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, or in Latin Jannonius (Peter), was born at Ischitella, a small town in Apulia, in the month of May 1676, and practised the law, but was much more distinguished as an historian. In 1723 he wrote a “History of Naples,” in 4 vols. 4to. The style is pure, but the freedom with which he discussed several topics relating to the origin of the papal power gave so much offence to the court of Rome, that he was obliged to exile himself from his native country. He found an asylum with the king of Sardinia, who did not, however, dare to avow himself his protector, but chose rather to represent his situation as that of a prisoner. Giannone died in Piedmont in April 1748. Extracts from his history were afterwards printed in Holland, under the title of “Anecdotes Ecclesiastiques.” His posthumous works were given to the world in a 4to volume, 1768, containing, among other miscellaneous matter, his profession of faith, and a justification of his history; and a life of him, by Leonard Panzini. There is a correct, but not very elegant French translation by Desmonceaux, Hague, 4 vols. 4to, and an English one, by capt. Ogilvie, in 1729 1731, in 2 vols. fol.

, an eminent musician, and in many respects the greatest performer on the violin during the last century, was a native of Piedmont; and when a boy, was a chorister in the Duomo at Milan, under Paladini, of whom he learned singing, the harpsichord, and composition; but having previously manifested a partiality for the violin, his father recalled him to Turin, in order to receive instructions on that instrument of the famous Somis. He went to Rome early in his life, and afterwards to Naples, where, having obtained a place among ripienos in the opera orchestra, he used to flourish and change passages much more frequently than he ought to have done. “However,” says Giardini, of whom Dr. Burney had this account, “I acquired great reputation among the ignorant for my impertinence yet one night, during the opera, Jomellfc who had composed it, came into the orchestra, and seating himself close by, me, I determined to give the maestro di cappella a touch of my taste and execution; and in the symphony of the next song, which was in a pathetic style, I gave loose to my fingers and fancy; for which I was rewarded by the composer with a violent slap in the face; which,” adds Giardini, “was the best lesson I ever received from a great master in my life.” Jomelli, after this, was however very kind, in a different way, to this young and wonderful musician.

Giardini came to England in the spring of 1750. His first public performance in London was at a benefit concert, on which occasion he played a solo and concerto, and though there was very little company, the applause was so loud, long, and furious, as nothing but that bestowed on Garrick had ever equalled. Inconsequence, he soon was engaged and caressed at most of the private concerts of the principal nobility, gentry, and foreign ministers; at the Castle and King’s-arms concert in the city; and in 1754 he was placed at the head of the opera band; in which he introduced a new discipline, and a new style of playing, much superior in itself, and more congenial with the poetry and music of Italy, than the languid manner of his predecessor Festing.

In 1756, on the failure and flight of the Impresario, or undertaker of the opera, Vaneschi, Mingotti, and Giardini joined their interests, and became managers, but found themselves involved at the end of the season in such difficulties, that they were glad to retire. Giardini, while in the opera management, besides arranging pasticcios, set several entire dramas; but though he had so great a hand on his instrument, so much fancy in his cadences and solos, yet he had not sufficient force or variety to supply a whole evening’s entertainment at the Lyric theatre, although he continued to throw in a single air or rondeau into the operas of other masters, which was more applauded than all the rest of the drama. In 1762, in spite of former miscarriages, Giardini and Mingotti again resumed the reins of opera government. But, after struggling two years, they again resigned it, and from this period Giardini was forced to content himself with teaching ladies of rank and fashion to sing, and the produce of a great annual benefit* He continued here unrivalled as a leader, a solo player, and a composer for his instrument, still augmenting the importance of his instrument and our national partiality for the taste of his country, till the admirable productions and great performers of Germany began to form a Teutonic interest and Germanic body here, which, before Giardini’s departure from London, became very formidable rivals to him and his Roman legion.

At the end of 1784, he went to Italy, and after remaining on the continent till the summer of 1789, returned to this country, bringing with him a female pupil and her whole family. He then attempted aburletta opera at the little theatre in the Hay market, while the operahouse, which had been burned down, was rebuilding; but his speculation failed. During his absence the public had learned to do without him, and reconciled themselves to his loss; his health, hand, and eyes were impaired; he was dropsical, his legs were of an enormous size, and little of his former superiority on his instrument remaine 1, but his fine tone. He composed quartets that pleased very much, but in which he never played any other part in public than the tenor. The style of music was changed; he printed many of his old compositions which used to please; but now could gain neither purchasers nor hearers, so that about 1793, he went to Petersburg with his burletta troop; which seems to have pleased as little there and at Moscow, as in London; and he is said to have died in this hist city in great wretchedness and poverty!

, a Scotch divine of considerable talents and zeal, and one of the founders of the Secession church in Scotland, (See Erskine, Ebenezer, and Ralph), and the leader of that division of the seceders called the Antiburghers, was born in Perthshire, in 1713, and was educated at the university of Edinburgh. Soon after 1730, violent disputes occurring in the general assembly of the church of Scotland, respecting the law of patronage, Mr. Gib was among the keenest opponents of private church patronage, and in 1733 was with three others dismissed from his pastoral charge. These afterwards formed congregations of their own, to one of which, at Edinburgh, Mr. Gib was ordained, in April 1741. This congregation gradually increased, and with others of the same kind, was in a flourishing state, when in 1746 a schism took place among them respecting the swearing of the oaths of burgesses, and from this time the secession church was divided into two parties, called burghers and antiburghers, and Mr. Gib was considered as the ablest advocate for the latter. In 1774 he published “A display of the Secession testimony,” 2 vols. 8vo, and in 1786 his “Sacred Contemplations,” at the end of which was an “Essay on Liberty and Necessity,” in answer to lord Kames’s Essay on that subject. Mr. Gib died at Edinburgh, June 18, 1788, and was buried in the Grey-friars church-yard, where art elegant monument has been erected to his memory, at the expence of his congregation, among whom he had unweariedly laboured for the long period of forty-seven years.

, an eminent English historian, was descended from an ancient family of that name in Kent. His grandfather, Edward Gibbon, a citizen of London, was appointed one of the commissioners of customs under the Tory administration of the last four years of queen Anne, and was praised by lord Bolingbroke for his knowledge of commerce and finance. He was elected one of the directors of the unfortunate South-sea company, in 1716, at which time he had acquired an independent fortune of 60,000l. the whole of which he lost when the company failed in 1720. The sum of 10,000l. however, was allowed for his maintenance, and on this foundation he reared another fortune, not much inferior to the first, an<,i secured a part of it in the purchase of landed property. He died in December 1736, at his house at Putney, and by his last will enriched two daughters, at the expence of his son Edward, who had married against his consent. This son was sent to Cambridge, where at Emanuel college, he “passed through a regular course of academical discipline,” but left it without a degree, and afterwards travelled. On his return to England he was chosen, in 1734, member of parliament for the borough of Petersfield, and in 1741 for Southampton. In parliament he joined the party which after a long contest, finally drove sir Robert Walpole and his friends from their places. Our author has not concealed that “in the pursuit of an unpopular minister, he gratified a private revenge against the oppressor of his family in the South-sea persecution.” "Walpole, however, was not that oppressor, for Mr. CoxC has clearly proved that he frequently endeavoured to stem the torrent of parliamentary vengeance, and to incline the sentiments* of the house to terms of moderation.

Edward Gibbon, the more immediate subject of thii article, was born at Putney April 27, O. S. 1737. His mother was Judith Porten, the daughter of a merchant of London. He was the eldest of five brothers and a sister, all of whom died in their infancy. During his early years, his constitution was uncommonly feeble, but he was nursed with much tenderness by his maiden aunt, Mrs. Catherine Porten, and received such instruction during intervals of health, as his years admitted. At the age of seven he was placed under the care of Mr. John Kirkby, the author of “Automathes,” a philosophical fiction. In his ninth year, January 1746, he was sent to a school at Kingston upon Thames, kept by Dr. Woodeson and his assistants; but even here Ins studies were frequently interrupted by sickness, nor does he speak with rapture either of his proficiency, or of the school itself. In 1747, on his mother’s death, he was recalled home, where, during a residence of two years, principally under the eye of his affectionate aunt, he appears to have acquired that passion for reading which predominated during the whole of his life.

In 1749 he was entered in Westminster-school, of which, within the space of two years, he reached the third form, but his application was so frequently rendered useless by sickness and debility, that it was determined to send him to Bath. Here, and at Putney, he recovered his health so far as to be able to return to his books, and as he approached his sixteenth year, his disorder entirely left him. The frequent interruptions, however, which he had met with, and probably a dread of the confined air of the city of Westminster, had induced his father to place him at Esher, in Surrey, in the house of the rev. Philip Francis, the translator of Horace. But his hopes were again frustrated. Mr. Francis preferred the pleasures of London to the instruction of his pupils; and our scholar, without farther preparation, was hurried to Oxford, where, on April 3, 1752, before he had accomplished his fifteenth year, he was matriculated as a gentleman commoner of Magdalencollege*.

To Oxford, he informs us, he brought “a stock of erudition that might have puzzled a doctor, and a degree of ignorance of which a school-boy would have been ashamed.” During the last three years, although sickness interrupted a regular course of instruction, his fondBess for books increased, and he was permitted to indulge it by ranging over the shelves without plan or design. His indiscriminate appetite fixed by degrees in the historical line, and he perused with greatest avidity such historical books as came in his way, gratifying a curiosity of which he could not trace the source, and supplying wants which he could not express. In this course of desultory reading be seems inconsciously to have been led t6 that particular branch in which he was afterwards to excel. But whatever connection this had with his more distant life, it was by no means favourable to his academical pursuits. He was exceedingly deficient in classical learning, and went to Oxford without either the taste or preparation which could enable him to reap the advantages of academical education. This may probably account for the harshness with which he speaks of the English universities. He informs us that he spent fourteen months at Magdalencollege, which proved the most idle and unprofitable of his whole life; but why they were so idle and unprofitable, we cannot learn from his Memoirs. To the carelessness of his tutors, indeed, he appears to have had some reason to object, but he allows that he was disposed to gaiety and to late hours, and therefore complains with little justice, that he was not taught what he affected to despise. The truth seems to be, that when he sat down to write his Memoirs, the memoirs of an eminent and accomolisued seholar, he found a blank which is seldom found in the bicM graphy of English scholars; the early displays of genius, the laudable emulation, and the well-earned honours; he found that he owed no fame to his academical residence, and therefore determined that no fame should be derivable from an univefsity education.

When he first left Magdalen-college, he informs us that his taste for books began to revive, and that “unprovided with original learning, unformed in the habits of thinking, unskilled in the arts of composition, he resolved to write a book.” The title of this first essay was “The Age of Sesostris,” the sheets of which he afterwards destroyed. On his return to college, want of advice, experience, and occupation, betrayed him into improprieties of conduct, late hours, ill-chosen company, and inconsiderate expense. In his frame of mind, indeed, there appears to have been originally a considerable proportion of juvenile arrogance and caprice. At the age of sixteen he tells us that his reading became of the religious kind, and after bewildering himself in the errors of the church of Rome, he was converted to its doctrines, if that can be called a conversion which was rather the adoption of certain opinions by a boy who had never studied those of his own church. This change, in whatever light it may be considered, he imputes principally to the works’ of Parsons the Jesuit, who in his opinion had urged all the best arguments in favour of the Roman catholic religion. Fortified with these, on. the 8th of Jdne 1753, he solemnly abjured what he calls the errors of heresy, before a catholic priest in London, and immediately announced the important event to his father in a very laboured epistle. His father regretted the change, but divulged the secret, and thus rendered his return to Magdalen college impossible. At an advanced age, and when he had learned to treat all religions with equal indifference, our author speaks of this conversion with a vain respect, declaring himself not ashamed to have been entangled by the sophistry which seduced the acute and manly understandings of Chillingworth and Bayle. The resemblance is more close, however, in the transition which, he adds, they made from superstition to scepticism.

His father was now advised to send him fot some time to Lausanne, in Switzerland, where he was placed, with a moderate allowance, under the care of. Mr, Pavilliard, a Calvinist minister. Mr. Pavilliard was instructed to reclaim his pupil from the errors of popery; but as he could not speak English, nor Mr. Gibbon French, some time elapsed before much conversation of any kind became practicable. When their mutual industry had removed this obstacle, Mr. Pavilliard first secured the attention and attachment of his pupil by kindness, then directed his studies into a regular plan, and placed within his power such means of information as might remove the errors into which he had fallen. This judicious method soon proved successful; on Christmas day 1754, after“a full conviction,” Mr. Gibbon received the sacrament in the church of Lausanne; and here it was, he informs us, that he suspended his religious inquiries, acquiescing with implicit belief in the tenets and mysteries which are adopted by the general consent of catholics and protestants.

His ad vantages in other respects were so important during his residence at Lausanne, that here, for the first time, he appears to have commenced that regular process of instruction which laid the foundation of all his future improvements. His thirst for general knowledge returned, and while he was not hindered from gratifying his curiosity in his former desultory manner, certain hours were appropriated for regular studies. His reading had now a fixed object, and that attained, he felt the value of the acquisition, and became more reconciled to regularity and system. He opened new stores of learning and taste, by acquiring a knowledge of the Greek, Latin, and French languages. Of this proficiency, although his tutor ought not to be robbed of his share of the merit, it is evident that Mr. Gibbon’s unwearied industry and laudable avidity of knowledge were at this time uncommon, and bespoke a mind capable of the/ji'vghest attainments, and deserving of the highest honours! wkhin the compass of literature. To mathematics only, he showed a reluctance; contenting himself with understanding the principles of that science. At this early age it is probable he desisted merely from finding no pleasure in mathematical studies, and nothing to gratify curiosity; but as in his more mature years it was his practice to undervalue the pursuits which he did not choose to follow, he took an opportunity to pass a reflection on the utility of mathematics, with which few will probably agree. He accuses this science of “hardening the mind by the habit of rigid demonstration, so destructive of the finer feelings of moral evidence, which must determine the actions and opinions of our lives.” So easy is it to find a plausible excuse for neglecting what we want the power or the inclination to follow.

To his classical acquirements, while at Lausanne, he added the study of Grotius, and Puffendorff, Locke, and Montesquieu; and he mentions Pascal’s “Provincial Letters,” La Bleterie’s “Life of Julian,” and Giannone’s civil “History of Naples,” as having remotely contributed to form the historian of the Roman empire. From Pascal, he tells us that he learned to manage the weapon of grave and temperate irony, even on subjects of ecclesiastical solemnity, forgetting that irony in every shape is beneath the dignity of the historical style, and subjects the historian to the suspicion that his courage and his argument are exhausted. Jt is more to his credit that at this time he established a correspondence with several literary characters, to whom he looked for instruction and direction, with Crevier and Breitinger, Gesner and Allamand; and that by the acuteness of his remarks, and his zeal for knowledge, he proved himself not unworthy of their confidence. He had an opportunity also of seeing Voltaire, who received him as an English youth, but without any peculiar notice or distinction. Voltaire diffused gaiety around him by erecting a temporary theatre, on which he performed his own favourite characters, and Mr. Gibbon became so enamoured of the French stage, as to lose much of his veneration for Shakspeare. He was now familiar in some, and acquainted in many families, and his evenings were generally devoted to cards and conversation, either in private parties, or more numerous assemblies.

During this alternation of study and pleasure, he became enamoured of a mademoiselle Susan C&rchod, a young lady whose personal attractions were embellished by her virtues and talents. His addresses were favoured by her and by her parents, but his father, on being consulted, expressed the utmost reluctance to this “strange alliance,” and Mr. Gibbon yielded to his pleasure. His wound, he tells us, was insensibly healed by time, and the lady was not unhappy. She afterwards became the wife of the celebrated M. Neckar.

In 1758 he was permitted to return to England, after an absence of nearly five years. His father received him with more kindness than he expected, and rejoiced in the suecess of his plan of education. During his absence his father had married his second wife, miss Dorothea Patton, whom his son was prepared to dislike, but found an amiable and deserving woman. At home he was left at liberty to consult his taste in the choice of place, company, and amusements, and his excursions were bounded only by the limits of the island and the measure of his income. He had now reached his twenty-first year; and some faint efforts were made to procure him the employment of secretary to a foreign embassy. His step-mother recommended the study of the law; but the former scheme did not succeed, and the tatter he declined. Of his first two years in England, he passed about nine months in London, and the remainder in thecountry. But London had few charms, except the common ones that can be purchased. His father had no fixed residence there, and no circles into which he might introduce his son. He acquired an intimacy, however, in the house of David Mallet, and by his means was introduced to lady Hervey’s parties. The want of society seems never to have given him much uneasiness, nor does it appear that at any period of his life he knew the misery of having hours which he could not fill up. At his father’s house at Buriton, near Petersfield, in Hampshire, he enjoyed much leisure and many opportunities of adding to his stock of learning. Books became more and more the source of all his wishes and pleasures, and although his father endeavoured to inspire him with a love and knowledge of farming, he could not succeed farther than occasionally to obtain his company in such excursions as are usual with country gentlemen.

The leisure he could borrow from his more regular plan of study, was employed in perusing the works of the best English authors since the revolution, in hopes that the purity of his own language, corrupted by the long use of a foreign idiom, might be restored. Of Swift and Arldison, who were recommended by Mallet, he seems to fix the true value, praising Swift for his manly original vigour, and Addison for elegance and mildness. The perfect composition, the nervous language, and well-turned periods of Robertson, inflamed him with the ambitious hope that he might one day tread in his footsteps. But charmed as he was at this time with Swift and Addison, Robertson and Hume, and well as he knew how to appreciate the excellence of their respective styles, he lost sight of every model when he became a writer of history, and formed a style peculiar to himself.

In 1761 his first publication made its appearance, under the title of “Essai sur l'etude de la litterature,” a small volume in 12 mo. Part of this had been written at Lausanne, and the whole completed in London. He consulted Dr. Maty, a man of extensive learning and judgment, who encouraged him to publish the work, but this he would have probably delayed for some time, had not his father insisted upon it, thinking that some proof of literary talenta might introduce him to public notice. The design of this essay was to prove that all the faculties of the mind may be exercised and displayed by the study of ancient literature, in opposition to D'Alembert and others of the French encyclopedists, who contended for that new philosophy that has since produced such miserable consequences. He introduces, however, a variety of topics not immediately connected with this, and evinces that in the study of the belles lettres, and in criticism, his range was far more extensive than could have been expected from his years. His style approaches to that of Voltaire, and is often sententious and flippant, and the best excuse that can be offered for his writing in French, is, that his principal object relates to the literature of that country, with which he seems to court an alliance, and with which it is certain he was more familiar than with that of England. This essay accordingly was praised in the foreign journals, but attracted very little notice at home, and was soon forgotten. Of its merits he speaks in his Memoirs, with a mixture of praise and blame, but the former predominates, and with justice. Had the French language been then as common in the literary world as it is now, so extraordinary a production from a young man would have raised very high expectations.

About the time when this essay appeared, Mr. Gibbon was induced to embrace the military profession. He was appointed captain of the south battalion of the Hampshire militia, and for two years and a half endured “a wandering life of military servitude.” It is seldom that the memoirs of a literary character are enlivened by an incident like this. Mr. Gibbon, as may be expected, could not divest his mind of its old habits, and therefore endeavoured to unite the soldier and the scholar. He studied the art of war in the Memoires Militaires of Quintus Icilius (M. Guichardt), while from the discipline and evolutions of a modern battalion, he was acquiring a clearer notion of the phalanx and the legion, and what he seems to have valued at its full worth, a more intimate knowledge of the world, and such an increase of acquaintance as made him better known than he could have been in a much longer time, had he regularly passed his summers at Buriton, and his winters in London. He snatched also some hours from his military duties for study, and upon the whole, although he does not look back with much pleasure on this period of his life, he permits the reader to smile at the advantages which the historian of the Roman empire derived from the captain of the Hampshire grenadiers. At the peace in 1762-3, his regiment was disbanded, and he resumed his studies, the regularity of which had been so much interrupted, that he speaks of now entering on a new plan. After hesitating, probably not long, between the mathematics and the Greek language, he gave the preference to the latter, and pursued his reading with vigour. But whatever he read or studied, he appears to have read and studied with a view to historical composition, and he aspired to the character of a historian long before he could fix upon a subject. The time was favourable to Mr. Gibbon’s ambition. He was daily witnessing the triumphs of Hume and Robertson, and he probably thought that a subject only was wanting to form his claim to equal honours.

During his service in the militia, he revolved several subjects for historical composition, and by the variety of them, it does not appear that he had any particular purpose to serve, or preconceived theory to which facts were to bend. Among the subjects he has enumerated, we find the expedition of Charles VIII. of France into Italy the crusade of Richard I. the barons 1 wars against John and Henry III. the history of Edward the Black Prince the lives, with comparisons of Henry V. and the emperor Titus the life of sir Philip Sidney, and that of the marquis of Montrose. These were rejected in their turns, but he dwelt with rather more fondness on the life of sir Walter Raleigh; and when that was discarded, meditated either the history of the Liberty of the Swiss; or that of the republic of Florence under the house of Medicis.

His designs were, however, now interrupted by a visit to the continent, which, according to custom, his father thought necessary to complete the education of an English gentleman. Previous to his departure he obtained recommendatory letters from lady Hervey, Horace Walpole (the late lord Orford), Mallet, and the duke de Nivernois, to various persons of distinction in France. In acknowledging the duke’s services, he notes a circumstance which in some degree unfolds his own character, and exhibits that superiority of pretensions from which he never departed. “The duke received me civilly, but (perhaps through Maty’s fault) treated me more as a man of letters than as a man of fashion.” Congreve and Gray were weak enough to be offended on a similar account, but that Mr. Gibbon, whose sole ambition was to rise to literary fame, should have for a moment preferred the equivocal character of a man of fashion, is as unaccountable as it is wonderful that, at an advanced period of life, he should have recorded the incident.

In France, however, the fame of his essay had preceded him, and he was gratified by being considered as a man of letters, who wrote for his amusement. Here he mixed in familiar society with D'Alembert, Diderot, count de Caylus, the abbé de Bleterie, Barthelemy, Raynal, Arnaud, Helvetius, and others, who were confessedly at the head of French literature. After passing fourteen weeks in Paris, he revisited (in the month of May 1763) his old friends at Lausanne, where he remained nearly a year. Among the occurrences here which he records with most pleasure, is his forming an acquaintance with Mr. Holroyd, now lord Sheffield, who has since done so much honour to his memory, and whom he characterises as “a friend whose activity in the ardour of youth was always prompted by a benevolent heart, and directed by a strong understanding.” In 1764 he set out for Italy, after having studied the geography and ancient history of the seat of the Roman empire, with such attention as might render his visit profitable. Although he disclaims that enthusiasm which takes fire at every novelty, the sight of Rome appears to have conquered his apathy, and at once fixed the source of his fame. “It was at Rome, on the 15th of October 1764, as he sat musing amidst the ruins of the capitol, while the bare-footed friars were singing vespers in the temple of Jupiter (now the church of the Zoccolants, or Franciscan friars) that the idea of writing the Decline and Fall of the city first started to his mind.” But this appears to hate been merely the effect of local emotion, for his plan was then confined to the decay of the city. In the month of June 1765, he arrived at his father’s house, and seems to have entered on a life which afforded no incident, or room for remark. The five years and a half which intervened between his travels and his father’s death in 1770, he informs us, were the portion of his life which he passed with the least enjoyment, and remembered with the least satisfaction. By the resignation of his father, and the death of sir Thomas Worsley, he was promoted to the rank of major and lieutenant-colonel commandant of his regiment of militia, but was, each year that it was necessary to attend the monthly meeting and exercise, more disgusted with “the inn, the wine, the company, and the tiresome repetition of annual attendance and daily exercise.”

Another source of uneasiness arose from reflections on his situation. He belonged to no profession, and had adopted no plan by which he could, like his numerous acquaintance, rise to some degree of consequence. He lamented that he had not, at a proper age, embraced the lucrative pursuits of the law, or of trade, the chances of civil office, or of India adventure, or even “the fat slumbers of the church.” Still, however, such a mind as his was not formed to be inactive, and a greater portion of his dissatisfaction appears to have arisen from an impatience to acquire fame, and from the extreme length of those prospects which the various designs he formed had presented. He yet contemplated the Decline and Fall of Rome, but at an awful distance; and in the mean time, as something more within his grasp, he resumed his study of the revolutions of Switzerland, so far as to execute the first book of a history. This was read in the following winter (1767) to a literary society of foreigners in London, who did not flatter him by a very favourable opinion; yet it was praised by Hume, who endeavoured only to dissuade him from the use of the French language. The opinion, however, of the foreign critics to whom he had submitted this attempt, prevailed over that of Hume, and he renounced the design of continuing it. The manuscript is now in the possession of lord Sheffield.

In 1767 he joined with Mr. Deyverdun, a Swiss gentleman then in England, and a man of taste and critical knowledge, to whom he was much attached, in publishing a literary Journal, in imitation of Dr. Maty’s “Journal Britannique. 1 * They entitled it” Memoires Literaires de la Grand Bretagne.“Two volumes only of this work were published, and met with very little encouragement. Mr. Gibbon acknowledges having reviewed lord Lyttelton’s History in the first volume. The materials of a third volume were almost completed, when he recommended his coadjutor Deyverdun as travelling governor to sir Richard Worsley, an appointment which terminated the” Memoires Literaires.“Mr. Gibbon’s next performance was an attack on Dr. Warburton, which he/ condemns for its severity and for its cowardice, while he brings the testimony of some eminent scholars to prove that it was successful and decisive. Warburton’s hypothesis on the descent of yEneas to hell had long been applauded, and if not universally adopted, had not been answered during a space of thirty years. It was the opinion of this learned writer, that the descent to hell is not a false, but a mimic scene which represents the initiation of Æneas, in the character of a law-giver, to the Eleusinian mysteries. Mr. Gibbon, on the contrary, in his” Critical Observations on the Sixth Book of the Æneid,“1770, endeavoured to prove, that the ancient law-givers did not invent the mysteries, and that Æneas never was invested with the office of law-giver that there is not any argument, any circumstance, which can melt a fable into allegory, or remove the scene from the Lake Avernos to the temple of Ceres; that such a wild supposition is equally injurious to the poet and the man; that if Virgil was not initiated he could not, if he were, be would not, reveal the secrets of the initiation; and that the anathema of Horace (vetabo qui Cereris sacrum vulgarity &c.) at once attests his own ignorance and the iimocence of his friend. All this might have been argued in decent and respectful language, but Mr. Gibbon avows that his hostility was against the person as well as the hypothesis of” the dictator and tyrant of the world of literature," and with the acuteness of the critic, he therefore determined to join the acrimony of the polemic. In his more advanced years he affects to regret an unmanly attack upon one who was no longer able to defend himself, but he is unwilling to part with the reputation to which he thought his pamphlet entitled, or to conceal the praise which professor Heyne bestowed on it.

After the death of his father in 1770, an event which left him the sole disposer of his time and inclinations, he sat down seriously to the composition of his celebrated history. For some years he had revolved the subject in his mind, and had read every thing with a view to this great undertaking, which his election for the borough of Leskeard in 1775 did not much interrupt. The first volume was published Feb. 17, 1776, and received by the public with such avidity, that a second edition,in June, and a third soon after, were scarcely adequate to the demand. To use his own language, his book was on every table, and almost on every toilette: the historian was crowned by the taste or fashion of the day. From the ample praises of Dr. Robertson, and of Mr. Hume, he appears to have derived more substantial satisfaction. Hume anticipates the objections that would be made to the fifteenth and sixteenth chapters, with his usual arrogance and contempt of religion. *' When I heard of your undertaking (which was some time ago) I own I was a little curious to see how you would extricate yourself from the subject of your two last chapters. I think you have observed a very prudent temperament; but it was impossible to treat the subject so as not to give grounds of suspicion against you, and you may expect that a clamour will arise. This, if any thing, will retard your success with the public; for in every other respect your work is calculated to be popular. But among many other marks of decline, the prevalence of superstition in England prognosticates the fall of philosophy and decay of taste; and though nobody be more capable than you to revive them, you will probably find a struggle in your first advances."

Mr. Gibbon’s reflections on this subject, in his Memoirs, are not very intelligible, unless we consider him as employing irony. He affects not to have believed that the majority of English readers were so fondly attached even to the name and shadow of Christianity; and not to have foreseen that the pious, the timid, and the prudent would feel, or affect to feel, with such exquisite sensibility. If he had foreseen all this, he condescends to inform us that “he might have softened the two invidious chapters.” He seems to rejoice that “if the voice of our priests was clamorous and bitter, their hands were disarmed from the power of persecution;” and adhered to the resolution of trusting himself and his writings to the candour of the public, until Mr. Davis, of Oxford, presumed to attack, ' not the faith, but the fidelity of the historian.“He then published his” Vindication,“which, he says,” expressive of less anger than contempt, amused for a while the busy and idle metropolis.“Of his other antagonists he speaks with equal contempt,” A victory over such antagonists was a sufficient humiliation.“It is not, however, quite certain that he obtained this victory; the silence of an author is nearly on a par with the flight of a warrior, and it is evident that the contempt which Mr. Gibbon has so lavishly poured on his antagonists, in his” Memoirs,“has more of passionate resentment than of conscious superiority.' Of his first resentment and his last feelings, he thus speaks” Let me frankly own, that I was startled at the first discharge of ecclesiastical ordnance but, as soon as I found that this empty noise was mischievous only in the intention, my fear was converted into indignation; and every feeling of indignation or curiosity has long since subsided into pure and placid indifference."

Mr. Gibbon’s Vindication now appeared under the title of “A Vindication of somepassages in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Chapters of the History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. By the author,” 1779, 8vo. This was immediately followed by 1. “A short Appeal to the public. By the gentleman who is particularly addressed in the postscript of the Vindication,” 1779-1780, 8vo. 2. “A Reply to Mr. Gibbon’s Vindication; wherein the charges brought against him in the Examination are confirmed, and further instances given of his misrepresentation, inaccuracy, and plagiarism. By Henry Edward Davis, B. A. of Baliol college, Oxford,” 1780, 8vo. 3. “A Reply to Mr. Gibbon’s Vindication, &c. containing a review of the errors still retained in these chapters. By James Chelsum, D. D. &c.” 1785, 8vo.

In addition to these antagonists, it may be mentioned that Dr. Priestley endeavoured to provoke Mr. Gibbon to a controversy. The letters which passed between them are republished in the Memoirs, and are interesting because highly characteristic of both parties. The literary world has seldom seen polemic turbulence and sceptical arrogance so ably contrasted. Of all Mr. Gibbon’s antagonists, he speaks with respect only of Dr. Watson. Davis, it is evident, gave him most uneasiness, because he was able to repel but a few of the many charges that writer brought against him. In sound, manly reasoning, clear, perspicuous, and well-founded, without an atom of controversial asperity, sir David Dalrymple’s Inquiry excels; and may perhaps be considered as completely proving, what it is of most importance to prove, that Mr. Gibbon’s attack on Christianity was unnecessary as to its connection with his history, and is* disingenuous as to the mode in which he conducted it. The controversy was upon the whole beneficial; the public was put upon its guard, and through the thin veil of lofty contempt, it is very evident that Mr. Gibbon repented that he had made a false estimate of the public opinion on the subject of religion.

The prosecution of his history was for some time checked by an employment of a different nature, but for which his talents were thought preferable to that of any writer connected with administration. At the request of the ministers of state, he was induced to answer a manifesto which the French court had issued against Great Britain, preparatory to war. This Mr. Gibbon ably accomplished in a “Memoire Justificatif,” composed in French, which was delivered as a state paper to the courts of Europe. For this service he was appointed one of the lords commissioners of trade and plantations, a place worth about 700l. or 800l. a year, the duties of which were not very arduous. His acceptance of this place, he informs us, provoked some of the leaders of the opposition, with whom he had lived in habits of intimacy, and he was unjustly accused of deserting a party in which he had never enlisted. At the general election, however, in 1780, he lost his seat in parliament, the voters of Leskeard being disposed to favour an oppositioncandidate.

In April 1781 he published the second and third volumes of his history, which excited as much attention, although less controversy, than his first volume. They were written with more caution, yet with equal elegance, and perhaps more proofs of just and profound thinking. His affection for his work appears to have been too warm to permit him to estimate the reception with which these volumes were honoured. He speaks, in his Memoirs, of what no person acquainted with the literary history of that very recent period can remember, of “the coldness and even prejudice of the town.” It is certain, and it is saying much, that they were received witja a degree of eagerness and approbation proportioned to their merit: but two volumes are not so speedily sold as one, and the promise of a continuation, while it gratified the wishes of his admirers, necessarily suspended that final sentence upon which the fame of the work was ultimately to depend.

Soon after the meeting of the new parliament, he was chosen, on a vacancy, to represent the borough of Lymington in Hampshire, but the administration to which he had attached himself was now on its decline, and with itsfall the board of trade was abolished, and “he was stripped of a convenient salary, after having enjoyed it about three years.” Amidst the convulsions of parties which followed the dissolution of lord North’s administration, he adhered to the coalition from a principle of gratitude, but he obtained in return only promises of distant advancement, while he found that an additional income was immediately necessary to enable him to maintain the style of living ta which he had been accustomed. Andsuch at the same time was his indifference towards public business, and such his eagerness to pursue his studies, that no additional income would have been acceptable, if earned at the expence of parliamentary attendance, or official duties.

In this dilemma, Mr. Gibbon turned his thoughts once more to his beloved Lausanne. From his earliest knowledge of that country, he had always cherished a secret wish, that the school of his youth might become the retreat of his declining age, where a moderate fortune would secure the blessings of ease, leisure, and independence. His old frieud Mr. Deyverdun was now settled there, an inducement of no small attraction; and to him he communicated his designs. The arrangements of friends are soon adjusted, and Mr. Gibbon, having disposed of all his effects, except his library, bid adieu to England, in September 1783, and arrived at Lausanne nearly twenty years after his second departure. His reception was such as he expected and wished, and the comparative advantages of his situation are thus stated, nearly in his own words. His personal freedom had been somewhat impaired by the house of commons and by the board of trade, but he was now delivered from the chain of duty and dependence, from the hopes and fears of political adventure; his sober mind was no longer intoxicated by the fumes of party, and he rejoiced in his escape, as often as he read of the midnight debates which preceded the dissolution of parliament. His English oeconomy had been that of a solitary bachelor, who might afford some occasional dinners. In Switzerland he enjoyed, at every meal, at every hour, the free and pleasant conversation of the friend of his youth; and his daily table was always provided for the reception of one or two extraordinary guests. In London he was lost in the crowd; but he ranked with the first families of Lausanne, and his style of prudent expence enabled him to maintain a fair balance of reciprocal civilities. Instead of a small house between a street and a stable-yard, he occupied a spacious and convenient mansion, connected on the north side with the city, and open, to the south, to a beautiful and boundless horizon.

In this catalogue of advantages, we may perceive somewhat of caprice and weakness, and it may certainly be conjectured that a man of his internal resources might have discovered situations in England, both adapted to the purposes of ceconomy and retirement, and yielding intervals of society. But from his subsequent remarks, it appears that he was, either from pride or modesty, averse to the company of his literary associates, and preferred, in his hours of relaxation, that company in which the conversation leads, not to discussion, but to the exchange of mutual kindness and endearments. In this perhaps he is not singular; and in disliking the polemical turn which literary conversation too frequently takes, he is not to be blamed. What was most commendable, however, and what constantly predominated in the mind of Gibbon, was increase of knowledge. From that aim no opulence of itation could have diverted him, and whatever his friends or the state might have done for him, his own scheme, the constant wish and prayer of his heart, was for a situation in which books might be procured.

He remained at Lausanne about a year, before he resumed his history, which he concluded in 1787. This event is recorded by him in language which it would be absurd to change, because it is personally characteristic, and of which no change could be an improvement. “I have presumed to mark the moment of conception: I shall now commemorate the hour of iny final deliverance. It was on the day, or rather night, of the 27th of June, 1787, between the hours of eleven and twelve, that I wrote the last lines of the last page, in a summer-house in my garden. After laying down my pen, I took several turns in a bcrceau, or covered walk of acacias, which commands a prospect of the country, the lake, and the mountains. The air was temperate, the sky was serene, the silver orb of the moon was reflected from the waters, and all nature was silent. I will not dissemble the first emotions of joy on the recovery of my freedom, and, perhaps, the establishment of my fame. But my pride was soon humbled, and a sober melancholy was spread over my mind, by the idea that I had taken an everlasting leave of an old and agreeable companion, and that whatsoever might be the future date of my History, the life of the historian might be short and precarious. I will add two facts, which have seldom occurred in the composition of six, or at least of five quartos. 1. My rough manuscript, without any intermediate copy, has been sent to press. 2. Not a sheet has been seen by any human eyes, excepting those of the author and the printer; the faults and merits are exclusively my own.”

With the manuscript copy of these volumes he set out from Lausanne, and at the end of a fortnight arrived at the house of his friend lord Sheffield, with whom he resided during the whole of his stay in England. Having disposed of the copyright to his liberal publisher, the late Mr. Cadell, and the whole having been printed, the day of publication, he informs us, was delayed, that it might coincide with the fifty-first anniversary of his birth-day, May 8, 1788, when the double festival was celebrated by a cheerful literary dinner at Mr. Cadell’s house. On this occasion some elegant stanzas by Mr. Hayley were read, at which, Mr. Gibbon adds, “I seemed to blush.”

The sale of these volumes was rapid, but the author had a more formidable host of critics to encounter than when he first started, and his style underwent a more rigid examination. He tells us himself that a religious clamour was revived, and the reproach of indecency loudly echoed by the censors of morals. The latter, he professes he could never understand. Why he should not understand what was equally obvious to his admirers and to his opponents, and has been censured with equal asperity by both, is a question which cannot be answered by supposing Mr. Gibbon defective in the common powers of discernment. Persisting, however, in his surprize, he offers a vindication of the indecent notes appended to these volumes, which probably never made one convert. He says that all the licentious passages are left in the obscurity of a learned language; but he forgets that Greek and Latin are taught at every school; that sensuality may be effectually censured without being minutely described; and that it is not historically just to exhibit individual vices as a general picture of the manners of an age or people.

In the preface to his fourth volume, he announced his approaching return to the neighbourhood of the lake of Lausanne, nor did his year’s visit to England once induce him to alter his resolution. He set out accordingly, a few weeks after the publication of his history, and soon regained his habitation, where, he informs us, after a full repast on Homer and Aristophanes, he involved himself in the philosophic mazes of the writings of Plato. But the happiness he expected in his favourite retreat was considerably lessened by the death of, his friend Deyverdun; while the disorders of revolutionary France began to interrupt the general tranquillity that had long prevailed in Switzerland. Troops of emigrants flocked to Lausanne, and brought with them the spirit of political discussion, not guided by reason, but inflamed by passion and prejudice. The language of disappointment on the one hand, and of presumption on the other, marked the rise of two parties, between whom the peaceful enjoyments of nearly three centuries were finally destroyed. Mr. Gibbon arrived at Lausanne, July 30, 1788. Of his employment during his stay, we have little account. It appears by his correspondence that he amused himself by writing a part of those “Memoirs of his Life” which lord Sheffield has since given to the public, and he projected a series of biographical portraits of eminent Englishmen from the time of Henry VIII. but in this probably no great progress was made. His habits of industry, he tells us, became now much impaired, and he had reduced his studies to be the loose amusement of his morning hours. He remained here, however, as long as it was safe, and until the murder of the king of France, and the war in which Great Britain was involved, rendered Switzerland no longer an asylum either for the enthusiast of literature, or the victim of tyranny.

He left Lausanne in May 1793, and arrived in June at lord Sheffield’s house in Downing-street, and soon after settled, for the summer, with that nobleman at Sheffield place. In October he went to Bath, to pay a visit of affection to Mrs. Gibbon, the widow of his father, and to Althorp, the seat of lord Spenser, from which he returned to London, and for the first time avowed to his friend lord Sheffield, by letter, the cause of the decay of his health, which he had hitherto concealed from every human being, except a servant, although it was a complaint of about thirtythree years standing. This was originally a rupture, which had now produced a hydrocele, and required immediate chirurgical aid. Tapping procured some relief for a time, but his constitution could no longer divert, or support the discharge. The last events of his life are thus related by his biographer:

"After I left him, on Tuesday afternoon (Jan. 14, 1794), he saw some company, lady Lucan and lady Spenser, and thought himself well enough at night to omit the opium draught, which he had been used to take for some time. He slept very indifferently; before nine the next morning he rose, but could not eat his breakfast. However, he appeared tolerably well, yet complained at times of a pain in his stomach. At one o‘clock he received a visit of an hour from madame de Sylva, and at three, his friend Mr. Crauford of Auchinames (whom he always mentioned with particular regard), called, and stayed with him till past five o’clock. They talked, as usual, on various subjects; and twenty hours before his death, Mr. Gibbon happened to fall into a conversation, not uncommon with him, on the probable duration of his life. He said, that he thought himself a good life for ten, twelve, or perhaps twenty years. About six, he ate the wing of a chicken, and drank three glasses of Madeira. After dinner he became very uneasy and impatient; 'complained a good deal, arul appeared so weak, that his servant was alarmed. Mr. Gibbon had sent to his friend and relation, Mr. Robert Darell, whose house was not far distant, desiring to see him, and adding, that he had something particular to say. But, unfortunately, this desired interview never took place.

“During the evening he complained much of his stomach, and of a disposition to vomit. Soon after nine, he took his opium draught, and went to bed. About ten he complained of much pain, and desired that warm napkins might be applied to his stomach. He almost incessantly expressed a sense of pain till about four o‘clock in the morning, when he said he found his stomach much easier. About seven, the servant asked, whether he should send for Mr. Farquhar? he answered, No; that he was as well as he had been the day before. About half past eight, he got out of bed, and said that he was ’ plus adroit” 1 than he had been for three months past, and got into bed again, without assistance, better than usual, x About nine, he said that he would rise. The servant, however, persuaded him to remain in bed till Mr. Farquhar, who was expected at eleven, should come. Till about that hour he spoke with great facility. Mr. Farquhar came at the time appointed, and he was then visibly dying. When the valet dc chambre returned, after attending Mr. Farquhar out of the room, Mr. Gibbon said Pourauoi est ce que vous me guides? This was about half past eleven. At twelve, he drank some brandy and water from a tea-pot, and desired his favourite servant to stay with him. These were the last words he pronounced artijculately. To the last he preserved his senses; and when he could no longer speak, his servant having asked a question, he made a sign, to shew him that he understood him. He was quite tranquil, and did not stir; his eyes half-shut. About a quarter before one, he ceased to breathe. The valet de chambre observed, that Mr. Gibbon did not, at any time, shew the least sign of alarm, or apprehension of death; and it does not appear that he ever thought himself in danger, unless his desire to speak to Mr. Darell may be considered in that light.' 7 Other reports of Mr. Gibbon’s death were circulated at the time, But the above proceeds from an authority which cannot be doubted. The religious public was eager to know the last sentiments of Mr. Gibbon on the important point which constituted his grand defect, but we find that there were no persons near him at his death to whom that was a matter of curiosity; and it appears that he did not think his end approaching until he became incapable of collecting or expressing his thoughts. If he has, therefore, added one more to the number of infidels who have died in full possession of their incredulity, let it be remembered that, as he saw no danger, he had no room to display the magnanimity which has been ostentatiously ascribed to dying sceptics.

Mr. Gibbon was a man of so much candour, or so incapable of disguise, that his real character may be justly appreciated from the Memoirs he left behind him. He discloses his sentiments there without the reserve he has put on in his more laboured compositions, and has detailed his mental failings with an ingenuous minuteness which is seldom met with. He candidly confesses to the vanity of an author, and the pride of a gentleman; and we may allow that it is the vanity of one of the most successful authors of modern times, and the pride of a gentleman of amiable manners and high accomplishments. At the same time, it cannot be denied that his anxiety of fame sometimes obscured the lustre of his social qualities, parted him too widely from his brethren in literature, and led him to speak of his opponents with an arrogance which, although uniformly characteristic of the cause he supported, was yet unworthy of his general cast of character. His conversation is said to have been rich in various information, communicated in a calm and pleasant manner, yet his warmest admirers do not give him the praise of excelling in conversation. He seldom brought his knowledge forwards, and was more ambitious in company to be thought a man of the world than a scholar. In parliament he never ventured to speak, and this probably lessened his value in the eyes of an administration that required the frequent and ready support of eloquence.

As a historian, the universal acknowledgment of the literary world has placed him in the very highest rank; and in that rank, had his taste been equal to his knowledge, if his vast powers of intellect could have descended to simplicity of narrative, he would have stood without a rival. But in all the varied charms of an interesting an-d pathetic detail, and perhaps in the more important article of fidelity, he is certainly inferior to Robertson as much as he excels that writer in extent of knowledge, and in the comprehensive grasp of a penetrating mind. If he is likewise superior to Hume in these respect^ he falls short of what he has himself so admirably characterised as “the careless, inimitable beauties” of that writer. Hume told him very candidly and justly, that his study of the French writers led him into a style more poetical and figurative, and more highly coloured than our language seems to admit of in historical composition. We find, in his correspondence, that during his first residence abroad, he had ajmost entirely lost his native language, and although he recovered it afterwards, during die twenty years he passed in England, yet his reading was so much confined to French authors, that when he attempted English composition, he every where discovered the turns of thought and expression by which his mind was imbued. It has been asserted that his style has the appearance of labour, yet we know not how to reconcile much effort with his declaration, that the copy sent to the press was the only one he ever wrote. His labour might be bestowed in revolving the subject hi his mind; and as his memory was great, he might commit it to paper, without the necessity of addition or correction. By whatever means, he soon formed a style peculiar to himself, a mixture of dignity and levity, which, although difficult at first, probably became easy by practice, and even habitual, for his Memoirs are written in the exact manner of his History, and the most trivial events of his life are related in the same stately periods with which he embellishes the lives of heroes, and the fate of empires. His epistolary correspondence is in general more free from stiffness, and occasionally assumes the gaiety and familiarity suited to this species of composition.

, an ancestor of the preceding, and a heraldic writer, was born November 3, 1629. He was son of Robert Gibbon, a woollen-draper in London, and a member of the Cloth-workers’ company, by a daughter of the Edgars of Suffolk. Having spent some time in Jersey, he was sent to Jesus college, Cambridge, but afterwards became a soldier, and went to the Netherlands, to France, and in 1659 and 1660 was in Virginia. He procured the appointment of blue-mantle by the patronage of sir William Dugdale, then norroy. His patent was given only during pleasure, and he never received any other. Ab his death, in 17 he was the oldest officer at arms, but thought himself ill-treated in never having farther promotion. To assist in maintaining his family he kept a school. He was a learned, but imprudent man, injuring his best interests by an arrogant insolence to his superiors in the college, filling the margins of the books belonging to the library with severe reflections upon their conduct, couched in quaint terms, and with silly calculations of his own nativity. He despised them for not having had so classical an education as himself, and he supposed his destiny so fixed by the stars which presided at his birth, that good or ill behaviour could never alter it. These were weaknesses which shaded his excellencies. His “Introductio ad Latinam Blazoniam, an essay towards a more correct Blazon in Latin than formerly hath been used,” was a work which did him the highest credit: it was printed in octavo, in 1682. He wrote two small tracts also, in the French language, entitled, “Christian Valour encouraged,” exhorting the king of France to join the Venetians in their design upon the Morea, and to attack the Turks, and leave Germany alone. He likewise wrote “Day Fatality” “Unio Pissidentium” “Prince-protecting Providences;” “Edivardus Confessor redivivus.” “Satan’s welcome,” 1679, and “Flagellum Mercurii Antiducales.” He also diligently collected, out of various authors, a particular account of the great and important services of heralds of former times, which he styled “Heraldo Memoriale,” the heads of which came afterwards into the hands of Maitland, to be inserted in his History of London.

, an eminent composer of church music in the reign of James I. was born in 1583, and at the age of twenty-one was appointed organist of the chapel-royal. In 1622 he was honoured at Oxford with a doctor’s degree, in consequence of the strong recommendation of the learned Camden. Previously to this he had published “Madrigals of five parts for voices and viols,” London, 1612; but the most valuable of his works, which are still in constant use among the best productions of the kind, are his compositions for the church, consisting of services and anthems. Of the latter, the most celebrated is his “Hosanna.” He also composed the tunes to the hymns and songs of the church, translated by George Withers, as appears by the dedication to king James I. In 1625, being commanded, ex ojficio, to attend the solemnity of the marriage of his royal master Charles I. with the princess Henrietta of France, at Canterbury, for which occasion he had composed the music, he was seized with the small-pox, and dying on Whitsunday, in the same year, was “buried in that cathedral. His son, Dr. Christopher Gibbons, was also honoured with the notice of Charles I. and was of his chapel. At the restoration, besides being appointed principal organist of the chapel royal, private organist to his majesty, and organist of Westminster-abbey, he obtained his doctor’s degree in music at Oxford, in consequence of a letter written by his majesty Charles II. himself, in his behalf in 1664. His compositions, which were not numerous, seem never to have enjoyed a great degree of favour; and though some of them are preserved in the Museum collections, they have long ceased to be performed in our cathedrals. Orlando Gibbons had also two brothers, Edward and Ellis, the one organist of Bristol, and the other of Salisbury. Edward was a Cambridge bachelor of music, and incorporated at Oxford, 1592. Besides being organist of Bristol, he was priest-vicar, sub-chanter, ajid master of the choiristers in that cathedral. He was sworn a gentleman of the chapel, March 21, 1604, and was the master of Matthew Lock 1 In the” Triumphs of Oriana," there are two madrigals, the one in five, and the other in six parts, composed by Ellis Gibbons. Of Edward Gibbons, it is said, that in the time of the rebellion he assisted king Charles I. with the sum of one thousand pounds; for which instance of his loyalty, he was afterwards very severely treated by those in power, who deprived him of a considerable estate, and thrust him and three grand-children out of his house, though he was more than fourscore years of age.

, an eminent carver in wood, and a statuary, supposed to be of Dutch parents, was born in Spur-alley in the Strand. He lived afterwards in Bell-savage court, Ludgate-hill, where he carved a pot of flowers, which shook surprizingly with the motion of the coaches that passed by. There, is no instance, says lord Orford, of a man, before Gibbons, who gave to wood the loose and airy lightness of flowers, and chained together the various productions of the elements with a free disorder natural to each species. He lived afterwards at Deptford, where Mr. Evelyn, discovering his wonderful talents, recommended him to Charles II. who gave him a place in the board of works, and employed him in the chapel at Windsor. His carved work here is done in lime-tree, representing a great variety of pelicans, doves, palms, and other allusions to scripture history, with the star and garter, and other ornaments, finished with great perfection. At Windsor too, he carved the beautiful pedestal in marble, for the equestrian statue of the king in the principal court. The fruit, fish, implements of shipping, are all exquisite; the base of the figure at Charing-cross, and the statue of Charles II. in the Royal-exchange, were also his, and probably the brazen statue of James II. in the Privy-­garden, for there was no other artist of that time capable of it.

Gibbons made a magnificent tomb for Baptist Noel viscount Camden, in the church of Exton, in Rutlandshire; it cost 1000l. is twenty-two feet high, and fourteen wide. There are two figures of him and his lady, and bas-reliefs of their children. The same workman performed the wooden throne at Canterbury, which cost 70l. and was the donation of archbishop Tenison. The foliage in the choir of St. Paul’s is of his hand. At Burleigh is a noble profusion of his carving, in picture frames, chimney-pieces, and door-cases, and the last supper in alto-relievo, finely executed. At Chatsworth, where a like taste collected ornaments, by the most living eminent masters, are many by Gibbons, particularly in the chapel; in the great antichamber are several dead fowl over the chimney, finely executed, and over a closet-door, a pen not distinguishable from real feather. When Gibbons had finished his works in that palace, he presented the duke with a point cravat, a woodcock, and a medal with his own head, all preserved in a glass case in the gallery. In lord Orford’s collection is another point cravat by him, the art of which arrives even to deception, and Herodias with St. John’s head, alto-relievo, in ivory. In Thoresby’s collection was Elijah under the juniper-tree, supported by an angel, six inches long and four wide. At Houghton, two chimneys are adorned with his foliage. At Mr. Norton’s, at Southwich, in Hampshire, was a whole gallery embroidered in pannels by his hand but the most superb monument of his skill is a large chamber at Petworth, enriched frpm the ceiling, between the pictures, with festoons of flowers and dead game, &c. all in the highest perfection and preservation. Appendant to one is an antique vase, with a basrelief of the purest taste, and worthy the Grecian age of cameos. At the earl of Halifax’s, at Stanstead, is a chimney-piece, adorned with flowers, and two beautiful vases. The font in St. James’ church in white marble, was also the work of Gibbons. It is supported by the tree of life; fche serpent is offering the fruit to our first parents, who stand beneath; on one side, of the font is engraven the Baptist baptising our Saviour: on another, St. Philip baptising the Eunuch: and on the third, Noah’s ark, with the dove bringing the olive-branch, the type of peace, to mankind. The chancel, above the altar, is enriched with some beautiful foliage in wood, by the same great artist.

Gibbons died August 3, 1721, at his house in Bowstreet, Covent-garden, and in November of the following year, his collection, a very considerable one, of pictures, models, &c. was sold by auction. Among other things were two chimney-pieces of his work, the one valued at 100l. and the other at 120l.; his own bust in marble, by himself, but the wig and cravat extravagant; and an original of Simon the engraver, by sir Peter Lely, which had been much damaged by the fall of Gibbons’ house.

, a learned English Jesuit, was born in Winchester in 1549, and going abroad, became a man of considerable consequence in his order. Besides filling some 'ecclesiastic posts, he was professor of philosophy and divinity in Italy, Spain, Portugal, at Toulouse in France, and lastly at Doway, where he lived during his latter years, and employed his leisure time in publishing editions of various works from Mss. illustrated with notes. He died there June 21, 1632. His works are, 1. “Nicolai Harpsfeldii Hist. Eccles. Angliae.” 2. “Opera divi jElredi, abbatis Riavallensis, Cisterciensis,” Doway, 1631, 8vo. 3. “Divi Amaduei, Episc. Lausannae, de Maria virgine matre, Homilia? octo,” Audomaropoli (St. Omer’s), 12mo. 4. “Vita bead Gosvini, &c.” 5. “Summa casuum conscientiae Francisci Toleti cardinalis,” with notes. 6. “F. Riberee Comment, in duodecirn prophetas minores,” Doway, 1612, &c. &c.

, a pious dissenting divine, was born at Reak, in the parish of Swaffham Prior, near Newmarket, May 31, 1720. His father, of both his names, was for some years pastor of a congregation at Olney, in Buckinghamshire, and afterwards of another at Royston in Hertfordshire. He received his early education in Cambridgeshire, and in 1735 was placed under the care of Dr. Taylor, at Deptford. After going through a course of preparatory studies, he was ordained, according to the forms among the dissenters, in 1742, and appointed assistant preacher at the meeting in Silver-street. In this situation, however, he did not continue long, being in 1743, called to the pastoral charge of the independent congregation at Haberdashers’ hall, which he sustained the whole of his life.

He became an author very early, publishing in 1743 “Poems on several occasions,” which were followed by other productions in the same style. It was perhaps Dr. Gibbons’s foible that he fancied himself a poet, and in consequence was all his life composing hymns, elegies, c. on occasional subjects, without any of the inspiration of genius. In 1754 he was elected one of the tutors of the dissenting academy at Mile-end; the sciences he taught were logic, metaphysics, ethics, and rhetoric, and he is said to have taught them with applause and success. In 1759 he was chosen one of the Sunday evening lecturers at Monkwell-street, which he probably held as long as that lecture continued to be preached. The following year he received the degree of M. A. from the college of New Jersey in America; and in 1764, that of D. D. from one of the colleges in Aberdeen. Among his most useful publications were, his “Rhetoric,” published in 1767, 8vo, and his “Female Worthies, or the Lives and Memoirs of eminently pious’ women,” 1777, 2 vols. 8vo. In 1780 ha published “Memoirs of the rev. Isaac Watts, D. D.” 8vo, and assisted Dr. Johnson with some materials for the life of Watts in the “English Poets.” Dr. Johnson always spoke of Gibbons with respect. He died Feb. 22, 1785, of a stroke of apoplexy. Dr. Gibbons was a Calvinist of the old stamp, and a man of great piety and primitive manners. After his death three volumes of his “Sermons on evangelical and practical subjects,” were printed by subscription. He published also, in his life-time, besides what have been mentioned, various sermons preached on funeral and other occasions and some practical tracts.

, an eminent architect, was the son of Peter Gibbs of Footdeesmire, merchant in Aberdeen, and Isabel Farquhar, his second wife; he was born about the year 1674, and was educated at the grammar-school and the Marischal college of Aberdeen, where he took the degree of master of arts. Having, however, few friends, he resolved to seek his fortune abroad; and about 1694 left Aberdeen, whither he never returned. As he had always discovered a strong inclination to the mathematics, h spent some years in the service of an architect and masterbuilder in Holland. The earl of Mar happening to be in that country, about 1700, Mr. Gibbs was introduced to him. This noble lord was himself a great architect; and finding his countryman Mr. Gibbs to be a man of genius, he not only favoured him with his countenance and advice, but generously assisted him with money and recommendatory letters, in order, by travelling, to complete himself as an architect.

Thus furnished, Mr. Gibbs went from Holland to Italy, and there applied himself assiduously to the study of architecture, under the best masters. About 1710 he came to England; where he found his noble patron in the ministry, and highly in favour with the queen. Lord Mar introduced him to his friends as a gentleman of great knowledge in his profession; and an act of parliament having been passed about this time for building fifty new churches, Mr. Gibbs was employed by the trustees named in the act, and gave a specimen of his abilities, in planning and executing St. Martin’s church in the fields, St. Mary’s in the Strand, and several others. Being now entered on business, he soon became distinguished; and although his generous patron had the misfortune to be exiled from his native country, Mr. Gibbs’s merit supported him among persons of all denominations, and he was employed by persons of the best taste and greatest eminence. The liadcliffe library at Oxford, begun June 16, 1737, and finished in 1747; the King’s college, Royal library, and Senatehouse, at Cambridge; and the sumptuous and elegant monument for John Holies, duke of Newcastle, done by order and at the expence of his grace’s only child, the countess of Oxford and Mortimer, are lasting evidences of his abilities as an architect. Some years before his death, he sent to the magistrates of Aberdeen, as a testimony of his regard for the place of his nativity, a plan of St. Nicholas church, which was followed in the re-building of it, and which was probably among the last of his performances.

As he was a bachelor, and had but few relations, and was unknown to these, he bequeathed the bulk of his fortune, amounting to about 14 or I5,000l. sterling, to those he esteemed his friends. He made a grateful return to the generosity of his noble patron the earl of Mar, by bequeathing to his son the lord Erskine, estates which yielded 280l. per annum, 1000l. in money, and all his plate. His religious principles were the same with those of his father, a nonjuror; but he was justly esteemed by good men of all persuasions, being courteous in his behaviour, moderate with regard to those who differed from him, humane, and charitable. He died on the 5th of August, 1754, and was buried in Marybone church.

, an elegant French scholar, was born January 17, 1662, at Aix in Provence. He took a bachelor’s degree in divinity, and was appointed professor of philosophy at Beauvais at the age of twenty-four, and professor of rhetoric four years after, at the Mazarine college, in which the exercises began 1688, and were opened by him with a public speech. He filled this chair with much credit above fifty years, and formed a great number of excellent scholars, by whom he had the art of making himself beloved. He was several times rector of the university of Paris, and defended its rights with zeal and firmness. In 1728 he succeeded his friend, the celebrated Pourchot, as syndic of the university; and it was in this character that he made a requisition in the general assembly of the university in 1739, by which he formed an opposition to the revocation of the appeal which the university had made from the bull Unigenitus to a future council; which step occasioned his being banished to Auxerre. He died in the bishop of Auxerre’s house, October 28, 1741. His principal work is entitled, “Jugement des Savans, sur les Auteurs qui ont traite de la Rhtorique,” 3 vois. 12mo. He also left “Traite de la veritable Eloquence,” and “Reflexions sur la Rheiorique,” in 4 books, where he answers the objections of P. Lami; “La Rhetorique, ou les Regies de TEloquence,” 12mo, the best work the French have upon that subject.

, LL. D. and D. D. a learned canonist of the same family as the preceding, was born at Aix in 1660. He first taught theology at the seminary of Toulon, then at Aix, and settled in Paris 1703. He refused all the benefices which were offered him, and spent his life in deciding cases of conscience, and questions in the canon law. He died December 2, 1736, at Paris. His chief works are, “Institutions Ecclesiastiques et Beneficiales.” The best edition is 1736, 2 vols. 4to. “Usages de PEglise Gallicane, concernant les Censures et l‘IrregulariteV’ 1724, 4to.” Dissertation sur Tautorite dn second ordre, dans le synode diocesain,“1722, 4to.” Tradition, ou Hist, de l'Eglise sur le Sacrement de Manage,“1725, 3 vols. 4to.” Consultations Canoniques sur les Sacrements en general, et en particulier,“1725, 12 vols. 12mo.” Corpus Juris Canonici per regulas naturali ordine dispositas, &c." 1737, 3 vols. fol.

, an eminent patron of literature, was born at Palermo, and in his youth distinguished himself in the literary court of Leo X. Clement VII. appointed him bishop of Verona at an early age; but as he was long resident at Rome, or employed on missions of the highest importance at the ecclesiastical state, Caraffi, who was afterwards Paul IV. was deputed to manage the concerns of his bishopric. At length, in the pontificate of Paul III. Gibertus returned to his diocese, where his public and private virtues rendered him an ornament to his station. His palace was always open to men of learning, whether Italians or strangers; and a considerable part of his great revenues was munificently employed in the encouragement of letters. He was a liberal patron of Greek literature, and had new Greek types cast at his own expence. He also employed under his roof, a number of persons in transcribing Mss. and defrayed the charge of publishing several excellent editions of the works of the Greek fathers, particularly a beautiful edition of Chrysostom’s Homilies on the epistles of St. Paul. He died Dec. 30, 1543. His works, with his life, were published at Verona, 1733. He is deservedly celebrated in the “Galateo” of Casa, and is the subject of the poem of Bembus, entitled “Benacus” and various other contemporary poets have paid him the tribute of praise which he so well merited; nor is it small praise that he was the firm opponent of Peter Aretin, and used all h.is efforts to strip the mask from that shameless impostor.

, bishop of London, son of Edward Gibson, of Knipe in Westmorland, was born at Bampton in the same county, in 1669; and, having laid the foundation of classical learning at a school in that county, entered a scholar of Queen’s-college, Oxford, in 1686. The study of the Northern languages being then particularly cultivated in this university, Gibson applied himself vigorously to that branch of literature, in which he was assisted by Dr. Hickes. The quick proficiency that he made appeared in a new edition of William Drummond’s “PolemoMiddiana,” and James V. of Scotland’s “Cantilena Rustica:” which he published at Oxford, 1691, in 4to, with notes. His observations on those facetious tracts afford proofs both of wit and learning. But his inclination led him to more solid studies; and, in a short time after, he translated into Latin the “Chronicon Saxonicum,” and published it, together with the Saxoa original, and his own notes, at Oxford, 1692, in 4to. This work he undertook by the advice of Dr. Mill, the learned editor of the “Greek Testament,” in folio and it is allowed by the learned to be the best remains extant of Saxon antiquity. The same year appeared a treatise, entitled, “Librorum Manuscriptorum in duabus insignibus Bibliothecis, altera Tenisoniana Londoni, altera Dugdaliana Oxonii, Catalogus.” Edidit E. G. Oxon, 1692, 4to. The former part of this catalogue, consisting of some share of sir James Ware’s manuscript collection, was dedicated to Dr. Thomas Tenison, then bishop of Lincoln, as at that time placed in his library. He had an early and strong inclination to search into the antiquities of his country; and, having laid a necessary foundation in the knowledge of its original languages, he applied himself to them for some years with great diligence, which produced his edition of Camden’s “Britannia,” and other works, no-' ticed hereafter and he concluded, in thisbranch of learning, with “Reliquiffi Spelmannianae, or the Posthumous works of sir Henry Spelman, relating to the laws and antiquities of England,” which, with a life of the author, he published at Oxford, 1698, folio. This he likewise dedicated to Dr. Tenison, then Abp. of Canterbury; and probably, about that time, he was taken as domestic chaplain into the archbishop’s family: nor was it long after, that we find him both rector of Lambeth, and archdeacon of Surrey. Tenison dying Dec. 14, 1715, Wake, bishop of Lincoln, succeeded him; and Gibson was appointed to the see of Lincoln. After this advancement, he went on indefatigably in defence of the government and discipline of the Church of England: and on the death of Robinson, in 1720, was promoted to the bishopric of London. Gibson’s talents seem to have been perfectly suited to the particular duties of this important station; upon the right management of which the peace and good order of the civil, as well as the ecclesiastical, state of the nation so much depend. He had a particular turn for business, which he happily transacted, by means of a most exact method that he used on all occasions: and this he pursued with great advantage, not only in the affairs of his own diocese in England, which he governed with the most precise regularity, but in promoting the spiritual affairs of the church of England colonies, in the West-Indies. The ministry, at this time, were so sensible of his great abilities in transacting business, that there was committed to him a sort of ecclesiastical ministry for several years; and especially during the long illness of Abp. Wake, almost every thing that concerned the church was in a great measure left to his care.

The writer of his life, among many instances which he declares might be assigned of his making a proper use of that spiritual ministry he was honoured with, specifies some few of a more eminent kind. One was his occasional recommendation of several worthy and learned persons to the favour of the secular ministry, for preferments suited to their merits. Another, that of procuring an ample endowment from the crown, for the regular performance of divine service in the royal-chapel, at Whitehall, by a succession of ministers, selected out of both universities, with proper salaries, who are continued until this day, under the name of Whitehall preachers, in number twenty-four, who officiate each a fortnight. A third, that he constantly guarded against the repeated attempts to procure a repeal of the corporation and test acts. By baffling the attacks made on those fences of the church, he thought he secured the whole ecclesiastical institution; for, it was his fixed opinion, that it would be an unjustifiable piece of presumption to arm those hands with power, that might possibly employ it, as was done in the days of our fathers, against the ecclesiastical constitution itself. He was entirely persuaded, that there ought always to be a legal establishment of the church, to a conformity with which some peculiar advantages might be reasonably annexed: and at the same time, with great moderation and temper, he approved of a toleration of protestant dissenters; especially as long as they keep within the just limits of conscience, and attempt nothing that is highly prejudicial to, or destructive of, the rights of the establishment in the church. But he was as hearty an enemy to persecution, in matters of religion, as those that have most popularly declaimed against it.

Lastly, one more service to the church and clergy, performed by the bishop of London, was thought worthy of their grateful acknowledgements; namely, his distinguished zeal (after he had animated his brethren on the bench to concur with him) in timely apprizing the clergy of the bold schemes that were formed by the Quakers, in order to deprive the clergy of their legal maintenance by tithes; and in advising them to avert so great a blow to religion, as well as so much injustice to themselves, by their early application to the legislature, to preserve them in the possession of their known rights and properties. But, though the designs of their adversaries were happily defeated, yet it ought ever to be remembered, in honour of the memory of the bishop of London, that such umbrage was taken by sir Robert Walpole, on occasion of the advice given by him and his brethren to the clergy in that critical juncture, as soon terminated in the visible diminution of his interest and authority.

The biographer of sir Robert Walpole allows that the inveteracy displayed against this eminent prelate for the conscientious discharge of his duty on this occasion, reflects no credit on the memory of that statesman. His esteem for Gibson had been so great, that when he was reproached with giving him the authority of a pope, he replied, “And a very good pope he is.” Even after theii; disagreement, he never failed to pay an eulogium to tha learning and integrity of his former friend. About this time, great pains were taken to fix upon this worthy prelate, the character of a haughty persecutor, and even of a Secret enemy to the civil establishment. To this end a passage in the introduction to his “Codex,” which suggested the groundlessness of the modern practice of sending prohibitions to the spiritual from the temporal courts, was severely handled, in a pamphlfet written by the recorder of Bristol, afterwards sir Michael Foster, as derogatory from the supreme power and superintendency of the court of king’s bench; and other writers, with less reason and no moderation, attacked our prelate in pamphlets and periodical journals. It is said also that he was obnoxious to the king, on a personal account, because he had censured, with a freedom becoming his character, the frequent recurrence of masquerades, of which his majesty was very fond. Bishop Gibson had preached against this diversion in the former reign: and he now procured an address to the king from several of the bishops, for the entire suppression of such pernicious amusements. In all this his zeal cannot be too highly commended; and to his honour be it recorded, that neither the enmity of statesmen, nor the frowns of princes, could divert his attention from the duties of his pastoral office; some of which consisted in writing and printinrg pastoral letters to the clergy and laity, in opposition to infidelity and enthusiasm; in visitation-charges, as well as occasional sermons, besides less pieces of a mixt nature, and some particular tracts against the prevailing immoralities of the age.

He was very sensible of his decay for some time before his death, in which he complained of a languor that hung about him. As, indeed, he had made free with his constitution by incredible industry, in a long course of study and business of various kinds; he had well nigh exhausted his spirits, and worn out a constitution which was naturally so vigorous, that life might, otherwise, have probably been protracted. He died, however, on September 6, 1748, with true Christian fortitude, an apparent sense of his approaching dissolution, and in perfect tranquillity of mind, during the intervals of his last fatal indisposition at Bath, after a very short continuance there. His lordship was married, and left several children of each sex, who were all handsomely provided for by him. In private life he possessed the social virtues in an eminent degree, and hi beneficence was very extensive. Of this one remarkable instance is recorded by Whiston. Dr. Crow had left him 2500l. which our prelate freely gave to Dr. Crow’s relations, who were in indigent circumstances. Recording this story does Whiston more credit than his foolish ravings against the bishop’s “gross ignorance” of what he calls “primitive Christianity.”

, commonly called the Dwarf, was a painter of some eminence in the time of sir Peter Lely, to whose manner he devoted himself, and whose picture’s he copied very faithfully. He was originally servant to a lady at Mortlake, who, observing that his genius led him to painting, put him to De Cleyn, to be instructed in the? rudiments of that art. De Cleyn was master of the tapestry-works at Mortlake, and famous for the cuts which he designed for some of Ogilby’s works, and for Sandys’s translation of Ovid. Gibson’s paintings in water-colours were well esteemed; but the copies he made of Lely’s portraits gained him the greatest reputation. He was greatly in favour with Charles I. to whom he was page of the back -stairs; and he also drew Oliver Cromwell several times. He had the honour to instruct in drawing queen Mary and queen Anne, when they were princesses, and he went to Holland to wait on the former for that purpose. He married one Mrs. Anne Shepherd, whb was also a dwarf. Charles I. was pleased, out of curiosity or pleasantry, to honour their marriage with his presence, and to give away the bride. Waller wrote a poem on this occasion, “of the marriage of the dwarfs.” Fenton, in his notes on it, tells us, that he had seen this couple painted by sir Peter Lely; and that they appeared to have been of an equal stature, each of them measuring three feet ten inches. They had, however, nine children, five of which attained to maturity, and were proportioned to the usual standard of mankind. To recompense the shortness of their stature, nature gave this little couple an equivalent in length of days for Gibson died in Covent-garden, in his 75th year, in 1690; and his wife, surviving him almost 20 years, died in 1709, aged 89. Gibson’s nephew, William, was instructed in the art of painting both by him and sir Peter Lely, and became also eminent. His excellence, like his uncle’s, lay in copying after sir Peter Lely; although he was a good limner, and drew portraits for persons of the first rank. His great industry was much to be commended, not only for purchasing sir Peter Lely’s collection after his death, but likewise for procuring from the continent a great variety of valuable works, which made his collection of prints and drawings equal to that of any person of his time. He died of a lethargy in 1702, aged 58. There was also one Edward Gibson, William’s kinsman, who was instructed by him, and first painted portraits in oil; but afterwards, finding more encouragement in crayons, and his genius lying that way, he applied himself to them. He was in the way of becoming a master, but died when he was young.

, a native of Morpeth in Northumberland, was famous in the sixteenth century, for the studies of physic, divinity, history, and botany, in which he made considerable progress. Bale bears witness to his character as a physician, by saying, that he performed almost incredible cures. He was a friend to the reformation, and wrote some pieces in defence of that cause, for which he was obliged to become a fugitive in the reign of queen Mary; but, on the accession of Elizabeth, returned, and died in London in 1562. Among his works are, 1. “A breve Chronicle of the bishops of Rome’s blessynge, &c.” a work supposed to be the same called by others “The treasons of the prelates,” in English rhyme, Lond. ICmo, printed by John Daye, consisting of only eight leaves. 2. “The sum of the acts and decrees made by divers bishops of Rome,” from the Latin, 12mo, no date. 3. “A treatise behoovefull as well to preserve the people from pestilence, as to help and recover them, &c.” 1536, 4to. The following remain in manuscript, “An herbal” “Treatise against unskilful chemists, &c.”

, a remarkable instance of the strength of natural powers usefully directed, and assiduously employed, was born in 1720 at Boulton, a few miles from Appleby in Westmoreland. By the death of his father, he became an orphan, without friends, or education even of the humblest kind, and hired himself to a farmer in the neighbourhood, with whom he remained some years, and then removed to superintend a farm at Kendal. Here, when in his eighteenth year, being informed that his father had been possessed of some landed property, he spent his savings in making inquiry, and at last found that it had been mortgaged beyond its value. He therefore continued his occupation, and soon after was enabled to rent and manage a little farm of his own, at a place called Hollios in Cartmell Fell, where he began to apply himself to study, without perhaps knowing the meaning of the word. A short time previous to this, he had admired the operation of figures, but laboured under every disadvantage for want of education. His first effort therefore wad to learn to read English and having accomplished that to a certain degree, he purchased a treatise on arithmetic. This he carefully perused, and although he could not write, soon went through common arithmetic, vulgar and decimal fractions, the extraction of the square and cube roots, &c. by his memory only, and became so expert, that he could tell, without setting down a figure, the product of any two numbers multiplied together, although the multiplier and the multiplicand, each of them, consisted of nine places of figures; and he could answer, in the same manner, questions in division, in decimal fractions, or in the extraction of the square or cube roots, where such a multiplicity of figures is often required in the operation.

Finding himself, however, still labouring under difficulties, from not being able to write, he applied to that art with such success as to be able to form a legible hand, which he of course found an acquisition of great importance. Still his knowledge went no farther than this. He did not at this time know the meaning of the word mathematics, nor had the least notion of any thing beyond the very little he had learned. Something was now proposed to him about Euclid, but he took no notice of this, until told that it meant a book, containing the elements of geometry, when he immediately purchased it, and studying it with his usual diligence, found that he could extend his knowledge beyond what he had before conceived possible. He therefore continued his geometrical studies, and as the demonstration of the different propositions in Euclid depends entirely upon a recollection of some of those preceding, his memory was of the utmost service to him, and as it required principally the management of straight lines, it became a study exactly suited to his circumstances. While attending the business of his farm, and apparently only whistling a tune, he used to be deeply engaged in some geometrical proposition, and with a piece of chalk upon the lap of his breeches-knee, or any other convenient spot, he would clear up very difficult parts of the science in a most masterly manner.

His mind being now a little accessible to impressions from the great works of nature, he paid particular attention to the theory of the earth, the moon, and the rest of the planets belonging to this system, of which the sun is thecentre and, considering the distance and magnitude of the different bodies belonging to it, and the distance of the fixed stars,he soon conceived each to be the centre of a different system. He vv.ell considered the laws of gravity, and that of the centripetal and centrifugal farces, and the cause of the ebbing and flowing of the tides; also the projection of the sphere, and trigonometry and astronomy. He never seemed better pleased than when he found his calculations agree with observation; and being well acquainted with the projection of the sphere, he was fond of describing all astronomical questions geometrically, and of projecting the eclipses of the sun and moon that way.

As he had paid a similar attention to all the intermediate parts, he was now become so conversant in every branch of the mathematics, that no question was ever proposed to him which he did not answer. In particular he answered all the questions in the Gentleman’s and Ladies’ Diaries, the Palladium, and other annual publications, for several years; but his answers were seldom inserted except by, or in, the name of some other persons, as he had neither vanity nor ambition, and no wish but to satisfy himself that nothing passed him which he did not understand. He frequently had questions sent from his pupils and other gentlemen in London, the universities, and different parts of the country, as well as from the university of Gottingen in Germany, which he never failed to answer; and from the minute inquiry he made into natural philosophy, there was scarcely a phenomenon in nature, that ever came to his knowledge or observation, for which he could not in some degree reasonably account.

He went by the name of “Willy o' the Hollins” many years after he left that place and removed to Tarngreen, where he lived about fifteen years, and from thence into the neighbourhood of Cartmell, where he was familiarly known by the name of “Willy Gibson,” and continued his occupation as before. For the last forty years of his life he kept a school of about eight or ten gentlemen, who boarded and lodged at his farm-house; and having a happy art of explaining his ideas, he was very successful in teaching. He also took up the business of land-surveying, and having acquired some little knowledge of drawing, could finish his plans in a very neat manner. He was often appointed, by acts of parliament, a commissioner for the inclosing of commons, for which he was well qualified in every respect. His practice was to study incessantly, during the greatest part of the night; and in the day-time, when in the fields, his pupils frequently went to him to have their difficulties removed. He appears to have been, altogether a very extraordinary character, and in private life amply deserving the great respect in which he was held by all who knew him. His death, occasioned by a fall, took place Oct. 4, 1791. He left a numerous family by his wife, to whom he had been happily united for nearly fifty years.

, a learned critic and civilian, was born at Buren in Guelderland in 1534. He studied at Louvain and at Paris, and was the first who erected the library of the German nation at Orleans. He took the degree of doctor of civil law there in 1567; and went thence to Italy in the retinue of the French ambassador. Afterwards he removed to Germany, where he taught the civil law with high repute, first at Strasburg, where he was likewise professor of philosophy; then in the university of Altdorf, and at last at Ingoldstadt. He forsook the protestant religion to embrace the Roman catholic. He was invited to the imperial court, and honoured with the office of counsellor to the emperor Rodolph. He died at Prague in 1609, if we believe some authors; but Thuanus, who is more to be depended on, places his death in 1604. He wrote notes and comments upon Aristotle’s “Politics and Ethics,” and on Homer and Lucretius; and published also several pieces relating to civil law.

As to his literary character, it is not without some stains. He has been accused of a notorious breach of trust, with regard to the Mss. of Fruterius. Fruterius had collected a quantity of critical observations; but died at Paris in 1566, a very young man, leaving them to Gifanius, to be published, who suppressed them as far as he was able; for which he is severely treated by Janus Douza in his satires and elsewhere. The fact is also mentioned by Thuanus. He was also charged with plagiarism by Lambin. Gifanius had inserted in his edition of Lucretius all the best notes of Lambin, without acknowledging to whom he was obliged; and with some contempt of Lambin, which Lambin, in a third edition of that author, resented with such abusive epithets as we are sorry to say are not unfrequent in the literary world. He calls him “audacem, arrogantem, impudentem, ingratum, petulantem, insidiosum, fallacem, inh'dum, nigrum.” Gifanius had also another quarrel with Seioppius, about a ms. of Syinmachus; which Scioppius, it is said, had taken away, and used without his knowledge.

, D. D. son of Emanuel, and grandson of Andrew Gifford, both dissenting ministers of the baptist persuasion, was born Aug. 17, 1700, and educated at Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire, under the Rev. Mr. Jones, author of the “History of the Canon of the Scripture,” whose seminary produced, among other eminent men, archbishop Seeker, bishop Butler, and Dr. Chandler. Mr. Gifford finished his studies under the celebrated Dr. Ward, and being afterwards baptised, was joined to his father’s church at Bristol, but in 1723 removed to the baptist meeting in Devonshire-square, London. In 1725 his first ministerial duties appear to have been performed at Nottingham, where he was very popular. In Feb. 1730 he was invited to London and ordained. The following year he commenced an intimacy with sir Richard Ellys, bart. (see Ellys) and became his chaplain, taking the lead in family worship. Lady Ellys continued him in the same office, with an annual present of forty guineas, until her second marriage in 1745. One of Mr. Gifford’s sermons preached in commemoration of the great wind in 1703, and published in 1734, was dedicated to sir Richard. In 1754 Mr. Gifford received the degree of D.D. from Marischal college, Aberdeen. His favourite study was that of antiquities, and although at no time a man of opulence, he made a very large collection of curious books, Mss. coins, &c. for which he gave liberal prices. It is said that his collection of coins, which was a very valuable one, was purchased by George II. as an addition to his own cabinet. His reputation as an antiquary, recommended him to the situation of assistant librarian of the British Museum in 1757, in which he was placed by the interest of the lord chancellor Hardwicke, and some other friends, but not, as his biographer says, by that of sir Richard Ellys, who had been dead some years before this period. To a man of literary curiosity and taste, no situation can be more interesting than that of librarian in the British Museum, and Mr. Gifford knew how to improve the opportunities which it affords. Having the talent to receive and communicate information with unaffected politeness, his acquaintance among the nobility and gentry soon became extensive. Some of them honoured him by a mutual exchange of friendly visits, and others of the first rank discovered their respect for him, either by an occasional attendance on his ministry, or by an obliging correspondence and intimacy. Amongst these were the marquis of Lothian, the earl of Halifax, lord Dartmouth, lady Buchan, lady Huntingdon, &c.

As a minister, his sentiments were of the Calvinistic kind, as put forth by the elders of the baptist churches in and about London in 1677 and 1689. His preaching was sincere, lively, and pathetic; and his faculties remained so Ion* unimpaired, that it was generally said, “he would die popular,” which proved true, although febis is seldom the lot of the dissenting clergy, their flocks too often deserting them when their strength begins to fail, and their powers of popular attraction to relax. For the last twenty ­five years of his life, he preached a monthly lecture at the meeting in Little St. Helen’s, in connection with several ministers of the Independent persuasion. The last time he administered the Lord’s Supper was on June 6, 1784, when he was very weak and low. On the following evening, he preached a sermon to the “Friendly Society” which meet at Eagle-street, when he took an affectionate leave of them, and of all farther public duties. He died June 19th following, in the eighty-fourth year of his age, and was buried in Bunhill Fields. He left 400l. to the above meeting in Eagle-street, and his books, pictures, and manuscripts to the baptist academy at Bristol, where they are * buried in comparative obscurity. Dr. Gifford published nothing of his own, except the sermon above mentioned, but was frequently a contributor to literary undertakings. In 1763 he superintended through the press, and enlarged the edition of Folkes’s “Tables of English silver and gold Coins,” printed at the expence of the Society of Antiquaries, 2 vols. 4to. To this he added the Supplement, the Postscript, and six plates.

, a learned Italian, who flourished in the early part of the seventeenth century, was admitted to the degree of doctor by the Ambrosian college at Milan. He was author of a Latin translation of the “Commentary of the three Rabbins on the Proverbs of Solomon,” Milan, 1620, 4to; but his better known work is his “Thesaurus Linguae Arabicse, seu Lexicon ArabicoLatinum,” 1632, 4 vols. fol. As a recompence for the learning and industry which it exhibited, pope Urban VIII. nominated the author to an honourable post in a college at Rome; but he died in 1632, before he could enter upon its functions.

, a brave officer and navigator, was born in 1539, in Devonshire, of an ancient family, and though a second son, inherited a considerable fortune from his father. He was educated at Eton, and afterwards at Oxford, but is not mentioned by Wood, and probably did not remain long there. His destination was the law, for which purpose he was to have been sent to finish his studies in the Temple; but being introduced at court by his aunt, Mrs. Catherine Ashley, then in the queen’s service, he was encouraged to embrace a military life. Having distinguished himself in several expeditions, particularly in that to Newhaven, in 1563, he was sent over to Ireland to assist in suppressing a rebellion excited by James Fitzmorris; and for his signal services he was made commander in chief and governor of Munster, and knighted by the lord-deputy, sir Henry Sidney, on Jan. 1, 1570, and not by queen Elizabeth in 1577, as Prince asserts. He returned soon after to England, where he married a rich heiress. In 1572 he sailed with a squadron of nine ships, to reinforce colonel Morgan, who at that time meditated the recovery of Flushing; and when he came home he published in 1576, his “Discourse to prove a passage by the North-west to Cathaia, and the East Indies,” Lond. This treatise, which is a masterly performance, is preserved in Hakluyt’s Voyages. The style is superior to most writers of that age, and shows the author to have been a man of considerable reading. The celebrated Frobisher sailed the same year, probably in consequence of this publication. In 1578, sir Humphrey obtained from the queen a very ample patent, empowering him to discover and possess in North America any lands then unsettled. He accordingly sailed to Newfoundland, but soon returned to England without success; yet, in 1583, he embarked a second time with five ships, the largest of which put back on occasion of a contagious distemper on board. Gilbert landed at Newfoundland, Aug. 3, and two days after took possession of the harbour of St. John’s. By virtue of his patent he granted leases to several people; but though none of them remained there at that time, they settled afterwards in consequence of these leases, so that sir Humphrey deserves to be remembered as the real founder of our American possessions. His half-brother, sir Walter Raleigh, was a joint adventurer on this expedition, and upon sir Humphrey’s death took out a patent of the same nature, and sailed to Virginia. On the 20th August in the above year (1583), sir Humphrey put to sea again, on board of a small sloop, for the purpose of exploring the coast. After this he steered homeward in the midst of a tempestuous sea, and on the 9th of September, when his small bark was in the utmost danger of foundering, he was seen by the crew of the other ship sitting in the stern of the vessel, with a book in his hand, and was heard to cry out, “Courage, my lads! we are as sear heaven at sea as at land.” About midnight the bark was swallowed up by the ocean; the gallant knight and all his men perished with her. He was a man of quick parts, a brave soldier, a good mathematician, and of a very enterprizing genius. He was also remarkable for his eloquent and patriotic speeches both in the English and Irish parliaments. At the close of the work above-mentioned, he speaks of another treatise “On Navigation,” which he intended to publish, but which is probably lost.

, knt. lord chief baron of the exchequer, and an eminent law writer, was born Oct. 10, 1674. Of his family, education, or early life, it has been found impossible to recover any information* Either in 1714, or 1715, for even this circumstance is not clearly ascertained, he was appointed one of the judges of the court of king’s bench in Ireland, and within a year was promoted to the dignity of chief baron of the exchequer in that kingdom, which office he held till the beginning of 1722, when he was recalled. During his residence there, he was engaged in an arduous and delicate contest concerning the ultimate judicial tribunal to which the inhabitants were to resort, which was disputed between the English house of lords and the Irish house of lords; and he appears to have been taken into custody by the order of the latter, for having enforced an order of the English house in the case of Annesley versus Sherlock, “contrary to the final judgment and determination of that house.” It appears by the style of this last order of the Irish house of lords, that he was a privy counsellor of that kingdom; and it is noticed in his epitaph, that a tender was made to him of the great seal, which he declining, returned to England. Here he was first called to the degree of an English serjeant at law, preparatory, according to ancient usage, to his taking his seat as one of the barons of the exchequer, in which he succeeded sir James Montague in June 1722. Having remained in that station for three years, he was in Jan. 1724 appointed one of the commissioners of the great seal in the room of lord Macclesfield, his colleagues being sir Joseph Jekyll and sir Robert Raymoqd. The great seal continued in commission till June 1, 1725, when sir Peter King was constituted lord keeper, and on the same day sir Jeffray Gilbert became, on the appointment of sir Rpbert Eyre to the chief-justiceship of the commonpleas, lord chief baron, which office he filled until his death, Oct. 14, 1726, at an age which may be called early, if compared with the multitude and extent of his writings, which were all left by him in manuscript.

In the only character extant of him, it is said that “he filled up every station of life with the greatest integrity and most untainted honour; and discharged the duties of his profession to the general satisfaction of all that had any opportunity of observing his conduct. Nor did his speedy advancement from one post to another procure him the envy even of the gentlemen of the long robe, who constantly paid him the regard that is due to the greatest merit when he was alive, and by whom the loss of him is now as generally regretted. The skill and experience he had in the laws of fads country, and the uncommon penetration he discovered in the decision of such causes of equity as came before him, were not more known in Westminster-hall, than his unwearied pursuit of mathematical studies (when his affairs would permit), as well as his fine taste of the more polite parts of learning, were to men of the most exalted genius in either.” He was interred in a vault built for the purpose in the abbey church at Bath, in which city he died. A monument was afterwards erected to his memory in the Temple church, London. His works are, 1. “Law of Devises, last Wills, and Revocations,” Lond. 1730, 8vo^ reprinted 1756 and 1773. 2. “The Law of Uses and Trusts,” 1734, 8vo, reprinted 1741. 3. “The Law and Practice of Ejectments,” 1734, 8vo, reprinted 1741 and 1781, by Charles Runnington, esq. 4. “Reports of Cases in Equity and Exchequer,” 1734, reprinted 1742, fol. 5. “Law and Practice of Distresses and Replevins,” no date, reprinted 1780, and 1794, by William Hunt, esq. 6. “History and Practice of Civil Actions in the Common-pleas,” 1737, 1761, and 1779. 7. “Treatise of the Court of Exchequer,” partly printed in 1738, 8vo, but completely in 1753. 8. “Treatise of Tenures,” third edition, 1757, 8vo. 9. “Treatise of Rents,” 8vo. 10. “History and Practice of the high court of Chancery,” 1758, 8vo. An erroneous Irish edition had preceded this. 11.“Cases in Law and Equity,” 1760, 8vo. 12. “The Law of Executions,” &c. 1763, 8vo. 13. “Theory or Law of Evidence,” 1761, 8vo, reprinted a fourth time in 1777, again in 1791, 1792, and 1796, 4 vols. 8vo, by Capel Lofft, esq. with some account of the life of the author, from which the present article is taken, Gilbert’s “Abridgment of Locke’s Essay on the Human Understanding,” and his argument in a case of homicide. 'The first volume was again reprinted in 1801, by J. Sedg. wick, esq. Besides these there are in Mr. Hargrave’s collection two manuscripts of lord chief baron Gilbert, the one a “History of the Feud,” the other “A Treatise of Remainders.”

, a nonconformist divine of very considerable abilities, was the son of William Gilbert of Priss, in Shropshire, and was born in 1613. In 1629 he was admitted a student of Edmund-hall, Oxford, where he took his bachelor’s degree, and after a short residence in Ireland, returned and took that of master in 1638. By the favour of Philip lord Wharton, he became minister of Upper Winchington, in Buckinghamshire; and in 1647, having taken the covenant, and become a favourite with the usurping powers, he was appointed vicar of St. Lawrence’s, Reading, and next year was created B. D. at the parliamentary visitation of the university of Oxford. About the same time he obtained the rich rectory of Edgemond, in his native county, where he was commonly called the bishop of Shropshire. In 1654 he was appointed an assistant to the commissioners of Shropshire, Middlesex, and the city of Westminster, for the ejection of such as were styled “scandalous, ignorant, and insufficient ministers and schoolmasters;” and according to Wood, was not sparing of the power which this sweeping commission gave him. After the restoration, he was ejected for nonconformity, and, retiring to Oxford, lived there very obscurely, with his wife, in St. Ebbe’s parish, sometimes preaching in conventicles, and in the family of lord Wharton. Nor was he without respect from some gentlemen of the university on account of his talents. Calamy informs us that, in a conversation with the celebrated Dr. South on the subject of predestination, he so satisfied him, that South became ever after an assertor of that doctrine. When a toleration or temporary indulgence was granted to the nonconformists in 1671, although a professed independent, he joined with three presbyterians in establishing a conventicle in Thames street, in the suburbs of Oxford; but this indulgence was soon called in. In his last days he was reduced to great distress, and was supported by the contributions of private persons, and of several heads of colleges. He died July 15, 1694, and was buried in the church of St. Aldate. He was esteemed a good philosopher, disputant, and philologist, and a good Latin poet. He published, 1. “Vindicise supremi Dei dominii,” against Dr. Owen, Lond. 1655, 8vo. 2. “An Assize Sermon,” ibid. 1657, 4to. 3. “England’s Passing-Bell, a poem written soon after the year of the plague, the fire of London, and the Dutch war,” 1675, 4to. 4. “Super auspicatissimo regis Gulielmi in Hiberniam descensu, et salva ex Hibernia reditu, carmen gratulatorium,” 1690, 4to, written in his eightieth year. 5. “Epitapbia diversa,” chiefly on persons not of the church of England. 6. “Julius Secundus,” a dialogue, Ox. 1669, 12mo, and 168O, 8vo. To this is prefixed a preface, also in the form of a dialogue, proving that piece to have been written by Erasmus. Dr. Jortin seems of the same opinion, and has reprinted it in his Life of Erasmus, pointing out some curious omissions by Gilbert. With the second edition, Gilbert republished “Jani Alex. Ferrafii Euclides catholicus,” an ironical work against the Romish church, written by an English convert who chose to conceal his true name. Gilbert translated into Latin a considerable part of Francis Potter’s book entitled “An interpretation of the number 666,” printed at Amsterdam, 1677. He is likewise supposed to have been concerned in the pamphlets called “Anni mirabiles,” printed in 1661, 1662, and the following years."

, a learned physician, who first discovered several of the properties of the load -stone, was born at Colchester, where his father was recorder, in 1540; and after an education at a grammarschool, was sent to Cambridge. Having studied physic for some time, he went abroad for his farther improvement; and in one of the foreign universities, had the degree conferred upon him of M. D. He returned to England with a considerable reputation for his learning in general, and had especially the character of being deeply skilled in philosophy and chemistry; and resolving to make his knowledge useful to his country by practising in this faculty, be presented himself a candidate to the college of physicians in London, and was elected a fellow of that society about 1573. Thus, every way qualified for it, he practised in this metropolis with great success and applause; which being observed by queen Elizabeth, whose talent it was to distinguish persons of superior merit, she sent for him to court, and appointed him her physician in ordinary; and gave him, besides, an annual pension, to encourage him in his studies. In these, as much as his extensive business in his profession would permit, he applied himself chiefly to consider and examine the various properties of the load-stone; and proceeding in the experimental way, a method not much used at that time, he discovered and established several qualities of it not observed before. This occasioned much discourse; and spreading his fame into foreign countries, great expectations were raised from his treatise on that subject, which were certainly not disappointed when he printed it, in 1600, under the following title, “De Magnete, magneticisque Corporibus & de rnagno magnete Tellure, Physioiogia nova,” i.e. “Of the Magnet (or Loadstone) and magnetical Bodies, and of that great magnet the Earth.” It contains the history of all that had been written on that subject before his time, and is the first regular system on this curious subject, and may not unjustly be styled the parent of all the improvements that have been made therein since. In this piece our author shews the use of the declination of the magnet, which had been discovered by Norman in finding out the latitude, for which purpose also he contrived two instruments for the sea. This invention was published by Thomas Blondeville, in a book entitled “Theoriques of the Planets, together with the making of two Instruments for Seamen, For finding out the Latitude without Sun, Moon, or Stars, invented by Dr. Gilbert,” 1624. But the hopes from this property, however promising at first, have by a longer experience beeo found to be deceitful.

After the death of Elizabeth, the doctor was continued as chief physician to James I. but he enjoyed that honour only a short time, dying Nov. 30, 1603. His corpse wa interred in Trinity Church, at Colchester, where he was burn, and where there is a handsome monument raised to his memory a print of which is to be seen in Morant’s “History and Antiquities of Colchester.” By a picture of him in the school-gallery of Oxford, he appears to have been tall of stature, and of a chearful countenance. His character stood very high with the philosophers of his age and country. Carpenter tells, us, that he had trodden oat a new path to philosophy. Sir Kenelm Digby compares him with Harvey, the discoverer of the circulation. Barrow ranks him with Galileo, Gassendus, Mercennus, and Des Cartes; whom he represents as men resembling the ancients in sagacity and acuteness of genius . Nor was his fame less celebrated among foreigners; the famous Peiresc often lamented, that when he was in England he was not acquainted with our philosopher.

Besides his principal work printed in his life-time, he left another treatise in ms. which coming into the hands of sir William Boswell, was from that copy printed at Amsterdam in 1651, 4to, under this title, “DC mundi nostro sublunari Philosophia nova.” As he was never married, he gave by his last will all his library, consisting of books, globes, instruments, &c. and a cabinet of minerals, to the college of physicians; and this part was punctually performed by his brothers, who inherited his estate, which must have been somewhat considerable. Wood observes, he was the chief person in hi parish at Colchester.

, the first practical writer on medicine whom this country produced, is placed by Bale (who calls him Gilbertus Legleus, and says he was physician to Hubert, archbishop of Canterbury,) in the reign of king John, about 1210; but Leland, without stating the grounds of his opinion, makes him more modern, and Dr. Freind thinks that he must have lived in the beginning of the reign of Edward 1.; “for he quotes Averrhoes,” Dr. Freind remarks, “who reached the close of the twelfth century; and whose works could not have been translated so early, and indeed were not translated till the middle, at least, of the thirteenth, as Bacon, a good voucher, informs” us: and the mention he makes of a book, * de Speculis,' which, without doubt, is that written by Bacon, and what he transcribes from Theodorick, concerning a leprosy, evidently shews that he lived low in this century, &c.“According to Leiand, he maintained a high character for his knowledge in philosophy and physic, which he had acquired by great study and much travelling; and he was very successful in his practice. His writings are principally compiled from those of the Arabian physicians, like the works of his contemporaries in other nations; sometimes, indeed, he transcribes whole chapters word for word, especially from Rhazes. He is represented as the first English physician who ventured to expose the absurd practices of the superstitious monks, who at that time engrossed much of the treatment of diseases, and is said to have contrasted with them the methods recommended by the ancients. The principal work of Gilbert, entitled” Compendium Medicinse tain morborum universalium quam particularium,“was corrected by Michael Capella, and printed at Lyons in 1510; and afterwards at Geneva, in 1608, under the title of” Laurea Anglicana, seu Compendium totius Medicinse.“His other treatises were,” De viribus Aquarum“”De Re Herbaria;“” Thesaurus Pauperum“and” De tuenda valetudine."

, a Scotch physician of eminence, was born at Dumfries in 1707. He began the study of medicine at Edinburgh, which he afterwards prosecuted at London and Paris. He obtained his degree of M. D. from the university of Rheims; and in 1732 he returned to the place of his nativity, where he afterwards constantly resided, and continued the practice of medicine till his death in 1774. Few physicians of the last century have been more successful in the exercise of their profession, or have contributed more to the improvement of the healing art. Having engaged in business at an early period of life, his attention was wholly devoted to observation. Endowed by nature with a judgment acute and solid, with a genius active and inventive, he soon distinguished himself by departing, in various important particulars, from established but unsuccessful modes of practice. Several of the improvements which he introduced have procured him deserved reputation both at home and abroad. In different medical collections are to he found several of his performances) which prove that he had something new and useful to offer upon every subject to which he applied his attention. But those writings which do him most credit are two long dissertations on “Neivous Fevers,” in the “Medical Essays and Observations” published by a society at Edinburgh and a “Treatise on the use of Sea-voyages in medicine,” which first made its appearance in 1756, and was reprinted in 1771. In the former, his recommendation of wine in nervous fevers^ and in the latter, of sea-voyages in cases of consumption, has been generally attended t in modem practice, and with great advantage.

, the oldest British historian, surnamed The Wise, was, according to Leland, born in Wales, in the year 511, but according to others, in 493. Where he was educated is uncertain; but from his writings he appears to have been a monk. Some writers say that he went over to Ireland others, that he visited France and Italy; but they agree that after his return to England, he became a celebrated and assiduous preacher ofChristianity. Leland says that he retired to one of the small islands in the Bristol Channel called the Hulms; but that, being disturbed by pirates, he removed thence to the monastery of Glastonbury, where he died. But all this is supposed to belong to another of the name, called Gildas Albanius. Du Pin says he founded a monastery at Venetia in Britain. The place and time of his death are as uncertain as ther particulars of his history which may be found in our airthorities. He is the only British author of the sixth century whose works are printed; and they are therefore valuable on account of their antiquity, and as containing the only information of the times in which he wrote. The only book, however, attributed to him with certainty, i$ his “Epistola de excidio Britanniæ, et castigatio ordinis ecclesiastici,” Lond. 1525, 8vo, Basil, 1541, 8vo, Lond. 1567, 12mo, Paris, 1576, Basil, 1568, 12mo, and by Gale, in his “Rerum Anglic. Scriptores veteres,” fol. 1684—7. There is also an English translation, Lond. 1652, 12mo. In this he laments over the miseries and almost total ruia of his countrymen, and severely reproves th corruption and profligacy of the age. The first part contains a vague accwnnt of events from the Roman invasion to his own umes. There were two other Gildas’s of the sixth century, whom some make distinct persons, and others consider as one and the same.

, a dramatic and miscellaneous writer, was born at Gillingham, near Shaftesbury, in Dorsetshire, in 1665. His parents and family were Roman catholics, and consequently endeavoured to instill the same principles into our author, but without success. His father was a member of the society of Gray’s-inn, and had suffered considerably in the royal cause. Mr. Gildon received the first rudiments of his education at Gillingham; but when twelve years of age, his parents sent him over to Doway, and entered him in the English college of secular priests there, with a view of bringing hi<m up likewise to the priesthood; but, during a progress of five years’ study he only found his inclinations more strongly confirmed for a quite different course of life.

At nineteen years of age he returned to England, and when he was otage, and by the entrance into his paternal fortune, which was not inconsiderable, rendered in every respect capable of enjoying the gaieties and pleasures of this polite twn, he came up to London. Here he soon spent the best part of what he had, and crowned his imprudences by marrying a young lady without any fortune, at about the age of twenty-three, adding to his other incumbrances that of a growing family, without any way of improving his reduced finances. During the reign of James II. he studied the religious controversies of that period, which ended in his becoming an infidel. In 1693 he ushered into the world “The Oracles of Reason,” written by Charles Blount, esq. after that author’s unhappy end, with a pompous eulogium and a defence of self-murder. He was afterwards, however, as Dr. Leland informs us, “convinced of his error; of which he gave a remarkable proof, in a good book whijch he published in 1705, entitled * The Deist’s Manual; or, a rational enquiry into the Christian Religion;' the greatest part of which is taken up in vindicating the doctrines of the existence and attributes of God, his providence and government of the world, the immortality of the soul, and a future state.”

Having greatly injured his fortune by thoughtlessness and dissipation, he was now obliged to consider on some method for retrieving it; or, indeed, rather for the means of sdbsistence; and he himself candidly owns, in his essays, that necessity was his first motive for venturing to be an author; nor was it till he had arrived at his two-and-thirtieth year, that he made any attempt in the dramatic way.

He died Jan. 12, 1723-4. His literary character is given in Boyer’s Political State, vol. XXVII. p. 102, as “a person of great literature, but a mean genius; who, having attempted several kinds of writing, never gained much reputation in any. Among other treatises he wrote the ‘ English Art of Poetry,’ which he had practised himself very unsuccessfully in his dramatic performances. He also wrote an English grammar; but what he seemed to build his chief hopes of fame upon was his Critical Commentary On the duke of Buckingham’s * Essay on Poetry,' which last piece was perused and highly approved by his grace.”

Much of this is certainly true. His plays, enumerated in the “Biog. Dramatics,” procured him little reputation. He had some talent, however, for criticism, and Pope was weak enough to believe that Addison employed Gildon to write against him. Pope introduced him into the Dunciad for another reason, his “New Rehearsal, or, Bays the Younger; containing an examen of Mr. Rowe’s plays, and a word or two on Mr. Pope’s ‘ Rape of the Lock,’” 1714. Gildon wrote the “Life of Betterton,” published in 1710.

, a learned general of the Augustines, and cardinal, was so called from the place of his birth. He was well skilled in languages, and much consulted by the learned of his age on that account. He opened the Lateran council under Julius II. 1512, and conducted several affairs of importance for Leo X. He died November 12, 1532, at Rome. This cardinal left “Commentaries” on some of the “Psalms;” “Remarks on the First Three Chapters of Genesis” “Dialogues, Epistles, and Odes,” in praise of Pontanus, &c. which may be found in Martenne’s “Amplissima Collectio,” and contained many useful notices respecting the state of learning and events of his time.

, head master of St. Paul’s school, was born in Lincolnshire, Feb. 27, 1564, and admitted scholar of Corpus college, Oxford, in Sept. 1583. He took his master’s degree in 1590, when he left college, and is supposed to have taught school at Norwich, as he was in that city in 1597, and there wrote his “Treatise concerning the Trinity,” 8vo, to which Wood gives the date of 1601. In 1608 he became chief master of St. Paul’s sf hool, in which his method of education is said to have been eminently successful. He was not more esteemed as a man of learning, and an excellent Latin scholar, than as a divine and critic. He died at his house in St. Paul’s church-yard, Nov. 17, 1635, and was buried in the antichapel belonging to Mercers’ hall. His other works are, 1. “Logonomia Anglica,” 1721, 4to; and 2. “Sacred Philosophy of Holy Scripture; or a Commentary on the Creed,” fol. 1635.

, son and successor to his father, the subject of the preceding article, was born in London, in 1597, and entered of Trinity college, Oxford, in 1612, on an exhibition from the Mercers’ company. When he had taken his master’s degree, he became usher under his father in St. Paul’s school, and under Thomas Farnaby, in his private school, but succeeded his father in 1635, and next year took the degree of D. D. He held the school only five years, being dismissed, as Knight thinks, for excessive severity. An allowance, however, was made to him of 25l. yearly, with which he set up a private school in Aldersgate-street, where he died in 1642, and was buried in the church of St. Botolph, Aldersgate. Wood speaks of his “unsettled and inconstant temper,” and of his “many changes, rambles, and some imprisonments,” but upon what account he does not inform us. Some light, however, is thrown upon the circumstance of imprisonments at least, in a late publication of Aubrey’s Lives. In his account of Chillingworth he says, “Dr. Gill, films doctorisGill, schoolmaster of Paules school, and Chillingworth, held weekely intelligence one with another for some years, wherein they used to nibble at state-matters. Dr. Gill, in one of his letters, calls king James and his sonne, the old foole and the young one, which letter Chillingworth communicated to W. Laud, A. B. Cant. The poore young Dr. Gill was seised, and a terrible storme pointed towards him, which by the eloquent intercession and advocation of Edward earle of Dorset, together with the teares of the poore old doctor, his father, and supplication on his knees to his majestic, was blowne over.” Most of his Latin poetry, in which he excelled, is published in a volume entitled “Poetici Conatus,” 1632, 12mo, but he has other pieces extant both in Latin and English, some of which are enumerated by Wood, who had seen others in manuscript. When usher of St. Paul’s school, he had the honour of having Milton under him, who was his favourite scholar. Three of Milton’s familiar Latin letters to him are extant, replete with the strongest testimonies of esteem and friendship. Milton also pays him high compliments on the excellence of his Latin poetry. He gave to the library of Trinity college the old folio edition of Spenser’s “Faerie Queene,” Brayton’s “Polyolbion,” by Selden; and Bourdelotius’s “Lucian,” all having poetical mottos from the classics in his own hand-writing, which shew his taste and track of reading; and in the “Lucian” are the arms of the Gills elegantly tricked with a pen, and coloured by him. He had two brothers, George and Nathaniel, who were both of the same college.

, D. D. an eminent dissenting divine, and the most able and learned baptist writer of the last century, was born at Kettering in Northamptonshire, Nov. 23, 1697, of parents in humble life. His father was a deacon of the baptist meeting at Kettering; and having, from various causes, some of which appear rather imaginary, a strong impression on his mind that this son would become a preacher, and an eminent character, exerted his utmost to give him a suitable education. His first attempts were crowned with such success as to confirm his father’s hopes. Being sent to the grammar school, he soon exceeded his equals in age, and even his seniors. At his eleventh year, he had not only gone through the common school books, but had read the principal Latin classics, and made considerable proficiency in the Greek language. Such was at the same time his avidity of knowledge, that he constantly frequented a bookseller’s shop (which was open only on market-days), where his acquirements became noticed by some c.f the neighbouring clergy; and he repaired so regularly to this repository of books, that it became a sort of asseveration, “such a thing is as sure as John Gill is in the bookseller’s shop.” Unfortunately, however, his progress at school was interrupted by an edict of the master, requiring that all his scholars, without exception, should attend prayers at the church on week-days. This, of course, amounted to an expulsion of the children of dissenters, and of young Gill among the rest. His parents not being able to send him to a distant school, some efforts were made to get him upon one of the dissenting funds of London, that he might be sent to one of their seminaries. In order to procure this favour, his progress in literature was probably stated as very extraordinary, and the application produced an answer fully as extraordinary namely, “that he was too young and, should he continue, as it might be supposed he would, to make such rapid advances in his studies, he would go through the common circle of learning before he could be capable of taking care of himself, or of being employed in any public service.” Notwithstanding this illiberal and absurd repulse, young Gill went on improving himself in Greek and Latin, by eagerly studying such books in both languages as he could procure, and added to his stock a knowledge of logic, rhetoric, moral and natural philosophy. Without a master also, he made such progress in the Hebrew as soon to be able to read the Bible with facility; and ever after this language was his favourite study. He read much in the Latin tongue, and studied various systematic works Oh divinity; but all this appears to have been done at such hours as he could spare from assisting his father in his business. In November 1716, he made a public profession of his religious sentiments before the baptist meeting, and was baptised according to the usual forms; soon after which he commenced preacher, and officiated first at Higham Ferrars, where in 1718 he married; he also preached occasionally at Kettering until the beginning of 1719, when he was invited to become pastor of the baptist congregation at Horslydovrn, Southwark, and soon became very popular in the metropolis.

In 1724 he appeared as an author by the publication of two sermons; but in 1726 he first distinguished himself as a champion for the peculiar tenet which divides the baptists from other denominations, by engaging in a controversy with Mr. Maurice, an independent minister. Zealously, however, as Dr. Gill was attached to the baptist tenets, and frequently as he wrote in favour of them, it was for the most part in his own defence. “Intimate witli him as I was,” says Mr. Toplady, “I never so much as once ueard him drop a single hint, in all our conversations, directly or indirectly, concerning the article of baptism.” In 1728 he published his “Exposition of the Song of Solomon,” folio. The year before it appeared, Whiston had published a pamphlet in which he endeavoured to prove that the Song of Solomon was a spurious book, and not fit to stand in the canon of scripture. To all this Gill answered with great ability. It does not appear whether Whiston had seen this answer, but he himself informs us that in 17 J-& he had heard a great character of Dr. Gill for his skill in the Oriental languages, and had a mind to hear him preach, but being informed that he had written a folio book, on the Canticles, he declined to go and hear him; a proof that Whiston’s dislike to bigotry was to the bigotry of others only. In 1751 a new edition of the "Exposition*' was published in 4 to, with corrections and additions, and a third, likewise: with additions, in 1767.

In the same year (1728) he published “The Prophecies of the Old Testament respecting the Messiah, considered, and proved to be literally fulfilled in Jesus,” in answer to Collins’ s “Scheme of literal Prophecy considered.” Becoming now a preacher of high reputation among dissenters of all denominations, many of whom wished to hear Dr. Gill frequently, but could not be expected to join his congregation, a weekly lecture was established by subscription in 1729, which he continued to preach until 1756, when age, and a multiplicity of engagements, obliged him to resign it. Here a numerous congregation heard those sermons, many of which he moulded afterwards into treatises for publication, particularly his “Treatise on the doctrine of the Trinity,” which appeared in 1731. One object of this treatise was to check the progress Sabellianism had at this time made among the baptists. In 1735, and following years, he published his “Cause of God and Truth,” 4 vols. 8vo, a defence of the Calvinistic against the Arminian sentiments, on the subjects of election, original sin, &c. Dr. Gill’s supralapsarian opinions in this (for such he held with great zeal) being animadverted on in an anonymous pamphlet, he published an answer called “Truth defended, c.” In 1737 he again engaged in controversy on the subject of baptism, with Mr. Samuel Browne, a dissenting minister.

When he first came to settle in London, in 1719, he became intimately acquainted with Mr. John Skepp, author of“The Divine Energy,” and in 1751 new-modelled that work for a second edition. Skepp was an able Hebraist, and had formed a good collection of Hebrew and Rabbinical books, which Gill bought on his death in 1721, and bestowed many years in a careful study of them, reading the Targums, the Mishna, the Talmuds, the book of Zohar; and having collected a vast mass of useful observations, he employed them as illustrations for his Exposition of the Bible. Of this voluminous work> the New Testament appeared first in 3 vols. t'ol. 1746, 1747, and 1748. In this last year he received the degree of D. D. from the Marischal college, Aberdeen, professedly “on account of his learned defence of the true sense of the holy scriptures against deists and infidels.” This diploma was decreed to him in the handsomest manner, without his knowledge, and the fees were remitted. His Exposition of the Old Testament was published afterwards in various years, forming, along with the New, 9 vols. fol. which, becoming of late years in much demand, and the price being greatly raised, a new and very neat edition was published in 1810—12, in 10 vols. 4to, by Mr. Bagster, of the Strand. In 1767 Dr. Gill published a “Dissertation on the Antiquities of the Hebrew Language, Letters, Vowel-points, and Accents,” and in the same year collated the various passages of the Old Testament quoted in the Mishna, in the Talmuds, both Jerusalem and Babylonian, and in the Rabbath; and extracted the variations in them, from the modern printed text, which he sent to Dr. Kennicott, who politely acknowledges the obligation in his “State of his Collation,” published in 1767. In 1769 Dr. Gill published a “Body of doctrinal Divinity,” 2 vols. 4to, and in 1770 a “Body of practical Divinity.” This was the last of his numerous publications, in the preparation of which he liad spent many years of his long life. He died at his house at Camberwell, Oct. 14, 1771; his wife had been dead some years before, and his only surviving son died in 1804, aged seventy-seven. Dr. Gill’s private character was so excellent, that the admirers of his writings have said that “his learning and labours were exceeded only by the invariable sanctity of his life and conversation.” His extensive learning and reading cannot be called in question, but as a writer he is in general too copious and diffuse.

, a distinguished scholar and traveller, was born 1490, at Albi. After travelling over France, and into Italy, he spent some time, at his return, with George d'Armagnac, bishop of Rhodes, afterwards cardinal, who was his patron; and, at this prelate’s request, wrote his 16 books on the nature of animals, “De vi et natura Animalium,” Lyons, 1533, 4to, extracted from Ælian, Porphyry, Heliodorus, and Oppian to which he has added his own observations, and a book of the fish found at Marseilles. He dedicated this work to Francis I. and entreated him, in the dedication, to send some learned men into foreign countries, at his own expence. Francis approved this plan, and the author was sent to the Levant some time after but, receiving nothing from the king during his stay there, he was obliged, at the king’s death, 1547, to enlist himself in the service of Soliman II. for a maintenance. In 1550, however, he returned to France with M. d‘Aramont, ambassador from that kingdom to the Porte; he went afterwards to cardinal d’Armagnac at Rome, being entrusted with the affairs between France and the holy see, and died in that city in 1555. Besides his work above mentioned, he left “Elephanti descriptio,” 8vo; “De Bosphoro Thracio,” 24to; “De Topographia Constantinouoleos,” 24to; and in Banduri’s Imperium Orientate, editions of Demetrius of Constantinople in “Rei Accipitrariae Auctores,” 1612, 4toj of Tbeodpret’s “Commentary on the Twelve minor Prophets;” and of the “Hist, of Ferdinand, king of Arragon,” by Laurentius Valla.

, an eminent English divine, and for his excellent character and usefulness, called the “Apostle of the North,” was descended from a good family in Westmoreland, and born in 1517, at Kentmire in that county. He was the son of Edwin Gilpin, by Margaret daughter of William Laton of Delain in Cumberland. From his earliest youth he was inclined to a contemplative life, thoughtful, reserved, and serious, which giving his parents an early presage of his future piety, they determined to educate him for the church. His first years wete spent at a public school, whence he was removed to Oxford, and at the age of sixteen was entered upon the foundation at Queen’s college. Besides his academical studies, to which he applied with great industry, he appears to have read while here some of the works of Erasmus, which at their first appearance were not very popular, and discovered in them a treasure of real learning, which he had in vain sought after in the writings then in most esteem. But as he had now determined to apply himself to divinity, he made the Scriptures his chief study; and was particularly anxious to gain an accurate knowledge of the Greek and Hebrew languages, in the study of which he was much assisted by Mr. Neal, a fellow of New college, and afterwards Hebrew professor at Oxford. He had not been long in the university before he was considered as a young man of good parts and considerable learning, and admired and loved for a remarkable sweetness of disposition, and unaffected sincerity in his manners. At the usual term he took the degree of M. A. and about the same time was elected fellow of his college.

If at this time, from perusing the writings of Erasmus, or by any other means, he entertained scruples respecting the religion of the Romish church, in which he had been bred up, he had the discretion to suppress his sentiments, and before he said any thing which might shake the faith of others, he determined to establish his own. He had not been long settled in his fellowship before a very public testimony was given to the reputation he had acquired, by his being one of the first in Oxford who were recommended to cardinal Wolsey for Christ Church college, which he had just founded, and accordingly Mr. Gilpin removed thither from Queen’s, and continued his former studies. From the nature of these, and the ingenuity and honesty of his disposition, it is not improbable that he might in time have been led by his own reasonings to that discovery of truth he aimed at; but Providence rewarded a pious endeavour, by throwing in his way the means of an earlier attainment of it. Under the patronage of Edward VI. who had now succeeded Henry VIII. Peter Martyr went to Oxford, where he read divinity lectures in a strain to which the university had been hitherto little accustomed, and particularly refuted the doctrine of tl^e corporal pretence. This occasioned a controversy of much warmth, such was Mr. Gilpia't credit at the university that the popish party were very solicitous to engage him on theic side. But, although he was as yet but imperfectly acquainted with the arguments of the reformers, he had, it seems, lately discovered, through a dispute he had been engaged in with Dr. Hooper, afterwards bishop of Worcester, that several of the Romish doctrines were not so well supported by Scripture as was commonly imagined; and, with a mind in this unsettled condition, he thought himself but ill qualified to espouse either side publicly. lit consequence, however, of repeated importunities, he ventured to appear in a public disputation against Peter Martyr, the consequence of which was, his ingenuously owning that he could not maintain his opinions, and a determination to enter into no more controversies until he had gained the full information he was in pursuit of. Peter Martyr acknowledged this candid behaviour, so different from that of Gilpin’s fellow disputants, Chedsey, Morgan, Tresham, &c. and often told his friends that it was the subject of his daily prayers that God would be pleased at length to touch the heart of this pious papist with the knowledge of true religion. Nor, says his biographer, did he pray in vain; for Mr. Gilpin from this time became every day more reconciled to the reformers.

He now began with great diligence to read over the Scriptures, and the writings of the fathers, the result of which was a more favourable opinion of the doctrines of the reformers. He also communicated some of his doubts to Cuthbert Tonstal, bishop of Durham, who was his mother’s uncle, and had always expressed a great regard for him, and to other learned men of the university, whose answers appear to have had a tendency to increase his scruples, and finally to make him declare himself a protestant; and it is certain, that while at Christ Church, he became fully convinced of the errors of popery. Such, however, was his diffidence in his own acquirements, and such his fear lest protestantism might suffer by the inexperience of its teachers, that he resisted many solicitations to leave the university, and undertake the cure of souls. These scruples detained him at Oxford until the thirty-fifth year of his age; about which time he yielded so far to the earnest solicitations of his friends as to accept the vicarage of Norton, in the diocese of Durham, in Nov. 1552. Before he went to Beside he was appointed to preach before the king, who was at Greenwich, which appears then to have been a custom before being presented to any benefice. On this occasion, with the true spirit of a reformer, he inveighed against the luxurious and corrupt manners of the times among all ranks, and although the king was not then present, delivered what he intended as an address to his majesty, not doubting, as he said, but that it would be carried to him. This courage recommended him to the notice of many persons of the first rank; particularly to sir Francis Russel, and sir Robert Dudley, afterwards earls of Bedford and Leicester, who from that time professed a great regard for him; and, when in power, were always ready to patronize him. Gilpin received their offered friendship with humility and gratitude, but never solicited it on his own account. He sometimes indeed applied to lord Bedford in behalf of his friends, but does not appear to have once asked any favour of the earl of Leicester, whose real character could not be unknown, or agreeable to him. He is likewise said to have been noticed by secretary Cecil, afterwards lord Burleigh, who obtained for him a general licence for preaching, a matter of great favour in those days. This licence he sometimes used in oilier parts of the country, but confined his services chiefly to his parish of Norton.

Here he made it his principal endeavour to inculcate moral virtue, and to dissuade from those vices which he observed most prevalent. He seldom handled controversial points, for he was still scarcely settled in some of his religious opinions. Hence by degrees a diffidence of himself arose, which gave him great uneasiness. He thought he had engaged too soon in his office, that he could not sufficiently discharge it, that he should not rest in giving his hearers only moral instructions, and that, overspread as the country was with popish doctrines, he did ill to pretend to be a teacher of religion, if he were unable to oppose such errors. These thoughts made every day a greater impression on him. At length, quite unhappy, he wrote his relation bishop Tonstal an account of his situation. The bishop very liberally told him, that as he was so uneasy, he should think of nothing till he had fixed his religion, and that, in his opinion, he could do no better than put his parish into the hands of some person, in whom he could confide, and spend a year or two in Germany, France, and Holland; by which means he might have an pportunity of conversing with some of the most eminent professors on both sides of the question. He acquainted him likewise, that his going abroad at this time would do him also a considerable service; for, during his confinement, he had written two or three books, particularly one upon the Lord’s Supper, which he had a desire to publish; and as this could nor be so conveniently done at home, he would be glad to have it done under his inspection at Paris.

This letter gave Mr. Gilpin much satisfaction, a conference with some of the learned men abroad being what his heart had been long set on. One objection, however, was the expencc, but the bishop told him his living would do something towards his maintenance, and deficiencies he would supply; but this did not remove a greater difficulty. Mr. Gilpin’s notions of the pastoral care were so strict, that he thought no excuse could justify non-residence for so considerable a time as he intended to be abroad. He could not, therefore, think of supporting himself with any part of the income of his living, and having discovered a person, with whose abilities and inclinations to discharge the duties of it, he was well acquainted, he resigned it to him, and set out lor London, to receive his last orders from the bishop, and to embark. The bishop received him at first -with some displeasure, but such an instance of sincerity could not fail to raise him higher in his esteem, although be would afterwards frequently chide him for these qualms of conscience, and would be often reminding him, that if he did not look better to his interest, he would certainly die a beggar.

Gilpin now embarked for Holland, whence he immediately went to Mechlin to visit his brother George, then a 2ealous papist, but afterwards a warm advocate for the reformation, and the translator from Dutch into English of that keen satire against popery, entitled “The Beehive of the Roman church.” He went afterwards to Louvain, where he resolved to settle for sometime, making occasional excursions to other placet. Loinrain was then one of the chief places for students in divinity. Some of the most eminent divines on both sides of the question resided there, and the most important topics of religion were discussed with gfeat freedom. Of such opportunities he soon began to avail himself, and the consequence was his imbibing juster notions of the doctrines of the reformation: he saw things in a clearer and stronger light, and felt a satisfaction in the change he Uad made, to whichhe had hitherto been n stranger. While thus pursuing his studies, he heard the important news from England of queen Mary’s accession to the crown, whose bigotry was well known, and in whom the signs of a persecuting spirit already appeared; and at the same time learned that his relation bishop Tonstal was released from the Tower, and reinstated in his bishopric. The first consequence of this last event was the offer of a living, which Mr. Gilpin declined in a long letter, the unaffected piety of which disarmed all resentment on the part of the bishop, and led him rather to admire a behaviour, in which the motives of conscience shewed themselves so superior to those of interest. After remaining two years in Flanders, to which his countrymen were daily flocking to escape the sanguinary laws of queen Mary, he took a journey to Paris, in order to print the bishop of Durham’s book on the Sacrament, with which that prelate had intrusted him. This work of Tonstal’s was written so much in a spirit of moderation respecting the extravagant popish doctrine of the Sacrament, that Gilpin was generally supposed to have corrupted it, which he refuted by shewing the bishop’s letter of thanks for his “care and fidelity” as an editor. While Mr. Gilpin staid at Paris, he lodged with Vascosan, the eminent printer, to whom he had been recommended by his friends in the Netherlands, and who shewed him great regard, introducing him to the most considerable men in that city. Here popery became quite his aversion; he saw more of its superstition and craft than he had yet seen; the former among the people, the latter among the priests, who scrupled not to avow how little truth was their concern. Here also he found his old acquaintance Mr. Neat, of New college, who was now become an inflexible bigot to popery, and resisted all Gilpin’s endeavours to reclaim him. This was the same Neal, who was afterwards chaplain to bishop Bonner, and distinguished himself by being sole voucher of the very improbable and silly story of the Nag’s head consecration.

Mr. Gilpin having spent three years abroad, was now fully satisfied in all his more considerable scruples. He wanted no further conviction of the bad tendency of popery: he saw the necessity of some reformation, and began to think every day more favourably of the present one. The doctrine of the corporal presence indeed he had not yet fully considered; but he looked upon it as a mystery, which it rather became him to acquiesce in than examine. The principal end of his going abroad being thus answered, he was desirous, of return ing iion:eb,ut ap the Marian persecution was still raging, his mends suggested that it was little less than madness to think of going to a place, from whence all of his sentiments were endeavouring to withdraw themselves. But it is most probable, that his purpose to return at this time was in pursuance of the bishop of Durham’s advice; who, rinding the infirmities of age increase upon him, and believing his nephew totally unqualified to advance himself in life, might be desirous of providing for him before l.is death; and hoped that his power, in that remote part of the kingdom, would be a sufficient protection for him against his enemies. It is, however, certain that he came into England during the heat of the persecution, and went immediately to the bishop, who was then in his diocese. Here this humane prelate kept himself withdrawn during most of that violent reign, to avoid having any hand in measures which he abhorred.

The bishop received him with great friendship, and within a very little time, gave him the archdeaconry of Durham, to which the rectory of Easington was annexed. Upon removing to this parish, he found it in great disorder, and set himself in earnest to reprove vice publicly and privately; and to explain the nature of true religion, with a freedom by no means suited to those dangerous times. In his office of archdeacon he endeavoured to reform the clergy, to discountenance pluralities, and to repress their private vices; and this he persisted in, notwithstanding the bishop hinted to him that more caution would be necessary in such times. It is, however, a little surprising that the bishop had not foreseen how much he must necessarily expose his nephew to the popish party, by placing him in such a station. He knew he could not temporize; and he must know, that without temporizing, he would soon be most obnoxious to those in power; with whose persecuting principles he was well acquainted. The consequence was as might have been expected; a clamour was raised against Mr. Gilpin as a heretic, and he was accused in form before the bishop of Durham, who, however, very artfully screened him at this time; but soon after, Mr. Gilpin finding the duties of his archdeaconry and rectory too nauch for his strength, and that they could not be divided, resigned both, and was for some time without any office in the church, except that of living with the bishop as one of his chaplains.

How long he continued unbeneficed, does not appear. It could not, however, be very long, because the rectory of Houghton-le-spring fell vacant, before Easington and the archdeaconry were disposed of; and the bishop, in a jocular way, made him an offer of all the three, which it was not likely he would listen to. He thanked the bishop, however, and accepted Houghton. This rectory was of considerable value, about 400l. per annum, but the duty of it was proportionably laborious, it being so extensive as to contain no less than fourteen villages, overrun with the darkness of popish ignorance and superstition. Gilpin, however, did not despair. He implored the assistance of God, and his sincere endeavours met with it. The people crowded about him, and heard him with attention, perceiving him a teacher of a different kind from those to whom they had hitherto been accustomed. This very cause, however, increased the malice of his enemies, and he was again formally accused before the bishop of Durham. How the bishop behaved at this time, we are not particularly informed; but no man knew better how to act upon an emergency; and it is certain that Mr. Gilpin was acquitted. The malice of his enemies succeeded, however, in part, for the bishop’s favour to him from this time visibly declined; though it is questionable, whether he really felt the indifference he expressed; or perhaps he might think it advisable thus far to temporize; hpping to deduct the sum of his own from the ill-will of others. Be this as it may, Mr. Gilpin acknowledged his great obligations to the bishop; was sorry to see him disgusted; and would have given up any thing to have him satisfied, except his conscience.

His enemies, in the mean time, were not thus silenced. Though they had been defeated a second time, they were only the more spirited up by that additional rancour which generally attends the baffled designs of the malicious. Convinced how impossible it was to work up the bishop of Durham’s zeal to the height they wished, they therefore laid thirty-two articles against their intended victim before bishop Bonner. Bonner extolled their laudable zeal for religion, and promised that the heretic should be at a stake in a fortnight. Of this determination Mr. Gilpin’s friends in London apprized him by a special messenger, but he had long been preparing to suffer for the truth, and now determined not to decline it. He even had a garment made in which he might go decently to the stake, and used to put it on evejy day until Bonner’s messengers apprehended him. In his way to London, it is said he broke his leg, which put a stop for some time to his journey, and before he was able to travel, queen Mary died, and he was get at liberty. This account of his accident has been doubted, but it is certain that the news of the queen’s death met him upon the road, and put a stop to any farther prosecution. He then returned to Houghton through crowds of people, triumphantly expressing the utmost joy, and blessing God for his deliverance.

When the popish bishops were deprived, and many sees by that means vacant, Mr. Gilpin’s friends at court, particularly the earl of Bedford, thought it a good opportunity to use their interest in his favour, and he was accordingly nominated to the see of Carlisle, but notwithstanding the pressing solicitations of his noble friends, and of Sandys, bishop of Worcester, he persisted in declining this high honour, as being unworthy of it. It is somewhat strange that Nicolson in his “Historical Library,” and Heylin in his “Church History,” should ascribe his conduct to lucrative motives, a calumny which has been amply refuted by his biographer. Both these writers indeed seem to have been very little acquainted with Mr. Gilpin’s character, in which disinterestedness bore so principal a part. The year after his refusal of*the bishopric of Carlisle, he was offered the provostship of Queen’s college, Oxford, which he also refused; and thus having had in his option almost every kind of preferment which an ecclesiastic i capable of holding, he sat down with one living, which gratified the utmost of his desires.

Soon after queen Elizabeth’s accession, a general visitation was held. An assembly of divines, among whom were Parker, Grindal, and Sandys, having finished a body of injunctions aud articles, commissions were issued out, impowering proper persons to enforce them; the oath of supremacy was to be tendered to the clergy, and a subscription imposed. When the visitors came to Durham, Mr. Gilpin was requested to preach before the clergy, against the pope’s supremacy. To this he had no objection, but did not like the thoughts of subscribing, having some doubts with regard to one or more of the articles. His curate having not these scruples, he hoped that his subscription might satisfy the visitors; but next clay, when the clergy were assembled to subscribe, as an instance of respect Mr. Gilpin was first called upon. The emergency allowed him no time for reflection. He just considered with himself, that upon the whole these alterations in religion were certainly right; that he doubted only in a few immaterial points; and that, if he should refuse, it might be a means to keep others back. He then took up the pen, and, with some hesitation, at length subscribed. Afterwards retiring, he sent a letter to the visitors, acquainting them in what sense he subscribed the articles; which they accepted very favourably.

When in order to enlighten the nation in true learning and religion, public schools began to be recommended, Mr. Gilpin endeavoured to promote the good work with the utmost of his ability. As his manner of living was most affluent and generous, and his hospitality and charities made daily a larger demand upon him, it was thought extraordinary, that, amidst such great expences, he should entertain the design of building and endowing a grammar school; yet his exact ceconomy soon enabled him to accomplish this, and the effects of his endowment were very quickly seen: his school was no sooner opened than it began to flourish, and to afford the agreeable prospect of a succeeding generation rising above the ignorance and errors of their forefathers. He not only placed able masters in his school, whom he procured from Oxford, but himself constantly inspected it, and took an active part in the education of the scholars. Such was his benevolence that whenever he met with a poor boy upon the road, he would make trial of his capacity l)y a few questions; and if he found it such as pleased him, he would provide for his education. From the school also he sent several to the universities, where he maintained them wholly at his own expence. Nor was this munificent and uncommon care unrewarded. Many of his scholars became great ornaments to the church, and exemplary instances of piety, among whom have been particularly mentioned, Henry Ayray, afterwards provost of Queen’s college; George Carleton, bishop of Chichester; and Hugh Broughton. It was also at Mr. Gilpin’s suggestion that his friend bishop Pilkington founded a school at the place of his nativity in Lancashire, the statutes of which he revised and corrected at the bishop’s request. Mr. Gilpin’s general reputation for learning and piety, made it the desire of persons of all religious persuasions to have their cause credited by his authority; and among others, the first dissenters, or puritans, who had contracted prejudices against certain church ceremonies, habits, &c. made early applications to Mr. Gilpin, but without effect. The reformation, he said, was just; essentials were there concerned; hut at present he saw no ground for disaffection. " The church of England, he thought, gave no reasonable offence. Some things there might be in it, which had been perhaps as well avoided (probably meaning the use of the vestments), but to disturb the peace of a nation for such trifles, he thought, was quite unchristian. And what indeed appeared to him chiefly blameable in the dissenters, was, that heat of temper with which they propagated their opinions, and treated those who differed from them. Such was not his practice, for he confined all his dislike to their sentiments, urged with intemperate warmth, but bore not the least ill-will to their persons. One of the most intimate friends he ever had was Mr. Lever, a minister of their persuasion, and a sufferer in their cause. It is almost needless to add, that he found it equally or more easy to resist the solicitations of the papists, who lamented, as they well might, that so good a man had forsaken their communion, and consequently they left no methods untried to bring him back.

His hospitable manner of living was the admiration of the whole country, and strangers and travellers met with a cheerful reception. Even their beasts had so much care taken of them, that it was humorously said, “if a horse was turned loose in any part of the country, it would immediately make its way to the rector of Moughton’s.” Every Sunday, from Michaelmas to Easter, was a sort of public day with him. During this season, he expected to see all his parishioners and their families, whom he seated, according to their ranks, at three tables; and when absent from home, the same establishment was kept up. When lord Burleigh, then lord treasurer, was sent on public affairs into Scotland, he unexpectedly paid a visit to Mr. Gilpin, but the reconomy of his house was not easily disconcerted, and he entertained the statesman nnd his retinue in such a manner as made him acknowledge “he could hardly have expected more at Lambeth.” On looking back from an eminence, after he had left Houghton, Btirleigh eould not help exclaiming, “There is the enjoyment of life indeed! who can blame that man for not accepting of a bishopric! what doth he want to make him greater, or happier, or more useful to mankind!” Mr. Gilpin’s labours extended beyond his own parish; he every year visited divers neglected parishes in Northumberland, Yorkshire, Cheshire, Westmoreland, and Cumberland; and that his own flock might not suffer, he was at the expence of a constant assistant. In all his journeys he did not fail to visit the gaols and places of confinement; and by his labours and affectionate manner of behaviour, he is said to have reformed many abandoned persons in those abodes of human misery. He had set places and times for preaching in the different parts of the country, which were as regularly attended as the assize towns of a circuit. If he came to a place in which there was a church, he made use of it; if not, of barns, or any other large building, where great crowds of persons were sure to attend him, some for his instructions, more, perhaps, to partake of his bounty; but in his discourses he had a sort of enthusiastic warmth, which roused many to a sense of religion who had never thought of any thing serious before. The dangers and fatigues attending this employment were, in his estimation, abundantly compensated by the advantages which he hoped would accrue from them to his uninstructed fellow-creatures. He did not spare the rich; and in a discourse before Barnes, bishop of Durham, who had already conceived a prejudice against him, he spoke with so much freedom, that his best friends dreaded the result; they rebuked him for giving the prelate a handle against him, to which he replied, “If the discourse should do the good he intended by it, he was regardless of the consequences to himself.” He then waited on the prelate, who said, “Sir, I propose to wait upon you home myself.” When they arrived at the rectory, and entered the house, the bishop turned suddenly round, and grasped him eagerly by the hand, saying, “Father Gil pin, I know you are fitter to be bishop of Durham, than I am to be parson of this church of yours. I ask forgiveness for past injuries. Forgive me, father, I know you have enemies, but while I live bishop of Durham, none of tjiem shall cause you any further trouble.”

For many interesting and honourable anecdotes of the conduct of this extraordinary man we must refer to his life by his descendant the late rev. William Gilpin. The present article has reached its utmost length, but will not be useless it' it direct the attention of the reader to one of the most exemplary pieces of biography in our language. It remains only to notice, that after a life devoted to every virtue that can dignify the character of an ecclesiastic, he found himself in February 1583 so weak, from a fall, and the infirmities of age, as to be sensible that his end wag drawing near. He told his friends of his apprehensions, and spoke of his death with great composure. He was soon confined to his chamber; but retained his senses to the last. A few days before his death, he desired his friends, acquaintance, and dependents, &c. might be called into his chamber; and being raised in his bed, addressed himself to them on matters of eternal concern. He also sent for several persons, who had hitherto made no good use of his advice, and upon whom he imagined his dying words might have a better eftect, but his speech began to faulter before he had finished his exhortations. The remaining hours of his life he spent in prayer, and broken conversation with some select friends, mentioning often the consolations of the gospel, declaring they were the only true ones, and that nothing else could bring a man peace at the last. He died March 4, 15S3, in the sixtysixth year of his age.

Thus died Bernard Gilpin, who, for his exemplary piety, laborious virtue, and unbounded benevolence, deserves to have his name transmitted to posterity with respect and reverence, and who obtained, and most deservedly, among his contemporaries, the title of the Northern Apostle. By his unwearied application he had amassed a great stock of knowledge, and was indeed ignorant of no part of learning at that time in esteem. He had given more than common attention to the study of the dead languages, to history and divinity; he is said to have excelled in poetry, but he expended little time in the pursuit of any thing that was foreign to his profession. His temper was naturally warm, but, by degrees, he succeeded in obtaining an entire command of himself. His disposition was serious, yet, among his particular friends, he was cheerful and even facetious. His severity had no other object but himself: to others he was mild, candid, and indulgent. His “Sermon preached at the court at Greenwich, before K. Edward VI.” in 1552, is the only revised composition of Mr. Gilpin’s that has survived him. It is printed in his Life by bishop Carleton, 1636, 12mo, fourth edition; and in that more elaborate and elegant life by his descendant, first printed in 1753, 8vo.

, a nonconformist divine and physician, probably of the same family with the preceding, was a native of Cumberland, and educated in Queen’s college, Oxford, whence he took the degree of M. D. but afterwards entered into holy orders, and became minister of Greystock, in his own county; but preached with great applause in London, at Lambeth, the Savoy, &c. and in many other parts of the kingdom; till he was silenced for refusing to comply with the act of uniformity, 1662. He afterwards practised physic in the north of England, particularly at Newcastle, where he was greatly esteemed by all that knew him, both as a physician and a divine. He died in 1657. He was the author of several treatises; but his discourse on “Satan’s Temptations,” 1677, 4to, is most esteemed.

, a late artist, and a descendant of the Apostle of the North, was born at Carlisle in 1733, from whence, after having acquired some relish for the art from his father, who was a captain in the army, he came to London, and was articled to a ship-painter. His first interesting works were composed of some market groups which struck his eye from his window. Soon after he went to Newmarket, being encouraged by the late William, duke of Cumberland, where he executed many compositions which might have vied with Hogarth in point of character. In the duke’s stud he acquired that knowledge of the horse, which he afterwards displayed with such superior spirit and beauty; and when we see with what felicity he applied it to the higher departments of the art, to historic compositions in the triuiph of Camillas, the election of Darius, the story of Phaeton, we must lament that such talents should have been drawn aside to the meaner employment of horse-portrait painting, which occupied too much of his valuable life.

His drawings of animals, in pencil and water-colours, display a degree of taste and skill seldom attained. Many of his most capital pictures are in the possession of noblemen and collectors; his chef-d'oeuvre, a group of tigers, is in the possession of S. Whitbread, esq. The etchings of cattle which accompany his brother’s descriptive writings, are his productions. As a man he was equally esteemed for probity of character and simplicity of manner, and, as a member of the royal academy, he added honour to the institution. He died at Brompton, March 8, 1807, three years after his learned and amiable brother, the rev. William Gilpin.

, a voluminous and useful French writer of the last century, was born at Paris, Nov. 17, 1726, and being educated in the profession of the law, became successively counsellor of the parliament of Paris, and member of the grand council. He died in that city in 1807. His countrymen owe to him various translations, which are held in high repute, particularly one of Homer, first printed in 1784, 8vo, of which there were afterwards two splendid editions printed by Didot; and translations of Hesiod, Theocritus, Demosthenes, and Goldsmith’s Vicar of Wakefield. His original works were, 1. “Traite de Peloquence de barreau,” 1767, 12mo. 2. “De la” Religion, par un homme du monde,“1778, and following years, 5 vols. 8vo. This work, though loaded with a superabundance of quotations, which render it too prolix, was well received. In 17 85 he published a judicious abridgment of it, under the title of” Nouveaux Melanges de Philosophic et de la Litterature,“exhibiting in a regular plan the fundamental principles of religion in general, and the moral government of the Deity. 3.” Les vrais principes du Governement Francaise,“Geneva, 8vo, Paris, 8vo, and 2 vols. 12mo. 4.” Analyse raisonnée du droit Français," Paris, 1782, 4to.

, to whom the invention of the compass has been ascribed, was a Neapolitan, and born about the year 13OO. At that time the sovereigns of Naples were younger branches of the royal family of France; and, to mark the circumstance of this invention of the compass originating with a subject of Naples, Gioia distinguished the north with a fleur de lis, a, particularity which has been adopted by all nations, to whom the use of this instrument is known. Some have pretended that the ancients wer6 not ignorant of the power of the magnet; but it is certain 'that Pliny, who often speaks of the load-stone, knew nothing of its appropriate direction to the pole. Some authors also have conferred the honour of this important discovery on the Chinese, and it has by Dr. Wallis been ascribed to the English. However this may be, the territory of Principato, which is part of the kingdom of Naples, and in which place Gioia was born, bears a compass for its arms. If it be only an improvement of an invention, though but partially known, which may be imputed to Gioia, he is without dispute entitled to a distinguished place in the rank of those who have contributed to the benefit of society.

, a skilful mathematician, was born December 13, 1633, at Bitonto. He spent his youth in idleness and debauchery, and married a young woman without any fortune; and having killed one of his brothersin-law, who reproached him with his indolence and laziness, he entered as a soldier in a fleet fitted out by the pope against the Turks. The admiral, finding that he did not want genius, gave him a writer’s place which happened to be vacant; and Giordani, being obliged in consequence to learn arithmetic, eagerly studied that of Clavius, and acquired a taste for mathematics. Returning to Rome, in 1659, he was made keeper of the castle of St. Angelo, and devoted the leisure that office afforded him to mathematical studies, in which he made so rapid a progress, that queen Christina chose him for her mathematician during her stay at Rome; and Louis XIV, appointed him to teach mathematics in the academy of painting and sculpture which he had founded in that city, 1666. Giordani was made engineer to the castle of St. Angelo by pope Clement X., appointed mathematical professor at the college della Sapienza 1685, and admitted into the academy of the Arcadi, May 5, 1691. He died November 3, 1711. His principal works are, “Euclide restitute,” foiio; “De componendis gravium momentis,” folio; “Fundamentum doctrines motus gravium,” 1705, folio; “Ad Hyacinthum Christophorum Epistola,” 1705, folio.

, an eminent artist, was born at Naples, in 1629, and at first was the disciple of Spagnoletto, and afterwards of Pietro da Cortona.When. h quitted the school of the latter, he went to Lonabarcly, to study Corregio 3 and then travelled to Venice, to improve himself hy the colouring and compositions of the besi Venetian artists. He had a fruitful imagination, and a surprising readiness and freedom of hand; his tone of colouring is agreeable; and his design, when he chose, correct. He studied the manners and particularities of the greatest masters with such care and judgment, and possessed so happy a memory, that he not only retained in his mind a distinct idea of the style of every celebrated master, but had the skill and power to imitate them with such a critical exactness, as to deceive even the ablest connoisseurs. In his early time this might have been the effect of study, and an attempt to arrive at excellence; but we may observe the same disposition of mind in those pictures which he painted in the best periods of his life, many of them being in the peculiar manner of Titian, Tintoretto, Guido, and Bassan. Some of those paintings are so like, that it is said there are in the most capital collections in England, some called Titian’s which are incontestably the sportings of Giordano’s pencil. One of his most considerable productions is the altar-piece of the church of the Ascension at Naples, representing the fall of Lucifer. And at Genoa, is a fine picture of Seneca dying in the Bath; of which, also, there is a duplicate in the gallery at Dresden. In Spain he executed many compositions at Madrid, Toledo, and at the Escurial; and employed only two years to paint ten arched ceilings of the church and staircase of that palace. He was exceedingly industrious, generally painting six or seven hours every day; and being highly favoured by the king, became exceedingly rich. In 1692 he first arrived at Madrid, and did not return to Italy till 1702, when he accompanied Philip V. to Naples, and in 1704 died there. The appellation of “Luca fa Presto” was accidentally applied to Giordano; not on account of the fame he had acquired by his expeditious manner of painting, but from the mercenary eagerness of his father, who sold at a high price the designs of Luca, which he m<Cde after the compositions of the great masters, while he pursued his studies. The father of Luca scarce allowed him time to refresh himself, but still said to him while he was at his meals as well as at his work, “Lucn, fa presto,” or, “Luca, make haste;” from which expression perpetually uttered, his companions gave him the nick-name of “Fa Presto.”

, an Italian ecclesiastic of considerable learning, was born in 1711 at St. Maur in the diocese of Rimini. In 1727 he entered the Augustin order, and studied in their various schools at Verona, Bologna, Padua, &c. where he became an accomplished scholar, particularly in the oriental languages. He afterwards was professor at various Italian seminaries until 1745, when pope Benedict XIV. invited him to Rome to the theological chair of La Sapienza, which he filled with great reputation for some time. The same pontiff also made him librarian del Angelica, and ordered him to efface from the Index Expurgatorius of the Spanish inquisition, the works of cardinal de Novis, which that tribunal had condemned. During the height of his reputation the emperor Francis I. endeavoured to persuade him to settle at Vienna, and made him most liberal offers, which he repeatedly declined. When the missionaries were sent by the college de Propaganda to Thibet, they found themselves much embarrassed to understand the language of that country, notwithstanding the assistance afforded by Hyde, Lacroix, Vespiere, and other authors, but were much relieved by a valuable publication of Giorgi’s, which appeared in 1761, entitled “Alphabetum Thibetanum,” 4to, enriched with valuable dissertations on the geography, mythology, history and antiquities of Thibet; and in this he explains with great ability the famous manuscripts found in 1721 near the Caspian sea by some Russian troops, and sent by Peter I. to M. Bignon. His next publication was not less important to the learned world, ^ Fragmentum Evangelii S. Johannis Grseco-Copto Thebaicum sseculi quarti; additamentum ex vetustissimis membranis lectiortum evangelicarum divinse Missae Cod. Diaconici reliquiae, et liturgica alia fragmenta, &c." Rome, 1789, 4to. His other works, enumerated by Fabroni, consist of letters, and dissertations on subjects of oriental criticism and antiquities, and some polemical treatises. Among his unpublished writings, was one on the Greek marbles of the temple of Malatesi at Rimini. Giorgi died May 4, 1797.

, an eminent artist, whose name was Gioggio Barbarellj, but was generally known by the appellation of Giorgione, from loftiness of figure and gait, or the grandeur that stamps his style, was born at Castelfranco, in Frioul, 1477, and became the scholar of Giovanni Bellini. Even then he dismissed the minuteness which chained his master, and substituted that freedom, that disdainful superiority of handling, which, if it be not the result of manner, is the supreme attainment of execution. Ample outlines, bold fore-shortening, dignity, and vivacity of aspect and attitude, breadth of drapery, richness of accompaniment, more natural and softer passages from tint to tint, and forcible effects of chiaroscuro, marked the style of Giorgione. This last, the great want of the Venetian school, had, indeed, already been discovered to Upper Italy, by Lionardo da Vinci. To him, or rather to certain pictures and drawings of his, all unknown to us, Vasari pretends that Giorgione owes his chiaroscuro; but neither the line and forms peculiar to Vipci, nor his system of light and shade, seem to countenance this assertion. Gracility and amenity of aspect characterize the lines and fancy of Lionardo; fulness, roundness, those of Giorgione. Fond of a much wider diffusion of shades, and gradually diminishing their mass, the Tuscan drives light to a single point of dazzling splendour. Not so the Venetian; more open, less dark, neither brown nor ferrugineous in his demi-tints, but transparent and true; to tell the whole, he is nearer to Corregioi He may, however, have inspected and profited by the example of Lionardo, the inventor of chiaroscuro; but so as Corregio did by the fore-shortening of Mantegna. His greatest works were in fresco, of which little but the ruins remain. His numerous oil-pictures, by rigorous impasto, and fulness of pencil, st^ll preserve their beauty. Of these, his portraits have every excellence which mind, air, dignity, truth, freshness, and contrast, can confer; he sometimes indulged in ruddy, sanguine tints, but, on the whole, simplicity is their standard. His compositions are few; the most considerable was, perhaps, that of the “Tempest allayed,” in the school of St. Marco at Venice. Some consider as his master-piece “Moses taken from the Nile, and presented to the daughter of Pharaoh,” in the archiepiscopal palace at Milan, in which a certain austerity of tone gives zest to sweetness. One large picture of a holy family is in possession of the marquis of Stafford, which is highly laboured as to effect. But, perhaps the most perfect work of his in this country, is a small picture in the collection of the earl of Carlisle, a portrait of Gaston de Foix, with a servant putting on his armour. We are not acquainted with any picture that has more truth or beauty of colour, and style of character. It is told of Giorgione, that having a dispute concerning the superiority of sculpture or painting; and it being argued, that sculpture had the advantage, because the figures it produces may be seen all around; he took the adverse side, maintaining, that the necessity of moving, in order to see the different sides, deprived it of its superiority; whereas the whole figure might be viewed at one glance, in a minute. To prove his position, he painted a figure, and surrounded it with mirrors, in which all the various parts were exhibited, and obtained great applause for his ingenuity. This artist is said to have fallen in love with a young beauty at Venice, who was no less charmed with him, and submitted to be his mistress. She fell ill with the plague; but, not suspecting it to be so, admitted Giorgione to her bed, where, the infection seizing him, they both died in 1511, he being no more than 33.

, an eminent painter, sculptor, and architect, was born in 1276, at a village near Florence, of parents who were plain country people. When a boy, he was sent out to keep sheep in the fields; and, having a natural inclination for design, he used to amuse himself with drawing his flock after the life upon sand, in the best manner he could. Cimabue travelling once that way, found him at this work, and thence conceived so good an opinion of his genius for painting, that he prevailed with his father to let him go to Florence, and be brought up under him. He had not applied himself long to designing, before he began to shake off the stiffness of the Grecian masters. He endeavoured to give a finer air to his heads, and more of nature to his colouring, with proper actions to his figures. He attempted likewise to draw after the life, and to express the different passions of the mind; but could not come up to the liveliness of the eyes, the tenderness of the flesh, or the strength of the muscles in naked figures. What he did, however, had not been done in, two centuries before, with any skill equal to his. Giotto’s reputation was so far extended, that pope Benedict IX. sent a gentleman of his court into Tuscany, to bring him a just report of his talents; and withal to bring him a design from each of the Florentine painters, being desirous to have some notion of their skill. When he came to Giotto, he told him of the pope’s intentions, which were to employ him in St. Peter’s church at Rome; and desired him to send some design by him to his holiness. Giotto, who was a pleasant ready man, took a sheet of white paper, and setting his arm close to his hip to keep it steady, he drew with one stroke of his pencil a circle so round and so equal, that “round as Giotto’s O” afterwards became proverbial. Then, presenting it to the gentleman, he told him smiling, that “there was a piece of design, which he might carry to his holiness.” The man replied, “I ask for a design:” Giotto answered, “Go, sir, I tell you his holiness asks nothing else of me.” The pope, who understood something of painting, easily comprehended by this, how much Giotto in strength of design excelled all the other painters of his time; and accordingly sent for him to Rome. Here he painted many pieces, and amongst the rest a ship of Mosaic work, which is over the three gates of the portico, in the entrance to St. Peter’s church, and is known to painters by the name of Giotto’s vessel. Pope Benedict was succeeded by Clement V. who transferred the papal court to Avignon; whither, likewise, Giotto was obliged to go. After some stay there, having perfectly satisfied the pope by many fine specimens of his art, he was largely rewarded, and returned to Florence full of riches and honour in 1316. He was soon invited to Padua, where he painted a new-built chapel very curiously; thence he went to Verona, and then to Ferrara. At the same time the poet Dante, hearing that Giotto was at Ferrara, and being himself then in exile at Ravenna, got him over to Ravenna, where he executed several pieces; and perhaps it might be here that he drew Dante’s picture, though the friendship between the poet and the painter was previous to this. In 1322, he was again invited abroad by Castruccio Castrucani, lord of Luca; and, after that, by Robert king of Naples. Giotto painted much at Naples, and chiefly the chapel, where the king was so pleased with him, that he used very often to go and sit by him while he was at work: for,Giotto was a man of pleasant conversation and wit. One day, it being very hot, the king said to him, “If I were you, Giotto, I would leave off working this hot weather” “and so would I, Sir,” says Giotto, “if I were you.” He returned from Naples to Rome, and from Rome to Florence, leaving monuments of his art in almost every place through which he passed. There is a picture of his in one of the churches of Florence, representing the death of the blessed Virgin, with the apostles about her: the attitudes of which story, Michael Angelo used to say, could not be better designed. Giotto, however, did not confine his genius altogether to painting: he was both a sculptor and architect. In 1327 he formed the design of a magnificent and beautiful monument for Guido Tarlati, bishop of Arezzo, who had been the head of the Ghibeline faction in Tuscany: and in 1334 he undertook the famous tower of Sancta Maria del Fiore; for which work, though it was not finished, he was made a citizen of Florence, and endowed with a considerable yearly pension. His death happened in 1336: and the city of Florence erected a marble statue over his tomb. He had the esteem and friendship of most of the excellent men of the age in which he lived and among the rest, of Dante and Petrarch. He drew, as already noticed, the picture of the former and the latter mentions him in his will, and in one of his familiar epistles.

Giotto is said to have been the inventor of Mosaic work, and of crucifixes. The former has been disproved in our Archasologia. The latter rests on a story which we hope has as little foundation. It is thus related: “Giotto, intending one day to draw a crucifix to the life, wheedled a poor man to suffer himself to be bound to a cross for an hour, at the end of which he was to be released, and receive a considerable reward for it; but instead of this, as soons he had fastened him, he stabbed him dead, and then fell to drawing when he had finished his picture, he carried it to the pope, who liked it so well, that he was resolved to place it over the altar of his own chapel: Giotto told him, as he liked the copy so well, he would show him the original. What do you mean, said the pope? Will you show me Jesus Christ on the cross in person? No, said Giotto, but I will show your holiness the original from whence I drew this, if you will absolve me from all punishment. The pope promised this, which Giotto believing, attended him to the place where it was: as soon as they were entered, he drew back a curtain, which hung before the dead man on the cross, and told him what he had done. The pope, troubled at so barbarous an action, repealed his promise, and told Giotto, that he should surely be put to an exemplary death. Giotto, with a seeming resignation, only begged leave to finish the piece before he died, which was granted him, and a guard set upon him to prevent his escape. As soon as the picture was delivered into his hands, he took a brush, and dipping it into a sort of stuff ready for that purpose, daubed the picture all over with it, so that nothing of the crucifix could be seen. This made his holiness stark mad, and he swore, that Giotto should he put to the most cruel death, unless he drew another equal to the former; if so, he would not only give him his life, but also an ample reward in money. Giotto, as he had reason, desired this under the pope’s signet, that he might not be in danger of a second repeal. This was granted to him; and taking a wet spunge, he wiped off all the varnish he had daubed on the picture, so that the crucifix appeared the same in all respects as it did before. Upon this, the pope remitted his punishment. And they say, that this crucifix is the original, from which the most famous crucifixes in Europe are drawn.”

, in Latin Gy raid us, an ingenious and learned Italian critic, was born at Ferrara in 1479, of an ancient and reputaWe-family. He learned the Latin tongue and polite literature under Baptist Guarini; and afterwards the Greek at Milan under Demetrius Chalcondyles. He retired into the neighbourhood of Albert Picus, prince of Carpi, and of John Francis Picus, prince of Mirandula; and, having by their means access to a large and well-furnished library, he applied himself intensely to study. He afterwards went to Modena, and thence to Rome, but being unfortunately in this city when it was plundered by the soldiers of Charles V. in 1527, he lost his all in the general ruin; and soon after his patrou cardinal Rangone, with whom he had lived some time. He was then obliged to shelter himself in the house of the prince of Mirandula, a relation of the great Picus, but had the misfortune to lose this protector in 1533, who was assassinated in a conspiracy headed by his nephew. Giraldi was at that time so afflicted with the gout, that he had great difficulty to save himself from the hands of the conspirators, and lost all which he had acquired since the sacking of Rome. He then returned to his own country, and lived at Ferrara, where he found a refuge from his misfortunes. The gout, which he is said to have heightened by intemperance, tormented him so for the six or seven last years of his life, that, as he speaks of himself, he might be said rather to breathe than to live. He was such a cripple in his hands and feet, that he was incapable of moving himself. He made, however, what use he could of intervals of ease, to read, and even write: and many of his books were composed in those intervals. He died at length of this malady in 1552 and was interred in the cathedral of Ferrara, where an epitaph, composed by himself, was inscribed upon his tomb.

His works consist of seventeen productions, which were first printed separately; but afterwards collected and published in 2 vols. folio, at Basil 15SO, and at Leyden 1696. The most valued pieces among them are, “Historia de Deis Gentium,” <( Historian Poetarum tarn Grajcorum, quam Latinorum Dialogi decem,“and,” Dialogi duo de Poetis nostrorum.“The first of these books is one of the last he composed, and full of profound erudition. The other two, which make up 'the history of the ancient and modern poets, are written with great exactness and judgment. Vossius speaks highly of this work, as the production of great judgment and learning, as well as industry, and observes, that though his professed design is to collect memoirs concerning their persons, characters, and writings in general, yet he has occasionally interspersed many things, regarding the art of poetry, which may be useful to those who intend to cultivate it. Joseph Scaliger, indeed, would persuade us, though not very consistently, that nothing can be more contemptible than the judgment be passes on the poets he treats of: for in another place he allows all the works of Giraldus to be very good, and that no man knew better how to temper learning with judgment. There is a work also by Giraldus,” De annis & mensibus, ciEterisque temporis partibus, una cum Kalendario Romano & Grocco,“written with a view to the reformation of the kalerular, which was afterwards effected by pope Gregory XIII. about 1582. There are likewise among his works a few poems, the principal of which is entitled,” Epistola in qua agitur de incommodis, quse in direptione Urbana passus est ubi item est quasi catalogus suorum, umicorurn Poetarum, & deileaiur interitus Herculis Carclinalis Rangonis.“This poem is annexed to the Florentine edition of th6 two dialogues concerning his contemporary poets; and contains a curious literary history of that time. To other praises bestowed upon Giraldus by authors of the first name, we may add that of Casaubon, who calls him,” vir solide doctus, & in scribendo accuratus,“a man solidly learned and an accurate writer. Thuanus says, that” he was excellently skilled in the Greek and Latin tongues, in polite literature, and in antiquity, which he has illustrated in several works; and that, though highly deserving a better fate, he struggled all his life with illhealth and ill-fortune." His books he bequeathed to his relatives John Baptist Giraldi and Pasetius.

, an Italian poet, of the same family with the preceding, was born at Ferrara in 1504. His father, being a man of letters, took great care of his education; and placed him under Cselio Calcagnini, to study the languages and philosophy. He made an uncommon progress, and then applied himself to the study of physic; in which faculty he was afterwards a doctor. At 21 years of age, he was employed to read public lectures at Ferrara upon physic and polite literature. In 1542, the duke of Ferrara made him his secretary; which office he held till the death of that prince in 1558. He was continued in it by his successor: but envy having done him some ill offices with his master, he was obliged to quit the court. He left the city at the same time, and removed with his family to Mondovi in Piedmont; where he taught the belles lettres publicly for three years. He then went to Turin but the air there not agreeing with his constitution, he accepted the professorship of rhetoric at Pavia which the senate of Milan, hearing of his being about to remove, and apprized of his great merit, freely offered him. This post he filled with great repute; and afterwards obtained a place in the academy of that town. It was here he got the name of Cintio, which he retained ever after, and put in the title-page of his books. The gout, which was hereditary in his family, beginning to attacR him severely, he returned to Ferrara; thinking that his native air might afford him relief. But he was hardly settled there, when he grew extremely ill; and, after languishing about three months, died in 1573.

His works are all written in Italian, except some orations, spoken upon extraordinary occasions, in Latin. They consist chiefly of tragedies: a collection of which was published at Venice 1583, in 8vo, by his son Celso Giraldi; who, in his dedication to the duke of Ferrara, takes occasion to observe, that he was the youngest of five sons, and the only one who survived his father. There are also some prose works of Giraldi: one particularly upon comedy, tragedy, and other kinds of poetry, which was printed at Venice by himself in 1554, 4to. Some make no scruple to rank him among the best tragic writers that Italy has produced; but perhaps the work by which he now is best known is his “Hecatommiti,” an hundred novels in the manner of Boccaccio, which have been frequently printed. There is a scarce volume of his poems printed at Ferrara in 1537, at the close of which is a treatise of Cielio Calcagnini, “De Imitatione,” addressed to Giraldi.

, an ingenious French writer, wa born at Clermont in Auvergne in 1678, and educated for the church. In his youth he had a canonry in the collegiate church of Notre Dame de Monferrand, but resigned it to one of his brothers, that he might be at liberty to go to Paris and devote his time to literary pursuits. There by the interest of some friends he was made almoner to the duchess of Berri, daughter of the regent, and also obtained the place of king’s interpreter for the Sclavonian and Russian languages. In 1744 he was admitted a member of the French academy. He died Feb. 4, 1748. The work by which he is best known, and to which indeed he chiefly owed his reputation in France, is his “Synonymes Fransais,” 12mo, of which a new edition, with some posthumous pieces by Girard, was published by M. Beauzee in 1769, 2 vols. 12mo. No grammatical work was ever more popular in France, nor more useful in denning the precise meaning of words apparently synonymous; and the elegance and moral tendency of the examples he produce* have been much admired. The abbe“Roubaud has since published” Les Nouveaux Synonymes Francais,“1786, 4 vols. 8vo, which may be considered as a supplement to Girard. Our author published also a grammar under the title of” Les vrais principes de la laugue Franc.ais," 2 vols. 12mp, far inferior in ingenuity to his former, and full of metaphysical whims on the theory of language, not unmixed with those infidel principles which were in his time beginning to be propagated.

, an ingenious young landscapepainter, was born Feb. 18, 1773, and received his first instructions from Mr. Fisher, a drawing-master in Aldt rsgatestreet, and was, for a short time, the pupil of Mr. Daves. He early made nature his model; but the first master that struck his attention forcibly was Canaletti, and, in the latter part of his life, he sedulously studied the colouring of Rubens. He was the first who introduced the custom of drawing upon cartridge-paper; by which means he avoided that spotty, glittering glare so common in drawings made on white paper; and some of his later productions have as forcible and spirited an effect as an oil-picture, and are more clear. In his first manner he made the outline with a pen, but afterwards did away that hard outline, which gives so edgy an effect to drawings that are not, in other respects, destitute of merit; and, having first given his general forms with Indian ink, finished his work by putting on his different tints. This, if judiciously managed, is certainly a great improvement in the art. It has been said, that he made great use of the rule, and produced some of his most forcible effects by trick, but this was not the case. His eye was peculiarly accurate; and by that he formed his judgment of proportions. Whoever inspected his pallet would find it covered with a greater variety of tints than almost any of his contemporaries employed. Mr. Moore was his first patron, and with him he went a tour into Scotland. The prospects he saw in that country gave that wildness of imagery to the scenery of his drawings by which they are so pre-eminently distinguished. He also went with Mr. Moore to Peterborough, Lichfield, and Lincoln; and, indeed, to many other places remarkable for their rich scenery, either in nature or architecture. That gentleman had a drawing that Girtin made of Exeter cathedral, which was principally coloured on the spot where it was drawn; for he was so uncommonly indefatigable, that, when he had made a sketch of any place, he never wished to quit it until he h^d given it all the proper tints. He was early noticed by lord Harewood, Mr. Lascellos^ and Dr. Monro; in whose collections are some of those fine specimens of the arts by the study of which he formed his taste. The doctor has in his possession some of his earliest, and many of his finest, drawings. He painted two pictures in oil; the first was a view in Wales, which was exhibited, and much noticed, in 1801; and the second, the panorama view of London, which was exhibited in Spring-gardens. About twelve months before his death he went to France, where he staid till May. His la:>t, and indeed his best, drawings were the views of Paris, which were purchased by lord Essex, and from which aqun-tinta prints by other artists have since been made. This promising young artist died Nov. 9, 1802, of an astnmatic disorder, which Mr. Edwards seems to attribute to irregularity.

, advocate to the parliament of Paris, and to the council, and member of the French academy, was born at Paris in 1596. His abilities an 1 probity recommended him to some very honourable employments, and he particularly enjoyed the confidence of cardinal Mazarin. He was author of the following translations “Dialogues des Orateurs,” 4to. “l'Apologie de Socrate” “riiist. Sacree de Sulpice Severe;” “I'Apologetique de Tertullien,” for which he was received into the academy; “la Cite de Dieu, de St. Augustin,” I vol, 4to.; “Epitres Choisies de St. Augustin,” 5 vols. 12mo. He died in 1665, at Paris. His son, Francis, who was provincial of the Minim order, gained great reputation by some devotional works; but deserves little credit for his principal publication, “Les Vies des Saints,” fol. which although esteemed for its piety, is full of fables, and far from accurate as to facts. P. Raft'ron, of the same order, has written his life, 12mo.

, a Benedictine monk, first of St. Germaine d'Auxerre, and afterwards of Cluni, and a man of superstitious credulity, flourished in the eleventh century, and wrote a “Chronicle or History of France,” in the Latin language. It consists of five books, of which the first relates to the events of the monarchy previously to Hugh Capet, and the four subsequent ones to those following it, as far down as 1046. This work is defective as a composition, and, at the same time, full of fabulous stories, yet it contains much valuable information relative to those remote ages. It was printed in the collections of Pithou and Duchesne. He was author of a life of William, abbot of St. Benignus at Dijon.

, a learned philologist of the sixteenth century, was born at Munster. He studied under Melancthon at Wittemberg, and became very distinguished for his critical knowledge of Greek and Latin. In 1533 he disputed publicly against the anabaptists at Munster. After visiting the principal German academies, he was elected rector of the college at Hanover, but, upon some dispute, he quitted in 1555, and retiring to Goslar, was followed by iriost of his scholars; but here again he had the misfortune to render himself unpopular, and was obliged to leave the place in 1560, on which he went to Marpurg, and was made professor of history. He died in 1564. His works are, 1. “Sylva Carminum Elegiacorum” 2. “Descriptio Gentis Antoniac” 3. “Familiae Julias Gentis” 4. “Disticha Sacra et Moralia” 5. “Annotat. in Jul. Cæsaris Comment.;” 6. “Annotat. in Ciceroniæ Epist. Famil.;” 7. “Onomasticon Historiae Romanae.”

, a German physician, was born in 1595, at Cologne, where his father was a surgeon. His first application to letters was at Bremen; whence he returned to Cologne, and devoted himself to philosophy, physic, and chirurgery. He studied four years under Peter Holtzem, who was the elector’s physician, and professor in this city; and he learned the practical part of surgery from his father. To perfect himself in these sciences, he went afterwards into Italy, and made some stay at Padua; where he greatly benefited himself by attending the lectures of Jerome Fabricius ab Aquapendente, Adrian Spigelius, and Sanctorins. He was here made M. D. After having visited the principal towns of Italy, he returned to his country in 1618, and settled at Bremen; where he practised physic and surgery with so much success, that the archbishop of this place made him his physician in 1628. He was also made physician of the republic of Bremen. The time of his death is not precisely known; some say 1640, but the dedication of his last work is dated Oct. 8, 1652. He published at Bremen, “ Speculum Chirurgorum,” in 1619, 8vo; reprinted in 1628, 4to; “Methodus Medendse Paronychia?,” in 1633; “Tractatus de Polypo Narium affectu gravissimo,” in 1628; and “Gazophylacium Polypusium Fonticulorum & Setonum Reseratum,” in 1633. These four pieces were collected and published, with emendations, tinder the title of his Works, at London, in 1729, 4to, with his life prefixed, and some curious tracts on Roman antiquities. It must needs suggest an high opinion of this young physician, that though he died a young man, yet his works should be thought worthy of a republication 100 years after; when such prodigious improvements have been made in philosophy, physic, and sciences of all kinds, of which he had not the benefit.

, a writer of the fourteenth century, was an English Minorite, or Franciscan, of the family of the earls of Suffolk. He is said to have studied at Oxford, Paris, and Rome, and to have been very familiar with the writings of Aristotle, Plato, and Pliny; from which, with his own observations, he compiled his celebrated work “De Proprietatibus rernrn,” a kind of general history of nature; divided into nineteen books, treating of God, angels, and devils, the soul, the body, animals, &c. In some copies there is an additional book, not of his writing, on numbers, weights, measures, sounds, &c. Some v “Sermons” of his were printed at Strasburgh in 1495. But his work “De Proprietatibus*' appears to have been the chief favourite, and was one of the first books on which the art of printing was exercised, there being no fewer than twelve editions, or translations, printed from 1479 to 1494. The English translation printed by Wynkyn de Worde is the most magnificent publication that ever issued from the press of that celebrated printer, but the date has not been ascertained. A very copious and exact analysis of this curious work is given by Mr. Dibdin in the second Volume of his” Typographical Antiquities."

, younger son of John Glanvil of Tavistock in Devonshire, one of the justices of the common pleas (who died in 1600), was educated at Oxford, and after serving for some time in an attorney’s office, studied law in Lincoln’s-inn, where he preserved the reputation of legal ability for which his family had long beendistinguished. When he had been a barrister of some years standing, he was elected recorder of Plymouth, and burgess for that place in several parliaments. In the 5tU of Charles I. he was Lent reader of his inn, and in May 1639 was made serjeant at law. Being chosen speaker of the parliament which assembled in April 1640, he shewed himself more active in the king’s cause, than formerly, when he joined in the common clamour against the prerogative. In August 1641, being then one of the king’s serjeants, he received the honour of knighthood; and when his majesty was obliged to leave the parliament, sir John followed him to Oxford. In 1645, being accused as a delinquent, or adherent to the king, he was deprived of his seat in parliament, and afterwards committed to prison, in which he remained until 1648, when he made a composition with the usurping powers. After the restoration he was made king’s serjeant again, and would have probably attained promotion had he not died soon after, on Oct. 2, 1661. He was buried in the church of Broad H in ton in Wiltshire, the manor of which he had bought some years before. His works consist chiefly of speeches and arguments, most of which are in Rnshworth’s “Collections.” His “Reports of Cases of controverted Elections,” were published in 1775, by John Topham, esq.

, a grandson of the preceding, war born at Broad Hinton in 1664, and became at the age of fourteen a commoner of Trinity-college, Oxford. He studied law afterwards in Lincoln’s-inn, and was admitted to the bar. He is known by some minor poems, the best of which may be seen in Mr. Nichols’s Collection. He made the first English translation of Fontenelle’s “Plurality of Worlds.” He died at Broad Hinton in 1735.

, a distinguished writer, was born in 1636, at Plymouth in Devonshire, where he probably received the first rudiments of his education, and was entered at Exeter-college, Oxford, April 19, 1652. He was placed under Samuel Conant, an eminent tutor, and having made great proficiency in his studies, he proceeded B. A. Oct. II, 1655. The following year, he removed to Lincoln-college, probably upon some view of preferment. Taking the degree of M. A. June 29, 1658, he assumed the priestly office, according to the forms used by the sectaries at that time, and became chaplain to Francis Rouse, esq. then made provost of Eton-college, by Oliver Cromwell, and designed for one of his house of lords. Had tin* patron lived a little longer, Glanvil’s expectations would, no doubt, have been fully answered; since according to Wood, he entirely complied with the principles of the then prevailing party, to whom his very prompt pen must needs have been serviceable. But Rouse dying the same year, he returned to his college in Oxford, and pursued his studies there during the subsequent distractions in the state. About this time, he became acquainted with Mr. Richard Baxter, who entertained a great opinion of his genius, and continued his respect for him after the restoration; when they espoused different causes. The friendship was equally warm on Glanvil’s side, who, Sept. 15, 1661, addressed an epistle to his friend, professing himself to be an admirer of his preaching and writings; he v also offered to write something in his defence, but yielded to his advice, not to sacrifice his views of preferment to their friendship.

Accordingly, he had the prudence to take a different method; and turning his thoughts to a subject not only inoffensive in itself, but entirely popular at that time, viz. a defence of experimental philosophy against the notional way of Aristotle and the schools, he published it this year, under the title of “The Vanity of Dogmatizing, or confidence in opinions, manifested in a discourse of the shortness and uncertainty of our knowledge and its causes, with some reflections on Peripateticism, and an apology for philosophy,” 1661, 8vo. These meetings, which gave rise to the Royal Society, were much frequented at this time, and encouraged by learned men of all persuasions; and this small discourse introduced him to the knowledge of the literary world in a very favourable light. He had an opportunity of improving by the weakness of an antagonist, whom he answered in an appendix to a piece called “Scepsis Scientifica, or confessed ignorance the way to science, in an Essay on the Vanity of Dogmatizing, and confident opinion,” 1665, 4to. Our author dedicated this piece to the royal society, in terms of the highest respect for that institution; and the society being then in a state ef infancy, and having many enemies, as might be expected in an undertaking which seemed to threaten the ruin of the old way of philosophizing in the schools, the “Scepsis” was presented to the council by lord Brereton, at a meeting, Dec. 7, 1664; when his lordship also proposed the author for a member, and he was elected accordingly in that month.

In 1663, the house of John Mumpesson of Tedworth, in Wiltshire, being disturbed by the beating of a drum invisibly every night, our author turned his thoughts to that subject, and in 1666 printed, in 4to, “Some philosophical considerations, touching the being of Witches and Witchcraft.” In this piece he defended the possibility of witchcraft, which drew him into a controversy that ended only with his life: during the course of it, he proposed to confirm his opinion by a collection of several narratives relating to it. But as he held then a correspondence with Mr. Boyle, that gentleman, observing with how much warmth the dispute was carried on, gave him many cautions about managing so tender a subject; and hinted to him, that the credit of religion might suffer by weak arguments upon such topics. In answer to which, Glanvil professes himself much obliged for those kind admonitions, and promises to be exceeding careful in the choice of his relations: however, he made a shift to pick out no less than twenty-six modern relations, besides that of Mr. Mumpesson’s drummer. They were not, however, printed till after his death, in a piece entitled “Sadducismus Triumphans, in two parts,” 1681, 8vo; and again in 1682, with large additions, by Dr. Henry More, the editor of both editions to whom our author had addressed a letter on the subject and in an appendix to the first part concerning the possibility of apparitions, there is added an account of the nature of a spirit, translated by our author, from the two last chapters of More’s “Enchiridion Metaphysicum.”

His defence of the royal society having procured him many friends, some of them obtained for him the rectory of the abbey church at Bath, into which he was inducted June the same year, 1666. From this time he fixed his residence in that city; and, continuing on all occasions to testify his zeal for the new philosophy, by exploding Aristotle, he was desired to make a visit to Mr. Robert Crosse, vicar of Chew, near Pcnsford, in Somersetshire, a great zealot for the old established way of teaching in the schools. Our author accepted the invitation, and going to Pensford in 1677, happened to come into the room just as the vicar was entertaining his company with the praises of Aristotle and his philosophy. After their first civilities were paid, he went on with his discourse, and, applying himself to Mr. Glanvil, treated the royal society and modern philosophers with some contempt. Glanvil, not expecting so sudden an attack, was in some measure surprized, mud did not answer with that quickness and facility as he otherwise might probably have done. But afterwards, both in conversation and by letters, he attacked his antagonist’s assertion, that Aristotle had more advantages for knowledge than the royal society, or all the present age had or could have, because, “totam peragravit Asiam,” he trarelled over all Asia.

Glanvil likewise laid the plan of a farther defence of the royal society; but bishop Sprat’s history of it being then in the press, he waited to see how far that treatise should anticipate his design. Upon its. publication, in 1667, finding there was room left for him, he pursued his resolution, and printed his piece the following year, with this title, expressing the motives of writing it: “Plus Ultra, or the Progress and Advancement of Knowledge since the days of Aristotle, in an account of some of the most remarkable late improvements of practical useful learning, to encourage philosophical endeavours, occasioned by a conference with one of the notional way,” 1668, 12mo. In some parts of this piece he treated the Somersetshire yicar with rough raillery, and this the vicar returned, in a piece which was denied the press both at Oxford and London, for its scurrility. Glanvil somehow obtaining the contents, printed them at London, with proper remarks of his own, under the title of “The Chew-Gazette,” but of these there were only 100 taken off, and those dispersed into private hands, in order, as Glanvil said, that Crosse’s shame might not be made public, &c. After this letter was published, Crosse wrote ballads against our author and the royal society; while other wags at Oxford, pleased with the controversy, made doggrel ballads on them both.

This affair also involved Glanvil in a scurrilous dispute with Henry Stubbe, who was then, as Wood observes, a summer practitioner at Bath; and bearing no good-will to the proceedings of Glanvil, took Crosse’s part, and encouraged him to write against the virtuosi, and at the time entered the lists himself and the follpwing pamphlets passed between them. I. “The Plus Ultra reduced to a Nonplus,” &c. 1670, 4to, Stubbe. 2. “A prefatory Anwer to Mr. HenryStubbe, the doctor of Warwick, wherein the malignity, &c. of his Animadversions are discovered. 1 * 1671, 12mo, Glanvil. 3.” A Preface against Ecebolius Glanvil, F. R.S. subjoined to his Reply, &c. Oxford,“167 I, 4to, Stubbe. The doctor also fell upon his antagonist, in his” Epistolary Discourse concerning Phlebotomy,“167 t, 4to; upon which Glanvil immediately published” A farther Discovery of Mr. Stnbbe, in a brief reply to his last pamphlet,“1671, 8vo, to which was added,” Ad clerum Somersetensem Epistola Προσφωνησισ.“And the doctor among other things, having censured the new philosophy, as tending to encourage atheism our author published his” Philosophia Pia,“&c. 1671, 8vo, which closed the controversy. When, however, Dr. Meric Casaubon entered the lists in his” Letter to Peter du Moulin," 1663, and managed the argument with more candour and greater knowledge, Glanvil chose to be silent; because not willing to appear in a controversy with a person, as he says, of fame and learning, who had treated him with so much civility, and in a way so different from that of his other assailants. While he was thus pleading the cause of the institution in general, he shewed himself no unuseful member in respect to the particular business of it. The society having given out some queries to be made about mines, our author communicated a paper in relation to those of Mendip hills, and such as respect the Bath, which was well received, ordered to be registered, and afterwards printed in their transactions.

In the mean time, he was far from neglecting the duties of his ministerial function; on the contrary, he distinguished himself so remarkably by his discourses from the pulpit, that he was frequently desired to preach upon public and extraordinary occasions, and several of these sermons were printed in a collection after his death. But in justice to his memory we must not omit to mention one which was never printed. His old antagonist Stubbe, going from Bath on a visit to Bristol, had the misfortune on his return to fall from his horse into a river, which, though shallow, proved sufficient to drown him: his corpse being interred in the abbey-church, our rector paid an honourable tribute to his memory, in a funeral sermon on the occasion. He also wrote an “Essay concerning Preaching,” for the use of a young divine; to which he added, “A seasonable Defence of Preaching, and the plain way of it.” This was chiefly levelled against that affectation of wit and fine speaking which began then to be fashionable. This essay was published in 1678, and the same year he was collated by his majesty to a prebend in the church of Worcester. This promotion was procured by the marquis of Worcester, to whom his wife was related and it was the more easily obtained, as he had been chaplain to the king ever since 1672 in which year he exchanged the vicarage of Frome for the rectory of Street, with the chapel of Walton annexed, in Somersetshire, an exchange which was easily accomplished, since both the livings were in the patronage of sir James Thynne.

He published a great number of tracts besides what have been mentioned. Among which are, 1. “A Blow at Modern Sadducism,” &c. 1668, to which was added, 2. “A Relation of the fancied Disturbances at the house of Mr. Mumpesson;” as also, 3. “Reflections on Drollery and Atheism.” 4. “Palpable Evidence of Spirits and Witchcraft,” &c. 1668. 5. “A Whip for the Droll Fidler to the Atheist,” 1668. 6. “Essays on several important subjects in Philosophy and Religion,” 1676, 4to. 7. “An Essuy concerning Preaching,” 1678, 8Vo, to which was added, 8. “A seasonable Defence of Preaching, -and the plain way of it.” 9. “Letters to the Duchess of Newcastle.” 10. Three single Sermons, besides four printed together, under the title of “Seasonable Reflections and Discourses, in order to the Conviction and Cure of the scoffing Infidelity of a degenerate age.” As he had a lively imagination, and a flowing style, these came from him very easily, and he continued the exercise of his pen to the last; the press having scarcely finished his piece entitled “The zealous and impartial Protestant,” &c. 1680, when he was attacked by a fever, which baffling the physician’s skill, cut him off in the vigour of his age. He died at Bath, Nov. 4th, 1680, about the age of forty-four. Mr. Joseph Pleydel, archdeacon of Chichester, preached his funeral sermon, when his corpse was interred in his own parish church, where a decent monument and inscription was afterwards dedicated to his memory by Margaret his widow, sprung from the Selwins of Gloucestershire. She was his second wife; but he had no issue by either. Soon after his decease, several of his sermons, and other pieces, were collected and published with the title of “Some Discourses, Sermons, and Remains,” 1681, 4to, by Dr. Henry Horneck, who tells us that death snatched him away, when the learned world expected some of his greatest attempts and enterprizes. Horneck gave a large, and apparently very just character of Glanvil, who was unquestionably a man of learning and genius, and although he retained the belief in witchcraft, surmounted many of the other prejudices of his time.

, a Scotch clergyman, and founder of a sect, was born at Dundee, 1638, and educated in the New-college, at St. Andrew’s, where he took his degrees, and was settled minister of a country church, near the place of his nativity. In 1727 he published a treatise to prove that the civil establishment of religion was inconsistent with Christianity, for which he was deposed, and became the father of a new sect, called from him Glassites; and afterwards from another leading propagator, Sandemanians. Some account of their tenets will be given under the article Sandeman. Glass wrote a great number of controversial tracts, which have been published at Edinburgh, in 4 vols. 8vo. He died at Dundee, in 1773, aged seventy-five.

, son of the above, was born at Dundee, in 1725, and brought up a surgeon, in which capacity he went several voyages to the West Indies, but not liking his profession, he accepted the command of a merchant’s ship belonging to London, and engaged in the trade to the Brazils. Being a man of considerable abilities, he published in 1 vtol. 4to, “A Decription of Teneriffe, with the Manners and Customs of the Portuguese who are settled there.” In 1763 he went over to the Brazils, taking along with him his wife and daughter; and in 1765 set sail for London, bringing along with him all his property; but just when the ship came within sight of the coast of Ireland, four of the seamen entered into a conspiracy, murdered captain Glass, his wife, daughter, the mate, one seaman, and two boys. These miscreants, having loaded their boat with dollars, sunk the ship, and landed at Ross, whence they proceeded to Dublin, where they were apprehended and executed Oct. 1764.

, an eminent German divine and critic, was born May 20, 1593, at Sondershausen, in Thuringia, and after some education under a private tutor, was sent in 1612 to Jena, where he was admitted to the degree of D. D. and was made professor of divinity. He was also appointed superintendant of the churches and schools in the duchy of Saxe-Gotha, and exercised the duties of these offices with great reputation. He died at Gotha July 27, 1656. His principal work was published in 1623, 4to, entitled “Philologia Sacra,” which is pronounced by Mosheim and Buddeus to be extremely useful for the interpretation of Scripture, as it throws much light upon the language and phraseology of the inspired writers. There have been several editions, the last at Leipsic, in 1776, by professor Dathius, under the title “Philologia Sacra his temporibus accommodata.” He was author, likewise, of “Onomatologia Messiac Prophetica” “Christologia Mosaica et Davidica” “Exegesis Evangeliorum et Epistolarum,” and some other pieces.

, a celebrated chemist of Amsterdam, and called the Paracelsus of his age, was born in Germany in the beginning of the sixteenth century. He travelled much in the pursuit of chemical knowledge, and collected many secret processes; and his experiments contributed to throw much light on the composition and analysis of the metals, inflammable substances, and salts. In fact he passed the greater part of his life in the laboratory. He did not always see the proper application of his own experiments, and vainly fancied that he had discovered the panacea, and the philosopher’s stone, which were at that time objects of pursuit; and the disappointment of many persons who had been seduced by his promises, contributed to bring the art of chemistry into contempt. His theory is full of obscurity; but his practice has perhaps been misrepresented by those who listened to his vain and pompous pretensions; and who accuse him of a dishonourable traffick, in first selling his secrets to chemists at an enormous price, of again disposing of them to other persons, and lastly, of making them public in order to extend his reputation. Glauber published about twenty treatises; in some of which he appears in the character of physician, in others in that of an adept or metallurgist; in the latter he most particularly excelled. However, it would be unjust not to give him the praise of acuteness of mind, of facility and address in the prosecution of his experiments, and of extensive chemical knowledge. He was the inventor of a salt which to this day retains his name in the shops of our apothecaries. The works of Glauber have appeared in different languages; the majority of editions are in German, some in Latin, and others in French. A collection of the whole in Latin was published at Francfort in 1658, in 8vo, and again 165y, in 4to. An English translation was published by Christopher Pack, London, 1689, fol.

, an English physician, was son of William Glisson, of Rampisham, in Dorsetshire, and grafidson of Walter Glisson, of the city of Bristol. He appears to have been born in 1596. Where he learned the first rudiments of his grammar is not known; but he was admitted June 18, 1617, of Caius college, in Cambridge, apparently with a view to physic. He first, however, went through the academical courses of logic and philosophy, and proceeded in arts, in which he took both degrees, that of B. A. in 1620, and of M. A. in 1624; and being chosen fellow of his college, was incorporated M. A. at Oxford, Oct. 25, 1627. From this time he applied himself particularly to the study of medicine, and took his doctor’s degree at Cambridge in 1634, and was appointed regius professor of physic in the room of Ralph Winterton; which office he held forty years. But not chusing to reside constantly at Cambridge, he offered himself, and was admitted candidate of the college of physicians, London, in 1634, and was elected fellow, Sept. 30, the ensuing year.

In the study of his art, he had always set the immortal Harvey before him as a pattern; and treading in his steps, he was diligent to improve physic by anatomical dissections and observations. In 1639 he was appointed to read Dr. Edward Wall’s lecture, and in executing that office, made several new discoveries of great use in establishing a rational practice of physic; but on the breaking out of the civil wars, he retired to Colchester, and followed the bu* siness of his profession with great repute in those times of public confusion. He was thus employed during the memorable siege and surrender of that city to the rebels in 1648; and resided there some time after.

Amidst his practice he still prosecuted his anatomical researches, and from observations made in this way published an account of the rickets in 1650, in which he shewed how the viscera of such as had died of that disorder were affected. This was the more interesting, as the rickets had been then first discovered in the counties of Dorset and Somerset, only about fifteen years before. In this treatise he had the assistance of two of his colleagues, Dr. George Bate, and Dr. Ahasuerus Regemorter; and these with other fellows of the college, requesting him to communicate to the public some of his anatomical lectures which had been read before them, he drew those up in a continued discourse, printed with the title “Anatomia Hepatis,” Lond. 1654, which brought him into the highest esteem among the faculty, and he was chosen one of the electors of the college the year following, and was afterwards president for several years. He published other pieces besides those already mentioned; viz. 1. “De Lymphaxluctis nuper repertis,” Amst. 1659, wuh the “Anatomica prolegomena & Anatomia Hepatis.” 2. “De naturae substantia energetica, seu de via vitae naturae ejusque tribus primis facultatibus,” &c. Lond. 1672, 4to. His last work was a “Treatise of the Stomach and Intestines,” printed at Amsterdam in 1677, not long before his death, which happened that year in the parish of St. Bride, London, in his eighty-first year.

Wood observes, that he died much lamented, as a person to whose learned lucubrations and deep disquisitions in physic not only Great Britain, but remoter kindoms, owe a particular respect and veneration, and it is certain that he was exceeded in judgment and accuracy by none of the English anatomists, who followed the steps of Harvey. Boerhaave terms him “omnium anatomicorum exactissimus,” and Haller speaks in praise of all his writings. Several of his original manuscripts, which were in sir Hans Sloane’s possession, are now in the British Museum.

, an English poet, the son of Richard Glover, a Hamburgh merchant in London, was born in St. Martin’s-lane, Cannon-street, in 1712. Being prot>ably intended for trade, he received no other education than what the school of Cheam, in Surrey, afforded, which he was afterwards induced to improve by an ardent love of learning, and a desire to cultivate his poetical talents according to the purest models. His poetical efforts were very early, for in his sixteenth year he wrote a poem to the memory of sir Isaac Newton, which was supposed to have merit enough to deserve a place in the view of that celebrated author’s philosophy, published in 1728, by Dr, Henry Pemberton. This physician, a man of much science, and of some taste, appears to have been warmly attached to the interests of our young poet, and at a time when there were few regular vehicles of praise or criticism, took every opportunity of encouraging his efforts, and apprizing the nation of this new addition to its literary honours.

At the usual period Glover became engaged in the Hamburgh trade, but continued his attachment to literature and the muses, and was, says Dr. Warton, one of the best and most accurate Greek scholars of his time. It is mentioned in the life of Green, that he published “The Spleen” of that poet, in which he is complimented on account of his study of the ancient Greek poets, and his wish to emulate their fame. Green had probably seen some part of “Leonidas,” which was begun when he was young, and had been submitted in specimens to many of his friends. This poem was first published in 1737, in a 4to volume, consisting of nine books. Its reception was highly flattering, for in this and the following year it passed through three editions. It was dedicated to lord Cobham, one of his early patrons, and whom, it is supposed, he furnished with many of the inscriptions at Stowe, now erased. It was also strongly recommended by such of that nobleman’s political friends as were esteemed the arbiters of taste. Lord Lyttelton, in the periodical paper called “Common Sense,” praised it in the warmest terms, not only for its poetical beauties, but its political tendency, “the whole plan and purpose of it being to show the superiority of freedom over slavery; and how much virtue, public spirit, and the love of liberty, are preferable, both in their nature and effects, to riches, luxury, and the insolence of power.” The same nobleman also addressed verses to our author, in which he inveighs with much asperity against the degeneracy of the times, but, not very consistently, compares England to Greece, and France to Persia. Other writers, particularly Fielding, in the paper called “The Champion,” took up the pen in favour of “Leonidas,” which being published just after the prince of Wales had been driven from St. James’s, and began to keep a separate court, it was praised by the whole of this new court, and by the adherents in general of opposition, not beyond its merit, but too evidently from a motive which could not always prevail, and which ceased to animate their zeal in its favour, when Walpole, the supposed author of all our national grievances, was compelled to resign.

In 1744, he was offered employment of a very different kind, being nominated in the will of the duchess of Marlborough, to write the duke’s life, in conjunction with Mallet. Her grace bequeathed 500l. to each on this condition, but Glover immediately renounced his share, while Mallet, who had no scruples of any kind where his interest was concerned, accepted the legacy, and continued to receive money from the late duke of Maryborough on the same account, although after twenty years of talk and boast, he left nothing behind him that could shew he had ever seriously begun the work. Glover’s rejection of this legacy is the more honourable, as at this time his affairs became embarrassed; from what cause we are not told. It may be conjectured, however, that he had shared the usual fate of those who are diverted from their regular pursuits by the dreams of political patronage. From the prince he is said to have received at one time a complete set of the classics, elegantly bound, and at another time, during his distresses, a present of 500l. But it does not appear that when the friends of “Leonidas” came into power, they made any permanent provision for the author.

During the period of his embarrassment, he retired from public notice, until the respect and gratitude of his humbler friends in the city induced them to request that he would stand candidate for the office of chamberlain of London, which was vacant in 1751, but his application was unfortunately made when the majority of the votes had already been engaged to sir Thomas Harrison. His feelings on this disappointment did him much honour, and were elegantly expressed in the speech he addressed to the livery on the occasion. In it he made an allusion to the favour of the prince of Wales, which was probably well understood at that time. By the death of that most illustrious personage, he no doubt lost a powerful patron.

In 1753, he began to try his talents in dramatic composition, and produced the tragedy of “Boadicea,” which was performed for nine nights at Drury-lane theatre. Dr. Pemberton, with his accustomed zeal, wrote a pamphlet to recommend it, and among the inferior critics, it occasioned a temporary controversy. Great expectations were formed of its success from the reputation of an author who had acquired so much praise from his “Leonidas.” At the rehearsal, he read his < Boadicea“to the actors, but his manner of conveying the meaning of his poem was very unhappy; his voice was harsh, and his elocution disagreeable. Mr. Garrick was vexed to see him mangle his own work, and politely offered to relieve him by reading an act or two; but the author imagining that he was the only person lit to unfold his intention to the players, persisted to read the play to the end, to the great mortification of the actors. In 1761 he published his” Medea," a tragedy, written on the Greek model, and therefore unfit for the modern stage. The author, indeed, did not intend it for representation, but Mrs. Yates considered the experiment as likely to procure a full house at her benefit, and brought it forward upon that occasion. It was afterwards acted a few nights, but without exciting much interest.

From this period, Glover’s affairs took a more promising turn, although in what way we are not told. At the accession of his present majesty, he was chosen member of parliament for Weymouth, and made a considerable figure in the many debates to which the confused state of affairs in India gave rise. In 1772, we find him an intelligent and active agent in adjusting the affairs of the bank of Douglas, Heron and Company, of Scotland, which failed about that time; and on other occasions, where the mercantile interests of London were concerned, he distinguished himself, not only by his eloquence, but by that general knowledge of commerce which inclines to enlarged and liberal measures. In 1775, the West India merchants testified the sense they entertained of his services in their affairs, by voting him a piece of place of the value of 300l. The speech which he delivered in the house of commons, on the application of these merchants, was afterwards printed, and appears to have been the last of his public services.

In 1770, he republished his “Leonidas,” in two vols. 12mo, extended from nine books to twelve, and the attention now bestowed on it, recalling his youthful ideas, strengthened by time and observation, probably suggested “The Athenaid,” which, however, he did not live to publish. Soon after 1775, he retired from public business, but kept up an intimacy with many of the most eminent scholars of the day, by whom he was highly respected. After experiencing, for some time, the infirmities of age, he departed this life at his house in Albemarle-street, November 25, 1785. Glover was twice married. His second wife is now [[1814]] living, and a daughter, married to Halsey, esq.

His character was drawn up by the late Dr. Brocklesby for the Gentleman’s Magazine, and as far as respects his amiable disposition, was confirmed to us by Dr. VVarton, who knew him well. “Through the whole of his life Mr. Glover was by all good men revered, by the wise esteemed, by the great sometimes caressed and even flattered, and now his death is sincerely lamented by all who had the happiness to contemplate the integrity of his character. Mr. Glover, for upwards of 50 years past through every vicissitude of fortune, exhibited the most exemplary simplicity of manners; having early attained that perfect equanimity, which philosophy often recommends in the closet, but which in experience is too seldom exercised by other men in the test of trial. In Mr. Glover were united a wide compass of accurate information in all mercantile concerns, with high intellectual powers of mind, joined to a copious flow of eloquence as an orator in the house of commons. Since Milton he was second to none of our English poets, in his discriminating judicious acquaintance with all ancient as well as modern literature witness his Leon i das, Medea, Boadicea, and London for, having formed his own character upon the best models of the Greek writers, he lived as if he had been bred a disciple of Socrates, or companion of Aristides. Hence his political turn of mind, hence his unwarped affection and active zeal for the rights and liberties of his country. Hence his heartfelt exultation whenever he had to paint the impious designs of tyrants in ancient times frustrated, or in modern defeated in their nefarious purposes to extirpate liberty, or to trample on the unalienable rights of man, however remote in time or space from his immediate presence. In a few words, for the extent of his various erudition, for his unalloyed patriotism, and for his daily exercise and constant practice of Xenophou’s philosophy, in his private as well as in public life, Mr. Glover has left none his equal in the city, and some time, it is feared, may elapse before such another citizen shall arise, with eloquence, with character, and with poetry, like his, to assert their rights, or to vindicate with equal powers the just claims of freeborn men. Suffice this testimony at present, as the wellearned meed of this truly virtuous man, whose conduct was carefully marked, and narrowly watched by the writer of the foregoing hasty sketch, for his extraordinary qualities during the long period in human life of upwards of 40 years and now it is spontaneously offered as a voluntary tribute, unsolicited and unpurchased but as it appears justly due to the memory of so excellent a poet, statesman, and true philosopher, in life and death the same.”

Glover’s “Leonidas” amply entitles him to a distinguished place among the poets of his country, but the public has not held it in uniform estimation. From the time of its first appearance in 1737, it went through six, if not seven editions; but for nearly forty years there has not been a demand for another, although that published in 1770 was highly improved and enlarged. Its history may probably account in part for this singular fate, and public taste must explain the rest. On its first publication, it was read and praised with the utmost avidity. Besides the encomiums it drew from Lyttelton and Pemberton, its fame reached Ireland, where it was reprinted, and became as much in fashion as it had been in England. “Pray who is that Mr. Giover,” says Swift to Pope, in one of his letters, *' who writ the epic poem called Leonidas, which is reprinting here, and hath great vogue“Unfortunately, however, the whole of this tribute of praise was not paid to the intrinsic merit of the poem. It became the adopted favourite of the party in opposition (to sir Robert Walpoie) who had long endeavoured to persuade the nation that public liberty was endangered by the measures of that minister, and that they formed the chosen band who occupied the straits of Thermopylae in defiance of the modern. Xerxes. Leonidas therefore was recommended, to rouse an oppressed and enslaved people to the vindication of their rights. That this should be attempted is less wonderful than that it should succeed. We find very few passages in this poem which will apply to the state of public affairs in. England at that time, if we except the common-place censure of courts and courtiers, and even that is appropriated with so strict historical fidelity to the court of Xerxes, that it does not seem easy to borrow it for any other purpose.” Nothing else,“however, Dr. Warton informs us,” was read or talked of at Leicester-house," the illustrious owner of which extended his patronage to all poets who fanned the sacred flame of patriotism. The consequence of all this was, that Leonidas, which might have laid claim to a considerable rank among English poems of the higher order, was pushed beyond it, and when the purposes for which it had been extolled were either answered, or no longer desirable, it fell lower than it deserved. This is the more justly to be regretted, as we have no reason to think the autlior solicited the injudicious praise of his friends and patrons, or had any hand in building the airyedifice of popular fame. He was, indeed, a lover of liberty, which has ever been the favourite theme of poets, but he did not write for a temporary purpose. Leonidas had been the fruit of very early ambition to be known to posterity, and when he had outlived the party who pressed his poem, into their service, he corrected and improved it for a generation that knew nothing of the partialities which first extended its fame. If his object, however, in this epopee, had been solely to inculcate a love of liberty, a love of our country, and a resolute determination to perish with its freedom, he could not have chosen a subject, at least from ancient times, so happily adapted to elevate the mind. The example was unparalleled in history, and therefore the more capable of admitting the embellishments and attractions that belong to the epic province. Nor does it appear that he undertook a task to which his powers were inadequate, when he endeavoured to interest his readers in the fate of his gallant hero and faithful associates. He is not deficient either in the sublime or the pathetic, although in these essentials he may not bear an uniform comparison with the great masters of the passions. The characters are varied with much knowledge of the human heart. Each has his distinctive properties, and no one is raised beyond the proportion of virtue or talent which may be supposed to correspond with the age he lived in, or the station he occupied.

His “Athenaid” was published in 1787, exactly as it was found among his papers. It consists of the unusual number of thirty books, but evidently was left without the corrections which he would probably have bestowed had he revised it (or the press. It is intended as a continuation, or second part to “Leonidas,” in which the Greeks are conducted through the vicissitudes of the war with Xerxes to the final emancipation of their country from his invasions. As an epic it seems defective in many respects. Here is no hero in whose fate the mind is exclusively engaged, but a race of heroes who demand our admiration by turns; the events of history, too, are so closely followed, as to give the whole the air of a poetical chronicle. Of his smaller poems, that on sir Isaac Newton is certainly an extraordinary production from a youth of sixteen, but the theme was probably given to him. Such an acquaintance with the state of philosophy and the improvements of our immortal philosopher, could not have been acquired at his age. “Hosier’s Ghost” was long one of the most popular English ballads; but his “London,” if intended for popular influence, was probably read and understood by few. In poetical merit, however, it is not unworthy of the author of “Leonidas.” Fielding wrote a very long encomium on it in his “Champion,” and predicted rather too rashly, that it would ever continue to be the delight of all that can feel the exquisite touch of poetry, or be roused with the divine enthusiasm of public spirit.

Since the above sketch of Glover was abridged from a more full account drawn up for another work, the attention of the public has been recently called to his history by the publication of a diary, or part of a diary, written by him. This, which appeared in 1813, is entitled “Memoirs of a distinguished Literary and Political Character, from the resignation of sir Robert Walpole in 1742 to the establishment of lord Chatham’s second administration in 1757.” It was immediately followed by “An Inquiry concerning the Author of the Letters of Junius, with reference to the Memoirs of a celebrated literary and political character,” the object of which is to prove that Glover was the author pf these Letters; and although this is not the place to enter into this controversy, we are inclined to think with the author of this “Inquiry,” that no one yet named as the author of Junins, and whose claim has been at all supported by facts, has much chance to stand in competition with Glover.

, a herald and heraldic writer, was the son of Thomas Glover, of Ashford in Kent, the place of his nativity. He was first made Portcullis Poursuivant, and afterwards in 1571, Somerset herald. Queen Elizabeth permitted him to travel abroad for improvement. In 1582, he attended lord Willoughby with the order of the garter, to Frederick II. of Denmark. In 1584, he waited with Clarenceux on the earl of Derby, with that order to the king of France. No one was a greater ornament to the college than this gentleman; the suavity of his manners was equal to his integrity and skill: he was a most excellent, and very learned man, with a knowledge in his profession which has never been exceeded, perhaps been paralleled; to this, the best writers of his own and more recent time* bear testimony. He left two treatises, one “I)e Nobilitate politica vel civili” the other “A Catalogue of Honour” both of which were published by his nephew, Mr. Thomas Milles, the former in 1608, the latter in 1610, both folio, to “revive the name and learned memory of his deceased friend and uncle, whose private studies for the public good deserved a remembrance beyond forgetful time.” His answer to the bishop of Ross’s book, in which Mary queen of Scots’ claim to the crown was asserted, was never published. He made great collections of what had been written by preceding heralds, and left of his own labours relative to arms, visitations of twenty-four counties, and miscellaneous matters belonging to this science, all written by himself. He assisted Camden in his pedigrees for his Britannia; communicated to Dr. David Powell, a copy of the history of Cambria, translated by H. Lloyd; made a collection of the inscriptions upon the funeral monuments in Kent; and, in 1584, drew up a most curious survey of Herewood castle, in Yorkshire. Mr. Thoresby had his collection of the county of York taken in 1584, and his catalogue of northern gentry whose surnames ended in son. He died in London, says Stow, April 14, (Lant and others, 10), 1588, aged only forty-five years, and was buried in St. Giles’s church, Cripplegate. His loss was severely felt by all our lovers of English antiquities. His “Ordinary of Arms” was augmented and improved by Edmondson, who published it in the first volume of his Body of Heraldry.

, a musical composer of great originality, was born in the palatinate, on the frontiers of Bohemia, in 1712, or as Dr. Bumey says, in 1716. His father, a man in poor circumstances, removed, during the infancy of his son, into Bohemia, where he died, leaving fris offspring in early youth, without any provision, so that his education was totally neglected. He had, however, an instinctive love for music, which is taught to all children, with reading and writing, in the Bohemian schools. Having acquired this knowledge, he travelled about from town to town, supporting himself by his talents, till he had worked his way to Vienna, where he met with a nobleman who became his patron, took -him into his service, and carried him into Italy, where he procured him lessons in counterpoint, at Naples, by which he profited so well, that before he left Italy he composed several dramas for different theatres. These acquired him reputation sufficient to be recommended to lord Middlesex as a composer to the opera house in the Haymarket, then under his lordship’s direction. He arrived in England in 1745, and, in that year and the following, produced his operas of “Artamene” and “La Caduta de Giganti,” with indifferent success.

From London he returned to Italy, and composed several operas in the style of the times, and afterwards engaged with the Italian poet Calsabigi, with whom he joined in a conspiracy against the poetry and music of the melo-drama then in vogue in Italy and all over Europe. In 1764, when the late emperor Joseph was crowned king of the Romans, Gluck was the composer, and Guadagni the principal singer. It was in this year that a species of dramatic music, different from that which then reigned in Italy, was attempted by Gluck in his famous opera of “Orfeo,” which succeeded so well, that it was soon after performed in other parts of Europe, particularly at Parma and Paris, Bologna, Naples, and in 1770 at London. In 1769 he produced “Alceste,” a second opera on the reformed plan, which received even more applause than the first; and in 1771 “Paride ed Helena;” but in 1774, his arrival at Paris produced a remarkable era in the annals of French music, by his conforming to the genius of the French language, and flattering the ancient national taste. All his operas proved excellent preparations for a better style of composition than the French had been used to; as the recitative was more rapid, and the airs more marked, than in Lulli and llameau; there were likewise more energy, fire, and variety of movement, in his airs in general, and infinitely more force and effect in his expression of all the violent passions. His music was so truly dramatic, that the airs and scenes, which had the greatest effect on the stage, were cold, or rude, in a concert. The situation, context, and interest, gradually excited in the audience, gave them their force and energy. He seemed indeed so much the national musician of France, that since the best days of Rameau, no dramatic composer had excited so much enthusiasm, or had his pieces so frequently performed, each of them two or three hundred times. The French, who feel very enthusiastically whatever music they like, heard with great rapture the operas of Gluck, which even the enemies of his genre allowed to have great merit of a certain kind; but though there is much real genius and intrinsic worth in the dramatic compositions of this master, the congeniality of his style with that of their old national favourites, Lulli and Rameau, was no small merit with the friends of that music. The almost universal cry at Paris was now, that he had recovered the dramatic music of the ancient Greeks; that there was no other worth hearing; that he was the only musician in Europe who knew how to express the passions: these and other encomiums were uttered and published in the journals and newspapers of Paris, accompanied with constant and contemptuous censures of Italian music, when Piccini arrived, and all the friends of Italian music, of Rousseau’s doctrines, and of the plan, if not the language, of Metastasio’s dramas, enlisted in his service. A furious war broke out at Paris; and these disputes, says Dr. Burney, of musical critics, and rival artists throughout the kingdom, seem to us to have soured and diminished the pleasure arising from music in proportion as the art has advanced to perfection. When every phrase or passage in a musical composition is to be analysed and dissected during performance, all delight and enthusiasm vanish, and the whole becomes a piece of cold mechanism.

The chevalier Gluck, after returning to Vienna from Paris, and being rendered incapable of writing by a paralytic stroke in 1784, only lingered in a debilitated state till the autumn of 1787, when he died at the age of seventythree. Gluck had great merit as a bold, daring, nervous composer; and as such, in his French operas, he was unrivalled. But he was not so universal as to be exclusively admired and praised at the expence of all other composers ancient and modern. His style was peculiarly convenient to France, where there were no good singers, and where no good singing was expected or understood by the public in general; and where the poetry was set up against music, without allowing equality, or even an opportunity of manifesting her most captivating vocal powers.

, was one of the Byzantine historians, but biographers are not agreed as to the period when he lived. Some years ago, professor Walchius published in the Gottingen Transactions an inquiry into this subject, but was obliged to confess that he could arrive at no probable conclusion. Some place Glycas in the twelfth, and some in the fifteenth century. No ancient record or writer mentions even his name, and all that is known of him has been gleaned from his works. It appears that he was a native of Constantinople; but passed a great part of his life in Sicily. Some have thought he was a monk, but this is uncertain, nor do we know whether he lived in public life, or in retirement. His letters, however, show that he was a grammarian, and was acquainted with theology, history sacred and profane, and other branches of knowledge; and such was his reputation that he was frequently consulted by monks, bishops, and the most celebrated doctors of his time. His “Annals,” by which only he is now known, contain an account of the patriarchs, kings, and emperors, and, in a word, a sort of history of the world as far as the emperor Alexis Comnenus, who died in 1118, including many remarks on divinity, philosophy, physic, astronomy, &c. Leunclavius first translated this work into Latin, and the whole was published by father Labbe, Paris, 1660, fol. Some of his letters have been published in the “Deliciae eruditorum,” Florence, 1736, and other collections.

, a physician and eminent botanist, was born at Tubingen August 12, 1709. He was distinguished by his diligence and early attainments at the school and university of Tubingen, and in 1727, took the degree of doctor of physic, and went to Petersburgh, where, in 1729, he was elected one of the members of the academy, and in 1731 was appointed professor of chemistry and natural history. In 1733 he was selected for the department of natural history, in a commission formed by the Russian government, for the purpose of exploring the boundaries of Siberia; and set out on the 19th of August, with G. F. Muller, and Louis de l'Isle de la Croyere, and a party of twenty-eight persons, consisting of draughtsmen, miners, hunters, land surveyors, and twelve soldiers, with a serjeant and drummer. On his return to Petersburgh in 1743, he resumed the offices which he had before filled. In the year 1749 he entered upon a new professorship, to which he had been appointed, while on a visit to Tubingen, but died of a fever in May, 1755. He published, “Flora Siberica, seu Historia Plantarum Siberise,” Petersburgh, 1747, 1749, in four parts, 4to, with plates: and, in German, “Travels through Siberia between the years 1733 and 1743,” Gottingen, 1751, 1752, in four parts, 8vo, with plates.

, nephew to the preceding, was born at Tubingen in 1743; where he was educated, and took his medical degree in 1763. He gave early proofs of genius, and during his travels in France and Holland distinguished himself so much by his knowledge of natural history, that he was appointed professor in the academy of sciences at Petersburgh. Like his uncle, he spent several years in travelling through the distant provinces of the Russian empire, for the purposes of scientific investigation, but ultimately with a less fortunate result. He commenced his travels in June 1763, and having traversed the provinces of Moscow, Voronetz, New Russia, Azof, Casan, and Astracan, he visited, in 1770 and 1771, the different harbours of the Caspian and examined with peculiar attention those parts of the Persian provinces which border upon that sea, of which he has given a circumstantial account in his travels. Actuated by a zeal for extend*­ing his observations, he attempted to pass through the western provinces of Persia, which were in a state of perpetual warfare, and infested by numerous banditti. Upon this expedition he quitted, in -April 1772, Einzillee, a small trading place in Ghilan, upon the southern shore of the Caspian; and, on account of many difficulties and dangers, did not, until Dec. 2, 1773, reach Sallian, a town situated upon the mouth of the river Koor. Thence he proceeded to Baku and Cuba, in the province of Shirvan, where he met with a friendly reception from Ah Feth Khan, the sovereign of that district. After he had been joined by twenty Uralian Cossacs, and when he was only four days journey from the Russian fortress Kislar, he and his companions were, on Feb. 5, 1774, arrested by order of Usmei Khan, a petty Tartar prince, through whose territories he was obliged to pass. Usmei urged as a pretence for this arrest, that, thirty years before, several families had escaped from his dominions, and had found an asylum in the Russian territories; adding, that 'Gmelin should not be released until these families were restored. As all arguing was in vain with this savage, Gmelin was removed from prison to prison, and at length, wearied out with confinement and harsh usage, expired July 27, at Achmet-Kent, a village of Mount Caucasus. Some of his papers had been sent to Kislar during his confinement, and the others were not without great difficulty rescued from the hands of the barbarians. The empress Catherine, would have rescued him by force, but this was rendered impossible at that time, by the rebellion of Pugatchef. She, however, expressed her regret and esteem for Gmelin by giving a gratification to his widow, of one year’s pay of the salary she had assigned to her husband during his travels, amounting to 1600 rubles.

His works are 1. “Historia Fucorum,” Petersburg!), in 1768, 4to. a subject to which botanists had paid little attention before him. 2. “Travels through Russia, for the purpose of exploring the three kingdoms of nature,” three parts of which were published in his life-time. A fourth was edited after the author’s death, by professor Pallas 3. “Journey from Astracan to Czarizyn” and also a “Second Persian Journey,” 1772 74; ibid. 1786. Pallas prefixed Gmelin’s Life to the fourth part of his travels.

, of the same family, although what relation to the preceding is not mentioned, was oorn at Tubingen in 1748. He was the author of several performances on vegetable physiology, and the classification of plants; and likewise published numerous works on the materia medica, and chemistry, mineralogy, and every part of natural history. One of the most celebrated is his edition of the “System of Nature of Linnæus.” He, however, is said to have introduced great disorder into the science, by multiplying the species. He was also the author of a “History of Chemistry,” forming a part of the history of arts and sciences undertaken by the professors of Gottingen. The world is indebted to him for the discovery of several excellent dyes, extracted from vegetable and mineral substances. He died in 1805.

, an eminent classical teacher, the son of John Goad, of Bishopsgate- street, was born there Feb. 15, 1615. He was educated at Merchant Taylors’ school, and elected thence a scholar of St. John’s college, Oxford, in 1632. He afterwards received his master’s degree, became fellow of his college, and took orders. In 1643 he was made vicar of St. Giles’s, Oxford, and continued to perform his parochial duties, although at the risk of his life, during the siege of the city by the parliamentary forces. In June 1646 he was presented by the university to the vicarage of Yarnton, and the year following was created B. D. When the loyalists were turned out by the parliamentary commissioners, Mr. Goad shared their fate; and although Dr. Cheyuel, who was one of the parliamentary visitors, gave him an invitation to return to his college, he refused it upon the terms offered. Yet he appears to have been so far connived at, as to be able to keep his living at Yarnton until the restoration. He also taught at Tunbridge school until July 1661, when he was made head master of Merchant Taylors’ school. Over this seminary he presided for nearly twenty years, with great success and approbation, and trained for the college many youths who did honour to their teacher and to their country; but in 1681 a suspicion was entertained that he inclined towards popery; and it was said that the comment whicli he made on the Church Catechism savoured strongly of popish tenets. Some particular passages having been selected from it, and laid before the grand jury of London, they on March 4 of the above year, presented a complaint to the Merchant Taylors’ company, respecting the catechism taught in their school. After he had been heard in his own defence, it was decided that he was “popishly and erroneously affected,” and immediately was discharged from his office; but such was their sense of his past services, that they voted him a gratuity of 70l. It soon appeared that the court of the company had not been deceived in their opinion of his principles. After being dismissed, he taught a school in Piccadilly, and in 1686, the reign of James II. openly professed himself a Roman catholic which, Wood says, he had long been covertly. He died Oct. 28, 1689, and was buried in the church of Great St. Helen’s, Bishopsgate-street, his memory being honoured by various elegies. He published, besides some single sermons, 1. “Genealogicon Latin um,” a small dictionary for the use of Merchant Taylors’ school, 8vo, 1676, second edit. 2. “Declamation, whether Monarchy be the best form of government” printed at the end of Richards’s “English Orator,” 1680, 8vo. 3. “Astro-Meteorologica, or aphorisms and discourses of the Bodies Celestial, their natures and influences, &c.” 1686, fol. This gained him great reputation. The subject of it is a kind of astrology, founded, for the most part, on reason and experiment, as will appear by comparing it with Boyle’s “History of the Air,” and Dr. Mead’s book * c De Imperio Solis etJLuna.“4.” Autodidactica, or a practical vocabulary, &c.“1690, 8vo. After his death was published” Astro-meteorologia sana, &c." 1690, 4to.

, a learned French Dominican, was born at Paris, of a reputable family, in 1601, and after a classical education, took the habit of his order in 1619. He then employed six years in the study of philosophy and theology, after which he was sent to Toul to instruct the young men of his order in these sciences. In the mean time his extreme partiality to the Greek, and his extensive reading in Greek literature, inspired him with a great desire to visit the country of the modern Greeks, and inquire into their sentiments and customs; and having obtained leave of his superiors, he set out in 1631, as an apostolic missionary, and was for the sake of local convenience, made prior of the convent of St. Sebastian, in the island of Chios. Here he resided eight years, conversing with the ablest of the natives, and inquiring into their history, religion, and manners. Before returning to France he went to Rome in 1640, where he was appointed prior of the convent of St. Sixtus, and being arrived at Paris, was made master of the novices, and began to employ his time in preparing his works for the press. This was an object so much at heart, that when elected in 1652 vicar-general of his order, he accepted it with great reluctance, as likely ta interrupt his labours. It is supposed, indeed, that his intense application, and the various duties of this office, impaired his health, and brought on a slow fever, which proved fatal Sept. 23, 1653. His principal work was his collection of Greek liturgies, published under the title of “Euchologion, sive rituale Grcecorum,” Paris, 1647, fol. a very curious and rare work. There is, however, a second edition printed at Venice in 1730. Goar also translated some of the Byzantine historians for the collection printed at the Louvre.

, a learned Jesuit, and secretary to the Chinese missionaries, was born at St. Malo in 1653, and having been educated in the academies belonging to his order, was made professor of philosophy and classics, which he taught for eight years with reputation. He then came to Paris, where he was appointed secretary and procurator to the Chinese missionaries. He died May 1708. He wrote many tracts on the progress of religion in China, and entered warmly into the disputes between the missionaries on the worship of Confucius. The best known of his works are, his “Lettres sur les Progres de la Religion a la Chine,” 1697, 8vo; his “Hist, de PEditde P empereur de la Chine en faveur de la religion Chretienne,” 1698, 12mo, which makes the third volume of le Comte’s Memoirs of China; his “Hist, des Isles Mariannes,” 1700, 12mo and eight parts or volumes of the “Lettres edifiantes et curieuses,” written by the Chinese missionaries. Of these letters there was afterwards a collection made, extending to 34 vols. 12mo; and in 1780, the abbe de Querbeuf published a new edition in 26 vols. They are still consulted as affording information respecting the natural history, geography, and politics of the countries which the Jesuits had explored, although they are not unfrequently mixed with improbable tales.

, a learned philologist, was born in 1485, in Westphalia. He acquired a high reputation for learning, and taught for a considerable time at the college of Bois-le-Duc in Louvain, where he died Jan. 25, 1539. Erasmus, who was his intimate friend, highly valued his character, and respected his erudition. He wrote notes on Cicero’s Offices, edited a new edition of Lucan, and published a Latin translation of Lucian’s “Hermotinus,” a dialogue on the sects of philosophers.

, an English physician and chemist, and promoter of the royal society, was the son of a rich ship-builder at Deptford, and born at Greenwich about 16 17. Being industrious and of good parts, he made a quick progress in grammar-learning, and was entered a commoner at Magdalen-hall, Oxford, in 1632. He staid at the university about four years, applying himself to physic; and then left it, without taking a degree, to travel abroad, as was at that time the custom, for farther improvement in his faculty. At his return, not being qualified, according to the statutes, to proceed in physic at Oxford, he went to Cambridge, and took the degree of bachelor in the faculty, as a member of Christ college, in 1638; after which, intending to settle in London, without waiting for another degree, he engaged in a formal promise to obey the laws and statutes of the college of physicians there, Nov. 1640. Having by this means obtained a proper permission, he entered into practice; but being still sensible of the advantage of election into the college, he took the first opportunity of applying for his doctor’s degree at Cambridge, which he obtained, as a member of Catherine-hall, in 1643; and was chosen fellow of the college of physicians in 1646. In the mean time, he had the preceding year engaged in another society, for improving and cultivating experimental philosophy. This society usually met at or near his lodgings in Wood-street, for the convenience of making experiments; in which he was very assiduous, as the reformation and improvement of physic was one principal branch of this design. In 1647, he was appointed lecturer in anatomy at the college; and it was from these lectures that his reputation took its rise. As he, with the rest of the assembly which met at his lodgings, had all along sided with the parliament, he was made head-physician in the army, and was taken, in that station, by Cromwell, first to Ireland in 1649, and then to Scotland the following year; and returned thence with his master; who, after the battle of Worcester, rode into London in triumph, Sept. 12, 1651. He was appointed warden of Merton-college, Oxon, Dec. 9th following, and was incorporated M. D. of the university, Jan. 14th the same year. Cromwell was the chancellor; and returning to Scotland, in order to incorporate that kingdom into one commonwealth with England, he appointed our warden, together with Dr. Wilkins, warden of Wadham, Dr. Goodwin, president of Magdalen, Dr. Owen, dean of Christ Church, and Cromwell’s brother-in-law, Peter French, a canon of Christ Church, to act as his delegates in all matters relating to grants or dispensations that required his assent. This instrument bore date Oct. 16, 1652. His powerful patron dissolving the long parliament, called a new one, named the Little Parliament, in 1653, in which the warden of Merton sat sole representative of the university, and was appointed one of the council of state the same year.

A series of honours and favours bestowed by the usurper, whose interest he constantly promoted, naturally incurred the displeasure of Charles II. who removed him from his wardenship, by a letter dated July 3, 1660; and claiming the right of nomination, during the vacancy of the see of Canterbury, appointed another warden in a manner the most mortifying to our author. The new warden was Dr. Edw. Reynolds, then king’s chaplain, and soon after bishop of Norwich, who was appointed successor to sir Nathaniel Brent, without the least notice being taken of Dr. Goddard. He then removed to Gresham college, where he had been chosen professor of physic on Nov. 7, 1655, and continued to frequent those meetings which gave birth to the royal society; and, upon their establishment by charter in 1663, was nominated one of the first council. This honour they were induced to confer upon him, both in regard to his merit in general as a scholar, and to his particular zeal and abilities in promoting the design of their institution, of which there is full proof in the “Memoirs” of that society by Dr. Birch, where there is scarcely a meeting mentioned, in which his name does not occur for some experiment or observation made by him. At the same time he carried on his business as a physician, being continued a fellow of the college by their new charter in 1663. Upon the conflagration in 1666, which consumed the old Exchange, our professor, with the rest of his brethren, removed from Gresham, to make room for the merchants to carry on the public affairs of the city; which, however, did not hinder him from going on with pursuits in natural philosophy and physic. In this last he was not only an able but a conscientious practitioner; for which reason he continued still to prepare his own medicines. He was so fully persuaded that this, no less than prescribing them, was the physician’s duty, that in 1668, whatever offence it might give the apothecaries, he was not afraid to publish a treatise, recommending it to general use. This treatise was received with applause; but as he found the proposal in it attended with such difficulties and discouragements as were likely to defeat it, he pursued that subject the follow, ing year, in “A Discourse, setting forth the unhappy condition of the practice of Physic in London,” 1669, 4to. But this availed nothing, and when an attempt was made by the college of physicians, with the same view, thirty years afterwards, it met with no better success. In 1671 he returned to his lodgings at Gresham college, where he continued prosecuting improvements in philosophy till his death, which was very sudden. He used to meet a select number of friends at the Crown-tavern in Bloomsbury, where they discoursed on philosophical subjects, and in his return thence in the evening of March 24, 1674, he was seized with an apoplectic fit in Cheapside, and dropped down dead.

His memory was long preserved by certain drops, which were his invention, and bore his name; but which, like all such nostrums, are now forgotten. His receipts “Arcana Goddardiana,” were published at the end of the “Pharmacopoeia Bateana,” 1691. He had several learned treatises dedicated to him as a patron of learning, made by persons well acquainted with him, such as Dr. Edmund Dickinson and Dr. Wallis, who highly praise his extensive learning, his skill in his profession, knowledge of public affairs, and generous disposition, his candour, affability, and benevolence to all good and learned men. Of this last there is one instance worth preserving; and that is, his taking into his apartment, at Gresham, Dr. Worthington, who lodged with him for the conveniency of preparing for the press the works of Mr. Joseph Mede, which he finished and published in 1664. According to Dr. Seth Ward, bishop of Salisbury, he was the first Englishman who made that noble astronomical instrument the telescope.

, a learned French bishop and writer, was descended from a good family at Dreux, and born in 1605. Being inclined to poetry from his youth, he applied himself to it, and so cultivated his genius, that he made his fortune by it. His first essay was a paraphrase in verse of the Benedicite, which was much commended. He was but twenty -four when he became a member of that society which met at the house of Mr. Conrart, to confer upon subjects of polite learning, and to communicate their performances. From this society cardinal Richlieu took the hint, and formed the resolution, of establishing the French academy for belles lettres; and our author in a few years obtained the patronage of that powerful ecclesiastic. The bishopric of Grasse becoming vacant in 1636, cardinal Richelieu recommended him to the king, who immediately conferred it upon him; and as soon as the ceremony of consecration was over, he repaired to his diocese, and applied himself to the functions of his office. He held several synods, composed a great number of pastoral instructions for the use of his clergy, and restored ecclesiastical discipline, which had been almost entirely neglected. He obtained from pope Innocent X. a bull for uniting the bishopric of Vence to that of Grasse, as his predecessor William le Blore had before obtained from Clement VIII. This arrangement, considering the propinquity of the two dioceses, and the small income of both together (about 450l.) was not unreasonable; but when Godeau found the people and clergy averse to it, he gave up his pretensions, and contented himself with the bishopric of Vence only. He assisted in several general assemblies of the clergy, held in 1645 and 1655; in which he vigorously maintained the dignity of the episcopal order, and the system of pure morality, against those who opposed both. One of his best pieces upon this subject, was published in 1709, with the title of “Christian Morals for the Instruction of the Clergy of the Diocese of Vence” and was afterwards translated into English, by Basil Kennet. These necessary absences excepted, he constantly resided upon his diocese, where he was perpetually employed in visitations, preaching, reading, writing, or attending upon the ecclesiastical or temporal affairs of his bishopric, till Easter-day, April 17, 1671; when he was seized with a fit of an apoplexy, of which he died the 21st.

He was a very voluminous author, both in prose and verse. Moreri, after giving a list of fifty works, adds many fugitive pieces of devotional poetry. One of his principal works is his “Ecclesiastical History,” intended to be comprized in 3 vols fol. The first appeared in 1653, containing the “History of the first eight centuries;” but as he did not finish the other two, they remained in manuscript. He was, however, the first person who gave a “Church History” in the French language. He was the author also of a “Translation of the Psalms into French verse,” which were so well approved, that those of the reformed religion have not scrupled to use them at home in their families, instead of the version of Marot, which is adapted and consecrated to the public service. Of this work Basil Kennet has given a criticism in the preface to “An Essay towards a Paraphrase on the Psalms,” 1709, 8vo. The Jesuit, Vavassor, wrote a piece on purpose to prove that our author had no true taste for poetry; and Boileau remarks several defects in his poetical performances.

, an eminent lawyer, and one of the most learned men of his age, was born October 17, 1549, at Paris. He was the son of Leon Godefroi, counsellor to the Chatelet. He had acquired a great reputation in the parliament, but embracing the reformed religion, was obliged to retire to Geneva, and taught law both there and in some German universities. In 1618 he was sent by the elector palatine to Louis XIII. who, among other marks of favour, presented him with his picture, and a gold medal. But being again obliged to quit the palatinate, during war, he went to Strasburgh, where he died September 7, 1622, leaving a great number of valuable works; the principal of which are, 1. “Notae in quatuor Libros institutionum.” 2. “Opuscula varia juris.” 3. “Corpus juris civilis, cum notis.” These notes are excellent: the best editions are those by Vitré, 1628, and by Elzevir, 1683, 2 vols. fol. 4. “Praxis civilis, ex antiquis et recentioribus scriptoribus.” 5. “Index Chronologicus legum et novellarum a Justiniano imperatore compositarum.” 6. “Consuetudines Civitatum et Provinciarum Galliae, cum notis,” fol. 7. “Quaestiones politico ex jure communi in Historia desumptae.” 8. “Dissertatio de nobilitate.” 9. “Statuta regni Gallise cum jure communi collata,” fol. 10. “Synopsis statutorum municipalium,” an edition, Greek and Latin, of the “Promptuarium juris” of Harmenopules. “Conjectures,” and several “Lectures upon Seneca,” with a defence of these Conjectures, which had been attacked by Gruter. “A Collection of the ancient Latin Grammarians,” &c. The following works are also ascribed to Denis Godefroi “Avis pour reduire les Monnoies a leur juste Prix et Valeur,” 8vo. “Maintenue et Defense des Empereurs, Rois, Princes, Etats, et Republiques; centre les Censures Monitoires, et Excommunications des Papes,” 4to. “Fragmenta duodecim Tabularum suis nunc primum Tabulis restituta,” 1616, 4to. His “Opuscula” have been collected and printed in Holland, fol.

, eldest son of the preceding, was born July 17, 1580, at Geneva, and went to Paris in 1602, where he turned Catholic, was appointed counsellor of state 1643, and died Octobers, 1643, at Munster, in which city he then resided as counsellor and secretary to the French embassy for the general peace. He left many excellent works on law, history, the titles of the kingdom, &c. the principal of which are, I. “Le Ceremonial de France,” 4to, a work much valued reprinted in 2 vols. fol. by his son Denys Godefroi but this is unfinished and the 4to edition must be referred to for the funeral ceremonies. 2. “Genealogie des Rois de Portugal issus en Ligne directe masculine de la Maison de France qui regne aujourd'huis,” 4to. 3. “Mem. concernant la Preseance des Rois de France sur les Rois d'Espagne, 4to. 4.” Entreveue de Charles IV. Empereur, et Charles V, Roi de France; plus PEntreveue de Charles VII. Roi de France, et de Ferdinand, Roi de Arragon.“&c. 4to. 5.” Hist, de Charles VI. par Jean Juvenal des Ursins; de Louis XII. par Seyssell, et par d'Auton, &c. de Cha. VIII. par Saligny, et autres du Chevalier Bayard, avec le Supplement, par Expilly,“1651, 8vo. 6.” De Jean le Meinore, dit Boucicaut, Marechal de France,“4to. 7.” D'Artus III. Due de Bretagne,“4to. 8.” De Guillaume Marescot,“4to. 9.” De la veritable Origine de la Maison d'Autriche,“4to. 10.” Genealogie des Dues de Lorrain,“4to. 11.” L‘Ordre et les Ceremonies observers aux Manages de France et d’Espagne,“4to. 12.” Genealogie des Comptes et Dues de Bar,“<Ko. 13.” Traite touchant les Droits du Roi tres Chretien, sur plusieurs Etats et Seigneuries, possedes par plusieurs Princes Voisins," fol. under the name of Pierre Dupuy.

, younger brother of the preceding, born in I 587, at Geneva, was also a very learned lawyer, and rose to the highest posts in that republic. He was five times syndic, and died there 1652. He left several works much esteemed; the following are the principal ones: I. “Opuscula varia, juridica, politica, historica, critica,” 4to. 2. “Fontes Juris civilis; de diversis Regulis Juris,” 1653, 4to. 3. “De famosis latronibus investigandis de jure praecedentiae de Salario animadversiones Juris civilis. De suburbicariis Regionibus de statu Paganorum sub Imperatoribus Christianis. Fragmenta Legum Juliae et Papioe collecta, et notis illustrata. Codex Theodosianus,” 1665, 4 vols.- fol. 4. “Veteris orbis descriptio Gracci Scriptoris, sub Constantio et Constante Imperantibus, Gr. et Lat. cum notis,” 4to. 5. “De Cenotaphio; de Dominio seu imperio marls et jure naufragii colligendi.” 6. Commentaries and Notes on several Orations of Libanius. 7. “L'Hist. Ecclesiastique de Philostorge, avec un Appendix.” 8. “Les Mercure Jesuite, ou Recueil des pieces concernant les Jesuites,” 1631, 2 vols. 8vo.

, son of Theodore, was born August 24, 1615, at Paris. He made use of his father’s Memoirs, and like him studied the History of France. Louis XIV. appointed him keeper and director of the chamber of accounts at Lisle, in which city he died June 9, 1681. He published “Le Ceremonial de France,” written by his father and the History of Charles VI. and Charles VII. printed at the Louvre, each in 1 vol. folio that of the Crown Officers, from the time at which that of John le Feron ends; “Memoires et Instructions pour servir dans les Negociations et les Affaires concernant les Droits du Roi,” 1665, fol. which had been attributed to chancellor Seguier, &c. 2 He left several children who were eminent among them.

, director of the chambre des comptes at Lisle, was another son of the second Denys, who published in 1706 an elegant edition of the “Memoires de Philippe de Commines;” and in 1711 a new edition of the “Satyre Menipee.” He also left the “Journal de Henri III.” with notes, and some new pieces, 2 vols. 8vo; a very curious book against that by Pere Guyard, a Jacobin, entitled “La Fatalite” de St. Cloud;“' Mem. de la Reine Marguerite,” 8vo, &c. No author has given so clear an account of the league, nor published so many curious pieces respecting the parties engaged in it. He died in February, 1732.

, the author of an ancient chronicle, is supposed to have been born in the twelfth century, at Viterbo, in Italy, and educated in his youth, at least, at Bamberg. He was afterwards chaplain and secretary to king Conrad III. the emperor Frederick, and his son Henry VI. He informs us that he spent forty years in searching among the manuscripts of the Greeks, Latins, Jews, Chaldeans, and barbarians, for materials proper for his Chronicle, had made himself acquainted with all these languages, and performed many voyages and travels in the same pursuit. This Chronicle, which does not, however, gratify all the expectations that might be formed from such learning and industry, begins with the creation of the world, and ends with 1186. It is written in Latin prose and verse, and entitled “Pantheon.” It was first printed at Basil, by Basilius John Herold, 1559, reprinted at Francfort in 1584, and at Hanover in 1613, in Pistorius’s collection of German writers; and Muratori has inserted in his great collection, that part which respects Italy. Lambecius speaks of another work by Godfrey, which exists in ms. in the imperial library at Vienna, entitled “Speculum regium, sive de genealogia regum et imperatorum a diluvii tempore ad Henricum VI. imperatorem.” Godfrey appears to have been a man of learning and observation, and is thought to deserve credit as to his relation of the events which occurred in his own time, and with which his situation at court enabled him to be acquainted.

, an eminent civilian, the third son of John Godolphin, esq. was descended from an ancient family of his name in Cornwall, and born Nov. 29, 1617, at Godolphin, in the island of Scilly. He was sent to Oxford, and entered a commoner of Gloucester-hall, in 1632; and having laid a good foundation of logic and philosophy, he applied himself particularly to the study of the civil law, which he chose for his profession; and accordingly took his degrees in that faculty, that of bachelor in 1636, and of doctor in 1642-3. He has usually been ranked among puritans for having written two treatises published by him in 1650 and jL 1651, entitled, 1. “The Holy Limbec, or an extraction of the spirit from the Letter of certain eminent places in the Holy Scripture.” Other copies were printed with this title, “The Holy Limbec, or a Semicentury of Spiritual Extractions,” &c. 2. “The Holy Harbour, containing the whole body of divinity, or the sum and substance of the Christian Religion.” But whatever may be the principles maintained in these works, which we have not seen, it is certain that when he went to London afterwards, he sided with the anti-monarchical party; and, taking the oath called the Engagement, was by an act passed in Cromwell’s convention, or short parliament, July 153, constituted judge of the admiralty jointly with William Clarke, LL. D. and Charles George Cock, esq. In July 1659, upon the death of Clarke, he and Cock received a new commission to the same place, to continue in force no longer than December following.

Notwithstanding these compliances with the powers then in being, he was much esteemed for his knowledge in the civil law, which obtained him the post of king’s advocate at the restoration: after which, he published several books in his own faculty then in good esteem, as “A View of the Admiral’s Jurisdiction,” 1661, 8vo, in which is printed a translation by him, of Grasias, or Ferrand’s “Extract of the ancient Laws of Oleron;” “The Orphan’s Legacy, &c. treating of last wills and testaments,” 1674, 4to. And “Repertorium Canonicurn,” &c. 1678, 4to. In this last piece he strenuously and learnedly asserts the king’s supremacy, as a power vested in the crown, before the Pope invaded the right and authority, or jurisdiction. He died April 4, 1678, and was interred in St. James’s church, Clerkenwell.

, earl of Godolphin, and lord high treasurer of England, descended from a very ancient family in Cornwall, was the third son of Francis Godolphin, K. B. by Dorothy, second daughter of sir Henry Berkley, of Yarlington in Somersetshire. He had great natural abilities, was liberally educated, and inheriting the unshaken loyalty of his family, entered early into the service of Charles II. who after his restoration made him one of the grooms of his bed-chamber. In 1663, when attending his majesty to the university of Oxford, he had the degree of M. A. conferred upon him. In 1678, he was twice sent envoy to Holland, upon affairs of the greatest importance; and the next year was made one of the commissioners of the treasury, which trust he discharged with integrity, and being considered as a man of great abilities, was sworn of the privy council. In 1680 he openly declared for the bill of exclusion of the duke of York; and in the debate in council, whether the duke should return to Scotland before the parliament met, he joined in the advice for his going away; and though the rest of the council were of the contrary opinion, yet the king acquiesced in his and lord Sunderland’s reasons. In April 1664 he was appointed one of the secretaries of state, which he soon resigned for the office of first commissioner of the treasury, and was created baron Godolphin of Rialton in Cornwall. He had hitherto sat in the house of commons as representative for Helston and for St. Mawe’s.

On the accession of James II. he was appointed lord chamberlain to the queen, and on the removal of the earl of Rochester, was again made one of the commissioners of the treasury. On the landing of the prince of Orange, he was one of the commissioners sent by king James to treat with that prince, which employment he discharged with great address and prudence. In the debate concerning the vacancy of the throne, after the abdication of king James, his lordship, out of a regard to the succession, voted for a regency; yet when king William was advanced to the throne, his majesty appointed him one of the lords commissioners of the treasury, and a privy-councillor, and in 1690 he was appointed first lord of the treasury. In 1695, he was one of the seven lords justices for the administration of the government, during the king’s absence, as he was likewise the year following, and again in 1701, when he was restored to the place of first commissioner of the treasury, from which he had been removed in 1697. On the accession of queen Anne, he was constituted lord high treasurer, which post he had long refused to accept, till the earl of Marlboro ugh pressed him in so positive a manner, that he declared, he could not go to the continent to command the armies, unless the treasury was put into his hands; for then he was sure that remittances would be punctually made to him. Under his lordship’s administration of this high office, the public credit was raised, the war carried on with success, and the nation satisfied with his prudent management. He omitted nothing that could engage theteubject to bear the burthen of the war with chearfulness; and it was owing to his advice, that the queen contributed one hundred thousand pounds out of her civil list towards it. He was also one of those faithful and able counsellors, who advised her majesty to declare in council against the selling of offices and places in her household and family, as highly dishonourable to herself, prejudicial to her service, and a discouragement to virtue and true merit, which alone ought and should recommend persons to her royal approbation. And so true a friend was his lordship to the established church, that considering how meanly great numbers of the clergy were provided for, he prevailed upon her majesty to settle her revenue of the first-fruits and tenths for the augmentation of the small vicarages. In July 1704 he was made knight of the garter; and in December 1706, advanced to the dignity of earl of Godolphin and viscount Rialton. But notwithstanding all his great services to the public, on the 8th of August 1710, he was removed from his post of lord high treasurer.

He died at St. Alban’s of the stone, on the 15th of September 1712, and was interred in Westminster-abbey. By his lady, Margaret, daughter of Thomas Blague, esq. he had issue Francis, second earl of Godolphin, on whose death the title became extinct.

Bishop Burnet says, “that he was the silentest and mojdestest man, who was perhaps ever bred in a court. He had a clear apprehension, and dispatched business with great method, and with so much temper, that he had no personal enemies. But his silence begot a jealousy, which hung long upon him. His notions were for the court; but his incorrupt and sincere way of managing the concerns of the treasury created in all people a very high esteem for him. He had true principles of religion and virtue, and never heaped up wealth. So that, all things being laid together, he was one of the worthiest and wisest men, who was employed in that age.” In another place the same historian observes, “that he was a man of the clearest head, the calmest temper, and the most incorrupt of all the ministers he had ever known; and that after having been thirty years in the treasury, and during nine of those lord treasurer, as he was never once suspected of corruption, ur of suffering his servants to grow rich under Jiim, so in all that time his estate was not increased by him to the value of four thousand pounds.” It is also said, that he had a penetrating contemplative genius, a slow, but unerring apprehension, and an exquisite judgment, with few words, though always to the purpose. He was temperate in his diet. His superior wisdom and spirit made han despise the low arts of vain-glorious courtiers; for he never kept suitors unprofitably in suspense, nor promised any thing, that he was not resolved to perform; but as he accounted dissimulation the worst of lying, so on the other hand his denials were softened by frankness and condescension to those whom he could not gratify. His great abilities and consummate experience qualified him for a prime minister; and his exact knowledge of all the branches of the revenue particularly fitted him for the management of the treasury. He was thrifty without the least tincture of avarice, being. as good an ceconomist of the public wealth, as he was of his private fortune. He had a clear conception of the whole government, both in church and state; and perfectly knew the temper, genius, and disposition of the English nation. And though his stern gravity appeared a little ungracious, yet his steady and impartial justice recommended him to the esteem of almost every person; so that no man, in so many different public stations, and so great a variety of business, ever had more friends, or fewer enemies. Dean Swift’s character of him is not so favourable, and in our references may be found many other opposite opinions of his merit and abilities. He had a brother of some poetical talent, noticed by Mr. Ellis.

, better known by the name of Woollstonecraft, a lady of very extraordinary genius, but whose history and opinions are unhappily calculated to excite a mixture of admiration, pity, and scorn, was born in or near London, April 27, 1759, of poor parents, who then resided at Epping, but afterwards removed to a farm near Beverley in Yorkshire, where this daughter frequented a day-school in the neighbourhood. From this place her father again removed to Hoxton near London, and afterwards to Walworth. During all this time, and until Miss Woollstonecraft arrived at her twenty-fourth year, there appears little that is interesting, or extraordinary in her history, unless it may be considered as such that she early affected an original way of thinking, accompanied with correspondent actions, and entertained a high and romantic sense of friendship, which seems greatly to have prevailed over filial affection. In her twenty-fourth year, she formed the plan of conducting a school at Islington, in conjunction with her sisters, which in the course of a few months she removed to Newington-green, where she was honoured by the friendship of Dr. Price. Of her opinions on religious subjects at this time, we have the following singular account from her biographer: “Her religion was, in reality, little allied to any system of forms, and was rather founded in taste, than in the niceties of polemical discussion. Her mind constitutionally attached itself to the sublime and amiable. She found an inexpressible delight in the beauties of nature, and in the splendid reveries of the imagination. But nature itself, she thought, would be no better than a vast blank, if the mind of the observer did not supply it with an animating soul. When she walked amidst the wonders of nature, she was accustomed to converse with her God. To her mind he was pictured as not less amiable, generous, and kind, than great, wise, and exalted. In fact she had received few lessons of religion in her youth, and her religion was almost entirely of her own creation. But she was not on that account the less attached to it, or the less scrupulous in discharging what she considered as its duties. She could not recollect the time when she had believed the doctrine of future punishments,” &c.

In 1785, a Mrs. Skeggs, with whom she had contracted an ardent friendship, and who resided at Lisbon, being pregnant, Miss Woollstonecraft, shocked with the idea hat she might die in childbed at a distance from her fri( ds, passed over to Lisbon to attend her, leaving the school under the management of her sisters; an exertion of friendship the more entitled to praise that it proved hurtful to her school, which oon after her return she was compelled to abandon. Perhaps, however, this was not wholly a matter of compulsion, for we are told that “she had a rooted aversion to that sort of cohabitation with her sisters, which the project of the school imposed.” She now appears to have meditated literary employment as a source of profit, and exhibited a specimen of her talents in a l'2mo pamphlet, entitled “Thoughts on the Education of Daughters,” for the copy-right of which she obtained the sum of ten guineas from the late Mr. Johnson, bookseller, of St. Paul’s church-yard, who afterwards proved one of her most liberal patrons. After this she was employed for some months, as a governess, in the family o an Irish nobleman, at the end of which she returned again to literary pursuits, and from 1787, when she came to reside in London, produced “Mary, a Fiction,” “Original Stories from real life,” made some translations from the French, and compiled “The Female Reader,” on the model of Dr. Enfield’s “Speaker.” She wrote also some articles in the “Analytical Review,” which was established by her publisher, in 1788.

In the French revolution which took place in the following year, and which let loose all kinds of principles and opinions except what had stood the test of experience, Miss Woollstonecraft found much that was congenial with her own ways of thinking, and much which it will appear soon she determined to introduce in her conduct. She was therefore among the first who attempted to answer Mr. Burke’s celebrated “Reflections on the French Revolution,” and displayed a share of ability which made her reputation more general than it had yet been. This was followed by her “Vindication of the Rights of Woman,” in which she unfolded many a wild theory on the duties and character of her sex. How well she was qualified to guide them appeared now in the practical use of her own precepts, of which the first specimen was the formation of a violent attachment for a very eminent artist, which is thus embellished by her biographer “She saw Mr. Fuseli frequently; he amused, delighted, and instructed her. As a painter, it was impossible she should not wish to see his works, and consequently to frequent his house. She visited him; her visits were returned. Notwithstanding the inequality of their years, Mary was not of a temper to live upon terms of so much intimacy with a man of merit and genius, without loving him. The delight she enjoyed in his society, she transferred by association to his person. What she experienced in this respect, was no doubt heightened, by the state of celibacy and restraint in which she had hitherto lived, and to which the rules of polished society condemn an unmarried woman. She conceived a personal and ardent affection for him. Mr. Fuseli was a married man, and his wife the acquaintance of Mary. She readily perceived the restrictions which this circumstance seemed to impose upon her, but she made light of any difficulty that might arise out of them.” Notwithstanding this contempt for difficulties, Mr. Fuseli was not to be won, and in order to get rid of a passion which he would not indulge, she went ever to France in 1792. Here within a few months she found a cure in that “species of connection,” says her biographer, “for which her heart secretly panted, and which had the effect of diffusing an immediate tranquillity and cheerfulness over her manners.” This was an illicit connection with a Mr. Imlay, an American, and we are gravely told, that “she was now arrived at the situation, which, for two or three preceding years, her reason had pointed out to her as affording the most substantial prospect of happiness.” Her reason, however, unfortunately pointed wrong in this instance, as she was afterwards most basely and cruelly abandoned by the object of her affections, whose conduct cannot be mentioned in terms of indignation too strong. She now made two attempts at suicide, on which we shall only remark that they were totally inconsistent with the character given of her by her biographer, as possessing “a firmness of mind, an unconquerable greatness of soul, by which, after a short internal struggle-, she was accustomed to rise above difficulties and suffering.” Having overcome two ardent passions, she formed a third, of which her biographer, Mr. William Godwin, was the object. A period only of six months intervened in this case; but, says Mr. Godwin, with a curious felicity of calculation, although “it was only six months since she had resolutely banished every thought of Mr. Imlay (the former lover), it was at least eighteen that he ought to have been banished, and would have been banished, had it not been for her scrupulous pertinacity in determining to leave no measure untried to regain him.” This connection, likewise, was begun without the nuptial ceremonies; but, after some months, the marriage took place; the principal reason was that she was pregnant, and “unwilling to incur that seclusion from the society of many valuable and excellent individuals, which custom awards in cases of this sort.” But it did not produce the desired effect. Some who visited her, or were visited by her, and who regarded her as the injured object of Mr. Imlay' s indifference, were not pleased to bestow their countenance on one who was so eager to run into the arms of another man, and alike informally. Mr. Godwin takes this opportunity of censuring the prudery of these nice people in terms of severity with what justice our readers may determine. The happiness of this connection, however, was transient. In August 1797, she was delivered of a daughter, and died Sept. 10, of the same year. From the account given of her, by her biographer, in which we must condemn the laboured vindication of principles inconsistent with the delicacy of the female sex, and the welfare of society, Mrs. Godwin appears to have been a woman of strong intellect, which might have elevated her to the highest rank of English female writers, had not her genius run wild for want of cultivation. Her passions were consequently ungovernable, and she accustomed herself to yield to them without scruple, treating female honour and delicacy as vulgar prejudices. She was therefore a voluptuary and sensualist, without that refinement for which she seemed to contend on other subjects. Her history indeed forms entirely a warning, and in no part an example. Singular she was, it must be allowed, for it is not easily to be conceived that such another heroine will ever appear, unless in a novel, where a latitude is given to that extravagance of character which she attempted to bring into real life.

Besides the works already noticed, she published “A moral and historical view of the French Revolution,” of which one volume only was published, and “Letters from Norway.” The latter contains much elegant description and just remark. The former could be noticed only at the time of its publication. The gay illusions of the French revolution soon disappeared. After her death some miscellanies, letters, and an unfinished novel, were published by her husband, in 4 vols. 12mo, with a Life of the authoress. Much of both had better been suppressed, as ill calculated to excite sympathy for one who seems to have rioted in sentiments alike repugnant to religion, sense, and decency.

, an English prelate, was born in 1517 at Oakingham in Berkshire; and being put to the grammar-school there, quickly made such a progress as discovered him to be endowed with excellent parts. But his parents being low in circumstances, he must have lost the advantage of improving them by a suitable education, had they not been noticed by Dr. Richard Layton, archdeacon of Bucks, a zealous promoter of the reformation, who, taking him into his house, and instructinghim in classical learning, sent him to Oxford, where he was entered of Magdalen college about 1538. Not long after, he lost his worthy patron; but his merit, now become conspicuous in the university, had procured him other friends; so that he was enabled to take the degree of B. A. July 12, 1543. The same merit released his friends from any farther expence, by obtaining him, the year ensuing, a fellowship of his college; and he proceeded M. A. in 1547. But he did not long enjoy the fruits of his merit in a college life; his patron, the archdeacon, had taken care to breed up Godwin in the principles of the reformation, and this irritating some popish members of the college, they made his situation so uneasy, that, the free-school at Brackley in Northamptonshire becoming vacant in 1549, and being in the gift of the college, he resigned his fellowship, and accepted it. In this station, he married the daughter of Nicholas Purefoy, of Shalston, in the county of Bucks, and lived without any new disturbance as long as Edward VI. was at the helm: but, upon the accession of Mary, his religion exposed him to a fresh persecution, and he was obliged to quit his school. In this exigence, although the church was his original intention, and he had read much with that view, yet now it became more safe to apply to the study of physic; and being admitted to his bachelor’s degree in that faculty, at Oxford, July 1555, he practised in it for a support till Elizabeth succeeded to the throne, when he resolved to enter into the church. In this he was encouraged by Bullingham, bishop of Lincoln, who gave him orders, and made him his chaplain; his lordship also introduced him to the queen, and obtained him the favour of preaching before her majesty; who was so much pleased with the propriety of his manner, and the grave turn of his oratory, that she appointed him one of her Lentpreachers. He had discharged this duty by an annual appointment, with much satisfaction to her majesty, for a series of eighteen years. In 1565, on the deprivation of Sampson, he was made dean of Christ church, Oxford, and had also the prebend of Milton-ecclesia in the church of Lincoln conferred on him by his patron bishop Bullingham. This year also he took his degrees of B. and D. D. at Oxford. In 1566, he was promoted to' the deanery of Canterbury, being the second dean of that church: and queen Elizabeth making a visit to Oxford the same year, he attended her majesty, and among others kept an exercise in divinity against Dr. Lawrence Humphries, the professor; in which the famous Dr. Jewel, bishop of Salisbury, was moderator. In June following he was appointed by archbishop Parker, one of his commissioners to visit the diocese of Norwich; and that primate having established a benefaction for a sermon on Rogation Sunday at Thetford in Norfolk and other places, the dean, while engaged in this commission, preached the first sermon of that foundation, on Sunday morning July 20, 1567, in the Green-yard adjoining to the bishop’s palace at Norwich. In 1573 he quitted his prebend of Milton-ecclesia, on being presented by Cooper, then bishop of Lincoln, to that of Leighton-Bosard, the endowment of which is considered the best in the church of Lincoln. In 1576 he was one of the ecclesiastical commissioners, empowered by the queen to take cognizance of all offences against the peace and good order of the church, and to frame such statutes as might conduce to its prosperity.

The see of Bath and Wells had in 1584 been vacant since the death of Dr. Gilbert Berkley in Nov. 1581. To this bishopric the queen now nominated dean Godwin, who accordingly was consecrated Sept. 13, 1584. He immediately resigned the deanery of Canterbury; and as he arrived at the episcopal dignity “as well qualified,” says his contemporary, sir John Harrington, “for a bishop as might be, umeproveable, without simony, given to good hospitality, quiet, kind, and affable,” it is to be lamented that he was unjustly opposed in the enjoyment of what he deserved. At the time of his promotion there prevailed among the courtiers no small dislike to the bishops; prompted by a desire to spoil them of their revenues. To cover their unjust proceedings, they did not want plausible pretences, the effects of which Godwin too severely experienced. He was a widower, drawing towards seventy, and much enfeebled by the gout, when he came to the see; but in order to the management of his family, and that he might devote his whole time to the discharge of his high office, he married a second wife, a widow, of years suitable to his own. An illiberal misrepresentation, however, of this affair was but too readily believed by the queen, who had a rooted aversion to the marriages of the clergy, and the crafty slanderers gratified their aim in the disgrace of the aged prelate, and in obtaining part of his property. This unfortunate affair, which affected his public character as well as his private happiness, contributed not a little to increase his infirmities. He continued, however, attentive to the duties of his function, and frequently gave proof that neither his diligence nor his observation were inconsiderable. During the two last years of his life, his health more rapidly declined, and he was also attacked with a quartan ague. He was now recommended by his physicians to try the benefit of his native air. Accordingly he came to Oakingham with this intention, but breathed his last there, Nov. 19, 1590. He was buried in the chancel of Oakingham church, where is a modest inscription to his memory, written by his son, the subject of the next article.

The memory of bishop Godwin will ever be respected. His own merit brought him into public notice, and when he rose in the church he adorned it by his amiable qualities. Though he was a distinguished scholar, yet he did not publish any of his labours. Among the Parker Mss. in Bene't college, Cambridge, is a sermon which he preached before the queen at Greenwich in 1566, concerning the authority of the councils and fathers.