoans himself for the necessity he was under in a very affecting manner, but in the course of the piece glances several strokes of satire at Caesar, which were so well understood as to direct the eyes of the spectators upon him. Coesar, by way of revenge, gave the preference to Publius Syrius, who was his rival upon the same theatre; yet, when the Mimes were over, presented him with a ring, as if to re-establish him in his rank. The very small fragments which remain of Laberius, have been often collected and printed with those of Ennius, Lucilius, Publius Syrus, &c. The prologue above-mentioned is preserved in Aulus Gellius, and there is a good version of it in Beloe’s translation of that author.

Having taken orders in the church, he was made almoner to the king, and collated to the priory of Juvigne. In 1664, his majesty, out of his special favour, made him commander of the order of St. Michael. He had many years before begun a translation of the History of Charles VI. written by a monk of St. Denys, and continued by John le Fevre, called of St. Remy; but though this translation was finished in 1656, it was not published till 1663, and then too came out with a very small part of those commentaries, which, according to his promise, were to have filled two volumes. He had also published in 1656, the history of the marshal of Guebriant, with the genealogy of Budos, and some other houses in Britanny; and gave the public the memoirs of Michael de Castelnau, with several genealogical histories, 1659, in 2 vols. folio, a scarce and highly-valued edition. He continued to employ himself in writing other pieces in the same way, some of which were published after his death, which happened in 1675. Le Long and others are of opinion that Laboureur had some hand in the two last volumes of Sally’s Memoirs. He had a brother named Louis Le Laboureur, who was bailiff of Montmorency, and author of several pieces of poetry. He died in 1679. These also had an uncle, Claude Le Laboureur, provost of the abbey of L'isle Barbe, upon the Seine, near Lyons, who, in 1643, published “Notes and Corrections upon the Breviary of Lyons;” and in 1665, 1681, and 1682, “Les Mesures de L'Isle Barbe,” i. e. an historical account of every thing relating to that abbey; but the little caution which he observed in speaking of the chapter of St. John at Lyons obliged him to resign his provostship, and raised him an enemy in the person of Besian d'Arroy, a prebendary of the church, who, in 1644, refuted his “Notes and Corrections,” and his “Measures” in 1668, in two publications, the first entitled “L'Apologie de PEglise de Lyon” and the other, “Histoire de PAbbaie de l'lsle Barbe.” Dom. Claude published “A Treatise of the Origin of Arms, against Menetrier,” and “A genealogical History of the House of St. Colombe,” which was printed in 1673.

, brother of the former, born at Paris, 1725, was the author likewise of many dictionaries, in the taste of the times, which seems t he the age among the French for subjecting all subjects to alphabetical order. The period of his death is likewise omitted in our authority. His most useful publications are, “Dictionnaire du Citoycn,” 1761, 2 vols. 8vo. “Dictionnaire de Jurisprudence,” 1763, 3 vols. 8vo. “Les Tense’s de Pope, avec sa vie,” 1766, 12mo. “Dictionnaire de Portraits et d'Anecdotes des Hommes ceMebres,” 2 vols. 8vo, &c. He is not to be confounded with another author of the same time, name, and nation, who has left a very useful dictionary of old French, 1765, 1 vol. 8vo.

, or Lucius Cælius, or Cæcilius (Firmianus), an eminent father of the church, was, as some say, an African, or, according to others, a native of Fermo, a town in the marche of Ancdna, whence Le is supposed to have taken his surname. Arnobius was his preceptor. He studied rhetoric in Africa, and with so great reputation, that Constantine the Roman emperor appointed him preceptor to his son Crispus. This brought him to court; but he was so far from giving into the pleasures or corruptions incident to that station, that, amidst very great opportunities of amassing riches, he lived so poor as even frequently to want necessaries. He is account^d the most eloquent of all the ecclesiastical Latin authors. He formed himself upon Cicero, and wrote in such a pure, smooth, and natural, style, and so much in the taste and manner of the lloman orator, that he is generally distinguished by the title of “The Christian Cicero.” We have several pieces of his, the principal of which is his “Institutiones Divinae,” in seven books, composed about the year 320, in defence of Christianity, against all its opposers. Of this treatise he made an abridgment, of which we have only a part, and added it to another tract, “De Ira Divina.” In 1777 the late sir David Dalrymple lord Hailes, published with notes a correct edition of the fifth book “De Justitia,” Edin. 12mo. Lactantius had before written a book “De Operibus Dei,” in which he proves the creation of man, and the divine providence. St. Jerome mentions other works of our author, as “Two Books to Æsclepiades;” “Eight Books of Letters;” a book entitled “The Festin,” composed before he went to Nicomedia; a poem in hexameter verse, containing a description of his journey thither; a treatise entitled “The Grammarian;” and another, “De Persecutione.” Concerning this last tract, there are various opinions. Dr. Lardner, after stating the evidence on both sides, seems inclined to deny that it was written by LaCtantius. He allows, however, that it is a very valuable work, containing; a short account of the sufferings of Christians under several of the Roman emperors, from the death and resurrection of Christ to Dioclesian; and then a particular history of the persecution excited by that emperor, with the causes and springs of it; as well as the miserable deaths of its chief instruments. The learned judge above mentioned, who published a translation of this work in 1782, Edin. 12mo, has also examined the opinions of those who have treated of its authenticity, with far more acuteness than Lardner, and concludes with Baluze, Mosheim, and other eminent critics, that the treatise “De Mortibus Persecutorum” was written by Lactantius. Lord Hailes’s preface is a master-piece of critical inquiry, nor are his notes and illustrations, which occupy one half of the volume, of less merit or utility.

Some works have unquestionably been erroneously attributed to Lactantius; as the poem called “The Phoenix,” which is the production of a pagan, and not of a Christian. The poem “Upon Easter,” indeed, appears to have been written by a Christian, but one who lived after the time of Lactantius; that “Of the Passion of Christ” is not in his style. The “Arguments upon the Metamorphoses of Ovid,” and the “Notes upon the Thebaid of Statius,” have for their true author Lactantius Placidius the grammarian.

, a dramatic writer, who flourished in the reign of king Charles II. was born near Doncaster in Yorkshire, and was at first bred a dancing-master, but afterwards went into the army, having a lieutenant’s commission and warrant as quarter-master under colonel Charles lord Gerrard. The charms of a military life, however, he quitted to go upon the stage, in which profession, from the advantages of a fine person, being well shaped, of a good stature, and well proportioned, added to a sound critical judgment, and a large share of comic humour, he arrived at so great a height of excellence, as to be universally admired; and in particular was so high in the esteem of king Charles II. that his majesty had his picture painted in three several characters, viz. Teague in the “Committee,” Scruple in the “Cheats,” and Galliard in the “Variety” which picture is still preserved at Windsorcastle. His cast of acting was chiefly in comedy and his writings are all of that kind, he being the author of the four following comedies: 1. “Dumb Lady, 11 1672, 4to. 2.” Sir Hercules Buffoon,“1684, 4to. 3.” Old Troop,“1698, 4to. 4.” Sawney the Scot," 1698, 4to. The second of these was not brought on the stage till three years after the author’s death, which happened on the 15th of September, 1681.

, a celebrated Greek philosopher of Cyrene, the disciple of Arcesilaus, and his successor in the academy, devoted himself early to study, and, in spite of poTerty, became a very skilful philosopher, and very pleasing in his discourses, teaching in a garden which was given him by Attalus, king of Pergamus. This prince also invited him to court, but Lacydes replied, that the portraits of kings should be viewed at a distance. In some things, however, like the rest of his brethren, he descended from philosophy to the littlenesses of common men. He had a goose who attended him every where, and when she died he buried her as magnificently as if she had been his son or brother and his death, which happened in the year 212 B. C. is attributed to excess in drinking. Lacydes followed the doctrines of Arcesilaus, and affirmed that we ought not to decide on any thing, but always suspend our judgment. His servants frequently took advantage of this maxim to rob him, and, when he complained of it, maintained that he was mistaken; nor could he, on his own principles, make any reply but, growing weary at last of being plundered, and they still urging that he ought to suspend his judgment, he said to them, “Children, we have one method of disputing in the schools, and another of living in our families.”

, an useful and agreeable French writer, was born Jan. 3, 1709, at Vauxcouleurs, in Champagne, where his father was a magistrate. He studied in his native place, but particularly at Pont-a-mousson, where he was called “the prince of philosophers,” an academical title given to those who distinguished themselves by their talents and application. Being intended for the church, he was sent to the seminary of St. Louis in Paris, where he remained five years. He afterwards took the degree of bachelor of divinity, was admitted of the house of the Sorbonne in 1734, and of the society in 1736, being then in his licentiateship; but after finishing that career with equal ardour and reputation, he was placed in the second rank, among more than 140 competitors. He took a doctor’s degree June 1738, and afterwards served the curacy of Greux, and Dom-Remi, to which he had been nominated by his bishop. This prelate proposed to have M. Ladvocat near him, fix him in his chapter, and place his whole confidence in him; but the Sorbonne did not give the bishop time to execute his plan for one of their royal professorships becoming vacant by the resignanation of M. Thierri, chancellor of the church and university of Paris, they hastened to appoint M. Ladvocat to it, January 11, 1740. Our new professor was unable to continue his lectures more than two years and a half, from a disorder of his lungs, thought by the physicians to be incurable, but of which he at length cured himself by consulting the best authors. In the mean time he wrote two tracts, one “on the Proofs of religion,” the other, “on the Councils,” both which are valued by catholics. In October 1742, he resigned his chair to be librarian to the Sorbonne, an office then vacant by the premature death of the abbe Guedier de St. Aubin, and made use of the leisure this situation afforded, to improve himself in the learned languages, which he had never neglected in the midst of his other studies. He was often consulted by Louis, duke of Orleans, first prince of the blood, who, among other things, wished to become acquainted with the original language of the holy scriptures. M. Ladvocat took advantage of his situation with this prince to represent to him what great and important benefits religion would derive from the establishment of a professor who should explain the holy scriptures according to the Hebrew text. M. the duke immediately comprehending all the good which would result from this professorship, realized it in 1751, and chose M. Ladvocat to fulfil its duties; desiring that for that time only, without any precedent being drawn from it in future, the offices of librarian and professor, which till then had been incompatible, might center in one person. M. Ladvocat was no sooner appointed to this professorship, than he considered by what means he might procure scholars to it; in which he was again seconded by the pious liberality of its august founder. The seminary of the Holy Family, endowed by Anne of Austria, offered choice subjects; the duke assembled them, and revived that seminary by paying the debts which had been necessarily contracted in repairing its buildings. The extinct, or suspended fellowships, rose to new existence, and were no longer given but to deserving competitors; an emulation for understanding scripture inspired the most indifferent, and. all the students in divinity hastened to receive lectures from the Orleans professor. The example was followed by some other communities, and this school, which seemed at first likely to be deserted, had the credit of training up many men of great talents. M. Ladvocat died at Paris, December 29, 1765, by which event the house and society of the Sorhonne lost one of its most learned members, the faculty of theology one of its most ingenious doctors, and religion one of its ablest defenders. There is scarce any kind of knowledge which he had not pursued; philosophy, mathematics, the learned languages, history, theology, the holy scripture, all fixed his attention. Assiduous and deliberate study had made the Greek and Latin fathers familiar to him: no monument of ecclesiastical antiquity had escaped his researches; but his peculiar study was to find the true sense of the sacred books; and the theses which he caused to be maintained on the Pentateuch, the Psalms, and the Book of Job, at which the most distinguished among the learned were present, prove the utility of his labours. A genius lively and penetrating, uncommon and extensive, accurate and indefatigable; a ready and retentive memory, a delicate and enlightened feeling, a decided taste formed from the best models of antiquity, a clear and impartial judgment, a fertile, singular, and natural imagination, and a conversation, which, without seeking for ornaments of style, never failed to prove agreeable and interesting, characterized the scholar in M. Ladvocat, and gained him the regard and esteem of all with whom he had any intercourse or connections. He was frequently consulted on the most intricate and important points, by persons of the greatest distinction in different departments, while his uniform conduct, full of candour and simplicity, tender and compassionate, honest and virtuous, rendered him, though always far from affluence, the resource of indigent men of letters, and made him a kind relation, an excellent friend, beloved by all who had any intercourse with him, and a most valuable member of society in general. His works are, “A Hebrew Grammar,” 1758, 8vo; “The Historical Dictionary,” 4 vols. 8vo, reprinted several times during his lite; “Tractatus de Consiliis” a “Dissertation on Psalm, 67, Exurgat Deus;” “Lettres sur FAutorite des Textes originaux de FEcriture Sainte;” “Jugemens sur qoelques nouvelles Traductions de ‘lEcriture Sainte, d’apres le Texte Hebreu.” The four last were published after his death. M. Ladvocat assisted in the “Dict. Geographique,” which has appeared under the name of M. the abbé de Vosgiens, the best edition of which is that of 1772, 8vo. He had planned several other works which ke had not time to finish, but which were impatiently expected even in foreign countries.

, an eminent mathematician, was born at Lyons in 1660. Being intended for the bar, he was sent to study the law first at the college of Lyons, and next at the university of Thoulouse but having accidentally met with Fournier’s Euclid, and a treatise on algebra, mathematics became his favourite science. In 1686 he came to Paris, was soon after appointed tutor to the duke de Noailles, elected a member of the academy of sciences, and was appointed by Louis XIV, royal hydrographer at Rochefort; but sixteen years afterwards, he was recalled to Paris, and made librarian to the king with a considerable pension. He died April 11, 1734, and in his last moments, when he no longer knew the persons who surrounded his bed, one of them, through a foolish curiosity, asked him “What is the square of 12” to which he replied, as it were mechanically, 144. His works are, 1. “New Methods for the Extraction and Approximation of Roots,” 1692, 4to, 2. “Elements of Arithmetic and Algebra,” 1697, 12mo. 3. “On the Cubature of the, Sphere,” 1702, 12mo. 4. “A general Analysis, or Method of resolving Problems,” published by Richer in 1733, 4to. 5. Several Papers in the Memoirs of the Academy. Lagny excelled in arithmetic, algebra, and geometry, in which he made many important discoveries.

, a very eminent mathematician and philosopher, was born at Turin, Nov. 25, 1736, where his father, who had been treasurer of war, was in reduced circumstances. In his early days his taste was more inclined to classical than mathematical studies, and his attention to the latter is said to have been first incited by a memoir that the celebrated Halley had composed for the purpose of demonstrating the superiority of analysis. From this time Lagrange devoted himself to his new study with such acknowledged success, that at the age of sixteen he became professor of mathematics in the royal school of artillery at Turin. When he had discovered the talents of his pupils, all of whom were older than himself, he selected some as his more intimate friends, and -from this early association arose an important institution, the academy of Turin, which published in 1759 a first volume under the title of “Actes de la Socie*te* Prive*e.” It is there seen that young 'Lagrange superintended the philosophical researches of Cigna, the physician, and the labours of the chevalier de Saluces. He furnished Foncenex with the analytical part of his memoirs, leaving to him the task of developing the reasoning upon which the formulae depended. In these memoirs, which do not bear his name, may be observed that pure analytical style which characterizes his greatest productions. He discovered a new theory of the lever, which makes the third part of a memoir that had much celebrity. The first two parts are in the same style, and are known to be also by Lagrange, although he did not positively acknowledge them, and they were generally ascribed to Foncenex.

Euler’s admiration of our young mathematician involves the origin of Lagrange' s discoveries, as he himself afterwards related. The first attempts to determine the maxima and minima in all indefinite integral formulae were made by means of a curve of the quickest descent, and by the Isoperimeters of Bernouilli. Euler reduced them to a general method, which, however, had not that simplicity which is desirable in a work of pure analysis. Euler himself thought so, but thought at the same time that it was conformable to truth, and that by means of sound metaphysics it might be made extremely evident; but this task, he said, he left to those who made metaphysics their study. While the metaphysicians took no notice of this appeal, Lagrange’s emulation was excited, and he soon discovered the solution that Euler had despaired of, by analysis; and in giving an account of his process, he said that he considered it not as a metaphysical principle, but as a necessary result of the laws of mechanism, as a mere corollary of a more general law, which he afterwards made the basis of his celebrated work, entitled “Mecanique analytique.” We see also the germ of this work in the paper he wrote when the Academy of sciences proposed as a prize question, the theory of the moon’s libration, on which subject he had an opportunity to apply the principles of his analytical discoveries. He wrote also an equally able memoir on another prize subject by the same academy, the theory of Jupiter’s satellites; and as the subject was not exhausted in this memoir, it was his intention to return to it and enlarge his researches, but his other more pressing engagements prevented him.

, a painter of histories on ceilings, staircases, halls, &c. and an assistant and imitator of Verrio, was born in France; and his father being master of the menagerie at Versailles, he had Louis XIV. for his godfather, and after him he was named. At first he was intended for the church, and was placed in the Jesuits’ college for education; but, having a hesitation in his speech, and having exhibited some taste in drawing, the king recommended to his parents to bring him up to the profession of painting. He then studied in the school of Le Brun, and in the royal academy of Paris; and made so much progress, that, in 1683, at the age of twenty, he came to England, and was immediately employed by Verrio upon the large work at St. Bartholomew’s hospital; in which he succeeded so well, that he soon obtained considerable employment on his own account, and executed a great number of ceilings, halls, and staircases, in the houses of the principal nobility of the country, particularly at lord Exeter’s at Burleigh, at Devonshire house, Piccadilly, Petworth, and Blenheim. King William gave him lodgings at Hampton Court, where he painted the “Labours of Hercules,” and repaired the large pictures called “The Triumphs of Caesar,” by Andrea Mantegna. His talents were not of a cast to demand very high respect, but they were fully equal to the mode in which they were employed, which requiring a certain portion of ingenuity, is a certain waste of talents of a superior class. In a few years, it is probable, his name will repose for perpetuity on the records of history, and the unlucky satire of Pope, “where sprawl the saints of Verrio and Laguerre.' He died in 1721, and in a place very seldom disturbed by such an event, viz. in the theatre of Drury-lane. He had gone there to see the” Island Princess" acted for the benefit of his son, who was newly entered upon the stage as a singer; but, before the play began, he was seized by an apoplexy, and carried away senseless.

, a French poet, was born in 1650, at Chimay, in Hairiault, and was of the same family with father Lainez, second general of the Jesuits, the subject of our next article. He was educated at Rheims, where his wit procured him an acquaintance with the chief persons of the town, and an admittance amongst the best companies. At length he came to Paris, and attended the chevalier Colbert, colonel of the regiment of Champagne, to whom he read lectures upon Livy and Tacitus. Several other officers of the army attended these lectures, making their remarks, and proposing their difficulties, which produced very agreeable and useful conversations. Having, however, a rambling disposition, he quitted this society, travelled into Greece, and visited the isles of the Archipelago, Constantinople, Asia Minor, Palestine, Egypt, Malta, and Sicily. Thence he made a tour through the principal towns of Italy, and, returning through Switzerland into France, arrived at Chimay, wiiere he resided in obscurity for two years, until the abbe Faultrier, intervdant of Hainault, having received orders from the king to seize some scandalous libels that were handed about upon the frontier of Flanders, forced himself by violence into his chamber, on suspicion of being one of the authors of these. There he found Lainez wrapped up in an old morninggown, surrounded with a heap of papers, all in the greatest confusion. He accosted him as a guilty person, and seiz-" ed his papers. Lainez answered with modesty, proved the injustice of the suspicion; and the examination of his papers, which consisted of verses, and minutes of his travelsj added conviction to his arguments. The abbé Faultrier was much pleased to find him innocent y and, having had this occasion of knowing his merit, took him home with him, furnished him with apparel, of which at this time he stood very much in need, gave him lodging and diet, and treated him as a friend. Four months after, Lainez followed his benefactor to Paris, and lived with him at the arsenal; but, in half a year’s time, finding the little restraint this laid him under not at all agreeable to his spirit, he obtained leave to retire. This being granted, he made an excursion to Holland, to visit Bayle; and then crossed the water to England, whence, at last, he returned to settle at Paris, where he passed his days betwixt stjdy and pleasure, especially that of the table. He was, according to Moreri, a great poet, a great classic, and a great geographer, and, if possible, a still greater drinker. Nobody exactly knew where he lodged. When he was carried homeward in any friend’s chariot, he always ordered himself to be set down on the Pont-neuf, whence he went on foot to his lodgings. His friends, who were very numerous, and among them several persons of distinguished birth as well as merit, did not care where he lodged, if they could often have the happiness of his company. His conversation at once charmed and instructed them. He talked upon all kinds of subjects, and talked well upon all. He was a perfect master of Latin, Italian, Spanish, and of all the best authors in each of those languages. The greatest part of the day he usually devoted to his studies, and the rest was passed in pleasure. As, one of his friends expressed his surprize to see him in the king’s library at eight in the morning, after a repast of twelve hours the preceding evening, Lainez answered him in this distich extempore:

, librarian to the cardinal Lomenie, a member of various learned academies in France and Italy, professor of bibliography, and member of the Lyceum, was born in 1739, at Dole in Franche-comte“, of reputable but poor parents, who, however, procured him admission into the religious house of the Minims of his native place. Here his easy access to the fine library of the order, inspired and gratified an early predilection for bibliographical researches, and laid the foundation of that general knowledge of literary history and antiquities, for which he was afterwards so much distinguished, and which he improved in the course of his travels in France, Italy, and Greece. He died at Paris in 1801. His works are, 1.” Memoires pour servir a i‘Histoire Litteraire de quelques grands hommes du 15 siecle, avec un Supplement aux Annales Typographiques de ’Mattaire.“This, of which we have only the French title, was published in Latin, at Naples in 1776, 4to. 2.” Specimen Historicum Typographic Romanic XV saeculi,“Rome, 1778, 3vo. This is the least valued of his works. 3.” Epistola ad abbatem Ugolini, c.“printed at Pavia, but in the title, Strasburgh. 4.” De l'origine et des progres de rimprimerie en FrancheComte,“with a catalogue of the works printed there Dole, 1784, 12mo. 5.” $erie dell' edizioni Aldine,“written in conjunction with the cardinal Lomenie, whose librarian he was, as noticed above: of this there have been three editions, at Pisa, 1790, at Padua, in the same year, and at Venice in 1792, 12mo. 6.” Index librorum ab inventa Typographia, ad annum 1500,“Sens, 1791, 2 vols. 8vo. This is a catalogue of the books of the fifteenth century, belonging to the library of the cardinal Lomenie, and is our author’s most useful work. Laire also published some pajiers on subjects of French antiquities, in the” Magazin Encyclopedique."

, an eminent Flemish painter, was born at Liege, in 1640. His father, who was a tolerable painter, put his son first to study the belles lettres, poetry, and music, to the last of which Gerard dedicated a day in every week: but at length taught him design, and made him copy the best pictures, particularly those of Bertholet Flaraael, a canon of that city. At the age of fifteen, Gerard began to paint portraits, and some historical pieces, for the electors of Cologne and Brandenburgh, which contributed-to make him known, and gave him great reputation. The ease, however, with which he got his money tempted him to part with it as easily, and run into expence. He was fond of dress, and making a figure in the world; he had also an ambition to please the ladies, and fancied that the liveliness of his wit would compensate in some degree for the deformity of his person. But one of his mistresses, whom he had turned off, having out of revenge wounded him dangerously with a knife, he abandoned such promiscuous gallantry, and married. While settled at Utrecht, and poor, he was seized with a contagious distemper; and, his wife lying-in at the same time, he was reduced to offer a picture to sale for present support, which, in three days’ time, was bought by Vytenburgh, a picture-merchant at Amsterdam, who engaged him to go to that city. Accordingly Lairesse settled there; and his reputation rose to so high a pitch, that the Hollanders esteem him the best history-painter of their country, and commonly call him their second Raphael; Hemskirk is their first. Yet his style of painting was but a compound of those of Poussin and the old French school. While he aimed at imitating the best Italian masters, he never avoided those false airs of the head and limbs, which seem rather taken from the stage than from nature; so that his works do not rise to the level of true merit. At length, borne down with infirmities, aggravated by the loss of his eye-sight, he finished his days at Amsterdam, in 1711, at the age of seventy-one.

, a very celebrated French astronomer, was born at Bourg, in the department of l'Ain, July 11, 1732. His father, who was possessed of property, intended him for the bar, and sent him to Paris to study the law, to which, for some time, he applied with so much assiduity, as to answer the most sanguine expectations of his friends, when the sight of an observatory awakened in him a propensity, which deranged the projects of his parents, and became the ruling passion of his life. He put himself under the instructions of Le Monnier, one of the then most celebrated astronomers of France, and profited so much by the lessons of his able instructor, as to afford him the highest degree of satisfaction, who, on his part, conceived for the young man a truly paternal affection, and was determined to promote his interests. An opportunity soon offered; the great astronomer Lecaille was preparing to set out for the Cape of Good Hope, in order to determine the parallax of the moon, and its distance from the earth. To accomplish this purpose, it was necessary he should be seconded by an observer placed under the same meridian, and at the greatest distance that could be conveniently chosen on the globe. Berlin was fixed on, and Le Monnier signified his intention of undertaking the business himself, but the mo.­ment when he appeared ready to depart, he had the credit to get his pupil appointed in his stead. Frederic, to whom Maupertuis had explained the delicacy and difficulty of the enterprize, could not forbear shewing some astonishment when the youthful astronomer was presented to him; “However,” said he, “the Academy of Sciences has appointed you, and you will justify their choice.” From that moment his age, being only eighteen, was an additional recommendation; he was admitted at court, welcomed by the academy, and became intimate with the most distinguished persons at Berlin. On his return, the account which he gave of his mission procured him free access to the Academy of Sciences, and its transactions were enriched every year by important communications from the young astronomer. The active part which he took in the labours of the academy, was not confined to the astronomical science: we have from his pen, a description of seven arts, as different from each other, as they are remote from the objects of his habitual meditations. He published the French edition of Dr. Halley’s tables, and the history of the comet of 1759, and he furnished Clairault with immense calculations for the theory of that famous comet. Being charged in 1760 with the compilation of the “Connoissance des Temps,” he entirely changed the form of that work, and of this collection he published thirty-two volumes, viz. from 1775 to 1807.

In 1764, appeared the first edition of his “Traite” Astronomique,“which he afterwards completed, and upon which his chief claim to fame rests. Lalande was the first who calculated the perturbations of Mars and Venus; and in the theory of Satellites, in which but little progress had been made, he explained a motion which Bailli claimed as his own discovery. A literary dispute arose out of this circumstance, which, however, was conducted with every regard to decency; and the probable result, as seen by disinterested spectators, was, that both had been led to the same discovery. He composed all the astronomical articles for the” Encyclopaedia of Yverdun,“those for the. supplements to the” Encyclopedic de Paris,“and those for the” Encyclopedic Methodique," substituting for the articles furnished by d'Alembert, and which he had compiled from the works of Le Monnier, such as were more complete and more modern, from his own observations and improved theories.

To his written works he joined oral instructions during t space of forty-six years; for from 1761 he had replaced the first master, De Lisle, in the chair of astronomy, in the college of France, and gave a new lustre to this curious part of public instruction in a celebrated school, which possessed the most distinguished professors of very kind, and which enjoyed and merited the extraordinary privilege of out-living the tremendous storms of a revolution, and escaping the almost universal destruction which levelled all around it. As a professor, he taught with so much ability that his school became a seminary of disciples who peopled the different observatories of the world. In the midst of his other labours he drew up his “Voyage d' Italic,” the most complete collection of curious objects that travellers can consult; his “Traite* des Canaux” and his “Bibliographic Astronomique,” which is an immense catalogue of all the works that have appeared on the subject of that science.

Associated to almost all the distinguished scientific societies in the world, he was their common bond of union by the correspondences which he maintained; and he promoted a circulation of intelligence from one to another, He employed the credit arising from the universal reputation which he enjoyed, for the general benefit of the sciences and their cultivators. To the extraordinary ardour and activity of his character, he joined a love for the truth, which he carried to the borders of fanaticism. Every degree of concealment appeared to him unworthy of an honest man; and he therefore, without reserve, uttered his sentiments on ^all occasions, and 1 by the bluntness of his manners, he sometimes made himself enemies, who not ! only called in question his real merits, but who excited against him a crowd of detractors, and because they could not rival his high reputation, they attempted to blast his well earned fame. He was not without his singularities sand failings, but they were trifling in comparison of his commendable qualities, yet his long and important services were frequently forgotten in the recollection of trivial lifailings.

Lalande has been charged with profaneness and atheism; llbut, says the writer of his life whom we have follovyed, no authority is produced to support such charges, which, if true, ought to have been sanctioned by some sort of proof, or by well ascertained facts. The facts, however, as given in the “Biographic moderne,” are these, that, “before the Revolution, Lalande made a public profession of Atheism: in 1793 he delivered a speech at the Pantheon, with the red cap on his head, against the existence of God; in 1805 he published a Supplement to the” Dictionary of Atheists,“by Silvain Mareschal, in which he endeavours to prove there is no Deity; and in support of his opinion he cites not only the dead, but even living persons, one of whom, Francis de Neufchateau, president of the senate, strongly protested in the public prints against this charge.” In the same work, we are likewise told, that the emperor (Bonaparte) on being informed of Lalande' s conduct, enjoined him to publish nothing more with his name, in a letter dated from the palace at Schoenbrunn, Jan. 18, 1806, which was read at a general meeting of the Institute, all the classes of which had been especially summoned. The substance of this letter is, that M. Lalande, whose name had hitherto been united with important labours in science, had lately fallen into a state of childhood, which appeared now in little articles unworthy of his name, &c. Lalande, who was present, rose and said, “I will conform to the orders of his majesty.” These are surely facts of the most decisive kind, and easily to be refuted, if they have no foundation. The editors of the Diet. Hist, borrowing from one of his eulogists, make a very poor defence, by saying that, “he always manifested a benevolent disposition, and approved himself a man of honour, probity, courage, full of activity for all useful things, and of love and zeal in behalf of his fellow creatures. To imitate the great benefactor is the most worthy homage we can pay to the infinite goodness; the supreme intelligence which governs the universe.” He rendered, however, inestimable service toi science during his life, and consulted its interests after his, death, by founding an annual prize to the author of the best astronomical memoir, or most curious observation. He died April 4th, 1807, in the 7 5th year of his age.

, a Jesuit, who died i 1748, left a valuable “Paraphrase on the Psalms,” 12mo, and several other works: the principal are, “Le veritable Esprit des Disciples de S. Augustin,” 1705, and 1707, 4 vols. 12mo; “Lettre d'un Abbe” a “EvSque,” &c. “Moral Reflexions, with notes on the New Testament,” written with a design to rival those by P. Quesnel, 12 vols. 12mo. He speaks much of this Jesuit in his “Letters to the Abbe Margon.” Lallemant was among the warmest defenders of the bull Unigenitus.

, a French ecclesiastic, was born at Paris in 1653, became bachelor of the Sorbonne, and chaplain of Notre Dame, and took possession of a canonry of St. Oportune, 1721, but never enjoyed it peaceably. He undertook missions in the provinces for the re- union of the Protestants, and devoted himself with success to the care of souls, and to preaching. He died May 9, 1724, aged seventy-one. He was for some time in the congregation of the oratory. His works are, 1. “Traite” de Controverse pour les nouveaux Reunis, suf la Presence resile, sur la Communion sous une Espece, et sur les Traduct. Fr. de PEcriture,“1692, 12mo. 2.” Extraits des S. S. Peres de PEglise, sur la Morale,“in 4 parts, 16to. 3.” An Abridgment of the Life of Catherine Antoinette de Gondi,“superior-general of Calvary, who died 1716, 12mo. 4. An Abridgment of the” Life of Cardinal le Camus, bishop of Grenoble,“12mo. 5.” The History and Abridgment of the pieces written for and against Plays and Operas,“12mo; a curious work and 6.” Pense*es sur les Spectacles," Orleans, 12mo, are also attributed to him.

, an eminent lawyer and antiquary, the eldest son of John Lambarde, alderman of London, by Juliana his wife, daughter of William Home or Herne, of London, was born Oct. 18, 1536. Nothing is recorded concerning the early part of his education, until he entered upon the study of the law, and was admitted into the society of Lincoln’s-inn, Aug. 15, 1556. Here he studied under Laurence Nowell (brother to the celebrated dean of St. Paul’s), a man famous for his knowledge of antiquities and of the Saxon tongue. Lambarde profited much by his instructions, considering an acquaintance with the customs and jurisprudence of the Saxon times as very useful in his profession. The first fruits of his studies appeared in a collection and translation of the Saxon laws, under the title of “A^awvo/iw, sive de priscis Anglorum legibus, libri,” 1568, 4to, republished afterwards, with Bede’s “Ecclesiastical History,” in 1644, by Abraham Wheelock, who commends highly the elegance of Lambarde’s interpretation.

In 1579 Lambarde was appointed a justice of peace for the county of Kent, an office which he not only performed with great diligence and integrity, but endeavoured to explain and illustrate for the benefit of other magistrates, in his “Eirenarcha, or the Office of the Justices of Peace, in four books,” 1581, reprinted eleven times, the last in 1619. Sir William Blackstone, in his Commentaries, recommends this work to the perusal of students. He published also, “The Duties of Constables,” &c. 1582, 8vo, and reprinted six times. His character and writings had now recommended him to the notice of some of the greatest and most powerful people of the realm. In 1589 he had a deputation from the lord treasurer for the composition for alienations for fines, an office erected in the 18th year of queen Elizabeth. In 1592 he was appointed a master in chancery by sir John Puckering, lord keeper; and in 1597 was appointed keeper of the rolls and house of the rolls, in Chancery-lane, by sir Thomas Egerton, lord keeper. At length, in 1600, he was personally noticed by the queen, who received him very graciously, and appointed him keeper of the records in the Tower. In consequence of this appointment, he had another interview with her majesty, Aug. 4, 1601, and presented her with an account of those records, which he called his “Pandecta Rotulorum.” In the mean time he had written, though not published, another work, entitled “Archeion, or a Discourse upon the high courts of justice in England.” It was not published until 1635, some years after his death, by his grandson, Thomas Lambarde. Of this work there are two editions of the same date, but Mr. Bridgman gives the preference to that with a preface signed T. L. which he thinks the most correct. Mr. Lambarde died Aug. 19, 1601, at his house of Westcombe, and was buried in the parish church of Greenwich. A monument was placed over him, which, upon the rebuilding of that church, was removed to the parish church of Sevenoak, in Kent, where is now the seat and hurying-place of the family. He was thrice married, but left issue only by his second wife. He left many Mss. of which Mr. Nichols has given an account; and appears to have been an accurate antiquary, and in all respects a man of learning and distinction.

, a very learned writer, was born at Hamburgh April 13, 1628, the son of Heino Lambecius, who had married a sister of the celebrated Lucas Holstein. In his youth he afforded many proofs of diligence and genius, and after studying for some time at Hamburgh, was advised by his uncle Holstein, who also offered to defray his expences, to pursue his studies in other seminaries. With such encouragement he left Hamburgh in Dec. 1645, and went by sea to Amsterdam, where for eight months he studied the belles lettres, history, and geography, under G. J. Vossius, and Caspar Barlaeus, to whom he had special recommendations from his uncle, and under other eminent teachers. It was here, too, where he first imbibed principles favourable to the Roman catholic religion, and it has been very justly accounted a blot in his character that he concealed his opinions for so many years, g.nd held offices which he knew to he incompatible with them.

While at Amsterdam, by the advice of his uncle, he learned the art of drawing geographical charts. He also began to study jurisprudence, and after visiting Ley den, and other principal cities in the Netherlands, arrived at Paris in September 1646. Here he resided a year with cardinal Barberini, who showed him every kindness in consideration of his relationship to Holstein; and partly by his means, and Holstein’s letters of recommendation, Lambecius was admitted into considerable familiarity, notwithstanding his youth, with many of the most learned men of the time. Having obtained access to the libraries, he availed himself of this opportunity to examine some manuscripts of importance, and in consequence published his “Prodromus lucubrationum criticorum in Auli Gellii Noctes Atticas, una cum dissertatione de vita et nomine A. Gellii,” Paris, 1647, 8vo. Gronovius reprinted this in his edition of Gellius, 1706, 4to. Lambecius also collected materials, while at Paris, for an edition of the antiquities of Constantinople, which did not, however, appear until 1655, when it was printed at Paris, under the title “Syntagma originum et antiquitatum Constantinopolitarum,” &c. Gr. et Lat. fol.

In 1647 he went to Italy, still under the direction of Holstein, whom he met there, but who had much reason to be dissatisfied with his conduct towards him, which was not respectful. What other faults Lambecius may have been guilty of, are not clearly explained; one at least, we hope, was not true, that he disgusted his uncle by proposing to steal some manuscripts before he left Rome. After remaining nearly two years at Rome, Lambecius returned to France, and went to Toulouse, where he studied law for a year. He again went to Paris, resumed his acquaintance with his former literary friends, and consulted the libraries for materials to enrich a history of the city of Hamburgh, which he had undertaken; but at the request of his parents, he returned home in 1650. About a year after, he was appointed professor of history, and commenced his office in January 1652, with an oration on the connection of history with other sciences, “De historiarum cum caeteris sapientise et literarum studiis conjunctione.” He was uow only in his twenty-fourth year. During his professorship, he took the degree of doctor of laws in France. In 1659, he was elected rector of the college of Hamburgh, and entered on the office in Jan. 1660, with an oration on the origin of the college of Hamburgh. His departure, however, from Hamburgh was approaching; for which various reasons have been assigned. It appears from the evidence produced by Chaufepie, that his religious principles began to be suspected and that he was querulous and ambitious but what, in the opinion of some, precipitated his retreat, was his marriage to an old maid, rich, but avaricious, with whom he found it impossible to live, when he found it impossible to get possession of her fortune. Perhaps all these causes might determine him to leave Hamburgh, which he did in April 1662, and arrived at Vienna, where, being introduced by Miller, the Jesuit, to the emperor Leopold, he presented to his majesty, his “Prodromus Historiae Literariae,” which he printed in 1659, and dedicated to Leopold, and his history of Hamburgh. The emperor received him very graciously, and presented him with a gold chain and medal. In May he left Vienna for Italy, and on his arrival at Venice, sent to the senate of Hamburgh, a formal resignation of his offices of rector and professor. From Venice he went to Rome, and made public profession of the Roman catholic religion. Here he was received into the house of his former patron cardinal Barberini, but was much chagrined to find that his uncle Holstein, who died in 1661, had made the cardinal his heir. In other respects he had no reason to be dissatisfied with his reception at Rome, being very kindly treated by Gudius, Leo AUatius, queen Christina of Sweden, the cardinals Azzolini and Chigi, and the pope himself. At Florence his reception was equally flattering on the part of Charles Dati, and Magliabecchi, who introduced him to Ferdinand II.

After these visits, he returned to Vienna Sept. 28, 1662, and, as it would appear, without any employment or resources. While sitting pensive at his inn, and ignorant which way to turn himself, he received a letter from Miller the Jesuit, mentioned above, and who was confessor to the emperor, requesting him to state in writing in what manner he wished to be employed under his majesty. Lambecius immediately returned for answer, that it had always been his greatest desire to serve the emperor and the august house of Austria, and that if his majesty would be so gracious as to admit him to court, he should endeavour to prove the sincerity of his zeal, by placing the imperial library in a better condition than it had ever been, by writing the history of Germany in general, and of the house of Austria in particular, and by continuing the history of literature, of which he had already dedicated a specimen to, his majesty. In consequence of these offers, the emperor appointed him his under-librarian and historiographer, and the same day (Nov. 27), the emperor spent three hours in shewing Lambecius his collection of medals, and made him a present of some of them. Three months afterwards, on the death of the head librarian, he was appointed to succeed him, and the emperor gave him also the title of counsellor, and bestowed, indeed, every mark of esteem upon him, conversing with him in the most familiar manner, and taking him as part of his suite in some of his travels. During the ten years that he lived at Vienna, he lodged with an advocate, who managed all his domestic concerns, and in return he made him his heir. He died in the month of April 1680. Lambecius was unquestionably one of the most learned men of his time; but his character, in other respects, as may be collected from the preceding narrative, was not without considerable blemishes. With respect to the imperial library, he certainly performed what he undertook, and has laid the learned world under great obligations by his vast catalogue, published in 8 vols. folio, from 1665 to 1679, under the title of “Commentariorum de augustissima Bibliotheca Csesarea Vindobonensi, libri octo.” To thes must be added as a supplement, “Dan. de Nessel Breviarium et supplementum commentariorum Bibl. Caes. Vindobon.” Vienna, 1690, 2 vols. folio. A second edition of this work was published at Vienna in 1766 82, in 8 vols. folio, “opera et studio Ad. Fr. Kollarii,” to which must be added “A. F. Kollarii ad Lambecii commentariorum libros octo, Supplementum liber primus posthumus,” Vienna, 1790, folio. In 1712 Reimann published, at Hanover, an abridgment of this catalogue in one volume, 8vo, under the title “Bibliotheca acromatica.” A new edition of Lambecius’s “Prodromus historic litterariae,” was published by Fabricius, at Leipsic, 1710, folio.

, an ingenious French lady, was daughter of a master of the accounts, and born at Paris in 1647. She lost her father at three years old; and her mother re-married to the ingenious Bachaumont, who took a singular pleasure in cultivating the happy talents of his daughter-in-law. She was married to Henry Lambert, marquis of S. Bris, in 1666, and lost him in 1686. After this, she had long and painful law- suits, concerning her property, which being at length decided in her favour, she settled in Paris, and kept a house, to which it was thought an honour to be admitted. All the polite among the lettered tribe resorted thither, for the sake of conversation for hers was almost the only house that was free from the malady of gaming and Fontenelle has taken notice, that the delinquents in this way would frequently glance a stroke at madame de Lambert’s. This lady died in 1733, aged eighty-six; having been the authoress of some very pleasing productions, indicative of good sense and elegant manners, which were collected and printed in 2 vols. 12mo, and of which there is an English translation. The principal are, 1. “Avis d'une mere a son fils, & (Tune mere a sa fille.” 2. “Nouvelles Reflexions sur les f* imes.” 3. “Traite de l'Amiti.” “Her treatise upon friendship (says Voltaire) shews that she deserved to have friends.” 4. “Traite de la Veillesse.” These two last were published in English in 1780. 5. “La Femme Hermite;” and several small pieces of morality and literature. In 1808, a new edition of her works appeared at Paris, with a collection of her letters, of which our authority speaks with indifference.

, a French monk, who became a zealous protestant, was born at Avignon in 1487. At the age of fifteen he entered himself among the Franciscan friars, and continued in the comrnunijty twenty years; during which time he acquired celebrity as a preacher, and was made general of the order. Much addicted to reading and reflection, in the course of his investigations he saw reason to renounce the doctrines of the catholic church, and to adopt those of the reformation; but on that account found it necessary to go to Switzerland, where he arrived in 1522. Here he became a popular preacher among the protestants, and having continued some time at Ba,sil, he set out for Wittemberg to visit Luther, in 1523. With that eminent reformer he grew into high esteem, and it was determined he should go to Zurich, to assist in disseminating the principles of the reformation through France; but this scheme was altered for some employment in the university of Wittemberg, where he most probably continued till 1526. In the following year he was appointed divinity-professor at the university of Marpurg, and in 1530 he died, at the age of forty-three. He was author of commentaries on almost all the parts of the Old and New Testament, and of many theological and controversial pieces.

, was an English artist, who obtained celebrity upon the revival of painting in this coontry. His taste led him to admire and to imitate the style of Caspar Poussin in landscape and he has produced several works of considerable merit; which, if theyhave not the brilliancy and force of Gaspar, are rich, and abound with beauties of a gentler kind. He also painted scenes from common nature; and at the Foundling hospital may be seen one he presented to that institution, which is deserving of very great praise. He was engaged to paint scenes for the play-houses, for which his pencil was peculiarly qualified, and, in concert with Scott, painted sir large pictures of their settlements for the East India Company, which are placed at their house in Leadenhall-street. He died in 1765. Mr. Edwards gives some anecdotes of this artist; and, among others, relates that he was the founder of the celebrated “Beef-steak-club” in Coventgarden.

, an eminent mathematician and astronomer, was born at Muhlhausen, in the Sundgaw, a town in alliance with the Swiss cantons, Aug. 29th, 1728. His father was a poor tradesman, who, intending to bring him up to his own business, sent him to a public school, where he was taught the rudiments of learning, at the expence of the corporation, till he was twelve years old. Here he distinguished himself among his school-fellows, and some attempts were made to provide him with the means of studying theology as a profession, but for want of encouragement, he was under the necessity of learning his father’s trade. In this laborious occupation, however, he continued to devote a considerable part of the night to the prosecution of his studies; and to furnish himself with candles, he sold for half-pence or farthings small drawings which he delineated while employed in rocking his infant sister in a cradle. He met with an old book on the mathematics which gave him inexpressible pleasure, and which proved that he had a genius for scientific pursuits. Seeing the turn which the young man had for knowledge, several learned men afforded him assistance and advice; and they had the pleasure of finding him improve, under their patronage, with a rapidity beyond their most sanguine expectations. He was now taken from the drudgery of the shop-board, and M. Iselin, of Basil, engaged him as his amanuensis, a situation which afforded him an opportunity of making further progress in the belles-lettres, as well as philosophy and mathematics. In 1748, his patron recommended him to baron Salis, president of the Swiss confederacy, to become tutor to his children, in which office he gladly engaged. His talents as a philosopher and mechanician began to display themselves in his inventions and compositions. After living eight years at Coire, he repaired, in 1756, with his pupils, to the university of Gottingen, where he was nominated a corresponding member of the scientific society in that place, and from thence he removed, in the following year, to Utrecht, where he continued twelve months. In 1758, he went with his pupils to Paris, where he acquired the esteem and friendship of D' Alembert and Messier; and from thence he travelled to Marseilles, and formed the plan of his work “On Perspective,” which he published in the following year at Zurich. In 1760 he published his “Photometry,” a master-piece of sagacity, which contains a vast quantity of information of the most curious and important nature. In the same year he was elected a member of the Electoral Bavarian Scientific Society. Lambert was author of many other pieces besides those which have been already mentioned: among these were his “Letters on the Construction of the Universe,” which were afterwards digested, translated, and published under the title of “The System of the World.” In 1764 he made an excursion to Berlin, and was introduced to Frederic II., who, sensible of his great services to science, gave directions to have him admitted a regular member of the academy; this appointment enabled him to devote himself wholly to the pursuit of his favourite studies. He enriched the transactions of several learned societies with his papers and treatises, some of which he published separately. He died Sept. 25th, 1777, when he was in the 50th year of his age. Most of his mathematical pieces were published in a collective form by himself in three volumes, in which almost every branch of mathematical science has been enriched with additions and improvements.

, a learned Frenchman, and noted commentator upon the classics, was born in 1516 at Montrevil in Picardy. Applying himself with indefatigable industry to polite literature, he made an extraordinary progress, especially in the critical knowledge of the classic authors. After some time he was taken into the retinue of cardinal Francis de Tournon, whom he attended into Italy, where he continued several years. On his return to Paris, he was made king’s professor of the belles lettres, which he had taught before at Amiens. He published commentaries upon Piautus, Lucretius, Cicero, and Horace; he translated, into Latin, Aristotle’s morals and politics, and several pieces of Demosthenes and Æschines. He died in 1572, of grief, for the loss of his friend Peter Ramus, who perished in the massacre of the protestants on the infamous vespers of St. Bartholomew. Lambin was not without apprehensions of suffering the same fate, notwithstanding he was otherwise a good catholic. He was married to a gentlewoman of the Ursin family, by whom he had a son, who survived him, and published some of his posthumous works.

, of Cremona, a celebrated Latin poet in the sixteenth century, followed John Lascaris to Rome, and there taught Greek and Latin. After the death of pope Leo X. in 1521, he went to Padua, where he also instructed youth, more for the profit than the reputation of that employment, in which, however, he was eminently successful. He was then invited to Mantua by Frederic Gonzaga, who appointed him tutor to his son, and there he is said to have died in 1540, or a few years after. Lampridius, we are told, was of so timid a nature, that his friends could never prevail on him to speak in public. We have epigrams and lyric verses of this author, both in Greek and Latin, which were printed separately, and also among the “Deliciae” of the Italian poets. In his odes he aimed to imitate Pindar; but he wanted the force of that unrivalled poet.

was many years rector of Stamford Rivers, near Ongar, in Essex; and author of the celebrated “Essay on Delicacy,” 1748. In speaking of Or. Lancaster, Mr. Hull the comedian, who was lus nepuew, (in a note on “Select Letters between the late Dutchess of Somerset, Lady Luxborough,” &c. &c. 1768, 2 vols. 8vo), says, “He w;is a man of strong natural parts, gieat erudition, refined taste, and master of a nervous, and at the same time elegant style, as is obvious to every one who has had the happiness to read the Essay here spoken of. His writings were fewer in number than their author’s genius seemed to promise to his friends, and his publications less known than their intrinsic excellence deserved. Had he been as solicitous as he was capable to instruct and please the world, few prose writers would have surpassed h m; but in his latter years he lived a recluse, and whatever he composed in the hours of retired leisure, he (unhappily for the public) ordered to be burned, which was religiously (I had almost said irreligiously) performed. He was a native of Cheshire; and in his early years, under the patronage and friendship of the late earl of Cholmondely, mixed in all the more exalted scenes of polished life, where his lively spirit and brilliant conversation rendered him universally distinguished and esteemed; and even till within a few months of his decease (near seventy-five years of age) these faculties could scarce be said to be impaired. The Essay on Delicacy (of which we are now speaking) the only material work of his which the editor knows to have survived him, was first printed in 1748, and has been very judiciously and meritoriously preserved by the late Mr. Dodsley in his Fugitive Pieces.” Notwithstanding Mr. Hull’s assertion, that his uncle wrote nothing but the “Essay,” a sermon of his, under the title of“Public Virtue, or the Love of our Country,” was printed in 1746, 4to. He was also author of a long anonymous rhapsodical poem, called “The Old Serpent, or Methodism Triumphant,” 4to. The doctor’s imprudence involved him so deeply in debt, that he was some time confined for it, and left his parsonage-house in so ruinous a condition, that his successor Dr. Beadon was forced entirely to take it down. He died June 20, 1775, leaving two daughters, one of whom married to the rev. Thomas Wetenhall, of Chester, chaplain of a man of war, and vicar of Walthamstow, Essex, from 1759 till his death, 1776.

, an useful French writer, born at Paris in 1619, had a principal hand in some very excellent works, which the Solitaires of Port Royal projected for the education of youth. He taught the belles lettres and mathematics in their school at Paris. He was afterwards charged with the education of the prince of Conti; but, being removed upon the death of the princess his mother, he took the habit of St. Benedict in the abbey of St. Cyran. Certain intestine troubles arising within these walls, he became a victim among others; and was banished to Ruimperlay, in Lower Britanny, where he died in 1695, aged seventy-nine. His principal works are, 1. “Nouvelle Methode pour apprendre la Langue Latine,” 1644, 8vo. This has been looked upon as a judicious extract, from what Valla, Scaliger, Scioppius, and above all, Sanctius, have written upon the subject. Lancelot is said to have been the first who threw off the ridiculous custom of giving boys rules to learn Latin in the Latin language. 2. “Nouvelle Methode pour apprendre Iq Grec,” 1656, in 8vo. These two grammars have been translated into English, under the title of “Port-Royal Grammars.” He was also author of “The Garden of Greek Roots,” 12mo; “An Italian Grammar,” 12mo; “A Spanish Grammar,” 12mo; the “Dissertations, Remarks, and Sacred Chronology” in the Bibles printed by Vitr6; “The general and rational Grammar,” 12mo. This excellent work was planned by M. Arnauld, but Lancelot composed the greatest part; it was published by M. Duclos with remarks, 1756, 12mo; “Delectus Epigrammatum,” of which the preface onlyU by M. Nicole, 12mo; “Mémoires pour servir a la vie de M. de S. Cyran,” in two parts, the second entitled “L'Esprit de M. de S. Cyran,” 2 vols. 12mo. He is accused of having written these memoirs with great partiality and prejudice. “Relation du vo‘iage d’Alet,” 12mo. This is an eulogy on the famous bishop of Alet.

, a celebrated physician, was born at Rome in October 1654. His parents were rather low in rank, but cherished the disposition for learning which he early displayed; and having finished his classical studies, he went through the course of philosophy in the Roman college, and then commenced the study of divinity. He had always evinced a great taste for natural history, which at length induced him to abandon the study of divinity, and apply himself entirely to that of medicine, and after a regular course he was created doctor in philosophy and medicine in 1672. In 1675, he was appointed physician to the hospital of the Holy Ghost, in Sassia, where he pursued his clinical inquiries with great accuracy and acuteness: but he quitted this situation in 1678, and was received a member of the college of St. Saviour; and his talents and acquirements being soon acknowledged, he was appointed professor of anatomy in the college de la Sapienza, in 1684, and continued his duties as a teacher for thirteen years with great reputation. In 1688, pope Innocent XI. chose Lancisi for his physician and private chamberlain and some time afterwards gave him a canon’s stall in the church of St. Lawrence but on the death of the pope, in 1689, he resigned it. He was now in high public estimation, attended Innocent XII. during his whole illness, was elected physician to the conclave, and was immediately appointed first physician and private chancellor to the succeeding pope Clement XI. He was indefatigable in the discharge of all his duties, as well as in the pursuit of his studies, reading and writing at every interval of leisure, and in his attendance on the learned societies of the time. He died in January, 1720, at the age of 65. He was a man of small stature, with a lively countenance, and cheerful disposition his manners were extremely engaging and he was possessed of much knowledge of mankind. His ardour for the advancement of his art was extreme and unceasing. He collected a library of more than twenty thousand volumes, which he presented in his life -time to the hospital of the Holy Ghost, for the use of the public, particularly the young physicians and surgeons who attended the patients in that hospital. This noble benefaction was opened in 1716. He published an edition of his works, entitled, “Mar. Lancisi archiatri pontificii Opera, qua; hactenus prodierunt omnia, &c. Genevae, 1718,” 2 vols. 4to. The first volume contains the following pieces: “De subitaneis mortibus; Dissertatio de nati vis deque ad ventitiisRomani cceli qualitatibus; Denoxiis Paludum effluviis.” The contents of the second volume are, “Dissertatio historica de Bovilla Peste ex Campaniae finibus, an. 1713;” “Latio iraportata, &c. 1715” “Dissertatio de recta medicorum studiorum instituenda” “Humani corporis anatomica synopsis” “Kpistola ad J. Baptist. Bianchi de humorum secretionibus et genere ac praecipue bilis in hepate separatione” “An acidum ex sanguine extrahi queat” (the negative had been maintained by Boyle) “Epistolae duse de triplici intestinorum polypo; de physiognomia,” and many small pieces, in Italian as well as Latin.

His mother dying, he came to his fortune young; and, passing over to England, met with a reception suitable to his merit. Admiral sir Edward Sprag, a patron of the art, recommended him to several persons of quality, among whom was sir William Williams, whose house was finally adorned with this master’s pictures, but not long after unfortunately burnt; so that, of this great painter, there are but very few finished pieces remaining, he having bestowed the greatest part of his time, while in England, on that gentleman’s house. He was also much courted by sir Peter Lely, who employed him in painting the grounds, landscapes, flowers, ornaments, and sometimes the draperies, of those pictures by which he intended to gain esteem. Lancrinck’s performances in landcapewere admired for invention, harmony, colouring, and warmth, and he was particularly successful in his skies, which were thought to excel the works of the most eminent painters in this article. Besides the specimens in the possession of Mr. Henly, of Mr. Trevox, and Mr. Austen, the father of which last was his great friend and patron, he painted a cieling at the house of Richard Lent, esq. at Causham in Wiltshire, near Bath, which was much admired. He practised also drawing after the life, and succeeded well in small figures, which were a great ornament in his landscapes, and in which be imitated the manner of Titian. Lancrinck is said to have shortened his days by too free indulgence, and died in August 1692, leaving a wellchosen collection of pictures, drawings, prints, antique heads, and models, most of which he brought from abroad.

In 1766, Mr. Landen was elected a fellow of the royal society, and in the “Transactions” for 1768 he wrote “A specimen of a new method of comparing Curvilinear Areas” by means of which many areas are compared, that did not appear to be comparable by any other method a circumstance of no small importance in that part of natural philosophy which relates to the doctrine of motion. In the 60th volume of the same work, for 17 70, he gave “Some new theorems” for computing the whole areas of curve lines, where the ordinates are expressed by fractions of a certain form, in a more concise and elegant manner than had been done by Cotes, De Moivre, and others who had considered the subject before him.

In the 67th volume, for 1777, he gave “A New Theory of the Motion of bodies revolving about an axis in free space, when that motion is disturbed by some extraneous force, either percussive or accelerative.” At that time he did not know that the subject had been treated by any person before him, and he considered only the motion of a sphere, spheroid, and cylinder. After the publication of of this paper, however, he was informed, that the doctrine of rotatory motion had been considered by d'Alembert; and upon procuring that author’s “Opuscules Mathematiques,” he there learned that d‘Alembert was not the only one who had considered the matter before him; for d’Alembert there speaks of some mathematician, though he does not mention his name, who, after reading what had been written on the subject, doubted whether there be any solid whatever, beside the sphere, in which any line, passing through the centre of gravity, will be a permanent axis of rotation. In consequence of this, Mr. Landen took up the subject again; and though he did not then give a solution to the general problem, viz. “to determine the motions of a body of any form whatever, revolving without restraint about any axis passing through its centre of gravity,” he fully removed every doubt of the kind which had been started by the person alluded to by d'Alembert, and pointed out several bodies which, under certain dimensions, have that remarkable property. This paper is given, among many others equally curious, in a volume of “Memoirs,” which he published in 1780. That volume is also enriched with a very extensive appendix, containing “Theorems for the calculation of Fluents;” which are more complete and extensive than those that are found in any author before him. In 1781, 1782, and 1783, he published three small tracts on the “Summation of Converging Series;” in which he explained and shewed the extent of some theorems which had been given for that purpose by De Moivre, Stirling, and his old friend Thomas Simpson, iii answer to some things which he thought had been written to the disparagement of those excellent mathematicians. It was the opinion of some, that Mr. Landen did not shew less mathematical skill in explaining and illustrating these theorems, than he has done in his writings on original subjects; and that the authors of them were as little aware of the extent of their own theorems, as the rest of the world were before Mr. Landen’s ingenuity made it obvious to all.

The extreme difficulty of th% subject, joined to the concise manner in which Mr. Landen had been obliged to give his solution, to confine it within proper limits for the Transactions, rendered it too difficult, or at least too laborious a task, for most mathematicians to read it; and this circumstance, joined to the established reputation of Euler and d'Al-embert, induced many to think that their solution was right, and Mr, Landen’s wrong; and there did not want attempts to prove it; particularly along and ingenious paper by the learned Mr, Wildbore, a gentleman of very distinguished talents and experience in such calculations; this paper is given in the 80th volume of the Philosophical Transactions for 1790, in which he agrees with the solutions of Kuler and d'Alembert, and against that of Mr. Landen. This determined the latter to revise and extend his solution, and give it at greater length, to render it more generally understood. About this time also he met by chance with the late Frisi’s “Cosmographia Physica et Mathematica;” in the second part of which there is a solution of this problem, agreeing in the result with those of Euler and d'Alembert. Here Mr. Landen learned that Euler had revised the solution which he had given formerly in the Berlin Memoirs, and given it another form, and at greater length, in a volume published at Rostoch and Gryphiswald, in 1765, entitled “Theoria Motus Corporum Solidorum seu Rigidorwn.” Having therefore procured this book, Mr. Landen found the same principles employed in it, and of course the same conclusion resulting from them, as in M. Euler’s former solution of the problem. But notwithstanding that there was thus a coincidence of at least four most respectable mathematicians against him, Mr. Landen was still persuaded of the truth of his own solution, and prepared to defend ifc. And as he was convinced of the necessity of explaining his ideas on the subject more fully, so he now found it necessary to lose no time in setting about it. He had for several years been severely afflicted with the stone in the bladder, and towards the latter part of his life to such a degree as to be confined to his bed for more than a month at a time: yet even this dreadful disorder did not extinguish his ardour for mathematical studies; for the second volume of his “Memoirs,” lately published, was written and revised during the intervals of his disorder. This volume, besides a solution of the general problem concerning rotatory motion, contains the resolution of the problem relating to the motion of a top; with an investigation of the motion of the equinoxes, in which Mr. Landen has first of any one pointed out the cause of sir Isaac Newton’s mistake in his solution of this celebrated problem; and some other papers of considerable importance. He just lived to see this work finished, and received a copy of it the day before his death, which happened on the 15th of January 1790, at Milton, near Peterborough, in the seventy- first year of his age. Though Mr. Landen was one of the greatest mathematicians of the age, his merit, in this respect, was not more conspicuous than his moral virtues. The strict integrity of his conduct, his great humanity, and readiness to serve every one to the utmost of his power, procured him the respect and the esteem of all who knew him.

, knt. lord chief baron of the exchequer, was born in the latter part of the sixteenth century, and was the son of Richard Lane of Courtenhall in Northamptonshire, by Elizabeth his wife, daughter of Clement Vincent of Harpole, in the same county. He studied law in the Middle Temple, with great success, and being called to the bar, became eminent in his profession. In the 5th Charles I. he was elected Lent reader of his inn, but the plague which broke out about that time, prevented his reading. In 1640 he was counsel for the unhappy earl of Strafford; and soon after was made attorney to prince Charles. As the Long-parliament grew more capricious and tyrannical in its proceedings, he began to be alarmed for his property, and entrusted his intimate friend Buistrode Whitlocke, with his chamber in the Middle Temple, his goods and library; and leaving London, joined the king at Oxford, where, in 1643, he was made serjeant at law, lord chief baron of the exchequer, a knight, and one of his majesty’s privy council. The university also conferred on him the degree of LL. D. “with more,” says Wood, “than ordinary ceremony.” In the latter end of the following year, he was nominated one of his majesty’s commissioners to treat of peace with the parliament at Uxbridge, and on Aug. 30, 1645, he had the great seal delivered to him at Oxford, on the death of Edward lord Littleton. In May and June 1646, he was one of the commissioners appointed to treat with the parliament for the surrender of the garrison of Oxford, apd soon alter went abroad to avoid the general persecution of the royalists which the parliament meditated. He died in the island of Jersey in 1650, or 1651, Wood tells a strange story of the fate of the goods he entrusted to Whitlocke. He says, that during sir Richard’s residence abroad, lm son applied to Whitlocke, who would not own that he knew such a man as sir Richard, and kept the goods. That this story is not without foundation, appears from Whitlocke’s receipt for his pension, &c. printed by Peck, to which he adds, “And I have likewise obtained some bookes and manuscripts, which were the lord Littleton’s; and some few bookes and manuscripts, which were sir Richard Lane’s; in all worth about So/.” Sir Richard Lane’s “Reports in the court of Exchequer in the reign of king James,” were published in 1657, folio.

, archbishop of Canterbury in the eleventh century, was an Italian, and born in 1005 at Pavia, being son of a counsellor to the senate of that town; but, losing his father in his infancy, he went to Bologna. Hence, having prosecuted his studies for some time, he removed into France in the reign of Henry I. and taught some time at Avranches, where he had many pupils of high rank. In a journey to Rouen, he had the misfortune to be robbed, and tied to a tree on the road, where he remained till next day, when being released by some passengers, he retired to the abbey of Bee, lately founded, and there took the monk’s habit in 1041. He was elected prior of this religious house in 1044; and opened a school, which in a little time became very famous, and was frequented by students from all parts of Europe. Amongst others, some of the scholars of Berenger, archdeacon of Angers, and master of the school at Tours, left that, and went to study at the abbey of Bee. This, it is said, excited the envy of Berenger, and gave rise to a long and violent controversy between him and Lanfranc, on the subject of the eucharist. (See Berengarius). In 1049, Lanfranc took a journey to Rome, where he declared his sentiments to pope Leo IX. against the doctrine of Berenger; for Berenger had xvritten him a letter, which gave room to suspect Lanfranc to be of his opinion. Soon after, he assisted in the council of Verceil, where he expressly opposed Berenger’s notions. He returned a second time to Rome in 1059, and assisted in the council held at the Lateran by pope Nicholas II. in which Berenger abjured the doctrine that he had till then maintained. Lanfranc now obtained a dispensation from the pope, for the marriage of William duke of Normandy with a daughter of the earl of Flanders his cousin. On his return to France, he rebuilt his abbey at Bee; but was soon removed from it by the duke of Normandy, who in 1062 made him abbot of St. Stephen’s at Caen in that province, where he established a new academy, which became no less famous than his former one at Bee. This duke, coming to the crown of England, sent for Lanfranc, who was elected archbishop of Canterbury in 1070, in the room of Stigand, who had been deposed by the pope’s legate. He was no sooner consecrated to this see, than he wrote to pope Alexander II. begging leave to resign it; which not being complied with, he afterwards sent ambassadors to Rome to beg the pall; but Hildebrand answering, in the pope’s name, that the pall was not granted to any person in his absence (which was not strictly true, as it had been sent to Austin, Justus, and Honorius), he went thither to receive that honour in 1071. Alexander paid him a particular respect, in rising to give him audience this pontiff, indeed, had a special regard for him, having studied under him in the abbey of Bee and kissed him, instead of presenting his slipper for that obeisance, nor was he satisfied with giving him the usual pall, but invested him with that pall of which he himself had made use in celebrating mass. Before his departure, Lanfranc defended the metropolitical rights of his see against the claims of the archbishop of York, and procured them to be confirmed by a national council in 1075, wherein several rules of discipline were established. At length, presuming to make remonstrances to the Conqueror upon some oppressions of the subjects, though he offered them with a becoming respect, the monarch received them with disdain and asked him, with an oath, if he thought it possible for a king to keep all his promises From this time, our archbishop lost his majesty’s favour, and was observed afterwards with a jealous eye. He enjoyed, however, the favour of William II. during the remainder of his life. Some years before this, Gregory VII. having summoned him several times to come to Rome, to give an account of his faith, at length sent him a citation to appear there in four months, on pain of suspension: Lanfranc, however, did not think proper to obey the summons. He died May 28, 1089.

Several of our ancient historians who were almost his contemporaries, speak in very advantageous terms of the genius and erudition of Lanfranc; and some of them who were personally acquainted with him, represent him as the most learned man of the age in which he flourished. His charity is said to have been so great, that he bestowed in that way no less than 500l. a year, a very great sum in those days, and equal to 1500l. in ours. Besides this he rebuilt the cathedral of Canterbury, re-established the chapter there, founded the hospitals of St. Nicholas at Herbaldown and St. John at Canterbury, repaired several churches and monasteries in his diocese, obtained a restoration of the estates of the church which had been alienated, and maintained the ecclesiastical immunities. A remarkable suit, which he carried against Odo, bishop of Bayeux and earl of Kent, put him in possession of five and twenty estates, which had been usurped by that prelate. Lanfranc, besides his piece against Berenger already mentioned, wrote several others, which were published in one volume, folio, in 1647, by father Luke D'Achery, a Benedictine monk, of the congregation of St. Maur. They consist of commentaries on the epistles of St. Paul, and on the Psalms a treatise on confession, letters, &C.

, an eminent Italian painter, was born at Parma, in 1581. His parents, being poor, carried him to Placenza, to enter him into the service of the count Horatio Scotte. While he was there, he was always drawing with coal upon the walls, paper being too small for him to scrawl his ideas on. The count, observing his disposition, put him to Agostino Caracci; after whose death he went to Rome, and studied under Annibale, who set him to work in the church of St. Jago, and found him capable of being trusted with the execution of his designs; in which Lanfranco has left it a doubt whether the work be his or his master’s. His genius lay to painting in fresco in spacious places, as appeared by his grand performances, especially the cupola of Andrea de Laval, in which he has succeeded much better than in his pieces of a less size. His taste in design he took from Annibale Caracci; and as long as he lived under the discipline of that illustrious roaster, he was always correct; but, after his master’s death, 'he gave a loose to the impetuosity of genius, without regarding the rules of art. He joined with his countryman Sisto Badalocchi, in etching the histories of the Bible, after Raphael’s painting in the Vatican; which work, in conjunction with Badalocchi, he dedicated to his master Annibale. Lanfranco painted the history of St. Peter for pope Urban VIII. which was engraved by Pietro Santi; he executed other performances, particularly St. Peter walking on the water, for St. Peter’s church, and pleased the pope so much, that he knighted him.

Lanfranco was happy in his family: his wife, who was very handsome, brought him several children, who, being grown up, and delighting in poetry and music, made a sort of Parnassus in his house. His eldest daughter sang finely, and played well on several instruments. He died in 1647, aged sixty-six. His genius, heated by studying Correggio’s works, and, above all, the cupola at Parma, carried him even to enthusiasm. He earnestly endeavoured to find out the means of producing the same things; and, that he was capable of great enterprizes, may be discovered by his performances at Rome and Naples. Nothing was too great for him: he made figures of above 20 feet high in the cupola of St. Andrea de Laval, which have a, very good effect, and look below as if they were of a natural proportion. In his pictures he endeavoured to join Annibale’s firmness of design to Correggio’s taste and sweetness. He aimed also at giving the whole grace to his imitation; not considering, that nature had given him but a small portion. His ideas indeed are sometimes great enough for the greatest performances; but his genius could not stoop to correct them, by which means they are often unfinished. His easel pieces are not so much esteemed as what he painted in fresco; vivacity of wit and freedom of band being very proper for that kind of painting. His grand compositions are full of tumult but the expression is neither elegant nor moving. His colouring was not so well studied as that of Annibale the tints of his carnations and his shadows are a little too black. He was ignorant of the elaro oscuro, as well as his master; though, as his master did, he sometimes endeavoured to practise it. He was, as M. Fuseli has observed, “a machinist in art of the first order, and taught his successors the means of filling the eye at a great distance, by partly painting and partly leaving it to the air to paint.”

Our author was much esteemed by several learned men of his time, and held a literary correspondence with Usher and Selden. He was screened from the persecutions of the then prevailing powers, to whom he so far submitted as to continue quiet without opposing them, employing himself in promoting learning, and preserving the discipline of the university, as well as that of his own college. With what spirit he did this, is best seen in the following passages of two letters, one to Usher, and the other to Selden. In the first, dated from Queen’s-college, Feb. 9, 1646-7, he gives the following account of himself: “For myself, I cannot tell what account to make of my present employment. J have many irons in the fire, but of no great consequence. I do not know how soon I shall be called to give up, and am therefore putting my house in order, digesting the confused notes and papers left me by several predecessors, both in the university and college, which I purpose to leave in a better method than I found them. At Mr. Patrick Young’s request, I have undertaken the collation of Constantino’s Geoponics with two Mss. in our public library, upon which I am forced to bestow some vacant hours. In our college I am ex officio to moderate divinity-disputations once a week. My honoured friend Dr. Duck has given me occasion to make some inquiry after the law; and the opportunity of an ingenious young man, come lately from Paris, who has put up a private course of anatomy, has prevailed with me to engage myself for his auditor and spectator three days a week, four hours each time. But this I do ut explorator, non ut transfuga. For, though 1 am not solicitous to engage myself in that great and weighty calling of the ministry after this new way, yet I would lothe to be teiTrorautriit as to divinity. Though I am very insufficient to make a master-builder, yet I could help to bring in materials from that public store in our library, to which I could willingly consecrate the remainder of my days, and count it no loss to be deprived of all other accommodations, so I might be permitted to enjoy the liberty of my conscience, and study in that place. But if there be such a price set upon the latter as I cannot reach without pawning the former, I am resolved. The Lord’s will be done.” The other letter to Selden, is dated Nov. 8, 1653; “I was not so much troubled to hear of that fellow, who lately, in London, maintained in public that learning is a sin, as to see some men, v.onld he accounted none of the meanest among ourselves here at home, under pretence of piety, go about to banish it th university. I cannot make any better construction of a late order made by those whom we call visitors, upon occasion of an election last week at All-Souls college to this effect, that for the future, no scholar be chosen into any place in any college, unless he bring a testimony, under the hands of four persons at least (not electors) known to these visitors to be truly godly men, that he who stands for such a place is himself truly godly; and by arrogating to themselves this power, they sit judges of all men’s consciences, and have rejected some, against whom they had no other exceptions, (being certified by such to whom their conversations were best known, to be unblameable, and statutably elected, after due examination and approbation of their sufficiency by that society), merely upon this account, that the persons who testified in their behalf are not known to these visitors to be regenerate. I intend (God willing) ere long to have an election in our college, and have not professed that I'will not submit to this order. Howl shall speed in it, I do not pretend to foresee; but if I be baffled, I shall hardly be silent.” Dr. Langbaine’s works were, 1. his Longinus, Oxon. 1636 and 1638, 8vo. 2. “Brief Discourse relating to the times of Edward VI.; or, the state of the times as they stood in the reign of King Edward VI. By way of Preface to a book intituled The true subject to the rebel: or, the hurt of sedition, &c. written by sir John Cheek.” Oxford, 1641, in 4to. To this Dr. Langbaine prefixed the life of sir John Cheek. 3. “Episcopal Inheritance; or, a Reply to the humble examination of a printed abstract; or the answers to nine reasons of the House of Commons against the votes of bishops in Parliament,” Oxford, 1641, 4to. To which is added, “A determination of the late learned Bishop of Salisbury (Davenant) Englished.” These two pieces were reprinted at London in 1680. 4. “A Review of the Covenant: wherein the original, grounds, means, matter, and ends of it are examined; and out of the principles of the remonstunce*, declarations, votes, orders and ordinances of trie prime covenanters, or the firmer grounds of scripture, law, and reason, disproved,” 1644. It was reprinted at London, 1661, in 4to. 5. “Answer of the Chancellor, master and scholars of the university of Oxford, to the petition, articles of grievance, and reasons of the city of Oxford; presented to the committee for regulating the University of Oxford, 24 July 1649,” Oxford, 1649, 4to; reprinted in 1678, with a book entitled “A defence of the rights and privileges of the University of Oxford,” &c. published by James Harrington, then bachelor (soon after master) of arts, and student of Christ-church, at Oxford, 1690, 4to. 6. “Quacstiones pro more solenni in Vesperiis propositac ann. 1651,” Oxford, 1658, 4to. Published by Mr. Thomas Barlow, afterwards Bp. of Lincoln, among several little works of learned men. 7. “Platonicorum aliquot, qui etiamnum supersunt, Authorum, Graecorum, imprimis, mox Latinorum, syllabus alphabeticus,” Oxford, 1607, 8vo, drawn up by our author at the desire of archbishop Usher, but left imperfect; which being found among his papers, was, with some few alterations, placed at the end of “Alcini, in Plutonicam Philosophiam Introductio,” published by Dr. John Fell, dean of Christ-church. 8. There is also ascribed to our author, “A View of the New Directory, and a Vindication of the ancient Liturgy of the Church of England: in answer to the reasons pretended in the ordinance and preface for the abolishing the one, and establishing the other,” Oxford, 1645, 4to, pages 112, Dr. Langbaine also published, 1. “The Foundation of the university of Oxford, with a Catalogue of the principal founders and special benefactors of all the colleges, and total number of students,” &c. London, 165I,4to f mostly taken from the Tables of John Scot of Cambridge, printed in '622. 2. “The Foundation of the University of Cambridge, with a Catalogue,” &c. printed with the forme? Catalogue, and taken from Mr. Scot’s Tables. He likewise laboured very much in finishing archbishop Usher’s book, entitled “Chronologia Sacra,” but died when he had almost completed it, which was done by Barlow. He translated into Latin “Reasons of the present judgment of the university concerning the solemn League and Covenant,” and assisted Dr. Robert Sanderson, and Dr. Richard Zouch, in the drawing up of those Reasons. He translated into English “A Review of the Council of Trent, written in French by a learned Roman catholic,” Oxford, 1638, fol. in which is represented the dissent of the Gallican church from several conclusions of the Council. He left behind him thirteen 4tos, and eight 8vos, in manuscript, with innumerable collections in loose papers, collected chiefly from ancient manuscripts in the Bodleian library, &c, He had also made several catalogues of manuscripts in various libraries, and of printed books likewise, with a view, as was supposed, to an universal Catalogue. Dr. Fuller tells us that he took a great deal of pains in the continuation of Brian Twyne’s “Antiq. Academ. Oxon.” and that he was intent upon it when he died. But Mr. Wood observes, that Dr. Thomas Barlow and Dr. Lamplugh, who looked over his library after his death, assured him that they saw nothing done towards such a design. Dr. Langbaine assisted Dr. Arthur Duck in composing his book “De usu & authoritate Juris Civilis Homanorum in Dominiis Principum Christianorum,” London, 1653, 8vo. In Parr’s collection of Usher’s letters, are several letters of our author to that prelate.

About this time, he published “An Appendix to a catalogue of all the graduates in divinity, law, and physic,” &c. written by R. Peers, superior beadle of arts and physic. Langbaine’s appendix contains the names of all “who proceeded from the 14th of June 168S, where Peers left off, to the 6th of August 1690. He did not survive this long, some disorder carrying him off in June 1692. But he is best known as the author of the” Account of the English dramatic poets,“His first attempt in this way was by a republication of a catalogue of plays collected original ir by Kirkman, a London bookseller, and appended to” Nicomede,“a translation of a play from Corneille in 1671. This Langbaine followed in 1688 by” MomusTriumphans,“which appeared afterwards under the title of” A new Catalogue of English Plays,“&c. The author at length digested his work anew, with great accessions and improvements, which he entitled” An Account of the English Dramatic Poets,“&c. Oxford, 1691, 8vo, reprinted by Gildon in 1699. Langbaine’s own collection amounted, as he says, to” above 980 English plays and masques, basides drolls and interludes.“The copy of his” Account" in the British Museum, with Oldys’s ms notes, is fell known to every student of dramatic history.

When he had by these means gained the love and esteem of the major part of the brotherhood, he carried the work of reformation to matters of greater importance. He formed a code of laws upon more liberal principles than those by which the monastic orders were in general go*­verned; and although, like all legislators, he met with considerable difficulty and opposition in their promulgation, yet he ultimately triumphed. He repressed the insolent, reduced the refractory, punished the wicked, and in a short time not only established order in a place which had been formerly the scene of confusion, but had so entirely gained the good opinion of the society, that, as Flete observes, his character was, “even by the old monks who had been his enemies, thought equal to that of the founder, Edward the confessor.”

The king, Edward 111. perceiving his talents and sagacity, promoted him in 1360 to the place of lord treasurer, and in 1361 he was chosen bishop of London; but the see of Ely becoming vacant at the same time, he chose the latter, and was consecrated March 20, 1361-2, and employed its revenues to the encouragement of learning, and to the relief of the poor. As his character in this high office began more fully to appear, the king became partial to Langham, and in Feb. 1364 removed him from the post of lord treasurer to that of chancellor, and in July 1366, he was, by papal provision, but at the express desire of the king, promoted to the see of Canterbury. The most remarkable event which occurred during his administration was, his undertaking to execute the bull promulgated by the pope Urban the Fifth, “for the correction of the abuse of the privilege of pluralities. 77 Archbishop Langham was indefatigable in his inquiry through his diocese; and the result of it was,” the reformation of a great many ecclesiastics who held an enormous number of livings, some of them twenty or thirty, with the cure of souls."

His conduct hitherto had been becoming his station, but we have now to record one action of his which, as Anthony Wood says, it is impossible to defend. This was the removal of the celebrated John Wickliff from his situation as head of a hall at Oxford, called Canterbury-hall, founded by his predecessor Simon Islip. Whether his holding tenets which might then be deemed heretical was the archbishop’s true reason for ejecting him, does not appear. That which he avowed was, that having a desire that the hall should be a college for the education of monks, he thought a secular priest (between whom and the monastic order it is well known a considerable jealousy subsisted) would be an improper person for their governor. But although this might have been the opinion of the prelate, it does not appear to have been that of the society; the fellows of which convened a meeting, in whichfthey drew up a spirited remonstrance against the tyranny of their superior. This was so ill receded by him, and their subsequent conduct considered as so contumacious, that he sequestered a large portion of their revenue. War was now declared on both sides. The society appealed to the pope, the archbishop sent an agent to Rome to answer for him; and he had interest enough to induce his holiness to confirm the decree by which Wickliff and some other refractory members of the fraternity were removed, and their places filled with those who were more steady adherents to nonachism, and consequently more devoted to the will of the archbishop.

The death of pope Urban happened at a period, as it was thought, critical to the affairs of the cardinal, as well as to those of the two kingdoms of England and France, as he had just appointed him to mediate a peace between them. But Gregory the Eleventh, who succeeded Urban, as sensible of his merit as his predecessor, confirmed his appointment, and even enlarged his powers. This treaty Tailing, as nad been foreseen by the cardinal, he proceeded from Melun, the place where he had met cardinal de Beauvois, to England with the sense of the French court upon the negotiation. Although unsuccessful in this business, he had, whilst abroad, an opportunity of displaying his diplomatic talents, wnich had a more fortunate issue. Through his (oediation a peace was made betwixt the king and the earl of Flanders, who had been at variance upon the account of the earl’s breaking his engagement to marry his daughter to Edmund earl of Cambridge, and betrothing her to Philip, the brother of Charles the Fifth, king of France. In the beginning of 1372, cardinal Langham left England in order to return to the pope; and when he arrived at Avignon, he found that his conduct had, during the course of his mission, been misrepresented to the pope, but he so amply satisfied his holiness on that point, that, in the same year, he elevated him to the dignity of cardinal bishop of Praeneste. On the death of Wittelsey, who succeeded him as archbishop of Canterbury, the monks endeavoured to persuade the king to allow Langham to return; but the king was enraged at their insolence, and in this was seconded by the pope, who preferred employing the cardinal at Avignon, where the affairs of the holy see rendered his presence necessary. From this situation, however, Langham had a strong desire to remove, and visit his native country, where he had projected some architectural plans, and meant to devote a large sum of money to the rebuilding of the abbey at Westminster. With this view he procured some friends at court to solicit leave to return, and their applications were successful; but before he could know the issue, he died suddenly of a paralytic stroke, July 22, 1376. His body was, according to 'the direction of his will, first deposited in a new-built church of the Carthusians, near the place of his decease, where it remained for three years. It was then with great state and solemnity removed to Saint Benet’s chapel, in Westminster abbey, where his tomb with his effigy upon it, and the arms of England, the monastery of Saint Peter, and the sees of Canterbury and Ely, engraved in tablets around it, still remains.

The character of this prelate, as given by Flete, the historian of the abbey, is, “that he was a man of great capacity, very wise, and very eloquent:” a character which, even allowing for the prejudice of monachism toward so eminent a benefactqr to the church, will not be disputed, if we consider also that he filled some of the highest departments of the state, under a monarch who is, by all historians, allowed to have been as eminent for his wisdom and discernment as he was for his courage and military glory.

, an English poet and miscellaneous writer, the son of h clergyman beneficed in Lincolnshire, was born at Kirkby Steven, in Westmoreland, in. the month of March 1735, His father dying when he was only four years of age, the care of his education devolved on his mother, who initiated him in the first principles of knowledge with such tender anxiety as left a pleasing and indelible impression on his memory. He celebrated her virtues on her tomb, and more particularly by a beautiful monody inserted among his poems. When of sufficient age, he was placed at a school at Winton, and afterwards at Appleby, where he recommended himself to the good opinion of Mr. Yates, his master, not only by speedily dispatching the usual school tasks, but by performing voluntary exercises, which he submitted to his revisal. By this employment of his leisure hours, he probably excelled his companions, and we are told that at the age of thirteen he was able to read and construe the Greek Testament.

His next occupation was that of an assistant at the free school of Wakefield, then superintended by Mr. Clarke; and while here he took deacon’s orders, and became, it is said, “a popular preacher.” In 1759, Mr. Clarke recommended him as preceptor to the sons of Robert Cracroft, esq. of Hackthorn, near Lincoln. Mr. Cracrdft had nine sons, and Mr. Langhorne must have been fully employed in the family; yet he added to theirs the tuition of Mr. Edmund Cartwright, a young gentleman of a poetical turn, who afterwards published an elegy, entitled “Constantia,” on the death of his preceptor’s wife. During his residence at Hackthorn, our author published a volume of his poems, for the relief of a gentleman in distress; and in the same year a poem, entitled “The Death of Adonis,” from the Greek of Bion. Public opinion gave him no encouragement to reprint this last, but he derived from it the advantage of being noticed as a critic of considerable acumen in Greek poetry.

While employed on the education of the sons of Mr. Cracroft, he became enamoured of the amiable disposition and personal charms of Miss Anne Cracroft, one of that gentleman’s daughters. He had given her some instructions in the Italian language, and was often delighted by her skill in music, for which he had a very correct ear. A mutual attachment was the consequence of these many opportunities and coincidences in polite accomplishments, which Mr. Langhorne was eager to terminate in marriage. But the lady, who knew that a match so disproportioned as to fortune would be opposed by her family, gave him a denial, as firm and as gentle as her good sense and secret attachment would permit. For this, however, Mr. Langhonie was not prepared, and immediately left his situation, in hopes of recovering a more tranquil tone of mind in distant scenes and different employment. In 1761 he officiated as curate to the rev. Abraham Blackburn of :cnham, and obtained the friendship of the Gillmans, a very amiable family in that place. While endeavouring to forget his heart’s disappointment, he found some relief in penning a “Hymn to Hope,” which he published this year in London, 4to; and in the course of the next, he gave further vent to his thoughts in “The Visions of Fancy, four Elegies,” 4to “Letters on Religious Retirement,” 8vo and “Solyman and Almena,” a fiction in the manner of the Eastern Tales, but not much to be praised for invention. The “Letters” are of a sentimental, melancholy cast, with a considerable mixture of lighter and more entertaining matter. In the same year he published “The Viceroy,” a poem in honour of lord Halifax, then lord lieutenant of Ireland. Here, as in the case of “Studley Park,” our author appears to have expected to find a patron, but lord Halifax did not condescend to notice what, it must be confessed, flatters him with too much artifice; and Langhorne, when he collected his poems, retained only a favourite fragment of this unlucky piece, omitting altogether the name of Halifax, or Viceroy. The whole, however, is given in the last edition of the “English Poets,” as originally written.

His “Letters on Religious Retirement” were dedicated, with rather more success, to bishop Warburton, who returned a complimentary letter, in which he encouraged our author to make some attempt in the cause of religion. This is supposed to have produced, in 1763, “The Letters that passed between Theodosius and Constantia,” a fiction founded on a well-known story in the Spectator. The style of these letters is in general elegant, but in some parts too florid. The*“Letter on Prayer” is very equivocal in its tendency. This year also gave birth to a poem, meant to be philosophical, entitled “The Enlargement of the Mind,” part first, in which we find some noble sentiments expressed in glowing and elevated language. His next publication, about the same time, called “Effusions of Friendship and Fancy,” 2 vols. 12rno, was a work of considerable popularity. It is indeed a very pleasing miseellany of humour, fancy, and criticism, but the style is often flippant and irregular, and made him be classed among the imitators of Sterne, whom it was too much the fashion at that time to read and to admire.

In 1764, having obtained the curacy and lectureship of St. John’s Clerkenwell, he was enabled to reside in London, where only literary talents meet with ready encouragement, and where he was already ranked among the elegant and pleasing poets of the day, and had given antipie proof of ease and versatility in the choice and management of his subjects. His first publication this year was a continuation of “Theodosius ami Constantia,” of much the same character as the former work, but enlivened by more variety. As he appears to have aspired to promotion through the popularity of his talents in the pulpit, he novr gave a specimen of what had pleased his congregation, in two volumes of “Sermons.” His biographer has taken some pains to defend these against the censure of the late Mr. Mainwaring of St. John’s, Cambridge, in his “Dissertation” prefixed to his Sermons, (1780). But it appears to us that they abound in the false pathos, and that the reasoning, where any occurs, is very superficial. They have, however, the advantage to those who dislike sermons of every kind, that they are perhaps the shortest ever published.

But whatever may be in this, his employment as a critic we are told, procured him many acquaintances among literary men, while the vein of ridicule which he indulged in treating several of the subjects that fell under his consideration, created him many enemies, who in their turn endeavoured to depreciate his performances. As no judgment can now be pronounced on the articles which he wrotCj it is impossible to say whether this vein of ridicule was employed as the just chastisement of arrogance and immorality, or substituted for fair and legitimate criticism. Illibefality has not often been imputed to the journal in which he wrote; and as to his enemies, we know of none more formidable than Churchill, Kelly, and Kenrick, two of whom were libellers by profession. Smollett, whose jealousy of the Monthly Review led him often to disgrace his talents by invidious attacks on the supposed writers belonging to it$ bestows almost uniform praise on Langhorne’s various works.

During Churchill’s career, our author endeavoured to counteract the scurrility he had thrown out against Scotland in his “Prophecy of Famine,” by an elegant poem entitled “Genius and Valour.” This provoked Churchill to introduce his name once or twice with his usual epithets of contempt, which Langhorne disregarded, and disregarded his own interest at the same time, by dedicating this poem to lord Bute, a minister going out of place It produced him, however, a very flattering letter, in 1766, from Dr. Robertson, the celebrated historian, and principal of the university of Edinburgh, requesting him to accept a diploma for the degree of D. D. He was farther consoled by the approbation of every wise and loyal man, who contemplated the miseries of disunion, and the glaring absurdity of perpetuating national prejudices.

During Mrs. Langhorne’s life, he produced one poem only, entitled “Precepts of Conjugal Happiness,” addressed to Mrs. Nelthorpe, a sister of his wife. To this lady he committed the care of his infant child, who lived to acknowledge her friendship, and to discharge the duties of an affectionate son, by the late “Memoirs of his Father,” prefixed to an elegant edition of his poems. In the “Precepts of Conjugal Happiness,” there is more good sense than poetry. It appears to have been a temporary effusion on which he bestowed no extraordinary pains. Not long after Mrs. Langhorne’s death, our author went to reside at Folkstone, in Kent, where his brother, the Kev. William Langhorne, then officiated as minister, a man of a very amiable character. He was born in 1721, and presented by the archbishop of Canterbury to the rectory of Hakinge, with the perpetual curacy of Folkstone, in 1754; and on this preferment he passed the remainder of his life. He published “Job,” a poem, and a poetical Paraphrase on a part of Isaiah, neither of which raised him to the fame of a poet, although they are not without the merit of correctness and spirit. He died Feb. 17, 1772, and his brother wrote some elegant lines to his memory, which are inscribed on a tablet in the chancel of Folkstone church. Between these brothers the closest affection subsisted; each was to the other “more the friend than brother of his heart.” During their residence together at Folkstone, they were employed in preparing a new translation of Plutarch’s Lives; and our poet, who became about this time intimate with Scott, the poet of Amwell (who likewise had just lost a beloved wife from a similar cause) paid him a visit at Aniwell, where he wrote the monody inscribed to Mr. Scott.

In 1776, he lost his second wife, who died, like the former, in child-bed, five years after her marriage, and left a daughter, whom he consigned by his will to the protection of his friend Mrs. Gillman. What impression this second interruption to domestic happiness produced on his mind we are not told. In this year, however, we find him again employing the press on a translation of Milton’s “Italian Sonnets,” and on two occasional sermons. In 1777, at the request of the Bouverie family, who highly respected Mr. Langhorne, Dr. Moss, bishop of Bath and Wells, presented him with a prebend in the cathedral of Wells. His last production was the tale of “Owen of Carron;” which, with some beauties, has less of his usual energy and vigour; it is uncertain whether this was owing to the nature of the poem, in which he conceived it necessary to imitate the ballad simplicity, or to a languor of body and mind. The death of the honourable Charles Yorke, from whom he had great expectations, is said to have made a lasting impression on him; but, as Mr. Yurke die-i in 1770, this seems wholly improbable. His biographer passes over his last clays without notice of his situation or enjoyments. We are merely told that he died on April i, 1779, in the forty -fifth year of his age.

, a gentleman of Westphalia, and provost of the cathedral church of Minister towards the end of the fifteenth century, distinguished himself by his learning, and by his zeal for the restoration of polite literature. He went through his first studies at Deventer, and was afterwards sent into Italy, where, under the greatest masters in literature, Laurence Valla, Mapheus Vegius, Francis Philelphus, and Theodore Gaza, he acquired an elegant Latin style both in verse and prose. His fellow-travellers in this journey were Maurice count of Spiegelberg and Rodolph Agricola, who, on their return to Germany, were the first to introduce proper methods of classical teaching, and to restore the purity of the Latin language. Langius being sent to the court of Rome by the bishop and chapter of Munster, under pope Sixtus IV. acquitted himself with great credit, and came back with letters from this pope and from Lorenzo de Medici, which gave him so much consequence in the eyes of his countrymen, that he was enabled more successfully to banish from the schools the ignorance which prevailed there. He was obliged, however, to struggle some years with those who objected that the introduction of a new method of teaching was dangerous; but at length he overcame those prejudices, and persuaded his bishop to found a school at Munster, the direction of which was committed to learned men, to whom he pointed out the method they were to follow, and the books they were to explain, ann gave them the use of his fine library. This school being thus established a little before the end of the fifteenth century, became very flourishing, and served as a nursery of literature to all Germany till the Revolutions which were occasioned at Munster by the anabaptists in the year 1554. Langius died in 1519, at the age of fourscore. He published some poems at Munster, 1486, 4to, by which, says Bayle, it appears that there were Latin poets of some reputation in Germany before Conrad Celtes. Rodolph Agricola dedicated his Latin translation of Plato’s “Axiochus” to Langius.

, archbishop of Canterbury in the thirteenth century, a native of England, was educated at the university of Paris, where he afterwards taught divinity, and explained the Scriptures with much reputation. His character stood so high, that he was chosen chancellor of that university, canon of Paris, and dean of Rheims. He was afterwards sent for to Rome by pope Innocent III. and created a cardinal. In 1207, the monks of Canterbury having, upon a vacancy taking place in that see, made a double return, both parties appealed to the pope, and sent agents to Rome to support their respective claims. His holiness not only determined against both the contending candidates, but ordered the monks, of Canterbury, then, at Rome, immediately to proceed to the election of an archbishop, and, at the same time, commanded them to choose cardinal Stephen Langton. After various excuses, which the plenitude of papal power answered, by absolving these conscientious monks from all sorts of promises, oaths, &c. and by threatening them with the highest penalties of the church, they complied; and Langton was consecrated by the pope at Viterbo. As soon as the news arrived in England, king John was incensed in the highest degree both against the pope and monks of Canterbury, which last experienced the effects of his indignation. He sent two officers with a company of armed men to Canterbury, took possession of the monastery, banished the monks out of the kingdom, and seized all their property. He wrote a spirited letter to the pope, in which he accused him of injustice and presumption, in raising a stranger to the highest dignity in his kingdom, without his knowledge. He reproached the pope and court of Rome with ingratitude, in not remembering that they derived more riches from England than from all the kingdoms on this side the Alps. He assured him, that he was determined to sacrifice his life in defence of the rights of his crown; and that if his holiness did not immediately repair the injury he had done him, he would break off all communication with Rome. The pope, whom such a letter must have irritated in the highest degree, returned for answer, that if the king persisted in this dispute, he would plunge himself into inextricable difficulties, and would at length be crushed by him, before whom every knee must bow, &c. All this may be deemed insolent and haughty, but it was not foolish. The pope knew the posture of king John’s affairs at home he knew that he had lost the affections of his subjects by his imprudence his only miscalculation was respecting the spirit of the people for when, which he did immediately, he laid the kingdom of England under an interdict, and two years after excommunicated the king, he was enraged to find that the great barons and their followers adhered with so much steadiness to their sovereign, that, while he lay under the sentence of excommunication, he executed the only two successful expeditions of his reign, the one into Wales, and the other into Ireland a proof that if he had continued to act with firmness, and had secured the affections of his subjects by a mild administration, he might have triumphed over all the arts of Rome. Such, however, was not the policy of John; and in the end, he submitted to the most disgraceful terms. In 1213, cardinal Langton arrived in England, and took possession of the see; and though he owed all his advancement to the pope, yet the moment he became an English baron, he was inspired with a zealous attachment to the liberties and independence of his country. In the very year in which he came over, he and six other bishops joined the party of the barons, who associated to resist the tyranny of the king; and at length they were successful in procuring the g eat charter. Langton was equally zealous in opposing the claims of the papal agents, particularly of the pope’s legate, who assumed the right of regulating all ecclesiastical affairs in the most arbitrary manner. In the grand contest which took place between king John and the barons about the charter, the archbishop’s patriotic conduct gave such offence to the pope, that, in 1215, he laid him under a sentence of suspension, and reversed the election of his brother Simon Langton, who had been chosen archbishop of York. Yet in the following year we find Langton assisting at a general council held at Rome; and during his absence from England at this time, king John died. In 1222, he held a synod at Oxford, in which a remarkable canon was made, prohibiting clergymen from keeping concubines publicly in their houses, or from going to them in other places so openly as to occasion scandal. In the following year, he, at the head of the principal nobility, demanded an audience of king Henry III. and demanded of him a confirmation of the charter of their JiberTheir determined manner convinced the king that their demand was not to be refused, and he instantly gave s lor the assembling of parliament. The archbishop shewed, in several instances, that he was friendly to the legal prerogatives of the crown; and by a firm conduct, in a case of great difficulty, he prevented the calamity of a civil war. He died in 1228, leaving behind him many works, which prove that he was deserving the character of being a learned and polite author. He wrote “Commentaries” upon the greatest part of the books of the Old and New Testament. He was deeply skilled in Aristotelian dialectics, and the application of them to the doctrines of Scripture. The first division of the books of the Bible into chapters is ascribed to this prelate. The history of the translation of the body of Thomas a Becket was printed at the end of that archbishop’s letters, at Brussels, 1682; and there are various Mss. of his in our public libraries. His letter to king John, with the king’s answer, may be seen, in d'Achery’s Spicilegium.

This connexion with Melancthon did not, however, extinguish the inclination which Languet had to travel. In 1551, he took up a resolution to visit some part of Europe every year, for which he set apart the autumn season, returning to pass the winter at Wittenberg. In the course of these travels, he made the tour of Rome in 1555, and that of Livonia and Laponia in 1558. During this last tour, he became known to Gustavus king of Sweden, who conceived a great affection for him, and engaged him to go into France, in order to bring him thence some of the best scholars and artists: for which purpose his majesty gave him a letter of credit, dated Sept. 1, 1557. Two years after, Languet attended Adolphus count of Nassau and prince of Orange, into Italy; and at his return passed through Paris, to visit the celebrated Turnebus; but it was a great deduction from the pleasure of this interview, that he heard at this time of the death of his friend Melancthon.

In 1565, Augustus elector of Saxony invited him to his court, and appointed him envoy to that of France the same year, after which he sent him as his deputy to the diet of the empire, which was called by the emperor Maximilian in 1568, at Augsburg. Thence the same master dispatched him to Heidelberg, to negotiate some business with the elector palatine; and from Heidelberg he went to Cologne, where he acquired the esteem and confidence of Charlotte de Bourbon, princess of Orange. The elector of Saxony sent him also to the diet of Spires; and in 1570 to Stetin, in quality of plenipotentiary, for mediating a peace between the Swedes and the Muscovites, who had chosen this elector for their mediator. This prince the same year sent Languet a second time into France, to Charles IX. and the queen-mother Catharine of Medicis, in the execution of which commission he made a remarkably bold speech to the French monarch, in the name of the protestant princes in Germany. He was at Paris upon the memorable bloody feast of St. Bartholomew, in 1572, when he saved the life of Andrew Wechelius, the famous printer, in whose house he lodged; and he was also very instrumental in procuring the escape of Philip de Mornay count de Plessis; but, trusting too much to the respect due to his character of envoy, was obliged for his own safety to the good offices of John de Morvillier, who had been keeper of the seals. Upon his recal from Paris, he received orders to go to Vienna, where he was in 1574; and in 1575 he was appointed one the principal arbitrators for determining of the disputes, which had lasted for thirty years, between the houses of Longueville and Baden, concerning the succession of Rothelin.

At length, in the controversy which arose in Saxony between the Lutherans and Zuinglians, respecting the eucharist, Languet was suspected to favour the latter, and in consequence was obliged to beg leave of the elector, being then one of his chief ministers, to retire; which was granted, with a liberty to go where he pleased. He chose Prague for the place of his residence, where he was in 1577; and in, this situation applied himself to John Casimir, count Palatine, and attended him to Ghent, in Flanders, the inhabitants of which city had chosen the count for their governor. On his quitting the government, Languet accepted an invitation from William prince of Orange, and remained with him until the bad state of his health obliged him to go in 1579 to the wells of Baden; and there he became acquainted with Thuanus, who was much struck with his conversation, probity, and judgment, not only in the sciences, but in public affairs. Thuanus tells us that Languet was so well acquainted with the affairs of Germany, that he could instruct the Germans themselves in the affairs of their own country. After Thuanus had left that place, they appear to have corresponded, and Thuanus speaks of some memoirs then in his possession, which Languet sent to him, containing an account of the present state of Germany, of the right of the diets, of the number of the circles, andi-of the order or rank of the different councils of that country.

Languet returned to Antwerp in 1580; and in 1581 the prince of Orange sent him to France to negociate a reconciliation between Charlotte of Bourbon, his consort, and her brother Louis, duke of Montpensier; which he effected. He died at Antwerp, Sept. 20, 1581, and was interred with great funeral solemnity, the prince of Orange going at the head of the train. During his illness he was visited by madam Du Plessis, who, though sick herself, attended him to his last moment. His dying words were, that “the only thing which grieved him was, that he had not been able to see mons. Du Plessis again before he died, to whom he would have left his very heart, had it been in his power: that he had wished to live to see the world reformed; but, since it became daily worse, he had no longer any business in it: that the princes of these times were strange men: that virtue had much to suffer, and little to get: that he pitied mons. Du Plessis very much, to whose share a great part of the misfortunes of the time would fall, and who would see many unhappy days; but that he must take courage, for God would assist him. For the rest, he begged one thing of him in his last farewell, namely, that he would mention something of their friendship in the first book he should publish.” This request was performed by Du Plessis, soon after, in a short preface to his treatise “Of the Truth of the Christian religion;” where he makes the following eloge of this friend in a few comprehensive words: “Is fuit qualis multi videri volunt: is vixit qualiter optimi raori cupiunt.”

, great grand nephew of the preceding, doctor of the Sorboime, the celebrated vicar of St. Sulpice, atParis, and a man of extraordinary benevolence, was born at Dijon, June C, 1675. His father was Denis Languet, procurator-general of that city. After having made some progress in his studies at Dijon, he continued them at Paris, and resided in the seminary of St. Sulpice. He was received in the Sorbonne, Dec. 31, 1698, and took his degree with applause. He was ordained priest at Vienne, in Dauphiny; after which he returned to Paris, and took the degree of doctor Jan. 15, 1703. He attached himself from that time to the community of St. Sulpice; and la Chetardie, who was vicar there, chose him for his curate. Languet continued in that office near ten years, and sold his patrimony to relieve the poor. During this period, St. Valier, bishop of Quebec, being prisoner in England, requested of the king, that Languet might be his assistant in North America. Languet was about to accept of the place, prompted to it by his zeal for the conversion of infidels; but his patrons and friends advised him to decline the voyage, as his constitution was by no means strong. He succeeded la Chetardie, as vicar of St. Sulpice, in June 1714.

Another work, which does no less honour to Languet, is the house de l'enfans Jésus. The nature of this establishment, as originally constituted, will best evince his piety and talents. It consisted of two parts; the first composed of thirty-five poor ladies, descended from families illustrious from 1535 to the present time; the second, of more than four hundred poor women and children of town and country. Those young ladies whose ancestors had been in the king’s service, were preferred to all others, and an education given them suited to the dignity of their birth. They were employed, by turns, in inspecting the bake-house, the poultry-yard, the dairies, the laundries, the gardens, the laboratory, the linen- warehouses, the spinning-rooms, and other places belonging to the house. By these means they became good housewives, and able to relieve their poor relations in the country; and it was also part of the duty to succour by a thousand little kind offices, the poor women and girls who worked there, and to acquire those habits of condescension and benevolence which are of great service to society.

Languet used besides to grant great sums of money to such ladies as were examples of ceconomy, virtue, and piety, in those religious houses which he superintended. The poor women and children who formed the second part, were provided with food every day, and work at the spinning-wheel. They made a great quantity of linen and cotton. Different rooms were assigned to them, and they were arranged under different classes. In each room were two ladies of the society of St. Thomas, of Ville N‘euve, q which Languet was superior-general. These ladies were placed there to oversee the work, and to give such instructions as they thought proper. The women and the girls who found employment in this house, had in a former period of their lives been licentious and dissolute, but were generally reformed by the example of virtue before their eyes, and by the salutary advice given to them, and had the amount of their work paid them in money when they left the house. By these means they became industrious and exemplary, and were restored to the community. There were in the house de retifans Jesus, in 1741, more than 14-00 women, and girls of this sort; and the vicar of St. Sulpice employed all the means in his power to make their situation agreeable. Although the ’land to the house measured only 17 arpens (about 100 perches square, each perch 18 feet), it had a large dairy, which gave milk to 2000 children belonging to the parish, a menagery, poultry of all sorts, a bake-house, spinning-rooms, a very neat and well cultivated garden, and a magnificent laboratory, where all sorts of medicines were made. The order and ceconomy observed in this house in the education, instruction, and employment of so many people, were so admirable, and gave so great an idea of the vicar of St. Sulpice, that cardinal Fleury proposed to make him superintenilant- general of all the hospitals in the kingdom but Langut-t used to answer him with a smile, “I have always said, ui) lord, that it was the bounty of your highness led me to the hospital.” The expence of this establishment was immense. He spent his revenue on it; an inheritance which came to him by the death of the baron of Montigni, his brother, and the estate of the abbe de Barnay, granted him by the king.

, brother of the preceding, a doctor of the Sorbonne, and bishop of Soisson, to which see he was promoted in 1715, and afterwards archbishop of>>ens, was distinguished for his polemical writings, and published numerous pieces in defence of the bull Unigenitus, in which he was much assisted by M. Tournely, professor at the Sorbonne; and this celebrated doctor dying 1729, the appellants then said that Pere de Tournemine directed his pen. M. Languet was appointed archbishop of Sens, 1731. He was very zealous against the miracles attributed by the appellants to M. Paris, and against the famous convulsions. He died May 3, 1753, at Sens, in the midst of his curates, whom he then kept in retirement. M. Languet was a member of the French academy, superior of the royal society of Navarre, and counsellor of state. His works are, three “Advertisements” to the appellants; several “Pastoral Letters, Instructions, Mandates, Letters,” to different persons, and other writings in favour of the bull Unigenitus, and against the Anti-Constitutionarians, the miracles ascribed to M. Paris, and the convulsions, which were impostures then obtruded on the credulity of the French, but which he proved to have neither certainty nor evidence. All the above have been translated into Latin, and printed at Sens, 1753, 2 vols. fol.; but this edition of M. Lang.uet’s “Polemical Works,” was suppressed by a decree of council. He published also a translation of the Psalms, 12mo; a refutation of Dom. Claudius de Vert’s treatise “On the Church Ceremonies,” 12mo. Several books of devotion; and “The Life of Mary Alacoque,” which made much noise, and is by no means worthy of this celebrated archbishop, on account of its romantic and fabulous style, the inaccurate expressions, indecencies, dangerous principles, and scandalous maxims which it contains. Languet is esteemed by the catholics as among the divines who wrote best against the Anti-constitutionarians, and is only chargeable with not having always distinguished between dogmas and opinions, and with not unfrequently advancing as articles of faith, sentiments which are opposed by orthodox and very learned divines.

, an artist of various talents in the seventeenth century, was born in Italy, and appears to have come over to England in the time of James I. He had a great share in the purchases of pictures made for the royal collection. He drew for Charles I. a picture of Mary, Christ, and Joseph; his own portrait done by himself with a pallet and pencils in his hand, and musical notes on a scrip of paper, is in the music-school at Oxford. He also employed himself in etching, but his fame was most considerable as a musician. It is mentioned in the folio edition of Ben Jonson’s works, printed 1640, that in 1617, his whole masque, which was performed at the house of lord Hay, for the entertainment of the French ambassador, was set to music after the Italian manner, stilo recitativo, by Nic. Laniere, who was not only ordered to set the music, but to paint the scenes. This short piece being wholly in rhyme, though without variation in the measure, to distinguish airs from recitation, as it was all in musical declamation, may be safely pronounced the first attempt at an opera in the Italian manner, after the invention of recitative. In the same year, the masque called “The Vision of Delight,” was presented at court during Christmas by the same author; and in it, says Dr. Burney, we have all the characteristics of a genuine opera, or musical drama of modern times complete: splendid scenes and machinery; poetry; musical recitation; air; chorus; and dancing. Though the music of this masque is not to be found, yet of Laniere’s “Musica narrativa” we have several examples, printed by Playford in the collections of the time; particularly the “Ayres and Dialogues,” 1653, and the second part of the “Musical Companion,” which appeared in 1667; and in which his music to the dialogues is infinitely superior to the rest; there is melody, measure, and meaning in it. His recitative is more like that of his countrymen at present, than any contemporary Englishman’s. However, these dialogues were composed before the laws and phraseology of recitative were settled, even in Italy. His cantata of “Hero and Leander” was much celebrated during these times, and the recitative regarded as a model of true Italian musical declamation. Laniere died at the age of seventyeight, and was buried in St. Martin’s in the Fields, Nov. 4, 1646.

, an eminent French scholar and translator, was born at Dijon, Oct. 12, 1726, of ancestors who were mostly lawyers, connected with some of the first names in the parliament of Burgundy, and related to the family of Bossuet. His father was a counsellor in the office of finance, who- died while his son was an infant, leaving him to the care of his mother. It was her intention to bring him up with a view to the magistracy, but young Larcher was too much enamoured of polite literature to accede to this plan. Having therefore finished his studies among the Jesuits at Pont-a-Mousson, he went to Paris and entered himself of the college of Laon, where he knew he should be at liberty to pursue his own method of study. He was then about eighteen years of age. His mother allowed him only 500 livres a year, yet with that scanty allowance he contrived to buy books, and when it was increased to 700, he fancied himself independent. He gave an early proof of his love and care for valuable books, when at the royal college. While studying Greek under John Capperonnier, he became quite indignant at having every day placed in his hands, at the risk of spoiling it, a fine copy of Duker’s Thucydides, on large paper. He had, indeed, from his infancy, the genuine spirit of a collector^ which became an unconquerable passion in his more mature years. A few months before his death he refused to purchase the new editions of Photius and Zonaras, because he was too old, as he said, to make use of them, but at the same time he could not resist giving an enormous price for what seemed of less utility, the princeps editio of Pliny the naturalist. It is probable that during his first years at Paris, he had made a considerable collection of books, for, when at that time he intended, unknown to his family, to visit England for the purpose of forming an acquaintance with the literati there, and of learning English, to which he was remarkably partial, he sold his books to defray theexpence of his journey. In this elopement, for such it was, he was assisted by father Patouillet, who undertook to receive and forward his letters to his mother, which he was to date from Paris, and make her and his friends believe that he was still at the college of Laon.

It does not appear that Larcher published any thing before his translation of the “Electra” of Euripides, which appeared in 1750; for the “Calendrier perpetuel” of 1747, although attributed to him, was certainly not his. The “Electra,” as well as many other of his publications, appeared without his name, which, indeed, he appended onJy to his “Memoire sur Venus,” his “Xenophon,” “Herodotus,” and “Dissertations acaderaiques.” The “Electra” had not much success, and was never reprinted, unless by a bookseller, who blunderingly inserted it among a collection of acting plays. In 1751 Larcher is supposed to have contributed to a literary journal called “Lettres d'une Societe;” and afterwards, in the “Melange litteraire,” he published a translation of Pope’s essay on Pastoral Poetry. He was also a contributor to other literary journals, but his biographer has not been able to specify his articles with certainty, unless those in the “Collection Academique” for 1755, where his articles are marked with an A. and in which he translated the Philosophical Transactions of London. He translated also the “Martinus Scribleru.s” from Pope’s works, and Swift’s ironical piece on the abolition of Christianity. Having while in England become acquainted with sir John Pringle, he published a translation of hi* work “On the Diseases of the Army,” of which an enlarged edition appeared in 1771.

In 1757 he revised the text of Hudibras, which accompanies the French translation, and wrote some notes to it. But these performances did not divert him from his Greek studies, and his translation of “Chereas and Calliroe,” which appeared in 1758, was considered in France as the production of one who would prove an honour to the class of Greek scholars in France. This was reprinted in the *‘ Bibliotheque des Romans Greo/’ for which also Larcher wrote “Critical Remarks on the Æthiopics of Heiiodorus,” but for some reason these never appeared in that work. In 1767 the quarrel took place between him and Voltaire. Larcher, although intimate with some of those writers who called themselves philosophers, and even favourable to some of their theories, was shocked at the impiety of Voltaire’s extremes; and when the “Philosophy of History” appeared, was induced by some ecclesiastics to undertake a refutation, which was published under the title of “Sup. plement a la Philosophic de I'Histoire,” a work which Voltaire himself allowed to be full of erudition. He could not, however, conceal his chagrin, and endeavoured to answer Larcher in his “Defense de mon oncle,” in which he treats his antagonist with unpardonable contempt and abuse. Larcher rejoined in “Reponse a la Defense de mon oncle.” Both these pamphlets added much to his reputation; and although Voltaire, whose resentments were implacable, continued to treat Larcher with abuse in his writings, the latter made no reply, content with the applause of the really learned, particularly Brunck and La Harpe, which last, although at that time the warmest of Voltaire’s" admirers, disapproved of his treatment of such a man as Lurcher; and in this opinion he was joined even by D'Alembert.

His reputation as a translator from the Greek being now acknowledged, some booksellers in Paris who were in possession of a manuscript translation of Herodotus left by the abbe“Bellanger without revision, applied to Larcher to prepare it for the press; and he, thinking he had only to correct a few slips of the pen, or at most to add a few notes, readily undertook the task, but before he had proceeded far, the many imperfections, and the style of Bellanger, appeared to be such, that he conceived it would be easier to make an entire new translation. He did not, however, consider this as a trifling undertaking, but prepared himself by profound consideration of the text of his author, which he collated with the ms copies in the royal library, and read with equal care every contemporary writer from whom he might derive information to illustrate Herodotus. While engaged in these studies, Paw published his” Recherches philosophiques sur les Egyptiens et les Chinois,“and Larcher borrowed a little time to publish an acute review of that author’s paradoxes in the” Journal des Savans“for 1774. The year following, while interrupted by sickness from his inquiries into Herodotus, he published his very learned” Memoire sur Venus,“to which the academy of inscriptions awarded their prize. During another interruption of the Herodotus, incident to itself, he wrote and published his translation of Xenophon, which added much to the reputation he had already acquired, and although his style is not very happily adapted to transfuse the spirit of Xenophon, yet it produced the following high compliment from Wyttenbach (Bibl. Critica)” Larcherus is est quern non dubitemus omnium, qui nostra aetate veteres scrintores in linguas vertunt recentiores, antiquitatis linguaeque Grace* scientissimum vocare.“Larcher’s critical remarks in this translation are very valuable, particularly his observations on the pronunciation of the Greek. The reputation of his” Memoire sur Venus,“and his” Xenophon,“procured him to be elected into the Academy of inscriptions, on May 10, 1778. To the memoirs of this society he contributed many essays on classical antiquities, which are inserted in vols. 43, 45, 46, 47, and 48; and these probably, which he thought a duty to the academy, interrupted his labours on Herodotus, not did it issue from the press until 1786. The style of this translation is liable to some objections, but in other respects, his profound and learned researches into points of geography and chronology, and the general merit and importance of his comments, gratified the expectations of every scholar in Europe. It was translated into Latin by Borheck, into German by Degan, and his notes have appeared in all the principal languages of Europe. We may here conclude this part of our subject by noticing his new and very much improved edition of” Herodotus,“published in 1802, 9 vols. 8vo. The particulars which distinguish this edition are, a correction of those passages in which he was not satisfied with having expressed the exact sense; a greater degree of precision and more compression of style; a reformation of such notes as wanted exactness; with the addition of several that were judged necessary to illustrate various points of antiquity, and render the historian better understood. We have already hinted that Larcher was at one time not unfriendly to the infidel principles of some of the French encyclopedists. It is with the greater pleasure that we can now add what he says on this subject in his apology for further alterations.” At length,“he says,” being intimately convinced of all the truths taught by the Christian religion, I have retrenched or reformed all the notes that could offend it. From some of them conclusions have been drawn which I disapprove, and which were far from my thoughts; others of them contain things, which I must, to discharge my conscience, confess freely, that more mature examination and deeper researches have demonstrated to have been built on slight or absolutely false foundations. The truth cannot but be a gainer by this avowal: to it alone have I consecrated all my studies: I have been anxious to return to it from the moment I was persuaded I could seize it with advantage. May this homage, which I render it in all the sincerity of my heart, be the means of procuring me absolution for all the errors I have hazarded or sought to propagate." In this vast accumulation of ancient learning, the English reader will find many severe strictures on Bruce, which he may not think compatible with the general opinion now entertained both in France and England on the merits of that traveller.

During the revolutionary storm Larcher lived in privacy, employed on his studies, and especially on the second edition of his “Herodotus,” and was but little disturbed. He was indeed carried before the revolutionary committee, and his papers very much perplexed those gentlemen, who knew little of Greek or Latin. For one night a sentinel was placed at his door, who was set asleep by a bottle of wine, and next morning Larcher gave him a small assignat, and he came back no more. When the republican government became a little more quiet, and affected to encourage men of letters, Larcher received, by a decree, the sum of 3000 livres. He was afterwards, notwithstanding his opinions were not the fashion of the day, elected into the Institute; and when it was divided into four classes, and by that change he became again, in some degree, a member of the Academy of inscriptions, he published four dissertations of the critical kind in their memoirs. The last honour paid to him was by appointing him professor of Greek in the imperial university, as it was then called; but he was now too tar advanced for active services, and died after a short illness, in his eighty-sixth year, Dec. 22, 1812, regretted as one of the most eminent scholars and amiable men of his time. His fine library was sold by auction in Nov. 1814.

, a very learned dissenting clergyman, was born at Hawkhurst, in Kent, June 6, 1684. He was educated for some time at a dissenter’s academy in London, by the Rev. Dr. Oldfield, whence he went to Utrecht, and studied under Grsevius and Burman, and made all the improvement which might be expected under such masters. From Utrecht Mr. Lardner went to Leyden, whence, after a short stay, he came to England, and employed himself in diligent preparation for the sacred profession. He did not, however, preach his first sermon till he was twenty-five years of age. In 1713 he was invited to reside in the house of lady Treby, widow of the lord chief justice of common pleas, as domestic chaplain to the lady, and tutor to her youngest son. He accompanied his pupil to France, the Netherlands, and United Provinces, and continued in the family till the death of lady Treby. It reflects no honour upon the dissenters that such a man should be so long neglected; but, in 1723, he was engaged with other ministers to carry on a course of lectures at the Old Jewry. The gentlemen who conducted these lectures preached a course of sermons on the evidences of natural and revealed religion. The proof of the credibility of the gospel history was assigned to Mr Lardner, and he delivered three sermons on this subject, which probably laid the foundation of his great work, as from this period he was diligently engaged in writing the first part of the Credibility. In 1727 he published, in two volumes octavo, the first part of “The Credibility of the Gospel History; or the facts occasionally mentioned in the New Testament, confirmed by passages of ancient authors who were contemporary with our Saviour, or his apostles, or lived near their time.” It is unnecessary to say how well these volumes were received by the learned world, without any distinction of sect or party. Notwithstanding, however, his great merit, Mr. Lardner was forty-five years of age before he obtained a settlement among the dissenters; but, in 1729, he was invited by the congregation of Crutcbedfriars to be assistant to their minister. At this period the enthusiasm of Mr. Woolston introduced an important controversy. In various absurd publications he treated the miracles of our Saviour with extreme licentiousness. These Mr. Lardner confuted with the happiest success, in a work which he at this time published, and which was entitled “A Vindication of three of our Saviour’s Miracles.” About the same time also he found leisure to write other occasional pieces, the principal of which was his “Letter on the Logos.” In 1733, appeared the first volume of the second part of the “Credibility of the Gospel-history,” which, besides being universally well received at home, was so much approved abroad, that it was translated by two learned foreigners; by Mr. Cornelius Westerbaen into Low Dutch, and by Mr. J. Christopher Wolff into Latin. The second volume of the second part of this work appeared in 1735; and the farther Mr. Lardner proceeded in his design, the more he advanced in esteem and reputation among learned men of all denominations. In 1737 he published his “Counsels of Prudence” for the use of young people, on account of which he received a complimentary letter from Dr. Seeker, bishop of Oxford. The third and fourth volumes of the second part of the “Credibility,” no less curious than the precediug, were published in 1738 and 1740. The fifth volume in 1743. To be circumstantial in the account of all the writings which this eminent man produced would greatly exceed our limits. They were all considered as of distinguished usefulness and merit. We may in particular notice the “Supplement to the Credibility,” which has a place in the collection of treatises published by Dr. Watson, bishop of Llandaff. Notwithstanding Dr. Lardner’s life and pen were so long and so usefully devoted to the public, he never rfceived any adequate recompence. The college of Aberdeen conferred on him the degree of doctor of divinity, and the diploma had the unanimous signature of the professors. But his salary as a preacher was inconsiderable, and his works often published to his loss instead of gain. Dr. Lardner lived to a very advanced age, and, with the exception of his hearing, retained the use of his faculties to the last, in a remarkably perfect degree. In 1768 he fell into a gradual decline, which carried him off in a few weeks, at Hawkhurst, his native place, at the age of eighty-five. He had, previously to his last illness, parted with the copy-right of his great work for the miserable sum of 150l. but he hoped if the booksellers had the whole interest of his labours, they would then do their utmost to promote the sale of a work that could not fail to be useful in promoting the interests of his fellow creatures, by promulgating the great truths of Christianity. After the death of Dr. Lardner, some of his posthumous pieces made their appearance; of these the first consist of eight sermons, and brief memoirs of the author. In 1776 was published a short letter which the doctor had written in 1762, “Upon the Personality of the Spirit.” It was part of his design, with regard to “The Credibility of the Gospel History,” to give an account of the heretics of the first two centuries. In 1780 Mr. Hogg, of Exeter, published another of Dr. Lardner' s pieces, upon which he had bestowed much labour, though it was not left in a perfect state; this was “The History of the Heretics of the first two centuries after Christ, containing an account of their time, opinions, and testimonies to the books of the New Testament; to which are prefixed general observations concerning Heretics.” The last of Dr. Lardner’s pieces was given to the world by the late Rev. Mr. Wicbe, then of Muidstone, in Kent, and is entitled “Two schemes of a Trinity considered, and the Divine Unity asserted;” it consists of four discourses; the first represents the commonly received opinion of the Trinity; the second describes the Arian scheme the third treats of the Nazarene doctrine and the fourth explains the text according to that doctrine. This work may perhaps be regarded as Supplementary to a piece which he wrote in early life, and which he published in 1759, without his name, entitled “A Letter written in the year 1730, concerning the question, Whether the Logos supplied the place of the Human Soul in the person of Jesus Christ:” in this piece his aim was to prove that Jesus Christ was, in the proper and natural meaning of the word, a man, appointed, anointed, beloved, honoured, and exalted by God, above all other beings. Dr. Lardner, it is generally known, had adopted the Socinian tenets.

, a French historian, was born September 7, 1638, at Montivilliers, of noble parents, who were Protestants. After having practised as an attorney some time in his native country, he went to Holland, was appointed historiographer to the States General, and settled afterwards at Berlin, where he had a pension from the elector of Brandenburg. He died March 17,1719, aged eighty. His principal works are, the “History of Augustus,” 1690, 12mo; “The History of Eleanor, queen of France, and afterwards of England,” 1691, 8vo; “A History of England,” 1697 to 1713, 4 vols. fol. the most valued of all Larrey’s works on account of the portraits, but its reputation has sunk in other respects since the publication of the history written by Rapin. He wrote also the history, or rather romance of “the Seven Sages,” the most complete edition of which is that of the Hague, 1721, 2 vols. 8vo; and “The History of France, under Louis XIV.” 3 vols. 4to, and 9 vols. 12mo, a work not in much estimation, but it was not entirely his. The third volume 4to was the production of la Martiniere.

, in Latin Larroquanus, whom Bayle styles one of the most illustrious ministers the reformed ever had in France, was born at Leirac, a small city of Guienne, near Agen, in 1619. He was hardly past his youth when he lost his father and mother, who were persons of rank and character. This misfortune was soon ifol lowed by the loss of his whole patrimony, although by what means is not known; but the effect was to animate him more strongly to his studies, and to add to polite literature, which he had already learned, the knowledge of philosophy, and above all, that of divinity. He made a considerable progress in these sciences, and was admitted a minister with great applause. Two years after he had been admitted in his office he was obliged to go to Paris to answer the cavils of those who intended to ruin his church, in which, although he was not successful, he met with such circumstances as proved favourable to him. He preached sometimes at Charenton, and was so well liked by the duchess de la Tremouille, that she appointed him minister of the church of Vitre, in Britany, and gave him afterwards a great many proofs of her esteem; nor was he less respected by the prince and princess of Tarente, and the duchess of Weimar. He served that church about twenty-seven years, and studied the ancient fathers with the utmost application. He gave very soon public proofs of the progress he had made in that study, for the answer he published to the motives which an opponent had alledged for his conversion to popery, abounded with passages quoted from the fathers, and the works which he published afterwards raised his reputation greatly. There was an intimate friendship between him and Messieurs Daille, father and son, which was kept up by a constant literary correspondence; and the journey he took to Paris procured him the acquaintance of several illustrious men of letters. The church of Charenton wished to have invited him in 1669, but his enemies had so prepossessed the court against him, that his majesty sent a prohibition to that church not to think of calling him, notwithstanding the deputy general of the reformed had offered to answer for Mods, de Larroque’s good behaviour. He was afterwards chosen to be both minister and professor of divinity at Saumur. The former he accepted, but refused the professorship of divinity, as it might interfere with the study of church history, to ttfhich he was very partial. The intendant of the province, however, forbad him to go to Saumur; and although the church complained of this unjust prohibition, and petitoned very zealously for the necessary permission, which she obtained, Larroquc did not think it proper to enter upon an employment against the will of the intendant. He continued therefore still at Vitré, where he did not suffer his pen to be idle. Three of the most considerable churches of the kingdom chose him at once, the church of Moutauban, that of Bourdeaux, and thut of Roan. He accepted the invitation of Roan, and there died, Jan. 31, 1684, having gained the reputation not only of a learned man, but also of an honest man, and a faithful pastor.

, son of the preceding, was born at Vitré. He retired 1681, to London, on the revocation of the edict of Nantes, and afterwards to Copenhagen, where his father’s friends promised him a settlement, but finding them unsuccessful, he went into Holland, where he remained till 1690, and then going into France, abjured the protestant religion, and turned Roman catholic. He usually resided at Paris, but having written the preface to a satirical piece, in which great liberties were taken with Louis XIV. on account of the famine in 1693, he was arresied and sent to the Chatelet, and then removed to the castle of Saumnr, where he remained rive years. At the end of that time, however, he regained his liberty by the abbess of Fontevraud’s solicitations, and got a place in M. de Torcy’s office, minister and secretary of state. When the regency commenced, Larroque was appointed secretary to the interior council, and on the suppression of that council, had a pension of 4000 livres till his death, September 5, 1731, when he was about seventy. He left several works, but much inferior to his father’s: the principal are, “La Vie de I'lmposteur Mahomet,” 12mo, transLt'-d from the English of Dr. Prideaux “Les ve>4tables Motifs de la Conversion de M. (le Bouthilier de Ranc6) l'Abbe de la Trappe,” with some reflections on his life and writings, 1685, L2mo, a satirical work. “Nouvelles Accusations con t re Van lias, ou Kemarqnes critiques contre une Partie de son Histoire de PHe>esie,” 8vo; ' La Vie de Frai>9ois Kiuies de Mexerai,“12mo, a satirical romance; a translation of Kc hard’s Roman History, revised and published by the abbe Desfontaines. Larroque also assisted, during some months, in the” Nouveiles de la Repubiique des Lettres,“while Bayle was ill. The” Advice to the Refugees" is also attributed to him, which was believed to have been written by Bayle, besause the latter would never betray Larroque, who, it is supposed, was the real author of it, chusing rather to suffer the persecution which this publication raised against him, than prove false to his friend, who had enjoined him secrecy.

, a learned Greek, descended from the imperial family of that name, was born at Constantinople, but became a refugee when it was taken, by the Turks in 1454, and went to Italy, where he was most amicably received by duke Francis Sforza of Milan, who placed his own daughter, a child of ten years of age, under the cure of Lascaris for instruction in the Greek language, and it is said to have been for her use he composed his Greek grammar. From Milan he went to Rome, about 1463, or perhaps later, and from, thence, at the invitation of king Ferdinand, to Naples, where he opened a public school for Greek and rhetoric. Having spent some years in this employment, he was desirous of repose, and embarked with the intention of settling at a town of Greece; but having touched at Messina, he was urged by such advantageous oilers to make it his residence, that he complied, and passed there the remainder of his days. Here he received the honour of citizenship, which he merited by his virtues as well as his learning, and by the influx of scholars which his reputation drew thither. He lived to a very advanced age, and is supposed to have died about the end of the fifteenth century. He bequeathed his library to the city of Messina. His Greek grammar was printed at Milan in 1476, reprinted in 1480, and was, according to Zeno, “prima Graeco-Latina praelorum foetura,” the first Greek and Latin book that issued from the Italian press. A better edition of it was given in 1495, by Aldus, from a copy corrected by the author, and with which the printer was furnished by Bembo and Gabrielli. This was the first essay of the Aldine press. Bembo and Gabrielli had been the scholars of Lascaris, although in his old age, as they did not set out for Messina until 1493. A copy of this Greek grammar of the first edition is now of immense value. Erasmus considered it as the best Greek grammar then extant, excepting that of Theodore Gaza. Lascaris was author likewise of two tracts on the Sicilian and Calabrian Greek writers, and some other pieces, which remain in manuscript.

, called Rhyndacenus, as Constantine was called Byzantinus, was a learned Greek of the same family with the preceding, who came either from Greece or Sicily to Italy, on the ruin of his country. He was indebted to cardinal Bessarion for his education at Padua, where he obtained a high reputation for his knowledge in the learned languages, and received the patronage of Lorenzo de Medici, who sent him into Greece with recommendatory letters to the sultan Bajazet, in order to collect ancient manuscripts: for this purpose he took two journeys, in the latter of which he appears to have been very successful. After the expulsion of the Medic, family from Florence, in 1494, he was carried to France by Charles VIII. alter which he was patronized by Louis XII. who sent him, in 1503, as his ambassador to Venice, in which oroce he remained till 1508. He ioined the pursuit of literature with his public employment, and held a correspondence with many learned men. After the termination of hi. embassy, he“remained some yeaa' Venice, as an mstructor in the Greek language. On the election of pope Leo X. to the popedom in 1513, he set out for Rome, where, at his instigation, Leo founded a college for noble Grecian youths at Rome, at the head of which he placed the author of the plan, and likewise made him superintendant of the Greek press; his abilities as a corrector and editor, had been already sufficiently evinced by his magnificent edition of the Greek” Anthologia,“printed in capital letters at Florence in 1494, and by that of” Callimachus,“printed in the same form. Maittaire thinks he was also editor of four of the tragedies of” Euripides,“of the” Gnorase Monastichoi,“and the” Argonautics“of Apollonius Rhodius. He now printed the Greek” Scholia“on Homer, in 1517; and in 1518 the” Scholia“on Sophocles. Having in this last-mentioned year quitted Rome for France, whither he was invited by Francis I. he was employed by that monarch in forming the royal library. He was also sent as his ambassador to Venice, with a view of procuring Greek youths for the purpose of founding a college at Paris similar to that of Rome. After the accomplishment of other important missions, he died at Rome in 1535, at an advanced age. He translated into the Latin language, a work extracted from Polybius, on the military constitutions of the Romans; and composed epigrams in Greek and Latin; this rare volume is entitled” Lascaris Rhydaceni epigrammata, Gr. Lat. edente Jac. Tossano,“printed at Paris, 1527, 8vo. There is another Paris edition of 1544, 4to. Mr. Dibdin has given an ample and interesting account of his” Anthologia" from lord Spencer’s splendid vellum copy.

, an eminent French physician, was born at Carpentras, on the 3d of July, 1717. He was removed for education to Paris, but in his early years he was less remarkable for his perseverance in study, than for a propensity which he shewed for the gay pleasures of youth; yet even then he raised the hopes of his friends by some ingenious performances, which merited academic honours. At length he applied with seriousness to study, and devoted himself wholly to the pursuits of anatomy, in which he made such rapid progress, that, at the age of twenty-five, he was received into the academy of sciences as associate-anatomist. An extraordinary event, however, put a period to his anatomical pursuits. In selecting among some dead bodies a proper subject for dissection, he fancied he perceived in one of them some very doubtful signs of death, and endeavoured to re-animate it: his efforts were for a long time vain; but his first persuasion induced him to persist, and he ultimately succeeded in bringing his patient to life, who proved to be a poor peasant. This circumstance impressed so deep a sense of horror on the mind of the anatomist, that he declined these pursuits in future. Natural history succeeded the study of anatomy, and mineralogy becoming a favourite object of his pursuit, he published his observations on the crystallized tree-stones of Fotuainbleau; but chemistry finally became the beloved occupation of M. de Lassone. His numerous memoirs, which were read before the royal academy of sciences, presented a valuable train of new observations, useful both to the progress of that study, and to the art of compounding remedies; and in every part of these he evinced the sagacity of an attentive observer, and of an ingenious experimentalist. After having practised medicine for a long time in the hospitals and cloisters, he was sent for to court; and held the office of first physician at Versailles. He lived in friendship with Fontenelle, Winslow, D'Alembert, Buffon, and other scientific characters; and the affability of his manners, and his ardent zeal for the advancement of knowledge, among the young scholars, whose industry he encouraged, and whose reputation was become one of his most satisfactory enjoyments, gained him general respect. When from a natural delicacy of constitution, M. cle Lassone began to experience the inconveniences of a premature old age, he became sorrowful and fond of solitude; yet, reconciled to his situation, he calmly observed his death approaching, and expired on Dec. 8, 1788. Lassone, at the time of his death, held the appointment of first physician to Louis XVL and his queen; he was counsellor of state, doctor-regent of the faculty of medicine at Paris, and pensionary-veteran of the academy of sciences, member of the academy of medicine at Madrid, and honorary associate of the college of medicine at Nancy.

, or, as he is called by the Italians, Orlando di Lasso, an eminent musician, was a native of Mons, in Hainault, born in 1520, and not only spent many years of his life in Italy, but had his musical education there, having been carried thither surreptitiously, when a child, on account of his fine voice. The historian Thuanus, who has given Orlando a place among the illustrious men of his time, tells us that it was a common practice for young singers to be forced away from their parents, and detained in the service of princes; and that Orlando was carried to Milan, Naples, and Sicily, by Ferdinand Gonzago. Afterwards, when he was grown up, and had probably lost his voice, he went to Rome, where he taught music during two years; at the expiration of which, he travelled through different parts of Italy and France with Julius Caesar Brancatius, and at length, returning to Flanders, resided many years at Antwerp, till being invited, by the duke of Bavaria, to Munich, he settled at that court, and married. He had afterwards an invitation, accompanied with the promise of great emoluments, from Charles IX. king of France, to take upon him the office of master and director of his band; an honour which he accepted, but was stopped on the road to Paris by the news of that monarach’s death. After this event he returned to Munich, whither he was recalled by William, the son and successor of his patron Albert, to the same office which he had held under his father. Orlando continued at this court till his death, in 1593, at upwards of seventy years of age. His reputation was so great, that it was said of him: “Hic ille Orlandus Lassus, qui recreat orbem.” As he lived to a considerable age, and never seems to have checked the fertility of his genius by indolence, his compositions exceed, in number, even those of Palestrina. There is a complete catalogue of them in Draudius, amounting to upwards of fifty different works, consisting of masses, magnificats, passiones, motets, and psalms: with Latin, Italian, German, and French songs, printed in Italy, Germany, France, and the Netherlands. He excelled in modulation, of which he gave many new specimens, and was a great master of harmony.

, an English lawyer, was a native of Somersetshire, and educated at Oxford, in St. John’s college, as Wood was informed, where, he adds, he made considerable proficiency in literature. Afterwards he removed to the Middle Temple, but being of a delicate habit, does not appear to have practised as a barrister. Some years before his death, he had embraced the Roman catholic religion, influenced by the artifices of a priest or Jesuit who prevailed on him to leave his estate to the society of Jesuits. He died at Hayes in Middlesex, in August 1655. He was the reporter of certain “Cases in the first three years of K. Car. I.” which were published in French, by Edward Walpole, 1662, folio.

, bishop of Worcester, one of the first reformers of the church of England, was descended of honest parents at Thurcaston in Leicestershire; where his father, though he had no land of his own, rented a small farm, and by frugality and industry, brought up a family of six daughters besides this son. In one of his court sermons, in Edward’s time, Latimer, inveighing against the nobility and gentry, and speaking of the moderation of landlords a few years before, and the plenty in which their tenants lived, tells his audience, in his familiar way, that, “upon a farm of four pounds a year, at the utmost, his father tilled as much ground as kept half a dozen men; that he had it stocked with a hundred sheep and thirty cows; that he found the king a man and horse, himself remembering to have buckled on his father’s harness when he went to Blackheath; that he gave his daughters five pounds a-piece at marriage; that he lived hospitably among his neighbours, and was not backward in his alms to the poor.” He was born in the farm-house about 1470; and, being put to a grammar-school, he took learning so well, that it was determined to breed him to the church. With this view, he was sent to Cambridge. Fuller and others say to Christ’s college, which must be a tradition, as the records of that college do not reach his time. At the usual time, he took the degrees in arts; and, entering into priest’s orders, behaved with remarkaable zeal and warmth in defence of popery, the established religion. He read the schoolmen and the Scriptures with equal reverence, and held Thomas a Becket and the apostles in equal honour. He was consequently, a zealous opponent of the opinions which had lately discovered themselves in England; heard the teachers of them with Uipb indignation, and inveighed publicly and privately against the reformers. If any read lectures in the schools, Latimer was sure to be there to drive out the scholars, and could nut endure Stafford, the divinity-lecturer, who, however, is said to have been partly an instrument of his conversion. When Latimer commenced bachelor of divinity, he gave an open testimony of ins dislike to their proceedings in an oration against Melancthon, whom he treated most severely i for his impious, as he called them, innovations in religion. His zeal was so much taken notice of in the univeriiity, that he was elected cross-bearer in all public processions; an employment which he accepted with reverence, and discharged with solemnity.

Among those in Cambridge who favoured the reformation, the most considerable was Thomas Bilncy, a clergyman of a most holy life, who began to see popery in a very disagreeable light, and made no scruple to own it. Biiney was an intimate, and conceived a very favourable opinion, of Latimer; and, as opportunities offered, used to suggest to him many things about corruptions in religion, till be gradually divested him of his prejudices, brought him to think with moderation, and even to distrust what he had so earnestly embraced. Latimer no sooner ceased from being a zealous papist, than he became (such was his constitutional warmth) a zealous protesiunt; active in supporting the reformed doctrine, and assiduous to make converts both in town and university. He preached in public, exhorted in private, and everywhere pressed the necessity of a holy life, in opposition to ritual observances. A behaviour of this kind was immediately taken notice of: Cambridge, no less than the rest of the kingdom, was entirely popish, and every new opinion was watched with jealousy. Latimer soon perceived bow obnoxious he had made himself; and the first remarkable opposition he met with from the popish party, was occasioned by a course of sermons he preached, during the Christmas holidays, before the university; in which he spoke his sentiments with great freedom upon many opinions and usages maintained and practised in the Romish church, and particularly insisted upon the great abuse of locking up the Scriptures in an unknown tongue. Few of the tenets of popery were then questioned in England, but such as tended to a relaxation of morals; transubstantiation, and other points rather speculative, still held their dominion; Lattmer therefore chiefly dwelt upon those of immoral tendency. He shewed what true religion was, that it was seated in the heart; and that, in comparison with it, external appointments were of no value. Having a remarkable address in adapting himself to the capacities of the people, and being considered as a preacher of eminence, the orthodox clergy thought it high time to oppose him openly. This task was undertaken by Dr. Buckingham, prior of the Black-friars, who appeared in the pulpit a few Sundays after; and, with great pomp and prolixity, shewed the dangerous tendency of Latimer' s opinions; particularly inveighing against his heretical notions of having the Scriptures in English, laying open the bad effects of such an innovation. “If that heresy,” said he, “prevail, we should soon see an end of every thing useful among us. The ploughman, reading that if he put his hand to the plough, and should happen to look back, he was unfit for the kingdom of heaven, would soon lay aside his labour; the baker likewise reading, that a little leaven will corrupt his lump, would give us a very insipid bread; the simple man also finding himself commanded to pluck out his eyes, in a few years we should have the nation full of blind heg jars.” Latimer could not help listening with a secret pleasure to this ingenious reasoning; perhaps he had acted as prudently, if he had considered the prior’s arguments as unanswerable; but he could not resist the vivacity of his temper, which strongly inclined him to expose this solemn trirler. The whole university met together on MI ml ay, wnen it was known Mr. Latimer would preach. That vein of pleasantry and humour which run through all hiswords and notions, would here, it was imagined, have its full scope; and, to say the truth, the preacher was not a little conscious of his own superiority: to complete the scene, just before the sermon began, prior Buckingham himself entered the church with his cowl about his shoulders, and seated himself, with an air of importance, before the pulpit. Latimer, with great gravity, recapitulated the learned doctor’s arguments, placed them in the strongest light, and then rallied them with such a flow of wit, and at the same timt with so much good humour, that, without the appearance of ill-nature, he made his adversary in the highest degree ridiculous. He then, with great address, appealed to the people; descanted upon the low esteem in which their guides had always held their understandings; expressed the utmost offence at their being treated with such contempt, and wished his honest countrymen might only have the use of the Scripture till they shewed themselves such absurd interpreters. He concluded his discourse with a few observations upon scripture metaphors. A figurative manner of speech, he said, was common in all languages: representations of this kind were in daily use, and generally understood. Thus, for instance, continued he (addressing himself to that part of the audience where the prior was seated), when we see a fox painted preaching in a friar’s hood, nobody imagines that a fox is meant, but that craft aud hypocrisy are described, which are so often found disguised in that garb. But it is probable that Latimer thought this levity unbecoming; for when one Venetus, a foreigner, not long after, attacked him again upon the same subject, and in a manner the most scurrilous and provoking, we find him using a graver strain. Whether he ridiculed, however, or reasoned, with so much of the spirit of true oratory, considering the times, were his harangues animated, that they seldom failed of their intended effect; his raillery shut up the prior within his monastery; and his arguments drove Venctus from the university.

These advantages increased the credit of the protestant party in Cambridge, of which Bilney and Latimer were the leaders; and great was the alarm of the popish clergy, of which some were the heads of colleges, and senior part of the university. Frequent convocations were held, tutors were admonished to have a strict eye over their pupils, and academical censures of all kinds were inflicted. But academical censures were found insufficient. Latimer continued to preach, and heresy to spread. The heads of the popish party applied to the bishop of Ely, Dr. West, as their diocesan; but that prelate was not a man for their purpose; he was a papist indeed, but moderate, tie, however, came to Cambridge, examined the state of religion, and, at their intreaty, preached against the heretics; but he would do nothing farther; only indeed he silenced Mr. Latimer, which, as he had preached himself, was an instance of his prudence. But this gave no check to the reformers; for there happened at this time to be a protestant prior in Cambridge, Dr. Barnes, of the Austinfriars, who, having a monastery exempt from episcopal jurisdiction, and being a great admirer of Latimer, boldly licensed him to preach there. Hither his party followed him; and, the late opposition having greatly excited the curiosity of the people, the friars’ chapel was soon incapable of containing the crowds that attended. Among others, it is remarkable, that the bishop of Ely was often one of his hearers, and had the ingenuousness to declare, that Latimer was one of the best preachers he had ever heard. The credit to his cause which Latimer had thus gained in the pulpit, he maintained by the piety of his life. Bilney and he did not satisfy themselves with acting unexceptionably, but were daily giving instances of goodness, which malice could not scandalize, nor envy misrepresent. They were always together concerting their schemes. The place where they used to walk, was long afterwards known by the name of the Heretics’ Hill. Cambridge at that time was full of their good actions; their charities to the poor, and friendly visits to the sick and unhappy, were then common topics. But these served only to increase the heat of persecution from their adversaries. Impotent themselves, and finding their diocesan either unable or unwilling to work their purposes, they determined upon an appeal to the higher powers; and heavy complaints were carried to court of the increase of heresy, not without formal depositions against the principal abettors of it.

His sufferings, far from shocking the reformation at Cambridge, inspired the leaders of it with new courage. Latimer began now to exert himself more than he bad yet done; and succeeded to that credit with his party, which Bilney had so long supported. Among other iustances of his zeal and resolution in this cause, he gave one very remarkable: he had the courage to write to the king against a proclamation then just published, forbidding the use of the Bible in English, and other books on religious subjects. He had preached before his majesty once or twice at Windsor, and had been noticed by him in a more affable manner than that monarch usually indulged towards his subjects. But, whatever hopes of preferment his sovereign’s favour might have raised in him, he chose to put all to the hazard rather than omit what he thought his duty. He was generally considered as one of the most eminent who favoured protestantism, and therefore thought it became him to be one of the most forward in opposing aopery. His letter is the picture of an honest and sincere eart: t t was chiefly intended to point out to the king the d intention of the bishops in procuring the proclamation, I concludes in these terms: Accept, gracious oveeign, without displeasure, what I have written; I thought it my duty to mention these things to your majesty. No personal quarrel, as God shall judge me, have I with any man; I wanted only to induce your majesty to consider well what kind of persons you have about you, and the ends for which they counsel. Indeed, great prince, many of them, or they are much slandered, nave very private ends. God grant your majesty may see through all the designs of evil men, and be in all things equal to the high office with which you are intrusted. Wherefore, gracious king, remember yourself, have pity upon your own soul, and think that the day is at hand, when you shall give account of your office, and of the blood that hath been shed by your sword: in the which day, that your grace may stand stedfastly, and not be ashamed, but be clear and ready in your reckoning, and have your pardon sealed with the blood of our Saviour Christ, which alone serveth at that day, is my daily prayer to him who suffered death for our sins. The spirit of God preserve you!"

Though the influence of the popish party then prevailed so far that this letter produced no effect, yet the king, no way displeased, received it, not only with temper, but with condescension, graciously thanking him for his wellintended advice. The king, capricious and tyrannical as he was, shewed, in many instances, that he loved sincerity and openness; and Larimer’s plain and simple manner had before made a favourable impression upon him, which this letter contributed not a little to strengthen; and the part he acted in promoting the establishment of the king’s supremacy, in 1535, riveted him in the royal favour. Dr. Butts, the king’s physician, being sent to Cambridge on that occasion, began immediately to pay his court to the protestant party, from whom the king expected most unanimity in his favour. Among the first, he made his application to Latimer, as a person most likely to serve him; begging that he would^collect the opinions of his friends in the case, and do his utmost to bring over those of most eminence, who were still inclined to the papacy. Latimer, being a thorough friend to the cause he was to solicit, undertook it with his usual zeal, and discharged himself so much to the satisfaction of the doctor, that, when that gentleman returned to court, he took Latimer along with him, with a design, no doubt, to procure him some favour suitable to his merit. About this time a person was rising into power, who became his chief friend and patron: The lord Cromwell, who, being a friend to the Reformation, encouraged of course such churchmen as inclined towards it. Among these was Latimer, for whom his patron soon obtained West Kington, a benefice in Wiltshire, whither he resolved, as soon as possible, to repair, and keep a constant residence. His friend Dr. Butts, surprized at this resolution, did what he could to dissuade him from it: “You are deserting,” said he, “the fairest opportunities of making your fortune: the prime minister intends this only as an earnest of his future favours, and will certainly in time do great things for you: but it is the manner of courts to consider them as provided for, who seem to be satisfied; and, take my word for it, an absent claimant stands but a poor chance among rivals who have the advantage of being present.” Thus the old courtier advised. But these arguments had no weight. He wag heartily tired of the court, where he saw much debauchery and irreligion, without being able to oppose them; and, leaving the palace therefore, entered immediately upon the duties of his parish. Nor was he satisfied within those limits; he extended his labours throughout the county, where he observed the pastoral care most neglected, having for that purpose obtained a general licence from the university of Cambridge. As his manner of preaching was very popular in those times, the pulpits every where were gladly opened for him; and at Bristol, where he often preached, he was countenanced by the magistrates. But this reputation was too much for the popish clergy to sulVcr, and their opposition first broke out at Bristol. The mayor had appointed him to preach there on Easter-day. Public notice had been given, and all people were pleased; when, suddenly, came an order from the bishop, prohibiting any one to preach there without his licence. The clergy of the place waited upon Latimer, informed him of the bishop’s order; and, knowing he had no such licence, were extremely sorry that they were thus deprived of the pleasure of hearing him. Latimer received their compliment with a smile; for he had been apprized of the affair, and knew that these very persons had written to the bishop against him. Their opposition became afterwards more public and avowed; the pulpits were used to spread invectives against him; and such liberties were taken with his character, that he thought it necessary to justify himself. Accordingly, he called upon his maligners to accuse him publicly before the mayor of Bristol; and, with all men of candour, he was justified; for, when the parties were convened, and the accusers produced, nothing appeared against him; but the whole accusation was left to rest upon the uncertain evidence of hearsay information.

His enemies, however, were not thus silenced. The party against him became daily stronger, and more inflamed. It consisted in general of the country priests in those parts, headed by some divines of more eminence. These persons, after mature deliberation, drew up articles against him, extracted chiefly from his sermons; in which he was charged with speaking lightly of the worship of saints; with saying there was no material fire in hell; and that he would rather be in purgatory than in Lollard’s tower. This charge being laid before Stokesley bishop of London, that prelate cited Latimer to appear before him; and, when he appealed to his own ordinary, a citation was obtained out of the archbishop’s court, where Stokesley and other bishops were commissioned to examine him. An archiepiscopal citation brought him at once to a compliance. His friends would have had him fly for it; but their persuasions were in vain. He set out for London in the depth of winter, and under a severe fit of the stone and cholic; but he was more distressed at the thoughts of leaving his parish exposed to the popish clergy, who would not fail to undo in his absence what he had hitherto done. On his arrival at London, he found a court of bishops and canonists ready to receive him; where, instead of being examined, as he expected, about his sermons, a paper was put into his hands, which he was ordered to subscribe, declaring his belief in the efficacy of masses for the souls in purgatory, of prayers to the dead saints, of pilgrimages to their sepulchres and reliques, the pope’s power to forgive sins, the doctrine of merit, the seven sacraments, and the worship of images; and, when he refused to sign it, the archbishop with a frown begged he would consider what he did. “We intend not,” says he, “Mr. Latimer, to be hard upon you; we dismiss you for the present; take a copy of the articles, examine them carefully; and God grant that, at our next meeting, we may find each other in a better temper!” At the next and several succeeding meet ings the same scene was acted over again. He continued inflexible, and they continued to distress him. Three times every week they regularly sent for him, with a view either to draw something from him by captious questions, or to teaze him at length into compliance. Of one of these examinations he gives the following account: “1 was brought out,” says he, “to be examined in the same chamber as before; but at this time it was somewhat altered: for, whereas before there was a fire in the chimney, now the fire was taken away, and an arras hanged over the chimney, and the table stood near the chimney’s end. There was, among these bishops that examined me, one with whom I have been very familiar, and whom I took for my great friend, an aged man; and he sat next the table-end. Then, among other questions, he put forth one, a very subtle and crafty one; and when I should make answer, * I pray you, Mr. Latimer,‘ said he, * speak out, I am very thick of hearing, and there be many that sit far off.’ I marvelled at this, that I was bidden to speak out, and began to misdeem, and gave an ear to the chimney; and there I heard a pen plainly scratching behind the cloth. They had appointed one there to write all my answers, that I should not start from them. God was my good Lord, and gave me answers I could never else have escaped them.” At length he was tired out with such usage and when he was next summoned, instead of going himself, he sent a letter to the archbishop, in which, with great freedom, he tells him, that “the treatment he had of late met with, had fretted him into such a disorder as rendered him unfit to attend that day that, in the mean time, he could not help taking this opportunity to expostulate with his grace for detaining him so long from the discharge of his duty; that it seemed to him most unaccountable, that they, who never preached themselves, should hinder others; that, us for their examination of him, he really could not imagine what they aimed at; they pretended one thing in the beginning, and another in the progress; that, if his sermons were what gaveofTence, which he persuaded himself were neither contrary to the truth, nor to any canon of the church, he was ready to answer whatever might be thought exceptionable in them; that he wished a little more regard might be had to the judgment of the people; and that a distinction might be made between the ordinances of God and man; that if some abuses in religion did prevail, as was then commonly supposed, he thought preaching was the best means to discountenance them; that he wished all pastors might be obliged to perform their duty: but that, however, liberty might be given to those who were willing; that, as for the articles proposed to him, he begged to be excused from subscribing them; while he lived, he never would abet superstition: and that, lastly, he hoped the archbishop would excuse what he had written; he knew his duty to his superiors, and would practise it: but, in that case, he thought a stronger obligation laid upon him.”

What particular effect this letter produced, we are not informed. The bishops, however, continued their prosecution, till their schemes were frustrated by an unexpected hand; for the king, being informed, most probably by lord Cromwell’s means, of Latimer’s ill-usage, interposed in his behalf, and rescued him out of their hands. A figure of so much simplicity, and such an apostolic appearance as his at court, did not fail to strike Anne Boleyn, who mentioned him to her friends, as a person, in her opinion, well qualified to forward the Reformation, the principles of which she had imbibed from her youth. Cromwell raised our preacher still higher in her esteem; and they both joined in an earnest recommendation of him for a bishopric to the king, who did not want much solicitation in his favour. It happened, that the sees of Worcester and Salisbury were at that time vacant, by the deprivation of Ghinuccii and Campegio, two Italian bishops, who fell under the king’s displeasure, upon his rupture with Rome. The former of these was o He red to Latimer; and, as this promotion came unexpectedly to him, he looked upon it as the work of Providence, and accepted it without much persuasion. Indeed, he had met with such usage already, as a private clergyman, and saw before him so hazardous a prospect in his old station, that he thought it necessary, both for his own safety, and for the sake of being of more service to the world, to shroud himself under a little more temporal power. All historians mention him as a person remarkably zealous in the discharge of his new office; and tell us, that, in overlooking the clergy of his diocese, he was uncommonly active, warm, and resolute, and presided in his ecclesiastical court in the same spirit. In visiting he was frequent and observant: in ordaining strict and wary: in preaching indefatigable: in reproving and exhorting severe and persuasive. Thus far he could act with authority; but in other things he found himself under difficulties. The popish ceremonies gave him great offence: yet he neither durst, in times so dangerous and unsettled, ay them entirely aside; nor, on the other hand, was he willing entirely to retain them. In this dilemma his address was admirable: he inquired into their origin; and when he found any of them derived from a good meaning, he inculcated their original, though itself a corruption, in the room of a more corrupt practice. Thus he put the people in mind, when holy bread and water were distributed, that these elements, which had long been thought endowed with a kind of magical influence, were nothing more than appendages to the two sacraments of the Lord’s-supper and baptism: the former, he said, reminded us of Christ’s death; and the latter was only a simple representation of being purified from sin. By thus reducing popery to its principles, he improved, in some measure, a bad stock, by lopping from it a few fruitless excrescences.

Henry VIII. made so little use of his judgment, that his whole reign was one continued rotation of violent passions, which rendered him a mere machine in the hands of his ministers; and he among them who could make the most artful address to the passion of the day, carried his point. Gardiner, bishop of Winchester, was just returned from Germany, having successfully negotiated some commissions which the king had greatly at heart; and, in 1539, a parliament was called, to confirm the seizure and surrendry of the monasteries, when that subtle minister took his opportunity, and succeeded in prevailing upon his majesty to do something, towards restoring the old religion, as being most advantageous for his views in the present situation of Europe. In this state of affairs, Latimer received his summons to parliament, and, soon after his arrival in town, he was accused of preaching a seditious sermon. The sermon was preached at court, and the preacher, according to his custom, had been unquestionably severe enough against whatever he observed amiss. The king had called together several bishops, with a view to consult them upon some points of religion. When they had all given their opinions, and were about to be dismissed, the bishop of Winchester (for it was most probably be) kneeled down and accused the bishop of Worcester as above-mentioned. The bishop being called upon by the king with some sternness, to vindicate himself, was so far from denying or even palliating what he said, that he boldly justified it; and turning to the king, with that noble unconcern which a good conscience inspires, made this answer: “I never thought myself worthy, nor I never sued to be a preacher before your grace; but I was called to it, and would be willing, if you mislike it, to give place to my betters; for I grant there may be a great many more worthy of the room than I am. And if it be your grace’s pleasure to allow them for preachers, I could be content to bear their books after them. But if your grace allow me for a preacher, I would desire you to give me leave to discharge my conscience, and to frame my doctrine according to my audience. I bad been a very dolt indeed, to have preached so at the borders of your realm, as I preach before your grace.” This answer baffled his accuser’s malice, the severity of the king’s conscience changed into a gracious smile, and the bishop was dismissed with that obliging freedom which this monarch never used but to those whom he esteemed. In this parliament passed the famous act, as it was called, of the six articles, which was no sooner published than it gave an universal alarm to all the favourers of the reformation; and, as the bishop of Worcester could not give his vote for the act, he thought it wrong to hold any office. He therefore resigned his bishopric , and retired into the country; where he resided during the heat of that persecution which followed upon this act, and thought of nothing for the remainder of his days but a sequestered life. He knew the storm which was up could not soon be appeased, and he had no inclination to trust himself in it. But, in the midst of his security, an unhappy accident carried him again into the tempestuous weather that was abroad he received a bruise by the fall of a tree, and the contusion was so dangerous, that he was obliged to seek out for better assistance than the country afforded. With this view he repaired to London, where he had the misfortune to see the fall of his patron, the lord Cromwell; a loss of which he was soon made sensible. Gardiner’s emissaries quickly found him out; and something, that somebody had somewhere heard him say against the six articles, being alleged against him, he was sent tp the Tower, where, without any judicial examination, he suffered, through one pretence or another, a cruel imprisonment for the remaining six years of king Henry’s reign.

Immediately upon the accession of Edward VI. he and all others who were imprisoned in the same cause, were set at liberty; and Latimer, whose old friends were now in power, was received by them with every mark of affection. He would have found no difficulty in dispossessing Heath, in every respect an insignificant man, who had succeeded to his bishopric: but he had other sentiments, and would neither make suit himself, nor suffer his friends to make any, for his restoration. However, this was done by the parliament, who, after settling the national concerns, sent up an address to the protector to restore him: and the protector was very well inclined, and proposed the resumption to Latimer as a point which he had very much at heart; but LatinYer persevered in the negative, alleging his great age, and the claim he had from thence to a private life. Having thus rid himself of all incumbrance, he accepted an invitation from Cranmer, and took up his residence at Lambeth, where he led a very retired life, being chiefly employed in hearing the complaints and redressing the injuries, of the poor people. And, indeed, his character for services of this kind was so universally known, that strangers from every part of England would resort to him, so that he had as crowded a levee as a minister of state. In these employments he spent more than two years, interfering as little as possible in any public transaction; only he assisted the archbishop in composing the homilies, which were set forth by authority in the first year of king Edward; he was also appointed to preach the Lent sermons before his majesty, which office he performed during the first three years of his reign. As to his sermons, which are still extant, they are, indeed, far enough from being exact pieces of composition: yet, his simplicity and familiarity, his humour and gibing drollery, were well adapted to the times; and his oratory, according to the mode of eloquence at that day, was exceedingly popular. His action and manner of preaching too were very affecting, for he spoke immediately from his heart His abilities, however, as an orator, made only the inferior part of his character as a preacher. What particularly recommends him is, that noble and apostolic zeal whi^h he exerts in the cause of truth.

But in the discharge of this duty a slander passed upon bim, which, being recorded by a low historian of those days, has found its way into ours. It is even recorded as credible by Milton, who suffered his zeal against episcopacy, in more instances than this, to bias his veracity, or at best to impose upon his understanding. It is said that after the lord high admiral’s attainder and execution, which happened about this time, he publicly defended his death in a sermon before the king; that he aspersed his character; and that he did it merely to pay a servile compliment to the protector. The first part of this charge is true; but the second and third are false. As to his aspersing the admiral’s character, his character was so bad, there was no room for aspersion; his treasonable practices too were notorious, and though the proceeding against him by a bill in parliament, according to the custom of these times, may be deemed inequitable, yet he paid no more than a due forfeit to the laxvs of his country. However, his death occasioned great clamour, and was made use of by the lords of the opposition (for he left a very dissatisfied party behind him), as an handle to raise a popular odium against the protector, for whom Latimer had always a high esteem. He was mortified therefore to see so invidious and base an opposition thwarting the schemes of so public-spirited a man; and endeavoured to lessen the odium, by shewing the admiral’s character in its true light, from some anecdotes not commonly known. This notice of lord Seymour, which was in Latimer' s fourth sermon before king Edward, is to be found only in the earlier editions.

Upon the revolution which happened at court after the death of the duke of Somerset, Latimer seems to have retired into the country, and made use of the king’s licence as a general preacher in those parts where he thought his labours might be most serviceable. He was thus employed during the remainder of that reign, and continued in the same course, for a short time, in the beginning of the next; but, as soon as the introduction of popery was resolved on, the first step towards it was the prohibition of all preaching throughout the kingdom, and a licensing only of such as were known to be popishly inclined: accordingly, a strict inquiry was made after the more forward and popular preachers; and many of them were taken into custody. The bishop of Winchester, who was now prime minister, having proscribed Latimer from the first, sent a message to cite him before the council. He had notice of this design some hours before the messenger’s arrival, but made no use of the intelligence. The messenger found him equipped for his journey; at which expressing surprize, Latimer told him that he was as ready to attend him to London, thus called upon to answer for his faith, as he ever was to take any journey in his life and that he doubted not but God, who had en- ­abled him to stand before two princes, would enable him to stand before a third. The messenger, then acquainting him that he had no orders to seize his person, delivered a letter, and departed. Latimer, however, opening the letter, and finding it contain a citation from the council, resolved to obey it. He set out therefore immediately; and, as he passed through Smithfield, where heretics were usually burnt, he said cheerfully, “This place hath long groaned for me.” The next morning he waited upon the council, who, having loaded him with many severe reproaches, sent him to the Tower. This was his second visit to this prison, but now he met with harsher treatment, and had more frequent occasion to exercise his resignation, which virtue no man possessed in a larger measure; nor did the usual cheerfulness of his disposition forsake him. A servant leaving his apartment one day, Latimer called after him, and bid him tell his master, that unless he took better care of him, he would certainly escape him. Upon this message the lieutenant, with some discomposure of countenance, came to Latimer, and desired an explanation. “Why, you expect, I suppose, sir,” replied Latimerj “that I should be burnt; but if you do not allow me a little fire this frosty weather, I can tell you, I shall first be starved.” Cranmer and Ridley were also prisoners in the same cause with Latimer; and when it was resolved to have a public disputation at Oxford, between the most eminent of the popish and protestant divines, these three were appointed to manage the dispute on the part of the protestants. Accordingly they were taken out of the Tower, and sent to Oxford, where they were closely confined in the common prison, and might easily imagine how free the disputation was likely to be, when they found themselves denied the use even of books, and pen and ink.

Fox has preserved a conference, afterwards put into writing, which was held at this time between Ridley and Latimer, and which sets our author’s temper in a strong light. The two bishops are represented sitting in their prison, ruminating upon the solemn preparations then making for their trial, of which, probably, they were now first informed. “The time,” said Ridley, “is now come; we are now called npon, either to deny our faith, or to suffer death in its defence. You, Mr. Latimer, are an old soldier of Christ, and have frequently withstood the fear of death; whereas I am raw in the service, and unexperienced.” With this preface he introduces a request that Latimer, whom he calls “his father,” would hear him propose such arguments as he thinks it most likely his adversaries would urge against him, and assist him in providing proper answers to them. To this Latimer, in his usual strain of good humour, replied that “he fancied the good bishop was treating him as he remembered Mr. Bilney used formerly to do; who, when he wanted to teach him, would always do it under colour of being taught himself. But in the present case,” said he, “my lord, I am determined to give them very little trouble: I shall just offer them a plain account of my faith, and shall say very little more; for I know any thing more will be to no purpose: they talk of a free disputation, but I am well assured their grand argument will be, as it once was their forefathers, * We have a law, and by our law ye ought to die.' Bishop Ridley having afterwards desired his prayers, that he might trust wholly upon God” Of my prayers,“replied the old bishop,” you may be well assured nor do J doubt but I shall have yours in return, and indeed prayer and patience should he our great resources. For myself, had I the learning of St. Paul, I should think it ill laid out upon an elaborate defence; yet our case, my lord, admits of comfort. Our enemies can do no more than God permits; and God is faithful, who will not suffer us to be tempted above our strength. Be at a point with them; stand to that, and let them say and do what they please. To use many words would be vain; yet it is requisite to give a reasonable account of your faith, if they will quietly hear you. For other things, in a wicked judgment-hall, a man may keep silence after the example of Christ,“&c. Agreeably to this fortitude, Latimer conducted himself throughout the dispute, answering their questions as far as civility required; and in these answers it is observable he managed the argument much better than either Ridley or Cranmer; who, when they were pressed in defence of transubstantiation, with some passages from the fathers, instead of disavowing an insufficient authority, weakly defended a good cause by evasions and distinctions, after the manner of schoolmen. Whereas, when the same proofs were multiplied upon Latimer, he told them plainly that” such proofs had no weight with him; that the fathers, no doubt, were often deceived; and that he never depended upon them but when they depended upon Scripture.“” Then you are not of St. Chrysostom’s faith,“replied they,” nor of St. Austin’s?“” I have told you,“says Latimer,” I am not, except they bring Scripture for what they say.“The dispute being ended, sentence was passed upon him; and he and Ridley were burnt at Oxford, on Oct. 16, 1555. When they were brought to the fire, on a spot of ground on the north side of Baliolcollege, and, after a suitable sermon, were told by an officer that they might now make ready for the stake, they supported each other’s constancy by mutual exhortations. Latimer, when tied to the stake, called to his companion,” Be of good cheer, brother; we shall this day kindle such a torch in England, as I trust in God shall never be extinguished." The executioners had been so merciful (for that clemency may more naturally be ascribed to them than to the religious zealots) as to tie bags of gunpowder about these prelates, in order to put a speedy period to their tortures. The explosion killed Latimer immediately; but Ridley continued alive during some time, in the midst of the flames. Such was the life of Hugh Latimer, one of the leaders of that glorious army of martyrs, who introduced the reformation in England. He was not esteemed a very learned man, for he cultivated only useful learning; and that, he thought, lay in a very narrow compass. He never engaged in worldly affairs, thinking that a clergyman ought to employ himself in his profession only; and his talents, temper, and disposition, were admirably adapted to render the most important services to the reformation.

, one of the revivers of classical learning in England, was educated at Oxford, and became fellow of All-Souls’ college, in 1489. Afterwards travelling into Italy, which was then the resort of those who wished to extend their studies, he remained for some time at Padua, where he improved himself very much, especially in the Greek language. On his return to England, he was incorporated M. A. at Oxford, Nov. 18, 1513. Soon afterwards he became tutor to Reginald Pole, afterwards the celebrated cardinal, by whose interest, it is thought, he obtained the rectories of Saintbury and Weston-underEdge, in Gloucestershire, and a prebend of Salisbury. He had also the honour of being one of those who taught Erasmus Greek at Oxford, and assisted him in the second edition of his New Testament. He died very old, about Sept. 1545; and was buried in the chancel of his church at Saintbury. He was reckoned one of the greatest men of his age, and with Colet, Lily, and Grocyn, contributed much to establish a taste for the Greek language. Erasmus styles him an excellent divine, conspicuous for integrity and modesty; and Leland celebrates his eloquence, judgment, piety, and generosity. Of his writings there is nothing extant, but a few letters to Erasmus.

, an eminent grammarian of Florence, in the thirteenth century, was of a noble family in that city, and during the party contests between the Guelphs and Ghibelins, took part with the former. When the Ghibelins had obtained assistance from Mainfroy, king of-Sicily, the Guelphs sent Bninetto to obtain similar aid from Alphonso king of Castillo; but on his return, hearing that the Ghibelins had defeated his party and got possession of Florence, he fled to France, where he resided several years. At length he was enabled to return to his own country, in which he was appointed to some honourable offices. He died in 1294. The historian Villani attributes to him the merit of having first introduced a degree of refinement among his countrymen, and of having reformed their language, and the general conduct of public affairs. The work which has contributed most to his celebrity, was one which he entitled “Tresor,” and wrote when in France, and in the French language, which he says he chose because it was the most agreeable language and the most common in Europe. This work is a kind of abridgment of the Bible, of Pliny the naturalist, Solinus, and other writers who have treated on different sciences, and may be called an Encyclopaedia of the knowledge of his time. It was translated into Italian about the same period, and this translation only was printed; but there are about a dozen transcripts of the original in the royal library at Paris, and there is a fine ms. of it in the Vatican, bound in crimson velvet, with manuscript notes, by Petrarch. After his return to Florence, Latini wrote his u Tesoretto,“or little treasure, which, however, is not as some have reported, an abridgment of the” Tresor,“but a collection of moral precepts in verse. He also translated into the Italian language part of Cicero” de Inventione.“His greatest honour seems to have been that he was the tutor of Dante, not however in poetry, for his” Tesoretto" affords no ground to consider him as a master of that art.

, a learned scholastib divine of the sixteenth century, a native of Gambron, in Hainault, doctor of Louvain, and canon of St. Peter’s in the same city, wrote against Luther, and was esteemed by his party one of the best controversialists of his time. He died 1544. All his works were collected and published, 1550, fol. by his nephew, James Latomus, who died 1596. They are in Latin, and consist of “Treatises on the Church,” the “Pope’s Primacy,” aud “Auricular Confession” a*' Defence of the Articles of Louvain“a tract” On the study of Divinity, and of the three Languages," in which he defends scholastic divinity. Erasmus having refuted this work, Latomus answered him by an Apology. He wrote Latin with facility, but without elegance, and neither understood Greek nor Hebrew. Luther’s confutation of Latomus’s defence of the articles of Louvain is accounted one of the ablest productions of that eminent reformer.

, archbishop of Canterbury, was son of William Laud, a clothier of Heading, in Berkshire, by Lucy his wife, widow of John Robinson, of the same place, and sister to sir William Webbe, afterwards lord-mayor of London, in 1591. His father died in 1594, leaving his son, after his mother’s decease, the house which he inhabited in Broad-street, and two others in Swallowfield; 1200l. in money, and the stock in trade. The widow was to have the interest of half the estate during her life. She died in 1600. These circumstances, although in themselves of little importance, it is necessary to mention as a contradiction to the assertion of Prynne, that he was of poor and obscure parents, which was repeated by lord Say, in the house of peers. He was born at Reading, Oct. 7, 1573, and educated at the free-school there, till July 1589; when, removing to St. John’s college, in Oxford, he became a scholar of the house in 1590, and fellow in 1593. He took the degree of A. B. in 1594, and that of master in 1598. He was this year chosen grammarlecturer; and being ordained priest in 1601, read, the following year, a divinity-lecture in his college, which was then supported by Mrs. Maye. In some of these chapel exercises he maintained against the puritans, the perpetual visibility of the church of Rome till the reformation; by which he incurred the displeasure of Dr. Abbot, then vice-chancellor of the university, who maintained that the visibility of the church of Christ might be deduced through other channels to. the time of that reformation. In 1603, Laud was one of the proctors; and the same year became- chaplain to Charles Blonnt, earl of Devonshire, whom he inconsiderately married, Dec. 26, 1605, to Penelope, then wife of Robert lord Rich; an affair that exposed him afterwards to much censure, and created him great uneasiness; in reality, it made so deep an impression upon him, that he ever after kept that day as a day of fasting and humiliation.

He proceeded B. D. July 6, 1604. In his exercise for this degree, he maintained these two points: the necessity of baptism; and that there could be no true church without diocesan bishops. These were levelled also against the puritans, and he was rallied by the divinity-professor. He likewise gave farther offence to the Calvinists, by a sermon preached before the university in 1606; and we are told it was made heresy for any to be seen in his company, and a misprision of heresy to give him a civil salutation; his learning, parts, and principles, however, procured him some friends. His first preferment was the vicarage of Stanford, in Northamptonshire, in 1607; and in 1608 he obtained the advowson of North Kilworth, in Leicestershire. He was no sooner invested in these livings, but he put the parsonage- houses in good repair, and gave twelve poor people a constant allowance out of them, which was his constant practice in all his subsequent preferments. This same year he commenced D. D. and was made chaplain to Neile, bishop of Rochester; and preached his first sermon before king James, at Theobalds, Sept. 17, 1609. In order to be near his patron, he exchanged North Kilworth for the rectory of West Tilbury, in Essex, into which he was inducted in 1609. The following year, the bishop gave him the living of Cuckstone, in Kent, on which he resigned his fellowship, left Oxford, and settled at Cuckstone; but the un-healthiness of that place having thrown him into an ague, he exchanged it soon after for Norton, a benefice of less value, but in a better air. In Dec. 1610, Dr. Bnckeridge, president of St. John’s, being promoted to the see of Rochester, Abbot, newly made archbishop of Canterbury, who had disliked Laud’s principles at Oxford, complained of him to the lord-chancellor Ellesmere, chancellor of the university; alledging that he was cordially addicted to popery. The complaint was supposed to be made, in order to prevent his succeeding Buckeridge in the presidentship of his college; and the lord-chancellor carrying it to the king, all his credit, interest, and advancement, would probably have been destroyed thereby, had not his firm friend bishop Neile contradicted the reports to his discredit. He was therefore elected president May 10, 1611, though then sick in London, and unable either to make interest in person or by writing to his friends; and the king not only con finned his election, after a hearing of three hours at Tichbonrn, but as a farther token of his favour, made him one of his chaplains, upon the recommendation of bishop Neile. Laud having thus attained a footing at court, flattered himself with hopes of great and immediate preferment; but abp. Abbot always opposing applications in his behalf, after three years fruitless waiting, he was upon the point of leaving the court, and retiring wholly to his college, when his friend and patron Neile, newly translated to Lincoln, prevailed with him to stay one year longer, and in the mean time gave him the prebend of Bugden, in the church of Lincoln, in 16 14; and the archdeaconry of Huntingdon the following year.

Upon the lord-chancellor Kllesmere’s decline, in 1610, Laud s interest began to rise at court, so that, in November that year, the king gave him the deanery of Gloucester; and as a farther instance of his heing in favour, he was selected to attend the king in his journey to Scotland, in 1617. Some royal directions were by his procurement sent to Oxford, for the better government of the university, before he set out on that journey, the design of which was to bring the church of Scotland to an uniformity with that of England; a favourite scheme of Laud and other divines: but the Scotch were resolute in their adherence to the presbyterian form of church government, and the only fruit of this expensive journey was, that the king found his commands nugatory, and his authority contemned. Laud, however, seems to have advanced in favour with his majesty, for on his return from Scotland, Aug. 2, 1617, he was inducted to the rectory of Ibstock, in Leicestershire; and Jan. 22, 1620-1, installed into a prebend of Westminster. About the same time, there was a general expectation at court, that the deanery of that church would have been conferred upon him; but Dr. Williams, then dean, wanting to keep it in commendam with the bishopric of Lincoln, to which he was promoted^ procured that Laud should be promoted to the bishopric of St. David’s. The day before his consecration, he resigned the presidentship of St. John’s, in obedience to the college-statute; but was permitted to keep his prebend of Westminster in corrimendam, through the lord-keeper Williams’s interest, who, about a year after, gave him a living of about 120l. a year, in the diocese of St. David’s, to help his revenue; and in January 1620, the king gave him also the rectory of Creeke, in Northamptonshire. The preachers of those times introducing in their sermons discussions on the doctrines of predestination and election, and even the royal prerogative, the king published, August 1622, directions concerning preachers and preaching, in which L;iud was said to have a hand, and which, being aimed at the puritans and lecturers, occasioned great clamour among them, and was one of the first causes of Laud’s unpopularity. This year also, our prelate held his famous conference with Fisher the Jesuit, before the marquis of Buckingham and his mother, in order to confirm them both in the protestant religion, in which they were then wavering. The conference was printed in 1624, and produced an intimate acquaintance between him and the marquis, whose special favourite he became at this time, and to whom he is charged with making himself too subservient; the proof of which is said to be, that Buckingham left him his agent at court, when he went with the prince to Madrid, and frequently corresponded with him.

After the duke of Buckingham’s murder, Laud became chief favourite to Charles I. which augmented indeed his power and interest, but at the same time increased that envy and jealousy, already too strong, which at length proved fatal to him. Upon the decline of archbishop Abbot’s health and favour at court, Laud’s concurrence in the very severe prosecutions carried on in the high-commission and star-chamber courts, against preachers and writers, did him great prejudice with most people. Among these, however, it has been remarked that his prosecution of the king’s printers, for leaving out the word “not,” in the seventh commandment, cpuld be liable to no just objection. On May 13, 163 3, he left London to attend the king, who was about to set out for his coronation in Scotland, and was sworn a privy-counsellor of that kingdom, June 15, and, on the 26th, came back to Fulham. During his stay in Scotland he formed a resolution of bringing that cnurch to a conformity with the church of Englan I; but the king committed the framing of a liturgy to a select number of Scottish bishops, who, inserting several variations from the English liturgy, were opposed strenuously but unsuccessfully, by Laud. Having endeavoured to supplant Abbot, “whom,” as Fuller observes in his Church History, “he could not be contented to succeed,” upon his death in August this year,' he was appointed his successor. That very morning, August 4, there came one to him at Greenwich, with a serious offer (and an avowed ability to perform it) of a cardinal’s hat; which offer was repeated on the 17th; but his answer both times was, “that somewhat dwelt within him which would not suffer that till Home were other than it is.” On Sept. 14 he was elected chancellor of the university of Dublin.

In 1634 our archbishop did the poor Irish clergy a very important service, by obtaining for them, from the king, a grant of all the impropriations then remaining in the crown. He also improved and settled the revenues of the London clergy in a better manner than before. On Feb. 5, 1634-5, he was put into the great committee of trade, and the king’s revenue, and appointed one of the commissioners of the treasury, March the 4th, upon the death of Weston earl of Portland. Besides this, he was, tvVo days after, called into the foreign committee, and had likewise the sole disposal of whatsoever concerned the church; but he fell into warm disputes with the lord^Cottington, chancellor of the exchequer, who took all opportunities of imposing upon him . After having continued for a year commissioner of the treasury, and acquainted himself with the mysteries of it, he procured the lord-treasurer’s staff" for Dr. William Juxon, who had through his interest been successively advanced to the presidentship of St. John’s college, deanery of Worcester, clerkship of his majesty’s closet, and bishopric of London, as already noticed in our life of Juxon. For some years Laud had set his heart upon getting the English liturgy introduced into Scotland; and some of the Scottish bishops hud, under his direction, prepared both that book and a collection of canons for public service; the canons were published in 1635, but the liturgy came not in use till 1637. On the day it was first read at St. Giles’s church, in Edinburgh, it occasioned a most violent tumult among the people, encouraged by the nobility, who were losers by the restitution of episcopacy, and by the ministers, who lost their clerical government. Laud, having been the great promoter of that affair, was reviled for it in the most abusive manner, and both he and the book were charged with downright popery. The extremely severe prosecution carried on about the same time in the star-chamber, chiefly through his instigation, against Prynne, Bastwick, and Burton, did him also infinite prejudice, and exposed him to numberless libels and reflections; though he endeavoured to vindicate his conduct in a speech delivered at their censure, June 14, 1637, which was published by the king’s command. Another rigorous prosecution, carried on with his concurrence, in the star-chamber, was against bishop Williams, an account of which may be seen in his article, as also of Lambert Osbaldiston, master of Westminster school.

In order to prevent the printing and publishing of what he thought improper books, a decree was passed in the star-chamber, July 11, 1637, to regulate the trade of printing, by which it was enjoined that the master-printers should be reduced to a certain number, and that none of them should print any books till they were licensed either by the archbishop, or, the bishop of London, or some of their chaplains, or by the chancellors or vice-chancellors of the two universities. Accused as he frequently was, of popery, he fell under the queen’s displeasure this year, by speaking, with his usual warmth, to the king at the council- table against the increase of papists, their frequent resort to Somerset house, and their insufferable misdemeanors in perverting his majesty’s subjects to popery. On Jan. 3i, 1638-9, he wrote a circular letter to his suffragan bishops, exhorting them and their clergy to contribute liberally towards raising the army against the Scots, For this he was called an incendiary: but he declares, on the contrary, that he laboured for peace so long, till he received a great check; and that, at court his counsels alone prevailed for peace and forbearance. lu 1639 he employed one Mr. Petley to translate the liturgy into Greek; and, at his recommendation, Dr. Joseph Hall, bishop of Exeter, composed his learned treatise of “Episcopacy by Divine Right asserted.” On Dec. 11, the same year, he was one of the three privy-counsellors who advised the king to call a parliament in case of the Scottish rebellion; at which time a resolution was adopted to assist the king in extraordinary ways, if the parliament should prove peevish and refuse supplies. A new parliament being summoned, met April 13, 1649, and the convocation the day following; but the Commons beginning with complaints against the archbishop, and insisting upon a redress of grievances before they granted any supply, the parliament was unhappily dissolved, May 5. The convocation, however, continued sitting; and certain canons were made in it, which gave great offence. On Laud many laid the blame and odium of the parliament’s dissolution; and that noted enthusiast, John Lilburne, caused a paper to be posted, May 3, upon the Old Exchange, animating the apprentices to sack his house at Lambeth the Monday following. On that day above 5000 of them assembled in a riotous and tumultuous manner; but the archbishop, receiving previous notice, secured the palace as well as he could, and retired to his chamber at Whitehall, where he remained some days; and one of the ringleaders was hanged, drawn, and quartered, on the 21st. In August following, a libel was found in Covent-garden, exciting the apprentices and soldiers to fall upon him in the king’s absence, upon his second expedition into Scotland. The parliament that met Nov. 3, 1640, not being better disposed towards him, but, for the most part, bent upon his ruin, several angry speeches were made against him in the House of commons.

On Tuesday, March 12, 1643-4, the trial was opened in form; the original and additional articles of impeachment were read, and, after that, the archbishop’s answer, plea, and demurrer to them. He requested that the charge and evidence to all the articles might be given together; and the articles of misdemeanour separated from those of treason; to which the celebrated lawyer, Maynard, answered, that, in the earl of Strafford’s trial, he was put to answer every day the particular evidence given that day; that they were now only to try matters of fact, not of law, and that all the articles collectively, not any one separately, made up the charge of treason. Serjeant Wilde then made a long speech, upon the charge of high treason, insisting chiefly upon the archbishop’s attachment to popery, and his intention to introduce it into England; concluding with these words, that “Naaman was a great man, but he was a leper,” and that the archbishop’s leprosy had so infected all, “as there remained no other cure but the sword of justice.” The archbishop replied to the several charges, and mentioned various persons whom he had brought back from the Romish religion, particularly sir William Webbe, his kinsman, and two of his daughters; his son lui took from him; and, his father being utterly decayed, bred him at his own charge, and educated him in the protestant religion. The trial lasted above twenty days, and on Sept. 2, 1644, the archbishop made a recapitulation of the whole cause; but, as soon as he came into the House, he saw every lord present with a new thin book in folio, in a blue cover; which was his “Diary,” which Prynne, as already mentioned, had robbed him of, and printed with notes of his own, to disgrace the archbishop. On Sept. 11, Mr. Brown delivered, in the House of Lords, a summary of the whole charge, with a few observations on the archbishop’s answer. The queries of his counsel on the law of treason was referred to a committee which ordered his counsel to be heard on Oct. 11, when Mr. Herne delivered his argument with great firmness and resolution. The lord chancellor Finch told archbishop Sancroft that the argument was sir Matthew Hale’s, afterwards lord chief justice; and that being then a young lawyer, he, Mr. Finch, stood behind Mr. Herne, at the bar of the house, and took notes of it, which he intended to publish in his reports. With this argument, the substance of which may be seen in our authorities, the trial ended for that day; but, after this, a petition was sent about London, “for bringing delinquents to justice;” and many of the preachers exhorted the people to sign it; so that with a multitude of hands, it was delivered to the House of Commons, on Oct. 8. The archbishop was summoned on Nov. 2, to the House of Commons, to hear the whole charges, and to make his defence, which he did at large, Nov. 11. On the following Wednesday Mr. Brown replied and after the archbishop was dismissed, the House called for the ordinance, and without hearing his counsel, voted him guilty of high treason. After various delays, the Lords had a conference with the Commons, on Dec. 24, in which they declared, “that they had diligently weighed all things charged against the archbishop, but could not, by any one of them, or all, find him guilty of treason.” The judges had unanimously made the same declaration. At the second conference, on Jan. 2, 1644-5, the reasons of the Commons for the attainder of the archbishop were communicated to the Lords, who in a very thin house, passed the ordinance that he should suffer death by hanging, which was fixed for Friday the 10th. He pleaded the king’s pardon, under the great seal, which was over-ruled, and rejected, without being read, and the only favour granted, and that after delay and with reluctance, was, that his sentence should be changed to beheading.

, a native of Scotland, the author of a remarkable forgery, was educated at the university of Edinburgh, where he finished his studies with great reputation, and acquired a considerable knowledge of the Latin tongue. He afterwards taught with success the Latin tongue to some students who were recommended to him by the professors. In 1734, Mr. professor Watt falling ill of that sickness of which he died, Lauder taught for him the Latin class, in the college of Edinburgh, and tried, without success, to be appointed professor in his room. He failed also in his application for the office of librarian. In Feb. 1739, he stood candidate, with eight others, for the place of one of the masters of the high school; but, though the palm of literature was assigned by the judges to Lauder, the patrons of the school preferred one of his opponents. In the same year he published at Edinburgh an edition of “Johnston’s Psalms,” or rather a collection of Sacred Latin poetry, in 2 vols, but his hopes of profit from this were disappointed. In 1742, although he was recommended by Mr. Patrick Cuming and Mr. Colin Maclaurin, professors of church history and mathematics, to the mastership of the grammar-school at Dundee, then vacant, we find him, the same year, in London, contriving to ruin the reputation of Milton; an attempt which ended in the destruction of his own. His reason for the attack has been referred to the virulence of violent party-spirit, which triumphed over every principle of honour and honesty. He began first to retail part of his design in “The Gentleman’s Magazine,” in 1747; and, finding that his forgeries were not detected, was encouraged in 1751 to collect them, with additions, into a volume, entitled “An Essay on Milton’s Use and Imitation of the Moderns in his Paradise Lost,” 8vo. The fidelity of his quotations had been doubted by several people; and the falsehood of them was soon after demonstrated by Dr. Douglas, late bishop of Salisbury, in a pamphlet, entitled “Milton vindicated from the Charge of Plagiarism brought against him by Lauder, and Lauder himself convicted of forgeries and gross impositions on the public. In a letter humbly addressed to the right honourable the earl of Bath,” 1751, 8vo. The appearance of this detection overwhelmed Lauder with confusion. He subscribed a confession, dictated by Dr. Johnson, on whom he had imposed, in which he ingenuously acknowledged his offence, which he professed to have been occasioned by the injury he had received from the disappointment of his expectations of profit from the publication of “Johnston’s Psalms.” This misfortune he ascribed to a couplet in Mr. Pope’s Dunciad, book iv. ver. iii. and thence originated his rancour against Milton. He afterwards imputed his conduct to other motives, abused the few friends who continued to countenance him; and, finding that his own character was not to be retrieved, quitted the kingdom, and went to Barbadoes, where he was for some time master of the free-school in Bridgetown, but was discharged for misconduct, and passed the remainder of his life in universal contempt. “He died,” says Mr. Nichols, “sometime about the year 1771, as my friend Mr. Reed was informed by the gentleman who read the funeral-service over him.” It may be added, that notwithstanding Lauder’s pretended regret for his attack on Milton, he returned to the charge in 1754, and published a pamphlet entitled “The Grand Impostor detected, or Milton convicted of forgery against Charles I.” which was reviewed in the Gent. Mag. of that year, probably by Johnson.

, or Launoius, a very learned man and voluminous writer, was born about 1601, and took a doctor of divinity’s degree in 1636. He made a journey to Rome, for the sake of enlarging his ideas and knowledge; and there procured the esteem and friendship of Leo Allatius and Holsten. Upon his return to Paris, he shut himself up, entering upon an extensive course of reading, and making collections upon all subjects. He held at his house every Monday a meeting where the learned conversed on many topics, but particularly on the discipline of the church, and the rights of the Gallican church; and they cordially agreed in condemning such legends as the apostolate of St. Dionysius the Areopagite into France, the voyage of Lazarus and Mary Magdalen into Provence, and a multitude of other traditions. Launoi was such an enemy to legendary saints, that Voltaire records a curate of St. Eustachius, as saying, “I always make the most profound obeisance to Mr. Launoi, for fear he should take from me my St. Eustachius.” He died at cardinal d‘Estr^es’s hotel, March 10, 1678, aged 75, and was buried at the convent of the Minimes de la Place Ro’iale, to whom he left two hundred crowns in gold, all the rituals which he had collected, and half his books; bequeathing the remainder to the seminary at Laon. Few men were so industrious and so disinterested, as M. de Launoi, who persisted in refusing all the benefices which were offered him, and lived in a plain, frugal manner, contented with his books and his private fortune, though the latter was but moderate. He was an enemy to vice and ambition, charitable, benevolent, a kind friend, ever consistent in his conduct, and submitted to be excluded from the faculty of theology at Paris, rather than sign the censure of M. Arnauld, though he differed in opinion from that celebrated doctor on the subject of Grace.

, the celebrated physiognomist, was born at Zurich, Nov. 15, 1741. He was from his earliest years of a gentle, timid disposition, but restless in the pursuit of knowledge. At school he was perpetually varying his studies by attempting mechanical operations, and often showed indications of genius and invention in his amusements. When he reached the upper classes of school, his diligence in study was encouraged by the advice of Bodmer and Breitenger, and quickened by a wish to emulate some school -fellows of superior talent. His turn of thinking was original, liberal, and manly. As he grew up he wrote some essays on subjects of morals and religion, which gained him the hearts of his countrymen. Having gone through the usual course of reading and instruction for the ecclesiastical profession, he was admitted into orders in May 1761, and two years afterwards he travelled with the brothers Hess, two amiable friends, of whom death deprived him, and, with Henry Fuseli, our celebrated painter. They went over Prussia, under the tuition of professor Sulzer, and Lavater made a considerable stay with Spalding, then curate of Barth in Pomeranian Prussia, and afterwards counsellor of the grand consistory. On his return to Zurich he became a very eloquent and much admired preacher, and proved himself the father of his flock by the most benevolent attention to their wants bodily and mental. After having been for some years deacon of th Orphans’ church, he was in 1774 appointed first pastor. In 1778 the parishioners of the church of St. Peter, the only persons in the canton of Zurich who have a right to chuse their own minister, made choice of Lavater as deacon; and, in 1786, as first pastor. Here he remained, intenton the duties of his office, and on his physiognomical studies until Zurich was stormed in 1797. On this occasion he was wounded by a Swiss soldier, on whom he had conferred important benefits; from the effects of this he never recovered, although he lived in full possession of his faculties till Jan. 2, 1801, when he expired in the sixtieth year of his age. His principal works are, 1. “Swiss Songs,” which he composed at the desire of the Helvetic society, aud which were sung in that society, and in other cantons. 2. Three collections of “Spiritual Songs, or Hymns,” and two volumes of “Odes,” in blank verse. 3. “Jesus Messiah, or the Evangelists and Acts of the Apostles,” 4 vols. a poetical history of our Saviour, ornamented with 72 engravings from his designs, executed by Chodoweiki, Lips, &c. 4. “A Look into Eternity,” which being severely criticised by Gothe, Lavater, who loved truth in every shape, instead of being offended at the liberties he took, sought out the author, and became his friend and correspondent. 5. “The secret Journal of a Self-Observer,” which was published here in 1795. In this Lavater unveils his secret conduct, and displays the motions of his heart. It may justly be said that every good heart is generally in unison with him, but it is impossible not to differ from many of his opinions, and not to perceive in them an uncommon degree of extravagance and enthusiasm. We learn from his Journal, however, and indeed from all his works, that a warm desire to promote the honour of God, and the good of his fellow creatures, was the principal feature in his character, and the leading motive of all he did. Next to these were an indefatigable placability, and an inexhaustible love for his enemies.

, an English prelate, and very eminent scholar, was descended from a family long settled in Wiltshire, and was born at the parsonage- house of Mildenhall, in the above county, and baptised Jan. 18, 1683, his grandfather, Constable, being then rector of that parish. Joseph, father to bishop Lavington, is supposed to have exchanged his original benefice of Broad Hinton, in Wiltshire, for Newton Longville, in Bucks, a living and a manor belonging to New college, in Oxford. Transplanted thither, and introduced to the acquaintance of several members of that society, he was encouraged to educate the eldest of his numerous children, George, the subject of this article, at Wykeham’s foundation, near Winchester, from whence he succeeded to a fellowship of New college, early in the reign of queen Anne. George, while yet a schoolboy, had produced a Greek translation of Virgil’s eclogues, in the style and dialect of Theocritus, which is still preserved at Winchester in manuscript. At the university he was distinguished by his wit and learning, and equally so by a marked attachment to the protestant succession, at a period when a zeal of that kind could promise him neither preferment nor popularity. But if some of his contemporaries thought his ardour in a good cause excessive, still their affection and esteem for him remained undiminished by any difference of political sentiment. In 1717, he was presented by his college to their rectory of Hayford Warren, in the diocese of Oxford. Before this his talents and principles had recommended him to the notice of many eminent persons in church and state. Among others Talbot, then bishop of Oxford, intended him for the benefice of Hook Norton, to which his successor, bishop Potter, collated him. Earl Coningsby not only appointed him his own domestic chaplain, but introduced him in the same capacity to the court of king George I. In this reign he was preferred to a stall in the cathedral church of Worcester, which he always esteemed as one of the happiest events of his life, since it laid the foundation of that close intimacy which ever after subsisted between him and the learned Dr. Francis Hare, the dean. No sooner was Dr. Hare removed to St. Paul’s, than he exerted all his influence to draw his friend to the capital after him; and his endeavours were so successful that Dr. Lavington was appointed in 1732, to be a canon residentiary of that church, and in consequence of this station, obtained successively the rectories of St. Mary Aldermary, and St. Michael Bassishaw. In both parishes he was esteemed a minister attentive to his duty, and an instructive and awakening preacher. He would probably never have thought of any other advancement, if the death of Dr. Stillingfleet, dean of Worcester, in 1746, had not recalled to his memory the pleasing ideas of many years spent in that city, in the prime of life. His friends, however, had higher views for him; and, therefore, on the death of bishop Clagget, lord chancellor Hardwick, and the duke of Newcastle, recommended him to the king, to till the vacancy, without his solicitation or knowledge. From this time he resided at Exeter among his clergy, a faithful and vigilant pastor, and died universally lamented, Sept. 13, 1762; crowning a life that had been devoted to God’s honour and service, by a pious act of resignation to his will; for the last words pronounced by his faultering tongue, were Ao<* in 0sa> “Glory to God.” He married Francis Maria, daughter of Lave, of Corf Mullion, Dorset, who had taken refuge in this kingdom from the popish persecution in France. She survived the bishop little more than one year, after an union of forty years. Their only daughter is the wife of the rev. N. Nutcombe, of Nutcombe, in Devonshire, and chancellor of the cathedral at Exeter. Bishop Lavington published only a few occasional sermons, except his “Enthusiasm of the Methodists and Papists compared,” three parts; which involved him in a temporary controvery with Messrs. Whitfield and Wesley.

The existence of a gaseous body, in a fixed or solid state, in the mild alkalies and alkaline earths, which, when expelled from these substances, assumed an aerial form, and left them in a caustic state, as well as its production during the combustion of fuel, had been demonstrated by Dr. Black; and Bergman had shown that this air possessed acid properties. Dr. Priestley had also submitted it to various experiments in 1767, but the honour of ascertaining the real constituent parts of this acid gas, or fixa^le air, was reserved for Lavoisier. He now turned his experimental researches to the subject of the calcination of metals. It had already been shewn by Rey and Homberg, that metals acquire an augmentation of weight during calcination but they differed in the causes of this augmentation. Lavoisier, who published the result of his experiments on the subject in 1774, demonstrated that a given quantity of air was requisite for the calcination of a given quantity of tin; that a part of the air is absorbed during this process, by which not only the bulk, but the weight of the air is diminished; that the weight of the tin is increased during the same process; and lastly, that the weight acquired by the tin is exactly equal to that which is lost by the air.

Time alone seemed now requisite to establish these doctrines, by exemplifying them in other departments of chemical research. In 1777 six memoirs were communicated feo the Academy of sciences by Lavoisier, in which his former experiments were confirmed, and new advances were made to a considerable extent. Our countrymen, Black and Crawford, in their researches respecting latent heat, and the different capacities of bodies under different circumstances, had laid a solid foundation, on which the doctrines of combustion, resulting from the foregoing experiments, might be perfected, and the cause of the light and heat connected with it might be explained. The first mentioned philosopher, Dr. Black, had shewn, that a solid, when it is made to assume a liquid form, and a liquid, when it assumes the form of vapour, absorbs or combines with, and renders latent, a large portion of heat, which is again parted with, becomes free and cognizable by the sense of feeling, and by the thermometer, when the vapour is again condensed into a liquid, and the liquid becomes solid. In like manner, it was now said by Lavoisier, during the process of combustion, the oxygen, which was previously in a gaseous state, is suddenly combined with the substance burnt into a liquid or solid. Hence all the latent heat, which was essential to its gaseous state, being instantaneously liberated in large quantity, produces flame, which is nothing more than very condensed free heat. About the same time, the analogy of the operation and necessity of oxygen in the function of respiration, with the preceding hypothesis of combustion, was pointed out by Lavoisier. In the process of respiration, it was found that, although atmospheric air is inhaled, carbonic acid and azot are expired. This animal operation, said Lavoisier, is a species of slow combustion: the oxygen of the air unites with the superfluous carbon of the venous blood, and produces carbonic acid, while the latent or combined caloric (the matter of heat) is set free, and thus supplies the animal heat. Ingenious and beautiful, however, as this extension of the analogy appeared, the subject of animal temperature is still under many obscurities and difficulties. The phenomena of chemistry, however, were now explicable upon principles more simple, consistent, and satisfactory than by the aid of any former theory; and the Lavoisierian doctrines were everywhere gaining ground. But there yet remained a formidable objection o them, which was derived from a circumstance attending the solution of metals in acids; to wit, the production of a considerable quantity of inflammable air. If sulphuric acid (formerly called vitriolic acid, or oil of vitriol) consists only of sulphur and oxygen, it was said, how does it happen, that wheti these two substances, with a little water, come in contact, they should produce a large quantity of inflammable air during their re-action? This objection was unanswerable, and appeared to be fatal to the whole theory: but it was most opportunely converted into an argument in its favour, by the great discovery of the decomposition of water, made by Mr. Cavendish; who resolved that element, as it was formerly esteemed, into oxygen and inflammable air. The latter has since, therefore, been called hydrogen, or generator of water. This experiment was repeated with full success by Lavoisier and his associates in 1783; and the discovery was farther established by a successful experiment of the same chemists, carried on upon a grand scale, in which, by combining the oxygen with hydrogen, they produced water, and thus adding synthesis to analysis, brought the fact to demonstration.

The time was arrived, however, when distinction even by his talents and worth was so far from securing public respect, amid the tumults of the revolution, that it became a source of danger, and, when joined with wealth, was almost certainly fatal. All those especially who had held any situation under the old administration, particularly in the financial departments, were sacrificed, during the murderous reign of Robespierre, to the popular odium. Lavoisier was seized and thrown into prison, upon some charges fabricated against himself and twenty-seven other farmers-general. During his confinement he foresaw that he should be stripped of all his property; but consoled himself with the expectation that he would be able to maintain himself by the practice of pharmacy. But a more severe fate awaited him: he was capitally condemned, and dragged to the guillotine, on the 8th of May, 1794.

The name of Lavoisier will always be ranked among the most illustrious chemists of the present age, when it is considered what an extensive and beneficial influence his labours have had over the whole science. It has been said, indeed, that if he be estimated on the score of his actual discoveries, not only Scheele and Priestley, and Cavendish, but many more, will stand before him. But he possessed in a high degree that rare talent of discernment, by which he detected analogies, which others overlooked, even in their own discoveries, and a sagacity in devising and an accuracy in completing his experiments, for the purpose of elucidating every suggestion which he thus acquired, such as few philosophers have possessed. No one who did so much, probably ever made so few unsuccessful or random experiments. It was the singular perspicuity, simplicity, and order to which he reduced the phenomena of chemistry, that claimed for his theory the general reception which it met with, and occasioned the abandonment of those doctrines which prejudice and habit conspired to support. Subsequent discoveries, however, and more especially those numerous facts which the genius of sir Humphrey Davy has lately brought to light, through the medium of that most powerful agent of decomposition, galvanism, have rendered several modifications of the Lavoisierian theory necessary, and bid fair to produce a more general revolution in the language and doctrines of chemistry.

M. Lavoisier married, in 1771, the daughter of a farmergeneral, a lady of pleasing manners and considerable talents, who partook of her husband’s zeal for philosophical inquiry, and cultivated chemistry with much success. She engraved with her own hand the copper-plates for his last work. Mad. Lavoisier afterwards gave her hand to another eminent philosopher, count llumtbrd, who, in 1814, left her a widow a second time.

, bishop of Carlisle, was born in the parish of Cartmel in Lancashire, in 1703. His father, who was a clergyman, held a small chapel in that neighbourhood, but the family had been situated at Askham, in the county of Westmoreland. He was educated for some time at Cartmel school, afterwards at the free grammar-school at Kendal; from which he went, very well instructed ia the learning of grammar-schools, to St. John’s college, Cambridge. He took his bachelor’s degree in 1723, and soon after 'was elected fellow of Christ’s-college in that university, where he took his master’s degree in 1727. During his residence here, he became known to the public by a translation of archbishop King’s (see William King) “Essay upon the Origin of Evil,” with copious notes; in which many metaphysical subjects, curious and interesting in their own nature, are treated of with great ingenuity, learning, and novelty. To this work was prefixed, under the name of a “Preliminary Dissertation,” a very valuable piece written by Mr. Gay of Sidney-college. Our bishop always spoke of this gentleman in terms of the greatest respect. “In the Bible, and in the writings of Locke, no man,” he used to say, “was so well versed.”

In 1737 he was presented by the university to the living of Graystock, in the county of Cumberland, a rectory of about 300l. a year. The advowson of this benefice belonged to the family of Howards of Graystock, but devolved to the university for this turn, by virtue of an act of parliament, which transfers to these two bodies the nomination to such benefices as appertain, at the time of the vacancy, to the patronage of a Roman catholic. The right, however, of the university was contested, and it was not until after a lawsuit of two years continuance, that Mr. Law was settled in his living. Soon after this he married Mary, the daughter of John Christian, esq. of Unerigg, in the county of Cumberland; a lady, whose character is remembered with tenderness and esteem by all who knew her. In 1743 he was promoted by sir George Fleming, bishop of Carlisle, to the archdeaconry of that diocese; and in 1746 went from Graystock to settle at Salkeld, a pleasant village upon the banks of the river Eden, the rectory of which is annexed to the archdeaconry; but he was not one of those who lose and forget themselves in the country. During his residence at Salkeld, he published “Considerations on the Theory of Religion” to which were subjoined, “Reflections on the Life and Character of Christ;” and an appendix concerning the use of the words soul and spirit in the Holy Scripture, and the state of the dead there described.

Dr. Keene held at this time with the bishopric of Chester, the mastership of Peter-house, in Cambridge. Desiring to leave the university, he procured Dr. Law to be elected to succeed him in that station. This took place in 1756, in which year Dr. Law resigned his archdeaconry in favour of Mr. Eyre, a brother-in-law of Dr. Keene. Two years before this (the list of graduates says 1749) he had proceeded to his degree of D. D., in his public exercise for which, he defended the doctrine of what is usually called the “sleep of the soul,” a tenet to which we shall have occasion to revert hereafter. About 1760 he was appointed head librarian of the university; a situation which, as it procured an easy and quick access to books, was peculiarly agreeable to his taste and habits. Some time after this he was appointed casuistical professor. In 1762 he suffered an irreparable loss by the death of his wife; a loss in itself every way afflicting, and rendered more so by the situation of his family, which then consisted of eleven children, many of them very young. Some years afterwards he received several preferments, which were rather honourable expressions of regard from his friends, than of much advantage to his fortune. By Dr. Cornwallis, then bishop of Lichfield, afterwards archbishop of Canterbury, xvho had been his pupil at Christcollege, he was appointed to the archdeaconry of Staffordshire, and to a prebend in the church of Lichfield. By his old acquaintance Dr. Green, bishop of Lincoln, he was made a prebendary of that church. But in 1767, by the intervention of the duke of Newcastle, to whose interest, in the memorable contest for the high stewardship of the university, he had adhered in opposition to some temptations, he obtained a stall in the church of Durham. The year after this, the duke of Grafton, who had a short time before been elected chancellor of the university, recommended the master of Peterhouse to his majesty for the bishopric of Carlisle. This recommendation was made, not only without solicitation on his part, or that of his friends, but without his knowledge, until the duke’s intention in his favour was signified to him by the archbishop.

The life of Dr. Law was a life of incessant reading: and thought, almost entirely directed to metaphysical and religious inquiries; but the tenet by which his name and writings are principally distinguished, is, “that Jesus Christ, at his second coming, will, by an act of his power, restore to life and consciousness the dead of the human species; who by their own nature, and without this interposition, would remain in the state of insensibility to which the death brought upon mankind by the sin of Adam had reduced them.” He interpreted literally that saying of St. Paul, I. Cor. xv. 21. “As by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.” This opinion, Dr. Paley says, had no other effect upon his own mind, than to increase his reverence for Christianity, and for its divine founder. He retained it, as he did his other speculative opinions, without laying, as many are wont to do, an extravagant stress upon their importance, and without pretending to more certainty than the subject allowed of. No man formed his own conclusions with more freedom, or treated those of others with greater candour and equity. He never quarrelled with any person for differing from him, or considered that difference as a sufficient reason for questioning any man’s sincerity, or judging meanly of his understanding. He was zealously attached to religious liberty, because he thought that it leads to truth; yet from his heart he loved peace. But he did not perceive any repugnancy in these two things. There was nothing in his elevation to his bishopric which he spoke of with more pleasure, than its being a proof that decent freedom of inquiry was not discouraged. He was a man of great softness of manners, and of the mildest and most tranquil disposition. His voice was never raised above its ordinary pitch. His countenance seemed never to have been ruffled; it preserved the same kind and composed aspect, truly indicating the calmness and benignity of his temper. He had an utter dislike of large and mixed companies. Next to his books, his chief satisfaction was in the serious conrersation of a literary companion, or in the company of a few friends. In this sort of society he would open his rnind with great unreservedness, and with a peculiar turn and sprightliness of expression. His person was low, but well formed; his complexion fair and delicate. Except occasional interruptions by the gout, he had for the greatest part of his life enjoyed good health; and when not confined by that distemper, was full of motion and activity. About nine years before his death, he'was greatly enfeebled by a severe attack of the gout, and in a short time after that, lost the use of one of his legs. Notwithstanding his fondness for exercise, he resigned himself to this change, not only without complaint, but without any sensible diminution of his cheerfulness and good humour. His fault was the general fault of retired and studious characters, too great a degree of inaction and facility in his public station. The modestj, or rather bashfulness of his nature, together with an extreme unwillingness to give pain, rendered him sometimes less firm and efficient in the administration of authority than was requisite. But it is the condition of human nature. There is an opposition between some virtues, which seldom permits them to subsist together in perfection. Bishop Law was interred in the cathedral of Carlisle, in which a handsome monument is erected to his memory. Of his family, his second son, John, bishop of Elphin, died in 1810; and his fourth son, Edward, is now lord Ellenborough, chief-justice of the king’s-bench.

, usually known by the name of the projector, was born at Edinburgh, in April 1671; and on the death of his father, who was a goldsmith or banker, inherited a considerable estate, called Lauriston. He is said to have made some progress in polite literature, but his more favourite study was that of financial matters, banks, taxes, &c. and he was at the same time a man of pleasure, and distinguished by the appellation of Beau Law. Having visited London in 1694, his wit and accomplishments procured him admission into the first circles, and he became noted for his gallant attentions to the ladies. One of his intrigues having involved him in a quarrel with a Mr. Wilson, a duel took place, and Mr. Law killed his antagonist. He was then apprehended, and committed to the king’s-bench prison, from which he made his escape, and is supposed to have retired to the continent. In 1700, however, he returned to Edinburgh, as he appears in that year to have written his “Proposals and reasons for constituting a Council of Trade,” which, although it met with no encouragement from the supremo judicature of the kingdom, procured him the patronage of some noblemen, under which he was induced in 1705, to publish another plan for removing the difficulties the kingdom was then, exposed to by the great scarcity of money, and the insolvency of the bank. The object of his plan was to issue notes, which were to be lent on landed property, upon the principle, that being so secured, they would be equal in value to gold and silver money of the same denomination, and even preferred to those metals, as not being liable to fall in value like them. This plausible scheme being also rejected as an improper expedient, Mr. Law now abandoned his native country, and went to Holland, on purpose to improve himself in that great school of banking and finance. He aftewards resided at Brussels, where his profound skill in calculation is said to have contributed to his extraordinary success at play.

On his arrival at Paris, his mind was occupied with higher objects, and he now presented to the comptrollergeneral of the finances under Louis XIV. a plan which was approved by that minister, but is said to have been rejected by the king because “he would have nothing to do with a heretic.” After, however, a short residence in Sardinia, where he in vain wanted to persuade Victor Amadeus to adopt one of his plans for aggrandizing his territories, he returned to Paris on the death of Louis XIV. and was more favourably received. He gained the confidence of the regent to such a degree, that he not only admitted him to all his convivial parties, but nominated him one of his counsellors of state. France was at this time burthened with an immense debt, which Law proposed to liquidate, by establishing a bank for issuing notes secured on landed property, and on all the royal revenues, unalienably engaged for that purpose. This scheme was approved of, but the conjuncture being thought unfavourable, he could only obtain letters patent, dated May 30, 1716, for establishing a private bank at Paris, along with his brother and some other associates. This scheme promised success, and the bank had acquired great credit, when it was dissolved in December 1718, by an arbitrary arret of the regent, who, observing the great advantages arising from it, and perceiving also that the people were growing fond of paper money, resolved to take it into the hands of government.

Mr. Law, however, was named director-general of this royal bank, and branches of it were established at Lyons, Rochelle, Tours, Orleans, and Amiens. In 1720, he began to develope his grand project, so well known to all Europe, under the name of the Missisippi scheme. This scheme was no less than the vesting the whole privileges, effects, and possessions of all the foreign trading companies, the great farms, the profits of the mint, the general receipt of the king’s revenue, and the management and property of the bank, in one great company, who thus having in their hands all the trade, taxes, and royal revenues, might be enabled to multiply the notes of the bank to any extent they pleased, doubling or even trebling at will the circulating cash of the kingdom; and by the greatness of their funds, possessed of a power to carry the foreign trade, and the culture of the colonies, to a height altogether impracticable by any other means. This monstrous and impracticable monopoly was approved of by the regent, who issued letters patent for erecting the “Company of the West,” to which he granted at the same time, the whole province of Louisiana, or the country on the river Missisippi, from which the scheme took its name. That part of America having been represented as a region abounding in gold and silver, and possessing a fertile and luxurious soil, the actions or shares were bought up with great avidity; and such was the rage for speculation, that the unimproved parts of the colony were actually sold for 30,000 livres the square league.

The “Company of the West,” of which Law was of course director-general, in pursuance of his scheme, undertook the farm of tobacco at an advanced rent of upwards of two millions of livres; they soon after engrossed the charter and effects of the Senegal company, and in May 1719, actually procured the grant of an exclusive trade to the East Indies, China, and the South-sea^, with all the possessions and effects of the China and India companies, which were now dissolved on the condition of liquidating their debts. The price of actions soon rose from 550 to 1000 livres each. On July 25th, the mint was made over to this company, which now assumed the name of “The Company of the Indies” for a consideration of fifty millions of livres, and on Aug. 27, following, they also obtained a lease of the farms, for which they agreed to pay three millions and a half of livres advanced rent. Having thus concentered within themselves, not only the whole foreign trade and possessions of France, but the collection and management of the royal revenues, they promised an annual dividend of 200 livres per share, in consequence of which the price of actions rose to 5000 livres, and a rage for the purchase of their stock seems to have infatuated all ranks in the kingdom. The whole nation, clergy, laity, peers, and plebeians, statesmen, and princes, nay even ladies, who had, or could procure money for that purpose, turned stock-jobbers, outbidding each other with such avidity, that in November 1719, after some fluctuations, the price of actions rose to above 10,000 livres, more than sixty times the sum they originally sold for.

Our projector had now arrived at an unexampled pitch of power and wealth; he possessed the ear of the duke of Orleans; he was almost adored by the people, and was constantly surrounded by princes, dukes, and prelates, who courted his friendship, and even seemed ambitious of his patronage. Such was the immensity of his property, that he bought no less than fourteen estates with titles annexed to them, among which was the marquisate of Rosny, that had belonged to the great duke of Sully, the minister and friend of Henry IV. About this period too, a free pardon for the murder of Mr. Wilson was conveyed to him from England, while Edinburgh, proud of having produced so great a man, transmitted the freedom of the city in a gold box.

The only obstacle to his advancement to the highest offices in the state being soon after removed by his abjuration of the protestant religion, he was declared comptroller-general of the finances on Jan. 18, 1720. But after having raised himself to such an envied situation, he at length fell a sacrifice to the intrigues of the other ministers, who, playing upon the fears of the regent, induced him to issue an arret on May 21, 1720, which, contrary to sound policy, and even to the most solemn stipulations, reduced the value of the company’s bank notes one half, and fixed their actions or shares at 5000 livres. By this fatal step, which seems to have been taken in opposition to the opinion and advice of the comptroller-general, the whole paper fabrick was destroyed, and this immense speculation turned out to be a mere bubble. The consternation of the populace was soon converted into rage; troops were obliged to be stationed in all parts of the capital to prevent mischief; and such was the depreciation of this boasted paper money, that 100 livres were given for a single louis-d'or. Law with some difficulty made his escape to Brussels, and of all his wealth and property, retained only the salary of his office, through the friendship of the duke of Orleans.

After waiting for some time, in expectation of being recalled to France, he travelled through part of Europe, and at length, in consequence of an invitation from the British ministry, arrived in England in Oct. 1721, was presented to the king, George I. and afterwards hired a house in Conduit-street, Hanover-square, where he was daily visited by people of the first quality and distinction. In 1722 he repaired once more to the continent, and concluded the chequered course of his life at Venice, in March 1729, in the fifty-eighth year of his age. He was at this time in a state little removed from indigence. Various opinions have been entertained respecting the merit of his project, but it seems generally agreed that if it had not been violently interrupted by the regent’s arret, it was too insecure in its principles to have been permanent. His family estate of Lauriston is still in the possession of his descendants, one of whom, the eldest sou of John Law de Lauriston, governor of Pondicherry, was one of the officers who perished in the unfortunate voyage of De la Perouse, and was succeeded as the head of the family, by general Lauriston, known in this country as the bearer of the ratification of the preliminaries of the short-lived peace between Great Britain and France in 1802.

By some persons now or lately living at Cliffe, who knew Mr. Law, it is reported that he was by nature of an active and cheerful disposition, very warm-hearted, unaffected, and affable, but not to appearance so remarkable for meekness “as some others of the most revered members of the Christian church are reported to have been.” He was in stature rather over than under the middle size; not corpulent, but stout made, with broad shoulders; his visage was round, his eyes grey, his features well-proportioned, and not large, his complexion ruddy, and his countenance open and agreeable. He was naturally more inclined to be merry than sad. In his habits he was very regular and temperate; he rose early, breakfasted in his bed-room on one cup of chocolate; joined his family in prayer at nine o‘clock, and again, soon after noon, at dinner. When the daily provision for the poor was not made punctually at the usual hour, he expressed his displeasure sharply, but seldom on any other occasion. He did not join Mrs. Gibbon and Mrs. Hutcheson at the tea-table, but sometimes ate a few raisins standing while they sat. At an early supper, after an hour’s walk in his field, or elsewhere, he ate something, and drank one or two glasses of wine; then joined in prayer with the ladies and their servants, attended to the reading of some portion of scripture, and at nine o’clock retired.

We know not where a more just character of this singular man can be found than in the “Miscellaneous Works” of Gibbon, the historian, who has for once praised a churchman and a man of piety, not only without irony, but with affection. “In our family,” says Gibbon, “he left the reputation of a worthy and pious man, who believed all that he professed, and practised all that he enjoined. The character of a nonjuror, which he maintained to the last, is a sufficient evidence of his principles in church and state; and the sacrifice of interest to conscience will be always respectable. His theological writings, which our domestic connection has tempted me to peruse, preserve an imperfect sort of life, and I can pronounce with more confidence and knowledge on the merits of the author. His last compositions are darkly tinctured by the incomprehensible visions of Jacob Behmen; and his discourse? on the absolute unlawfulness of stage-entertainments is sometimes quoted for a ridiculous intemperance of sentiment and language. But these sallies of religious phrensy must not extinguish the praise which is due to Mr. William Law as a wit and a scholar. His argument on topics of less absurdity is specious and acute, his manner is lively, his style forcible and clear; and, had not his vigorous mind been clouded by enthusiasm, he might be ranked with the most agreeable and ingeniotfs writers of the times. While the Bangorian controversy was a fashionable theme, he entered the lists on the subject of Christ’s kingdom, and the authority of the priesthood; against the Plain account of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper‘ he resumed the combat with bishop Hoadly, the object of Whig idolatry and Tory abhorrence; and at every weapon of attack and defence, the nonjuror, on the ground which is common to both, approves himself at least equal to the prelate. On the appearance of the Fable of the Bees,’ he drew his pen against the licentious doctrine that private vices are public benefits, and morality as well as religion must join in his applause. Mr. Law’s masterwork, the ‘Serious Call,’ is still read as a popular and powerful book of devotion. His precepts are rigid, but they are founded on the gospel; his satire is sharp, but it is drawn from the knowledge of human life; and many of his portraits are not unworthy of the pen of La Bruyere *. If he finds a spark of piety in his reader’s mind, be will soon kindle it to a flame; and a philosopher must allow that he exposes, with equal severity and truth, the strange contradiction between the faith and practice of the Christian world.”

Lawes taught music to the family of the earl of Bridgewater: he was intimate with Milton, as may be conjectured from that sonnet of the latter, “Harry, whose tuneful and well-measured song.” Peck says, that Milton wrote his masque of “Comus” at the request of Lawes, who engaged to set it to music. Most of the songs of Waller are set by Lawes; and Waller has acknowledged his obligation to him for one in particular, which he had set in 1635, in a poem, wherein he celebrates his skill as a musician. Fenton, in a note on this poem, says, that the best poets of that age were ambitious of having their verses set by this incomparable artist; who introduced a softer mixture of Italian airs than before had been practised in our nation. Dr. Burney entertains another kind of suspicion. “Whether,” says this historian, “Milton chose Lawes, or Lawes Milton for a colleague in Comus, it equally manifests the high rank in which he stood with the greatest poets of his time. It would be illiberal to cherish such an idea; but it does sometimes seem as if the twin-sisters. Poetry and Music, were mutually jealous of each other’s glory: * the less interesting my sister’s offspring may be,‘ says Poetry, * the more admiration will my own obtain.’ Upon asking some years ago, why a certain great prince continued to honour with such peculiar marks of favour, an old performer on the flute, when he had so many musicians of superior abilities about him? We were answered, * because he plays worse than himself.' And who knows whether Milton and Waller were not secretly influenced by some such consideration? and were not more pleased with Lawes for not pretending to embellish or enforce the sentiments of their songs, but setting them to sounds less captivating than the sense.”

, an eminent physician, the son of captain Thomas Lawrence of the royal navy, and grandson of Dr. Thomas Lawrence, first physician to queen Anne, was born May 25, 1711, in the parish of St. Margaret, Westminster. His mother was Elizabeth, daughter of Mr. Gabriel Soulden, merchant of Kinsale in Ireland, and widow of colonel Piers. His father’s residence being at Southampton, he was placed under the care of the rev. Mr. Kingsman, master of the free-school at that place, but had previously received some education at Dublin, where his father was in 1715. In 1727 he was entered as a commoner of Trinity college, Oxford, under the tuition of the rev. George Huddesford, afterwards president of that college; and here he pursued his studies until some time in 1734. He then removed to London, and took a lodging in the city for the convenience of attending St. Thomas’s hospital, and became a pupil of Dr. Nicholls, who was at that time reading anatomical lectures, with uncommon celebrity. Mr. Lawrence made a suitable progress under so able an instructor, and at those lectures formed many of the friendships which he most valued during the remainder of his life; among others he became here first acquainted with Dr. Bathurst, who introduced him to the friendship of Dr. Johnson.

, master-gunner of England, was born at Harwich, in 1629, and being bred to the sea-service, distinguished himself by his skill and bravery in many actions. At the restoration he was made master-gunner of the Princess, a frigate of fifty guns; and in the first Dutch war exhibited his skill and bravery in two very extraordinary actions, in one against fifteen sail of Dutch men of war, and another in 1667, against two Danish ships in the Baltic, in which, the principal officers being killed, the command devolved on him, though only master-gunner. In 1669 he was promoted to be gunner of the Royal Prince, a first-rate man of war. In 1673 he was engaged with his two sons Henry and John, against Van Trump. His ship was the Royal Prince, a first-rate man of war, all the masts of which were shot away, four hundred of her men killed or disabled, and most of her upper tier of guns dismounted. Whilst she was thus a wreck, a large Dutch ship of war came down upon her, with two fire-ships, meaning to burn or carry her off. Captain, afterwards sir George Rooke, thinking her condition hopeless, ordered the men to save their lives, and strike the colours. Mr. Leake, hearing this, ordered the lieutenant off the quarter-deck, and took the command upon himself, saying, “the Royal Prince shall never be given up while I am alive to defend her.” The chief- gunner’s gallantry communicated itself to all around the crew returned with spirit to their guns, and, under the direction of Mr. Leake and his two sons, compelled the Dutchman to sheer off, and sunk both the fireships. Leake afterwards brought the Royal Prince safe to Chatham; but the joy of his victory was damped by the loss of his son Henry, who was killed by his side. He was afterwards made master-gunner of England, and storekeeper of the ordnance at Woolwich. He had a particular genius for every thing which related to the management of artillery, and was the first who contrived to fire otf a mortar by the blast of a piece, which has been used ever since. He was also very skilful in the composition of fire-works, which he often and successfully exhibited for the amusement of the king, and his brother, the duke of York. He died in 1686, leaving a son, who is the subject of our next article.

Having brought the campaign to so happy a conclusion, he returned home; where, during his absence, he had been appointed one of the council to the lord-high-admiral, and was likewise elected member of parliament both for Harwich and Rochester, for the latter of which he made his choice. In December the same year, he was made a second time admiral of the fleet. In May 1709, he was constituted rear-admiral of Great -Britain, and appointed one of the lords of the admiralty in December. Upon the change of the ministry in 1710, lord Orford resigning the place of first commissioner of the admiralty, sir John Leake was appointed to succeed him; but he declined that post, as too hazardous, on account of the divisions at that juncture. In 1710, he was chosen a second time member of parliament for Rochester, and made admiral of the fleet the third time in 1711, and again in 1712, when he conducted the English forces to take possession of Dunkirk. Before the expiration of the year, the commission of admiral of the fleet was given to him a fifth time. He was also chosen for Rochester a third time. Upon her majesty’s decease, 'Aug. l, 1714, his post of rear-admiral was determined; and he was superseded as admiral of the fleet by Matthew Aylmer, esq. Nov. 5. In the universal change that was made in every public department, upon the accession of George I. admiral Leake could not expect to be excepted. After this he lived privately; and, building a little box at Greenwich, spent part of his time there, retreating sometimes to a country-house he had at Beddington in Surrey. When a young man, be had married a daughter of captain Richard Hill of Yarmouth; by whom he had one son, an only child, whose misconduct had given him a great deal of uneasiness. In Aug. 1719, he was seized with an apoplectic disorder; but it went off without any visible ill consequence. Upon the death of his son, which happened in March following, after a lingering incurable disorder, he discovered more than ordinary affliction; nor was he himself ever well after; for he died in his house at Greenwich, Aug. 1, 1720, in his sixty-fifth year. By his will, he devised his estate to trustees for the use of his son during life: and upon his death without issue, to captain Martin, who married his wife’s sister, and his heirs.

, a herald and antiquary, son of captain Stephen Martin, mentioned in the preceding article, was born April 5, 1702. He was educated at the school of Mr. Michael Maittaire, and was admitted of the Middle-temple. In 1724 he was appointed a deputylieutenant of the Tower-hamlets; in which station he afterwards distinguished himself by his exertions during the rebellion in 1745. On the revival of the order of the Bath in 1725, he was one of the esquires of the earl of Sussex, deputy earl-marshal. He was elected F. A. S. March 2, 1726-7. In the same year he was created Lancaster herald, in the room of Mr. Hesketh; in 1729 constituted Norroy; in 1741 Clarenceux; and by patent dated December 19, 1754, appointed garter. In all his situations in the college Mr. Leake was a constant advocate for the rights and privileges of the office. He obtained, after much solicitation, a letter in 1731, from the duke of Norfolk to the earl of Sussex, his deputy earl -marshal, requesting him to sign a warrant for Mr. Leake’s obtaining a commission of visitation, which letter, however, was not attended with success. In the same year he promoted a prosecution against one Shiets, a painter, who pretended to keep an om'ce of arms in Dean’s-court. The court of chivalry was opened with great solemnity in the paintedchamber, on March 3, 1731-2, in relation to which he had taken a principal part. In 1733, he appointed Francis Bassano, of Chester, his deputy, as Norroy, for Chester and North Wales; and about the same time asserted his right, as Norroy, to grant arms in North Wales, which right was claimed by Mr. Longville, who had been constituted Gloucester King at Arms partium Walii<t, annexed to that of Bath King at Arms, at the revival of that order. He drew up a petition in January 1737-8, which was presented to the king in council, for a new charter, with the sole power of painting arms, &c. which petition was referred to the attorney and solicitor general; but they making their report favourable to the painters, it did not succeed. He printed, in 1744, “Reasons for granting Commissions to the Provincial Kings at Arms for visiting their Provinces.” Dr. Cromwell Mortimer having, in 1747, proposed to establish a registry for dissenters in the college of arms, he had many meetings with the heads of the several denominations, and also of the Jews, and drew up articles of agreement, which were approved by all parties: proposals were printed and dispersed, a seal made to affix to certificates, and the registry was opened on February 20, 1747-8; but it did not succeed, owing to a misunderstanding between the ministers and the deputies of the congregations. A bill having been brought in by Mr. Potter, in the session of parliament in the year 1763, for taking the number of the people, with their marriages and births, he solicited a claim in favour of the college: but the bill did not pass. In 1755-6, he made an abstract of the register- books belonging to the order of the garter, which being translated into Latin, was deposited in the register’s office of the order.

In 1726, he published his “Nummi Britan. Historia, or Historical Account of English Money.” A new edition, with large additions, was printed in 1745, dedicated to the duke of Suffolk. It is much to Mr. Leake’s honour, that he was the first writer upon the English coinage. From affectionate gratitude to admiral sir John Leake, and at the particular desire of his father, he had written a history of the life of that admiral, prepared from a great collection of books and papers relating to the subject which were in his possession. This he published in 1750, in large octavo. Fifty copies only were printed, to be given to his friends: this book is therefore very scarce and difficult to be obtained. Bowyer, in 1766, printed for him fifty copies of the Statutes of the Order of St. George, to enable him to supply each knight at his installation with one, as he was required to do officially. Ever attentive to promote science, he was constantly adding to the knowledge of arms, decents, honors, precedency, the history of the college, and of the several persons who had been officers of arms, and every other subject in any manner connected with his office. He also wrote several original essays on some of those subjects. These multifarious collections are contained in upward of fifty volumes, all in his own handwriting; which ms., with many others, he bequeathed to his son, John-Martin Leake, esq. He married Ann, youngest daughter, and at length sole- heiress of Fletcher Pervall, esq. of Downton, in the parish and county of Radnor, by Ann his wife, daughter of Samuel Hoole of London, by whom he had nine children, six sons and three daughters; all of whom survived him. He died at his seat at Mile-end at Middlesex, March 24, 1773, in the seventieth year of his age, and was buried in the chancel of Thorpe Soken church in Essex, of which parish he was long impropriator, and owner of the seat of Thorpe-hall, and the estate belonging to it, inheriting them from his father.

, an English physician and writer, was the son of a clergyman who was curate of Ainstable in Cumberland. He was educated partly at Croglin, and partly at the grammar-school at Bishop Auckland. He then went to London, intending to engage in the military profession: but finding some promises, with which he had been flattered, were not likely soon to be realized, he turned his attention to medicine. After attending the hospitals, and being admitted a member of the corporation of surgeons, an opportunity presented itself of improving himself in foreign schools; he embarked for Lisbon, and afterwards visited Italy. On his return, he established himself as a surgeon and accoucheur in the neighbourhood of Piccadilly; and about that time published “A Dissertation on the Properties and Efficacy of the Lisbon Dietdrink,” which he professed to administer with success in many desperate cases of scrophula, scurvy, &c. Where he obtained his doctor’s diploma is not known; but he became ere long a licentiate of the College of Physicians, and removed to Craven-street, where he began to lecture on the obstetric art, and invited the faculty to attend. ID 1765 he purchased a piece of ground on a building lease, and afterwards published the plan for the institution of the Westminster Lying-in- Hospital and as soon as the building was raised, he voluntarily, and without any consideration, assigned over to the governors all his right in the premises, in favour of the hospital. He enjoyed a considerable share of reputation and practice as an accoucheur, anJ as a lecturer; and was esteemed a polite and accomplished man. He added nothing, however, in the way of improvement, to his profession, and his writings are not characterized by any extraordinary acuteness, or depth of research; but are plain, correct, and practical. He was attacked, in the summer of 1792, with a disorder of the chest, with which he had been previously affected, and was found dead in his bed on the 8th of August of that year. He published, in 1773, a volume of “Practical Observations on Child-bed Fever;” and, in 1774, “A Lecture introductory to the Theory and Practice of Midwifery, including the history, nature, and tendency of that science,” &c. This was afterwards considerably altered and enlarged, and published in two volumes, under the title of “Medical Instructions towards the prevention and cure of various Diseases incident to Women,” &c. The work passed through seven or eight editions, and was translated into the French and German languages. In the beginning of 1792, ^a short time before his death, he published “A practical Essay on the Diseases of the Viscera, particularly those of the Stomach and Bowels.”

, a young lady of considerable poetical talent, was born Feb. 26, 1722. Her father, at thistime was gardener to judge Blencowe, at Marston St. Lawrence, in Northamptonshire. She was brought up under the care of a pious and sensible mother, who died a few years before her. The little education which she received, consisted wholly in being taught to read and write, and it is said that she was for some time cook-maid in a gentleman’s family: with all these disadvantages, however, she began at a very early age to compose verses, at first with the approbation of her parents, who afterwards, imagining an attention to poetry would be prejudicial to her, endeavoured by every possible means to discountenance such pursuits. These, however, were ineffectual, and she was at last left to follow her inclination. She died the 12th of November, 1746, at Brackley; and after her death two volumes of her Poems were printed in 8vo, in. 1748 and 1751, by subscription, the proposals for which were drawn up by Mr. Garrick. Mr. Hawkins Browne was editor of the second volume. Our late amiable poet and critic, Cowper, had a high opinion of Mrs. Leapor’s poetry.

, a French historian and antiquary, was born at Auxerre in 1687, and became a member of the academy of belles lettres and inscriptions of Paris in 1750. He died in 1760, aged 73. Among his productions are, 1. “Recueil de divers Merits servant a Pe‘claircissement de l’histoire fie France,” 1738, 2 vols. 12mo. 2. “Dissertations sur l'histoire ecclésiastique et civile de Paris;” to which are added several matters that elucidate the history of France; 3 vols. 12mo. 3. “Traité historique et pratique sur le chant ecciesiastique,” 1741, 8vo. This was dedicated to Vintimille, archbishop of Paris, who had employed him in composing a chant for his new breviary and missal. 4. “M6moires sur l‘Histoire d’Anxerre,” 1743, 2 vols. 4to. 5. “Histoire de la ville et de tout le diocese de Paris,” 15 vols. 12mo. 6. Several dissertations dispersed in the journals, and in the memoirs of the academy of which he was member. The learned are indebted to him likewise for the discovery of a number of original pieces, which he found in various libraries, where they had long remained unknown. He was a man of extensive learning and laborious research; and undertook several journeys through the different provinces of France for the purpose of investigating the remains of antiquity. In such matters he was an enthusiast, and so engaged in them, as to know very little of the world, being content with the very small competency on which he lived.

, historiographer of buildings of the academy della Crusca, and of that of the Arcades at Rome, was born at Dijon, in 1707, of poor parents, but he went early to Paris, where his talents procured him friends and patrons. He then came to London, and met with the same advantage. In 1746 Maupertuis offered him, on the part of the king of Prussia, a place suitable to a man of letters, at the court of Berlin; but he preferred mediocrity at home to flattering hopes held out to him from abroad. He died in 1781. His tragedy of “Abensaïde,” the subject of which is very interesting, was well received at first, notwithstanding the harshness of the versification but it did not support this success when revived on the stage in 1743. What most brought the abbé Le Blanc into repute was the collection of his letters on the English, 1758, 3 vols. 12mo, in which are many judicious reflections; but he is heavy, formal, fruitful in vulgar notions, and trivial in his erudition, and the praises he bestows on the great men, or the literati, to whom he addresses his letters, are deficient in ease and delicacy. The letters of abbé Le Blanc cannot bear a comparison with the “London” of Grosley, who is a far more agreeable writer, if not a more accurate observer.