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, esq. LL.D. and F.A.S. eldest son and heir of the preceding, succeeded by virtue of the grant passed in 1727. He had been educated as a gentleman commoner at Corpus Christi college in Oxford. At the revival of the order of the Bath he was made genealogist and registrar. He was presented by Dr. Brookes, regius professor of civil law in Oxford, with the degree of LL.D. April 22, 1749, being the opening of the Radcliffe Library. July 21, 1736, he had been elected a member of the Society of Antiquaries. The margrave of Anspach, when invested with the order of the garter, presented him with 300 ducats, the gold-hilted sword his highness then wore, and gave him 100 ducats in lieu of his upper robe, which Garter claimed as belonging to him, by virtue of his office. He spent most of his time at Mortlake, where, indulging himself too freely with wine, it shortened his life, dying there December 5, 1754, aged only forty-six. He was undoubtedly a man of abilities, but harsh in his temper, especially towards the members of the college. Never having married, his brother, the Rev. George Anstis, became his heir. The manuscripts and well-chosen collection of books which had been possessed by his father were disposed of at his death.

, son of the preceding, was born at Broughton in Northamptonshire, in 1629, educated at Westminster school, and elected student of Christ-church in 1646, where, according to Wood, his conduct for some time was turbulent and disorderly. Having finished his studies, however, he was in 1656 appointed to officiate as second master of Westminster school, and in 1657 was confirmed in the office. Behaving improperly to the celebrated Busby, he was, in 1658, turned out of this place; but soon after he became vicar of Ambrosden in Oxfordshire, having taken orders from Brownrig, bishop of Exeter. After the Restoration, Arthur earl of Anglesey appointed him his chaplain, on which Mr. Bagshaw left Ambrosden, in hopes of farther promotion, which, however, he never attained, having written and preached doctrines against the church and state, for which he was committed prisoner, first to the Gatehouse in Westminster, next to the Tower, and thence to South Sea castle, Hampshire, in 1664. After his release he returned to London, and fell tinder fresh suspicions, and having refused the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, was committed to Newgate, where he continued twenty-two weeks. He appears to have been again released, as he died at a house in Tothill-street, Westminster, Dec. 28, 1671, and was buried in Bunhillfields cemetery, with an altar monument, and an inscription written by the celebrated Dr. Owen, implying that he had been persecuted for his adherence to the gospel, and had now taken sanctuary “from the reproaches of pretended friends, and the persecutions of professed adversaries.” Baxter’s account is less favourable he records him as an anabaptist, fifth-monarchy man, and a separatist, a man of an extraordinary vehement spirit, but he allows that he had been exasperated by many years “hard and grievous imprisonment.” Wood has a long list of his writings, mostly controversial with Baxter, L'Estrange, and others, and probably forgotten. All his biographers, however, allow him to have been a man of abilities.

, one of the active agents in the French revolution, was born in 1761, the son of an opulent attorney of Grenoble. He was educated to the profession of the law, and being appointed deputy to the States-General in 1789, became one of the most implacable enemies of the court, and in other respects betrayed that sanguinary spirit which at that time raised many more obscure men into popular reputation. He joined in most of the extravagant measures of the assembly, and argued in particular for confiscating the property of the clergy, and abolishing religious orders. In order to catch popularity from whatever quarter, he declared himself the advocate of protestants, actors, Jews, and executioners, and solicited their admission to the rights of citizenship. He was likewise for the suppression of all feudal rights and titles, and in general for all the measures of the Jacobin party but amidst all this violence, he ventured to think for himself on some points, which proved his ruin. On one occasion, he insisted that no law shouJd be passed concerning people of colour, until the motion had been made by the colonies and pointed out the certain resistance of the planters to innovations of this nature. Such an appearance of justice could not be acceptable at that time. It was even attributed to corruption, of which a more direct proof appeared soon after. On the news of the king’s being arrested in his flight, Barnave, with Petion, and another, were appointed to escort the royal family to Paris. He returned in the carriage of their majesties, and conducted himself with all proper respect and attention. What had happened to produce this change is not known it might be compunction, or he might have discovered that the unfortunate monarch was not the monster he had represented him but from this hour Barnave became a suspected character; and he increased this suspicion, by giving in the assembly a simple recital of his mission, without adding any reflection. He did worse he even spoke for the inviolability of the king’s person, and repelled, with looks of contempt, the hootings of the populace. He still continued, however, to enjoy some influence in the assembly, to which his talents justly entitled him, and even was powerful enough to procure a repeal of the decree respecting the colonies, which he had before opposed against the voice of the majority. At the end of the session he was appointed mayor of Grenoble, where he married the only daughter of a lawyer, who brought him a fortune of 700,000 livres but all this he did not enjoy long. When the jacobin party obtained possession of the court, in consequence of the events of August 1792, they found, or created, proofs of his connection with the cabinet of the Thuileries. After a long imprisonment at Grenoble, he was brought before the revolutionary tribunal of Paris, where he made an able defence, and probably impressed even his enemies with a favourable opinion of his conduct. He was, however, condemned to be guillotined, which was executed Nov. 29, 1793. Barnave was unquestionably a man of abilities, whatever may be thought of their direction. Mirabeau, to whom he was a rival, and whom he often opposed, was astonished that a young man should speak so rapidly, so long, and so eloquently and said of him, “It is a young tree, which will mount high if it be let to grow.”

Dr. Bennet was undoubtedly a divine of eminent piety and distinguished learning. The zeal and diligence with which he engaged in the studies and duties of his profession were highly commendable, and shew that h had no conception that the life of a clergyman was to be an idle or trifling life. Several of his works, however, being upon subjects of temporary controversy, are, we apprehend, not much read at present. This will ever be the case when disputes turn upon matters which are not of lasting importance, or upon some trivial circumstances in questions otherwise momentous, and it will especially be the case, when a man of abilities has to contend with insufficient adversaries. Dr. Kippis remembered being told, in his youth, by Dr. Doddridge, that the dissenting ministers, in and near Colchester, who endeavoured to answer Dr. Bennet, and particularly Mr. Shepherd, were persons of very mean talents. The doctor, in some of his subsequent writings, met with far abler 'antagonists. The question concerning-schism was deemed of gr^at importance during the last century, and in the beginning of the present. The Papists charged this crime upon the Protestants, and the members of the church of England upon the Dissenters. A concise and rational account of the general controversy with regard to schism, and of the variations and inconsistencies to which it hath given rise, would be no incurious subject in the history of theological literature.

, nephew of the preceding, and a man of abilities, although not equal to his uncle, was born Jan. 8, 1705, and consequently could not have been educated by his uncle, as some biographers have asserted. Removing from Rouen to Paris in his thirty-fourth year, he opened there a public school for architecture, and acquired so much reputation as to be elected into the academy in 1755. Appointed afterwards professor, he carried on his public lectures and private tuition for thirty years, during which his instructions produced a new sera in architecture. He likewise wrote all the articles on this subject in the Encyclopaedia. When attacked with the disease which proved fatal, he caused himself to be removed to his school in the Louvre, that he might breathe his last in the place where he had acquired his fame, and died there, January 9, 1774. His principal buildings are to be seen at Metx and Strasburgh. His printed works are, 1. “Architecture Francaise,” 1772, 2 vols. fol. 2. “Cours d' Architecture civile,” 9 vols. 8vo, three of which consist o? plates only but this work, the second part of which appeared in 1773, is unfortunately imperfect, owing to his death. 3. “Architecture moderne,” 1728, 2 vols. 4to. 4. “De la distribution des maisons de plaisance,” Paris, 1737, 2 vols. 4to. Blondel was a good engraver, and executed many of the plates for his “Course of Architecture.”

, a man of abilities, succeeded his father William, fourth lord Chandos, in Nov. 1602. He was a friend of the earl of Essex, in whose insurrection he was probably involved, for his name appears on the list of prisoners confined in the Fleet on that account, Feb. 1600. He was made a knight of the bath at the creation of Charles duke of York, Jan. 1604, and in August 1605 was created M. A. at Oxford, the king being present. He was an associate of that active and romantic character, lord Herbert of Cherbury. and appears to have volunteered his services in the Low Countries, when the prince of Orange besieged the city of Juliers in 1610, and the Low Country army was assisted by four thousand English soldiers, under the command of sir Edward Cecil. From the great influence which his hospitality and popular manners afterwards obtained in Gloucestershire, and his numerous attendants when he visited the court, he was styled king of Cotswould, the tract of country on the edge of which his castle of Sudeley was situated. On November 18, 1617, he was appointed to receive and introduce the Muscovite ambassadors, who had brought costly presents from their master to the king. He died August 20, 1621. There is no doubt, says sir Egerton JBrydges (by whom the preceding notices were drawn together) that lord Chandos was a man of abilities as well as splendid habits of life, and by no means a literary recluse, although he is supposed to have been the author of “Horae subsecivas, Observations and Discourses,” Lond. 1620, 8vo, a work containing a fund of good sense and shrewd remark. In sir John Beaumont’s poems are some lines on his death, highly expressive of an excellent character.

, a man of learning in the beginning of the sixteenth century, and the friend of Erasmus, who corresponded with him by the name of Bovillus, was a native of Berkshire, according to Fuller. He was educated at Queen’s college, Cambridge, where he took his bachelor’s degree in 1504, and his master’s in 1507, and was chosen fellow in the last mentioned year. He commenced D. D. in 1520, and was vice-chancellor in 1524—5. He was esteemed a man of abilities, and chosen by cardinal Wolsey to answer Luther. The cardinal also made him his chaplain, but we do not find that he raised him to any higher dignity, yet the oration he spoke in favour of the cardinal, now printed in Fiddes’s life of that great churchman, seems to have merited a higher reward. By his letters to Erasmus, it appears that he was an able Grecian at a time when that language was little known. In 1513, in conjunction with Mr. Walden, he read a mathematical lecture, and had a salary from the university for it. He was also one of the twelve preachers sent out by that university in 1515. The biographers of Erasmus profess their ignorance of the time of his death. Tanner fixes it in 1526, but Dodd says he was living in 1530. He wrote, 1. “De Captivitate Babylonica contra Lutherum.” 2. “Epistolse et Orationes.” 3. “De Serpentibus siticulosis,” a translation from the Greek of Lucian, printed at Cambridge, 1521, 4to. 4. “Oratio coram Archiepiscopo Eboracensi,” ibid. 1521, s 4to.

, an eminent French writer and critic, secretary, and one of the forty members of the French academy, censor-royal, &c. was born at Beauvais, in December, 1670. After some elementary education at home, he came to Paris in 1686, and pursuing his studies, took his bachelor’s degree in divinity in 1691. One of his uncles, a canon of the cathedral of Beauvais, being attacked by a dangerous illness, resigned his canonry to him in 1695, but on his recovery chose to revoke his resignation. The nephew appears to have felt this and other disappointments in his view of promotion so keenly, as to determine to change his profession. He accordingly left Beauvais in the last-mentioned year, returned to Paris, and soon was distinguished as a man of abilities. The same year he acquired a situation in the office for foreign affairs, and became patronized by M. de Torcy, by whose means he accompanied the French plenipotentiaries to Ryswick, in 1696, where peace was concluded. After his return to France, he was sent to Italy in 1699, although without an ostensible character, to negociate some affairs of importance in the Italian courts, which occupied him until 1702. Some time after, he went to England, as charge d'affaires, and while the war occasioned by the contest about the crown of Spain was at its height, and had involved all Europe, he was the only minister France had at the court of St. James’s, where he resided without rank or character. He then went to the Hague, and to Brussels, and at this latter place wrote the manifesto of the elector of Bavaria, which did him so much credit. In 1707 we find him at Neufchatel, and in 1710 at Gertruydenburgh, and he appears to have had a considerable hand in the treaties of peace concluded at Utrecht, Baden, and Rastadt. All these services were recompensed in 1705, by the priory of Veneroles, and in 1714 by a canonry of the church of Beauvais. Having been employed in other state affairs by the regent and by cardinal Dubois, he was rewarded in 1716 by a pension of 2000 livres, and in 1723 was promoted to the abbey of Notre-Dame de Ressons, near Beauvais. As it was now his intention to execute the duties of these preferments, he received in 1724 the orders of subdeacon and deacon, and was about to have taken possession of his canonry, when he was seized with a disorder at Paris, which proved fatal March 23, 1742. In 1720 he was elected into the French academy, and in 1723 was appointed their secretary.

After a lite of almost constant activity and employment, he found, at the age of sixty -five, that the infirmities of age began to visit him, and to lessen his abilities for travelling with his wonted alacrity; yet, in the year 1709, he visited the west of England, and some counties nearer his residence in the metropolis. But at length, in 17 1O, finding the air near the city not to agree with his declining constitution, he took a handsome seat at Rushcomb, near Twyford, in Berkshire, at which he continued to reside to the time of his decease. In 1712, he had, at distant times, three fits, thought to be of the apoplectic kind. The last of these impaired his understanding and memory, so much as to render him unfit for public action afterwards. His friend, Thomas Story, an eminent Quaker, who had been the first recorder of the corporation of Philadelphia, made him annual visits after this time, to his death. In 1713 and 1714, he found him cheerful, and able to relate past transactions, but deficient in utterance, and recollection of the names of absent persons. In 1715, his memory seemed further decayed; but both in this, and the former year, Story relates, that he continued to utter in the Quakers’ meeting at Heading, short, but sound and sensible expressions. This year he also tried, but without benefit, the effect of the waters at Bath. In 1716, he seemed glad to see his friend, and at parting with him and another, he said, “My love is with you. The Lord preserve you, and remember me in the everlasting covenant.” In 1717, he scarce knew his old acquaintance, or coud wajk without leading. His decease was on the 30th of July, 1718, and his interment the 5th of the next moch, at Jordan, near Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire. Without attempting to draw up a regular character of William Pdin, it must be evident from his works, that he was a man of abilities; and, from his conduct through life, that hewas a man of the purest conscience. This, without acceling to his opinions in religion, we are perfectly willing to How and to declare.

During the leisure he enjoyed, while confessor to the duchess of Cleves, he employed himself in that work which alone has made him known to posterity, in compiling “The Lives of the Kings, Bishops, Apostolical Men, and Writers of England.” They were comprised in four large volumes; the first containing the lives of the kings; the second, of the bishops; the third, of the apostolical men; and the fourth, of'the writers. The three first are preserved in the archives of the collegiate church of Verdun: the fourth only was published, and that after his decease, at Paris, 1619, and 1623, in 4to, under the title of “J. Pitsei Angli, &c. Relationum Historicarum de Rebus Anglicis tomus primus;” but the running title, and by which it is oftenest quoted, is, “De Illustribus Angliae. Scriptoribus.” It is divided into four parts; the first of which is preliminary matter, “De laudibus Historiae, de Antiquitate Ecclesise Britannicae, de Academiis tarn antiquis Britonum quam recentioribus Anglorum.” The second part contains the lives and characters of three hundred English writers; the third is an “Appendix of some Writers, in alphabetical order, and divided into four Centuries,”- together with “An Index of English Books, written by unknown Authors.” The last part consists of “Fifteen Alphabetical Indexes,” forming a kind of epitome of the whole work. Pits appears to have acted in a very disingenuous manner, especially in the second part of this work; the greater part of which he has taken without any acknowledgment from Bale’s book “De Scriptoribus majoris Britanniae,” while he takes every opportunity to shew his abhorrence both of Bale and his work. He pretends also to follow, and familiarly quotes, Leland’s “Collectanea de Scriptoribus Anglise;” whereas the truth is, as Wood and others have observed, he never saw them, being but twenty years of age, or little more, when he left the nation: neither was it in his power afterwards, if he had been in England, because they were kept in such private hands, that few protestant antiquaries, and none of those of the church of Rome, could see or peruse them. What therefore he pretends to have from Leland, he takes at second-hand from Bale. His work is also full of partiality: for he entirely leaves out Wickliflfe and his followers, together with the Scots and Irish writers, who are for the most part commemorated by Bale; and in their room gives an account of the Roman catholic writers, such especially as had left the kingdom, after the Reformation in queen Elizabeth’s reign, and sheltered themselves at Rome, Douay, Louvain, &c. This, however, is the best and most valuable part of Pits’s work. Pits was a man of abilities and learning. His style is clear, easy, and elegant; but he wants accuracy, and has fallen into many mistakes in his accounts of the British writers. His work, however, will always be thought of use, if it be only that “Historia quoquo modo scripta delectat.”

Some years after, having received an invitation from the pope, he took a journey to Rome, whence he was sent as nuncio to the popish bishops and clergy in Ireland, and landed there in 1579. At this time Gerald Fitzgerald, earl of Desmond, was in arms, as he pretended, in defence of the liberties and religion of his country; but in 1583 his party was routed and himself killed. The part Sanders took in this rebellion is variously represented. Camden says that he was sent over purposely to encourage Desmond, and that several companies of Spanish soldiers went over with him, and that when their army was routed, he fled to the woods, and died of hunger. All that the catholics deuy in this account, is, that Sanders was sent purposely i but this they deny very feebly. With regard to the manner of Sanders’s death, Dodd seems inclined to prefer Wood’s account, who says that he died of a dysentery, and Dodd likewise adopts the report of Rushton and Pits, who say that he died at the latter end of 1580, or the beginning of 1581, because this was long before Desmond’s defeat, and consequently dissolves in some measure the supposed connection between him and Sanders. Dodd, however, who is generally impartial, allows that several catholics, his contemporaries, were of opinion that he was engaged in the Spanish interest against queen Elizabeth; and his writings prove that he maintained a deposing power both in the church and people, where religion was in danger. He was, according to all accounts, a man of abilities, and was considered as the most acute adversary for the re-establishment of popery in England, which his party could boast of. He had, however, to contend with men of equal ability, who exposed his want of veracity as well as of argument, and few of his works have survived the times in which they were written. Among them are, 1. “The Supper of our Lord, &c.” a defence of the real presence, being what he calls “A confutation of Jewel’s Apology, as also of Alexander Newel’s challenge,” Louvain, in 1566, 1567, 4to. 2. “Treatise of the Images of Christ and his Saints; being a confutation of Mr. Jewel’s reply upon that subject,” ibid. 1567, 8vo.- 3. “The Rock of the Church/ 1 eoncerning the primacy of St. Peter, ibid. 1566, 1567, St. Omer’s, 1624, 8vo.' 4.” A brief treatise on Usury,“ibid. 1566. 5.” De Visibili monarchia Ecclesia,“ibid. 1571, folio, Antwerp, 1581, Wiceburg, 1592. 6.” De origine et progressu Schismatis Anglicani,“Colon. 1585, 8vo, reprinted at other places in 1586, 1588, and 1590, and translated into French in 1673, with some tracts on the tenets of his church, which seem not of the controversial kind. Mo’st of the former were answered by English divines of eminence, particularly his large volume” De visibili monarchia ecclesise," by Dering, Clerk, and others, of whose answers an account may J>e seen in Strype’s Life of Parker. That on the English schism is refuted, as to his more important assertions, in the appendix to Burnet’s History of the Reformation, vol. II.

, a skilful medallist of the sixteenth century, was born at Parma, where, hearing of the reputation which Marc Antonio Raimondi had acquired at Rome by his engravings, he went to that city, and became his pupil. As an engraver, Strutt thinks that Vico was a man of abilities, but does not seem to have been endowed with patience enough to pay sufficient attention to the mechanical part of the execution of his plates. He could draw correctly, but seldom exerted himself. He is noticed here, however, chiefly for his knowledge of medals. In 1548, he published his “Discourses on the Medals of the Ancients,” Venice, 4to, succeeded by a second edition in 1555. This, which is a treatise of very considerable intelligence for that period, treats of the metals employed in ancient coinage of portraits to be found on coins of the types on their reverses of their legends of medallions of false medals, and rules for discerning them dates of history; forms of edifices names of magistrates, &c. This he dedicated to one of his patrons, the grand duke Cosmo, himself a distinguished amateur.

, a Carmelite monk of great learning in the fourteenth century, was born at Walden in Essex, about 1367. His father’s name was John Netter, but he chose to be denominated, as indeed was very commoil then, from the place of his nativity. He was educated among the Carmelites in London, whence he removed for the farther prosecution of his studies to Oxford. Here he continued some years, and received the degree of doctor in divinity, after which he returned to London, and took the habit of the Carmelites. Being introduced at the court of Henry IV. he became a favourite with the king, and was appointed the principal champion of the church against heretics, and especially those who had adopted the tenets of Wickliff, Huss, or Jerome of Prague. In 1409 he was sent by the king to the grand council at Pisa, where he is said to have been much admired for his eloquence and learning. After his return to England, he was made provincial of his order; and Henry V. admitted him of his privy-council, and appointed him his confessor. In 1415 he was sent to the council of Constance, and about 1419, was employed to negociate peace between Uladislaus, king of Poland, and Michael, general of the Teutonic order. In 1422 the king died in the arms of Waldensis, at Vincennes in France. He became afterwards a favourite with the young king Henry VI. and was appointed his confessor. In 1430 he attended the king to France, and at Roan was seized with an acute disease, of which he died Nov. 2, and was buried in the convent of Carmelites in that city. He appears to have been a man of abilities; Pits says that he was master of the Greek and Hebrew languages, and in general a polite scholar. His principal work, the only one printed, is his “Doctrinale antiquum fidei ecclesias catholicse,” Paris, 1521—1523, 3 vols, folio, and reprinted at Saumur, Venice, and Paris. Mr. archdeacon Churton, in his valuable Lives of the founders of Brasenose-college, informs us, that the bishop of Lincoln, Russel, being harassed and fatigued, as he feelingly complains, with the multitude of heretics at Oxford in 1491, met with this book of Waldensis, and resolved to make extracts from it (vol. III. “de sacramentalibus”), for the more speedy and effectual refutation of the “insane dogmas, with which, he says, so many of his countrymen were infected.” Having framed his compendium with great care, by a written injunction under his own hand he ordered it to be preserved in the registry of the see, for the benefit of his successors in their examinations of “heretical depravity;” pronouncing an anathema at the same time against any one who should obliterate the title, expressive of the design of the performance and the name of the compiler. The original copy of this “touchstone of error,” which was completed at Woburn on the feast of the Epiphany 1491-2, is still extant in the library of University-college, Oxford.

, author of the “History of Independency,” was born at Clifte in Dorsetshire, and is said to have been educated at Christ’s church, Oxford, in which however, Wood could find no memorial of him. Afterwards leaving the university without a degree, he retired to an estate he had at Charterhouse near Wells in Somersetshire, where he lived in good repute especially for his loyalty and hatred of the puritans, in both which respects he appears soon after to have changed his mind. Before the civil wars, he had been made usher of the exchequer, but, says Wood, when “the puritans or presbyterians were like to carry all before them, he closed with them,” and was elected member of parliament for the city of Wells in 1640. Afterwards he became a zealous covenanter, and had a considerable share in the violent measures of the times, until the independents began to acquire the superiority, whom he resisted as much as lay in his power, especially in his “History” of that sect, which had a very considerable influence, as he was not only a man of abilities, but had acquired a character for disinterestedness. When the second part of this work was published in 1649, he was discovered to be the author, and imprisoned by Cromwell in the Tower. There having allowance of pen, ink, and paper, he wrote the third part of his history, but was never released. He died in the Tower in Oct. 1651, to the great grief, Wood says, of the presbyterian party. He was interred in Allhallows Barking, near the Tower. Walker wrote several temporary pamphlets, enumerated by Wood, arising out of the circumstances of the times, but none of any consequence, unless what he has incorporated in his “History of Independency,” published in three parts, 1648 1651, 4to, to which a fourth part by T. M. was added in 1660. “It is written,” says Warbnrton, “in a rambling vvay, and with a vindictive presbyterian spirit, full of bitterness but it gives an admirable idea of the character of the times, parties, and persons.” Within the last tweitty years, the price of this work, when complete, has risen from shillings to guineas.