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, an eminent improver on English manufactures, was a native of Derbyshire, and in his early days, followed the humble occupation of a barber at Wirksworth, where, if we are not mistaken, his father had carried on the same trade. About the year 1767, he quitted both his occupation and residence, and went through the country buying hair. Soon after he became acquainted with a mechanic, with whom in concert he contrived, or, from whom, as some think, he learned the structure of a machine for spinning cotton, which after various adventures, and incredible perseverance, he brought to such perfection, as to become of the greatest advantage to the commerce of his country. He afterwards erected cotton works at Crumford in Derbyshire, and realized an immense fortune. In 1786, he served the office of high sheriff for that county, and was knighted on presenting an address to his majesty. He died at Crumford, August 3, 1792. Various opinions have been entertained of his right to the honour of inventing the machines by which he became enriched, and the kingdom so essentially benefited; but it is universally allowed that he discovered that spirit and perseverance in bringing them to perfection which were wanting in all preceding attempts.

, one of the most learned critics of his age, was a native of Derbyshire, where he was born about 1665. He was admitted of Queen’s college, Cambridge, May 18, 1682, and having taken his degree of B. A. was elected fellow of that college, April 30, 1687, to be admitted to profits upon a future vacancy, which did not happen till April 9, 1690. He became chaplain to bishop Patrick, by whom he was presented to the rectory of Rattenden in Essex, March 10, 1698-9, which living he exchanged, in June following, for a chaplainship of Chelseacollege or hospital and that preferment also he soon after quitted, on being collated by his patron to a prebendal stall in the cathedral of Ely, July 3, 1701, and the next day to the mastership of Jesus’ college, Cambridge, both vacant by the death of Dr. Say well the same year he proceeded to his degree of D. D. and was elected vice-chancellor of the university in 1702. His mastership and prebend (both of which he was in possession of above fifty years) were the only preferments he held afterwards, not choosing to accept of any parochial benefice, but leading a very retired and studious life in his college, except when statutable residence, and attendance at chapters, required his presence at Ely, on which occasions he seldom or never failed to be present, till the latter part of his life. He died in March 1752, in the eighty-seventh year of his age, and was buried in Jesus’ college chapel. He had great knowledge in most branches of literature, but particularly in ecclesiastical antiquities and in chronology. In the classics he was critically skilled. Dr. Taylor always spoke with rapture of his correction of the inscription to Jupiter Urios, which he considered as uncommonly felicitous anct Mr. Chishull on the same occasion calls him “Aristarchus Cantabrigiensis summe eruditus.” There were many valuable pieces of his published in his life-time, but without his name, among which are “Locus Justini Martyris emendatus in Apol. I. p. 11. ed. Thirlby,” in the Bibliotheca Literaria, published by the learned Mr. Wasse of Aynho, Northamptonshire, 1744, No. VIII. “Tully and Hirtius reconciled as to the time of Caesar’s going to the African war, with an account of the old Roman year made by Ceesar,” ib. No. III. p. 29. “Origen de Oratione,” 4to, published by the Rev. Mr. Reading, keeper of Sion college library“and he is also supposed to have contributed notes to Reading’s edition of the Ecclesiastical Historians, 3 vols. fol.” Hierpclis in Aurea Carmina Pythagorea Comment." Lond. 1742, 8vo, published with a preface by Dr. Richard Warren, archdeacon of Suffolk. Dr. Harwood pronounces this to be the best edition of a most excellent work that abounds with moral and devotional sentiments. After his death a correct edition of Justin Martyr’s Apologies was published from his Mss. by the Rev. Mr. Keller, fellow of Jesus’ college, Cambridge, and rector of Kelshali in Herefordshire. It is too honourable for the parties not to be mentioned, that it used to be observed, that all the other colleges, where the fellows chuse their master, could not show three such heads, as the only three colleges where the masters are put in upon them: viz. Bentley of Trinity, by the crown; Ashton of Jesus, by the bishop of Ely; and Waterland of Magdalen, by the earl of Suffolk.

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

, M. D. a native of Derbyshire, or according to Mr. Bosvvell, of Scotland, was born“in 1726, After the usual school education, he went to Edinburgh, where he resided about seven years, and during his medical course of study, published” A method of cure for the Stone, chiefly by injections,“1754, 12mo, and” Dissertatio de frigore quatenus morborom causa,“1757, Hvo. In 1761 he took his degree of M. D. and published far his inaugural thesis,” Dissertatio Medica et Chirurgica tie Arteriotomia,“a subject on which he is said to have held some bold opinions, and when at Edinburgh, made an attempt publicly to open the carotid artery of a patient in the hospital, but after making the first incision, the patient fainted, and the operation, which he intended to renew next day, was prevented by the interference of the managers of the hospital. He afterwards practised medicine for several years at Derby, whence, in 1778, he removed and settled in London. In 1773 he published a treatise on the kink-cough, the name he gives to the tussis convulsiva, or whooping-cough. In the cure he relied principally on the efficacy of the extract of hemlock, which he considered as a specific in the complaint. Two years after, he gave an account of the puerperal fever, as it appeared in Derbyshire and some of the adjacent counties, 8vo; in 1782,” A Treatise on the Worm Fever;“in 1783,” An improved method of opening the Temporal Artery;“and in 1794, a treatise on the angina pectoris, first described by Dr. Heberden. His account of it is published in the second volume of” Medical Transactions,“by the royal college of physicians. Dr. Butter calls it the diaphragmatic gout, and thinks it generally curable. In the fit he gives opium with aromatics, and for the cure he recommends pills with aloes and soap, to keep the body soluble. These, with temperance, he says, will usually succeed in putting an end to the complaint. In 1801, he published” A Treatise on the Venereal Rose," in which he considers virulent gonorrhea as a species of erysipelas, and resorts to his favourite hemlock for a cure. He died at his house in Lower Grosvenor-street, March 21, 1805. His practice in London was not very extensive, nor had he the good fortune to procure the approbation of his, brethren to his writings. Striving to be an inventor, he became a nostrum-monger, and in his latter days his manners had none of that polish which procures respect.

, one of the most eminent and highly-distinguished writers of the eighteenth century, was born on the 18th of September, 1709, at Lichfield in Staffordshire, where his father, Michael Johnson, a native of Derbyshire, of obscure extraction, was at that time a bookseller and stationer. His mother, Sarah Ford, was a native of Warwickshire, and sister to Dr. Ford, physician, who was father to Cornelius Ford, a clergyman of loose character, whom Hogarth has satirized in the print of Modern Midnight Conversation. Our author was the eldest of two sons. Nathaniel, the youngest, died in 1737 in his twenty-fifth year. The father was a man of robust body and active mind, yet occasionally depressed by melancholy, which Samuel inherited, and, with the aid of a stronger mind, was not always able to shake off. He was also a steady high-churchman, and an adherent of the house of Stuart, a prejudice which his son outlived in the nation at large, without entirely conquering in himself. Mrs. Johnson was a woman of good natural understanding, unimproved by education; and our author acknowledged with gratitude, that she endeavoured to instil sentiments of piety as soon as his mind was capable of any instruction. There is little else in his family history worthy of notice, nor had he much pleasure in tracing his pedigree. He venerated others, however, who could produce a recorded ancestry, and used to say, that in him this was disinterested, for he could scarcely teil who was his grandfather. That he was remarkable in his early years has been supposed, but many proofs have not been advanced by his biographers. He had, indeed, a retentive memory, and soon discovered symptoms of an impetuous temper; but these circumstances are not enough to distinguish him from hundreds of children who never attain eminence. In his infancy he was afflicted with the scrophula, which injured his sight, and he was carried to London to receive the royal touch from the hand of queen Anne, the last of our sovereigns who encouraged that popular superstition. He was first taught to read English by a woman who kept a school for young children at Lichfield; and afterwards by one Brown. Latin he learned at Lichfield school, under Mr. Hunter, a man of severe discipline, but an attentive teacher. Johnson owned that he needed correction, and that his master did not spare him; but this, instead of being the cause of unpleasant recollections in his advanced life, served only to convince him that severity in school-education is necessary; and in all his conversations on the subject, he persisted in pleading for a liberal use of the rod. At this school his superiority was soon acknowledged by his companions, who could not refuse submission to the ascendancy which he acquired. His proficiency, however, as in every part of his life, exceeded his apparent diligence. He could learn more than others in the same allotted time: and he was learning when he seemed to be idle. He betrayed an early aversion to stated tasks, but, if roused, he could recover the time he appeared to have lost with great facility. Yet he seems afterwards to have been conscious that much depends on regularity of study, and we find him often prescribing to himself stated portions of reading, and recommending the same to others. No man perhaps was ever more sensible of his failings, or avowed them with more candour; nor, indeed, would many of them have been known, if he had not exhibited them as warnings. His memory was uncommonly tenacious, and to his last days he prided himself on it, considering a defect of memory as the prelude of total decay. Perhaps be carried this doctrine rather too far when he asserted, that the occasional failure of memory in a man of seventy must imply something radically wrong; but it may be in. general allowed, that the memory is a pretty accurate standard of mental strength. Although his weak sight prevented him from joining in the amusements of his schoolfellows, for which he was otherwise well qualified by personal courage and an ambition to excel, he found an equivalent pleasure in sauntering in the fields, or reading such books as came in his way, particularly old romances. For these he retained a fondness throughout life; but was wise and candid enough to attribute to them, in some degree, that unsettled turn of mind which prevented his fixing in any profession.