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, or Abou-Machar, a noted Arabian astrologer and philosopher, was born at Balkh in the Khorasan, about the year 805 or 806. For a long time he was addicted to the Mahometan traditions, and a determined enemy to philosophy; but in his forty-seventh year he began to study the sciences, and acquired the reputation of an astronomer and astrologer; and, although he is now principally known by his writings on astrology, he cannot be refused a place among the most distinguished easterns, who have made astronomical observations. The table called Zydj Abou-Machar was calculated from his observations; but the work from which he derives his principal reputation, is his treatise on astrology, entitled “Thousands of years;” in which, among other singular positions, he maintains that the world was created when the seven planets were in conjunction in the first degree of Aries, and will end when they shall assemble in the last degree or Pisces. He died in 885. His astrological work was published at Venice, 1506, 8vo; with the title “De magnis conjunctionibus, annorum revolutionibus, ac eorum perfectionibus;” but his “Introductio ad Astronomiam” was printed before this in 4to,. Augsburgh, 1489; and reprinted at Venice, 1490, 1506, and 1515, 4to.

, or Abdelazyz, an Arabian astrologer, lived in the reign of Seif-Eddaulah, prince of the dynasty of the Hamdanites, or about the middle of the tenth century of the Christian sera. His reputation extended to Hurope, where John Hispalensis translated into Latin, about the twelfth or thirteenth century, his treatise “On judicial Astrology.” This was printed at Venice in 1503, 4to, under the title “Alchabitius cum commento,” and under the title a figure representing the circle and the armillary sphere. There is, however, an edition mentioned by Panzer of the date 1473, 4to, which is the most scarce and valuable. Bayle says that he wrote also a treatise on optics, which was found in a German convent.

, a native of the island of Crete, and physician to the emperor Nero, A. D. 65, has been handed down to posterity, as the inventor of a medicine named theriaca, which is now deemed of little use. It however set aside the mithridate, which till then had been held in great esteem. Andromachus wrote the description of his antidote in elegiac verse, which he dedicated to Nero. His son, of the same name, wrote this description in prose. Damocrates turned it into Iambic verse in a poem, which he wrote upon Antidotes. Galen informs us that Andromachus the father wrote a treatise “De Medicamentis compositis ad affectus externos,” and that he was a man of great learning and eloquence. Erotion dedicated his Lexicon to him, and some writers say he was a good astrologer. He was the first who bore the tide of archiater.

, or Anvari, one of the most celebrated poets of Persia, was born in the twelfth century, and was incited to turn poet from the honours bestowed on that class by the sultan Sandjar. He presented a composition to that sultan, who admitted him to his court, and here Raschidi was his rival. These two poets were for some time of opposite parties; Anvari was in the camp of Sangiar when he attacked Alsitz, governor and afterwards sultan of the Kouarasmians, with whom Raschidi had shut himself up. Whilst the two sultans were assailing and repulsing each other, the two versifiers were skirmishing in their own method, reciprocally throwing at one another rhymes fastened to the end of an arrow. Our poet was at the same time an astrologer; but in his predictions he was particularly unfortunate, and his enemies took advantage of this to injure him with the sultan, and he was obliged to retire to the town of Balke, where he died in 1200. This Persian bard corrected the licentiousness that had been customary in the poetry of his country, but nothing of his remains except two small pieces, one of which is inserted in the Asiatic Miscellany, No. I. 1786, and translated by capt. Kirkpatrick; the other, translated into German by Chezy, was published in the secoud number of the Oriental Mine, a journal printed at Vienna, under the patronage and at the expense of count Rzewuski.

Apian also wrote a treatise, entitled “Cosmographia,” of which there have been many editions, from 1529, when Frisius published it in 4to, to 1575. In 1533 he made, at Norimberg, a curious instrument, which from its figure he called Folium Poputi, which, by the sun’s rays, shewed the hour in all parts of the earth, and even the unequal hours of the Jews. In 1534 he published his “Inscriptiones sacro-sanctae Vetustatis variae,” Ingost. fol. and in the same year his “Instrumentum Sinuum, sive Prinii Mobilis,” fol. with 100 problems; and was the author of many other works; among which may be mentioned the Ephemerides from the year 1534 for several years, and books upon Shadows, Arithmetical Centilogues: books upon Arith metic, with the rule of Coss (Algebra) demonstrated; upon Guaging; Almanacks, with Astrological directions; a book vipon Conjunctions; Ptolemy with very correct figures, drawn in a quadrangular form; Ptolemy’s works in Greek; books of Eclipses; the works of Azoph, a very ancient astrologer; the works of Gebre; the perspective of Vitello, of Critical Days, and of the Rainbow; a new Astronomical and Geometrical Radius, with various uses of sines and chords; Universal Astrolabe of Numbers; maps of the world, and of particular countries, &c.

, a physician and astrologer, was born in 1250, at the village of Abano near Padua, of which the Latin name is Aponus, and hence he is frequently called Petrus de Apono, or Aponensis. He is also sometimes called Petrus de Padua. When young, he went, with a view to study Greek, to Constantinople, or according to others, to some of the islands belonging to the Venetian republic. Having afterwards a desire to study medicine and mathematics, he returned, and spent some years at Padua, and at Paris, where he was admitted to the degree of doctor of philosophy and medicine. He was, however, recalled to Padua, and a professorship of medicine founded for him. He attained great reputation as a physician, and is said to have been very exorbitant in his fees. We are not told what his demands were in the place of his residence, but it is affirmed that he would not attend the sick in any other place under 150 florins a day; and when he was sent for by pope Honorius IV. he demanded 400 ducats for each day’s attendance. But these reports are thought to have been exaggerated, as perhaps are many other particulars handed down to us, such as his abhorrence of milk, which was so great, that he fainted if he saw any person drink it.

, one of those impostors who amused the public in the seventeenth century, was born at Manchester in 1601, and was bred a haberdasher in Lawrencelane, London, but quitted this employment and followed that of a writing-master at Hadley in Middlesex, and was afterwards for some time clerk to the sitting aldermen at Guildhall. He in a few years rendered himself so eminent, that he was appointed licenser of mathematical books, under which were included all those that related to the celestial sciences. Lilly tells us, that he once thought him the greatest astrologer in the world; but it appears that he afterwards sunk in his esteem, and that he thought himself a much greater man. We are told by the same author, that “he had a curious fancy in judging of thefts, and was as successful in resolving love questions,” which was a capital branch of his trade. George Wharton, who was formerly one of his astrological friends, had a great quarrel with him, which occasioned his publishing “MercurioCrelico Mastix; or an Anti-caveat to all such as have heretofore had the misfortune to be cheated and deluded by that great and treacherous impostor John Booker; in an answer to his frivolous pamphlet, entitled Mercurius Coelicus, or a Caveat to all the people of England;” Oxon. 1644, 4to. The only work of Booker’s worth notice is, his “Bloody Irish Almanac,” which contains some memorable particulars relative to the war in Ireland. He died April 1667, and his books were sold to Elias Ashmole, who, as Lilly informs us, and we may readily believe, gave more for them than they were worth.

He seems to have embraced a large circle of the arts and sciences. He cultivated poetry, and wrote Latin verses, not without some degree of classic elegance. He drew the plan for building the castle of Cronberg, and sketched the design for the noble mausoleum of Frederic the Second, which was executed in Italy, and is erected in the cathedral of Roschild. He dabbled also in physic. He was fond of being consulted, and readily gave his advice and medicines gratis to those who consulted him. He invented an elixir, which he calls an infallible cure for epidemic disorders, of which he has published the recipe in a letter to the emperor Rhodolph. He was a good mechanic. He possessed several automates, and took great delight in showing them to the peasants, and was always pleased if they took them for spirits. He was no less fond of being consulted as a fortune-teller, and willingly encouraged an opinion, that his knowledge of the heavenly bodies enabled him to observe horoscopes, and foretel events. Many traditional fables of his predictions have been handed down to posterity, which shew his proneness to judicial astrology, and the weakness of those who beheved his predictions. In many instances astrological predictions, by alarming, occasion the event which they foretel, and have thus gained a false credit from the weak or the unwary. Thus Tycho Brahe’s astrological predictions proved fatal to the emperor Rhodolph II. for, being informed by Tycho, that a star Which presided at his nativity threatened him with some sinister designs to his prejudice, from his relations, he was thrown into such a panic, that he did not venture to quit his palace, or appear before any person; and, as the conduct of his brother Matthias conlirmed the astrologer’s informations, he fell at last a prey to his grief, and died 18th of January 1612, aged fiftynine years.

, a non-conformist divine, was born at Ashby-de-la-Zouch, in Leicestershire, in 1600. His father was also a divine of the puritan kind, and master of the school at Ashby. The noted astrologer William Lilly, was at his school in 1613. His mother was sister to bishop Hall. After being educated by his father, he was admitted of Emanuel college, Cambridge, at the age of thirteen and a half. Having resided there three or four years, he attended his uncle Hall, then dean of Worcester, as his amanuensis, to the synod of Dort, and after his return, resumed his studies at Cambridge, and being elected schoJar of the house, resided there until he took his degrees. When ordained he preached first at Preston, near Chelmsford, then at Somerieyton in Suffolk, and lastly was called to Yarmouth, on the election of the township, but his principles being objected to by Dr. Harsnet, bishop of Norwich, he could only preach on the week days at a country village adjoining, whither the people of Yarmouth followed him, until the township applied to the king for his licence for Mr. Brinsley to preach in Yarmouth. This being granted by his majesty, he remained there until the restoration, when he was ejected with his numerous brethren, who refused the terms of conformity. Although a man of moderate sentiments, he appears to have been inflexible in the points which divided so large a tody of clergymen from the church, and is said to have refused considerable preferment to induce him to remain in it. He is praised by his biographer for piety, and extensive learning in theology. He died Jan. 22, 1665. He wrote several treatises enumerated by Calamy, none of which, we believe, are now much known. He had a son, Robert, who was ejected from the university, and afterwards studied and took his degree of M. D. at Leyden, and practised at Yarmouth.

The character of Byrom, as a poet, has been usually said to rest on his pastoral of Colin and Phebe, which has been universally praised for its natural simplicity; but, if we inquire what it is that pleases in this poem, we shall probably find that it is not 4:he serious and simple expression of a pastoral lover, but the air of delicate humour which runs through the whole, and inclines us to think, contrary to the received opinion, that he had no other object in view. Much, therefore, as this piece has been praised, he appears to have more fully established his character in many of those poems written at a more advanced age, and published for the first time, in two elegant volumes, at Manchester, inl 1773, especially “The Verses spoken extempore at the meeting of a Club”——“The Astrologer” ——“The Pond”——“Contentment, or the Happy Workman”——most of his Tales and Fables, and the paraphrase on the twenty-third psalm, entitled a “Divine Pastoral.” In these there appears so much of the genuine spirit of poetry, and so many approaches to excellence, that it would be difficult even upon the principles of fastidious criticism, and impossible upon those of comparison, to exclude Byrom from a collection of English poets. His muse is said to have been so kind, that he always found it easier to express his thoughts in verse than in prose, and although this preference appears in many cases where the gravity of prose only ought to have been employed, yet merely as literary curiosities, the entire works of Byrom appear to deserve the place allotted to them in the late edition of the English poets, 1810, 21 vols. 8vo.

Innumerable other singular metaphysical and physical notions are to be found in the works of Cardan and they are accompanied with many experiments and observations on natural phenomena. But the whole is thrown together in such a confused mass, as plainly proves that, though the author’s head was replete with ideas, he wanted that sound understanding and cool judgment, without which the mosfe ingenious and original conceptions must prove abortive. He was too fond of mysticism, too credulous, too superstitious, and, in a word, too much of an astrologer, to be a true philosopher. Cardan, therefore, notwithstanding all the variety and apparent originality of his writings, must be ranked among the unsuccessful adventurers in philosophy.

, M. D. among Granger’s heroes, was a noted astrologer in the time of queen Anne, and succeeded Lilly, who left him possessed of his apparatus, particularly his darkened chamber, and pictures, with which he pretended to shew his customers their absent friends. Case used to exhibit these to his intimates, in the hours of conviviality, laughing at the folly and credulity of the people. Over his door was written, “Within this place Lives Dr. Case.”

By which distich the author of the Tatler says, he probably got more than Dryden did by all his works. Haller also mentions a doctor John Case who published in 1694, “Compendium Anatomicum, nova methodo instructum,” 12mo, in which the writer strenuously defends the opinion of De Graaf, that quadrupeds, and all other animals, as well as birds, proceed ab ovo. But we doubt whether our astrologer had learning enough for a work of this description, or ever published more than a hand-bill Those who have the curiosity to peruse some of these effusions may indulge it in our authorities.

, is the adopted name of Francis, or Francesco Stabili; a native of Ascoli, in the march of Ancona, in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, whg acquired considerable reputation, unfortunately for himself, as a critic and poet. Among the many anachronisms and contradictions in the accounts given of his life, which Tirabotchi has endeavoured to correct, we find that when young, he was professor of astrology in the university of Bologna, that he published a book on that science, which being denounced to the Inquisition, he escaped by recanting what was offensive but that the same accusations being afterwards renewed at Florence, he was condemned to be burnt, and suffered that horrible deatb in 1327, in the seventieth year of his age. We have already seen, in former lives, that it was no uncommon thing for enraged authors to apply to the secular arm for that revenge which they could not otherwise have inflicted on one another. The pretence for putting this poor man to death, was his “Commentary on the Sphere of John de Sacrabosco,” in which, following the superstition of the times, he asserted that wonderful things might be done by the agency of certain demons who inhabited the first of the celestial spheres. This was foolish enough, but it was the prevalent folly of the times, and Cecco probably believed what he wrote. That he was not an impostor wiser than those whom he duped, appears from his conduct to Charles, duke of Calabria, who appointed him his astrologer, and who, having consulted him on the future conduct of his wife and daughter, Cecco, by his art, foretold that they would turn out very abandoned characters. Had he not persuaded himself into the truth of this, he surely would have conciliated so powerful a patron by a prediction of a more favourable kind; and this, as may be supposed, lost him the favour of the duke. But even the loss of his friend would not have brought him to the stake, if he had not rendered himself unpopular by attacking the literary merit of Dante and Guido Cavalcanti, in his poem entitled “Acerba.” This provoked the malice of a famous physician, named Dino del Garbo, who never desisted until he procured him to be capitally condemned. This poem “Acerba,” properly “Acerbo,” or “Acervo,” in Latin Acervus, is in the sesta rima divided into five books, and each of these into a number of chapters, treating of the heavens, the elements, virtues, vices, love, animals, minerals, religion, &c. The whole is written in a bad style, destitute of harmony, elegance, or grace; and, according to a late author, much of the plan, as well as the materials, are taken from the “Tresor” of Brunetto Latini. It is, however, a work in demand with collectors, and although often printed, most of the editions are now very scarce. The first was printed at Venice in 1476, 4to, with the commentary of Nicolo Massetti, and was reprinted in 1478. Haym (in the edition of his Biblioteca, 1771) speaks of a first edition as early as 1458, which we apprehend no bibliographer has seen.

, in Latin Castellanus, a very learned French prelate, is said by some to have been of obscure birth, but his biographer Galland makes him of an ancient family, and the son of a brave knight. Yet this is doubtful, if what he said to king Francis I. be more than a witticism. The king once asked him if he was a gentleman; to which Chatel answered “that there were three in the ark, but he did not really know from which of them he descended.” He was, however, born at Arc, in Burgundy, and in the eleventh year of his age, before which his parents died, he was sent to Dijon, for education, where he made an astonishing progress, and before he had been there six years, was appointed a teacher, in which capacity he soon distinguished himself, and on one occasion made a public display of more than grammatical talents. His master, Peter Turreau, was accused of being an astrologer, and Chatel pleaded his cause so ably that he was acquitted. He afterwards travelled, in order to cultivate the acquaintance of the learned men of his time, and particularly of Erasmus, whom he met at Basil, and who conceived such a high opinion of his learning, as to recommend him to Frobenius, to be corrector of the Greek and Latin authors, printed at his celebrated press. While here he had also an opportunity of correcting some of Erasmus’s works; but they left Basil together, when the popish religion was established there. Erasmus retired to Fribourg, and Chatel returned to France, where he accepted the offer made him by some persons of distinction, to be tutor to certain young men who were to study law at Bourges, under the celebrated Alciat. As they were not yet prepared to depart, he read public lectures on the Greek text of St. Paul’s epistle to the Romans; and unfortunately for his reputation, was entrapped into an intrigue with a young woman, a circumstance on which Bayle expatiates with his usual delight ~in what is indelicate. ChatePs scholars, however, being at length ready, he accompanied them to Bourges, and studied law, filling up his leisure hours with topics of polite literature. His diligence was unremitting, as he slept scarcely three hours in the night, and the moment he waked ran with eagerness to his books. This method of study he preserved, even afterwards, when appointed reader to the king.

The very high estimation in which this work was held in, Florence appears from a very singular institution. The republic of Florence, in 1373, assigned a public stipend to a person appointed to read lectures on the poem of Dante. Boccaccio was the first person engaged in this office; but his death happening two years after his appointment, his comment extended only to the first seventeen cantos of the “Inferno.” Another very terrible instance of their veneration for their native bard is told by the author of the “Memoires de Petrarque.” Ceno de Ascoli, a celebrated physician and astrologer, had the boldness to write parodies on the poem of Dante. This drew on him the animadversion of the inquisition. Charles, duke of Calabria, thought to protect him, but in vain. The bishop of Aversa, his chancellor, declared it was highly impious to entertain a sorcerer as a physician, and Ascoli was accordingly burnt at Florence, about three years after the death of the poet whom he had maligned.

, “an English musician of the fifteenth century, at an early stage of counterpoint, acquired on the continent the reputation of being its inventor, which, however, Dr. Burney has proved could not belong to him. He was the musician whom the Germans, from a similarity of name, have mistaken for saint Dunstan, and to whom, as erroneously, they have ascribed with others the invention of counterpoint in four parts. He was author of the musical treatise” De Mensurabili Musica,“which is cited by Franchinus, Morley, and Ravenscroft. But though this work is lost, there is still extant in the Bodleian library, a Geographical Tract by this author and, if we may believe his epitaph, which is preserved by Weever, he was not only a musician, but a mathematician, and an eminent astrologer. Of his musical compositions nothing remains but two or three fragments in Franchinus, and Morley. He is very unjustly accused by this last writer of separating the syllables of the same words by rests. Stow calls him” a master of astronomy and music," and says he w;;s buried in the church of St. Stephen, Walbrook, in 1458.

, was a Welch conjuror, of whom Wood has extracted the following account from a manuscript life of the famous William Lilly, astrologer, written by himself, and preserved in Ashmole’s museum. Evans is said to have applied his mind to astrology, after he had continued some time in the university of Oxford, where he was brought up. Then, entering into orders, he obtained a cure in Staffordshire; but was forced to fly from it some years after, not only on account of debaucheries, for which he was infamous, but for “giving judgment upon things lost, which,” as Lilly saith, “-is the only shame of astrology.” He is described as the most saturnine person that ever was beheld; of a middle stature, broad forehead, beetle-browed, thickshouldered, flat-nosed, full-lipped, down-looked, of black curling stiff hair, and splay-footed. But, says Wood, to give him his due, he had a most piercing judgment, naturally, upon a figure of theft, and many other questions; though for money he would at any time give contrary judgment. He was addicted to drinking, we are told, as well as to women; and in his liquor was so very quarrelsome and abusive, that he was seldom without a black eye, or a bruise of some kind or other. He made a great many antimonial cups, upon the sale of which he principally subsisted. After he was forced from Enfield, he retired with his family to London; where Lilly found him in 1632, and received from him instructions in astrology. Wood relates, that he had done some acts above and beyond astrology, having been well versed in the nature of spirits; and had many times used the circular way of invocating, of which he produces the following instance: In 1630 he was desired by lord Bothwell and sir Kenelm Digby to shew them a spirit; which he promised to do. When they were all in the body of the circle which he had made, Evans upon, a sudden, after some time of invocation, was taken out of the room, carried into the field, and flung down near Battersea Causey, close to the Thames. Next morning -a countryman going by to his labour, and espying a man in black clothes, came to him; and awakening him, for it seems he was asleep, asked him how he came there. Evans by this understood his condition; and, when Lilly inquired afterwards of him upon what account the spirits carried him away, he answered, that “he did not at the time of invocation make any suffumigation; at which the spirits were vexed.” If the reader should be in pain about what became in the mean time of lord Bothwell and sir Kenelm Digby, we are able to make him easy upon that head. They both got home without any harm. During the reigns of Elizabeth and James I. these ridiculous impostures were the fashionable credulity of the times; and the greatest men were often the dupes of these pretenders to occult science. Ben Jonson, in his excellent comedy of the Alchemist, for a time gave almost as fatal a blow to the black art, as Cervantes did in Spain to chivalry; but since avarice and curiosity are passions most difficult to conquer, it rose again with fresh vigour, and maintained its ground till the restoration.

, a celebrated astrologer, was born at Quidham, near Wilton, in Wiltshire, Dec. 30, 1552, of a good family, being the grandson of sir Thomas Forman, of Leeds, and great grandson of another sir Thomas Forman. As an introduction to his astrological history, we are told that, at six years old and after, he was much troubled “with strong dreams and visions.” His education at Salisbury was of a very humble kind, his master being only able to teach him English, and something of the accidence. From him he was sent to the free school at Salisbury, where he continued two years. His next preceptor was one Minterne, a prebendary of the cathedral, of whom we are only informed that he used to carry his wood from place to place in winter to warm himself, and made Simon do the same, “so gaining heat without fire.” In 1563 Ford’s father died, a very unfortunate event, for his mother not caring for him, made him keep sheep, and plow, and pick up sticks. At the age of fourteen, however, he became apprentice to a dealer in grocery and drugs at Salisbury, and acquired some knowlege of the latter, which he endeavoured to improve by books, but his master would not let him read. Yet such was his avidity to learn, that his master having a young boarder in the house who wept to school at Salisbury, Ford learned of him what he had been taught in school, although that was. but little. ~At length, in consequence of a quarrel with his master’s wife, he obtained leave to quit his service, and went again to school for about eight weeks, applying very diligently to his books until his “illnatured and clownish mother” refused to maintain him. At length, when in his eighteenth year, he became schoolmaster at the priory of St. Giles’s, and by teaching thirty boys for half a year, scraped together forty shillings. With this, accompanied by an old schoolfellow, he travelled on foot to Oxford, and became a poor scholar of Magdalen college, being partly maintained by a bachelor of arts; but this person employed him in so many menial employments during his college frolics, that he left the university after two years’ residence.

Hitherto we have seen onjy the laudable efforts of a young man to overcome the difficulties of adverse fortune. In what follows he is less entitled to respect. He now applied himself to the study of physic and astrology, and after having travelled to Holland for that purpose, set up in Philpot-lane, London, where his practice being opposed by the physicians, and himself four times fined and imprisoned, he went to study at Cambridge, where he took a doctor’s degree, and a licence to practise; and settling at Lambeth, openly professed the joint occupation of physician and astrologer. “Here he lived,” says Lilly, “with good respect of the neighbourhood, being very charitable to the poor, and was very judicious and fortunate in horary questions and sicknesses.” His charity to the poor, however, was not wholly disinterested. Quacks of this description are generally well repaid for their charity by the good report of the poor, wh.o are illiterate and credulous. In 1601 a complaint was made to Whitgift, archbishop of Canterbury, against him for deluding the people, but it does not appear what steps were taken against him. In the mean time he was much resorted to by all ranks of people; among others the famous, or rather infamous, countess of Essex, applied to him for his assistance in her wicked designs, as appeared by the trials of that lady and of Mrs. Anne Turner, for the murder of sir Thomas Overbury. He died suddenly in a boat on the Thames, Sept. 12, 1611, and if we may believe Lilly, predicted his death on that day. He wrote a great many books, on the philosopher’s stone, magic, astronomy, natural history, and natural philosophy, two treatises on the plague, and some religious tracts, of which Anthony Wood has given a catalogue from the Ashmolean museum, where his Mss. were deposited, but it seems doubtful whether any of them were printed. There are also some of his Mss. on astrology in the British Museum. He was a man of considerable learning in all the above sciences, as they were then understood, but seems to have been either an egregious dupe, or unprincipled impostor, in the use he made of his knowledge.

, one of the astrological impostors of the seventeenth century, was born at Wheatly near Oxford, Dec. 31, 1627. His father, William, was a farmer of that place, and his mother was a daughter of sir John Curzon of Waterperry, knt. Our conjuror was first put apprentice to Thomas Nicols, a taylor, in Oxford, but leaving his master in 1644, he went up to London, and became a pupil of the noted William Lilly, under whom be profited so far as to be soon enabled “to set up the trade of almanack-making and fortune-telling for himself.” His pen was employed for many years on nativities, almanacks, and prodigies. There is, we believe, a complete collection of his printed works in the new catalogue of the British Museum, and vre hope we shall be excused for not transcribing the list. Dodd, who has given an account of him, as a Roman catholic, says that some of his almanacks, reflecting upon the management of state affairs during the time of Oates’s plot, brought him into trouble. While other astrologers were content to exercise their art for the benefit of their own country only, Gadbury extended his to a remote part of the globe, as, in 1674, he published his “West India, or Jamaica Almanack” for that year. He collected and published the works of his friend sir George Wharton in 1683, 8vo. His -old master Lilly, who quarrelled with him, and against whom he wrote a book called “Anti-Merlinus Anglicus,” says he was a “monster of ingratitude,” and “a graceless fellow;” which is true, if, according to his account, he had two wives living at one time, and one of them two husbands. Lilly adds, that be went to sea with intention for Barbadoes, but died by the way in his voyage. When this happened we are not told. Lilly died in 16S1, and according to Wood, Gadbury was living in 1690. “The Black Life of John Gadbury” was written and published by Partridge in 1693, which might be about the time of his death, but his name, as was usual, appeared long after this in an almanack, similar to that published in his life-time. There was another astrologer, a Job Gadbury, who was taught his art by John, and probably succeeded him in the almanack, and who died in 1715.

In 1653, he was drawn into a dispute with Lilly the astrologer, about the certainty of his art, which that impostor had maintained was revealed to mankind by the good angels. Our author, in his annotations upon Jeremiah, taking notice of this profaneness, had used the astrologer a little roughly, calling him blind buzzard, &c. in return to which, Lilly in his “Annus Tenebrosus,” reflected upon the divine; who replied, in “A Vindication of the Annotations,” &c. 1653, 4to. It is said that he had thought proper before he had published this piece, to consult Mr. Briggs, for his opinion in the point, who returned a decisive and ready answer, that he conceived it to be a mere system of groundless conceits. To this Lilly printing an answer, in which he charged his antagonist with covetousness, and prostituting his function to worldly views, Gataker wrote “A Discourse Apologetical,” vindiCiating himself from those calumnies. This last piece was published in 1654; and the same year he died, being in his 80th year. His corpse was interred at his own church, Mr. Simon Ashe preaching his funeral sermon: this was printed in 1655, with a narrative of his life, which has been the ground-work of this memoir. He would never suffer his picture to be drawn, and probably it is Owing to the same cause, that no stone marked the place of his burial.

Yet whatever may be thought of his learning, it is greatly over-rated, when opposed or preferred to the genius of his contemporary Shakspeare. Jonson 1 s learning contributed very little to his reputation as a dramatic poet. Where he seems to have employed it most, as in his “Cataline,” it only enables him to encumber the tragedy with servile versifications of Sallust, when he should have been studying nature and the passions. Dry den, whose opinions are often inconsistent, considers Jonson as the greatest man of his age, and observes, that “if we look upon him when he was himself (for his last plays were but his dotages) he was the most learned and judicious writer any theatre ever had.” In another place (preface to the “Mock Astrologer”), he says “that almost all Jonson’s pieces were but crambt his cocta, the same humour a little” varied and written worse."

, in Italian Giuntino, a celebrated mathematician and astrologer of the sixteenth century, was born 1523, at Florence. He published Commentaries, in Latin, on the Sphaera of Holywood or Sacro Bosco, 1577 and 1578, 2 vols. 8vi; “Speculum Astrologiae,” Lngd. 1581, 2 vols. fol. and other works relating to astronomy. There is also a treatise written by him in French on the comet which appeared in 1577, 8vi; and another on the reformation of the calendar by Gregory XIII. 8vi, in Latin. He had quitted the Carmelite order, and became a protestant, but returned afterwards to the Catholic church, and spent the chief of his life at Lyons, where his conduct was very irregular. He died 1590. a

"He read all books without exception the more odd and whimsical the title was, the more curious he was to examine the contents. He found a romance written in German by Mr. Eckard: this romance contained the history of a father, who having consulted an astrologer about the future destiny of his son, learnt that to preserve him from death, there was no other method than to make him pass for the son of a hangman. Leibnitz found this romance so excellent that he read it through at one sitting.

, a famous English astrologer, was born at Diseworth in Leicestershire, in 1602, and was put to school at Ashby-de-la-Zouch, in the same county; but, his father not being in circumstances to give him a liberal education, as he intended at Cambridge, he was obliged to quit the school, after learning writing and arithmetic. Being then, as his biographers inform us, of a forward temper, and endued with shrewd wit, he resolved to push his fortune in London, where he arrived in 1620; and where his immediate necessities obliged him to article himself as a servant to a mantua-maker, in the parish of St. Clement Danes. In 1624, he was assistant to a tradesman in the Strand; who, not being able to write, employed him (among other domestic offices) as his book-keeper. He had not been above three years in this place, when, his master dying, he addressed and married his mistress, with a fortune of 1000l. In 1632, he turned his mind to astrology; and applied to one Evans, a worthless Welsh clergyman, who, after practising that craft many years in Leicestershire, had come to London, and, at this time, resided in Gunpowder-alley. Here Lilly became his pupil, and made such a quick progress, that he understood, in the cant of his brethren, how “to set a figure” perfectly in seven or eight weeks; and, continuing his application with the utmost assiduity, gave the public a specimen of his attainments and skill, by intimating that the king had chosen an unlucky horoscope for the coronation in Scotland, 1633.

In the mean time he buried his first wife, purchased a moiety of thirteen houses in the Strand, and married a second wife, who, joining to an extravagant temper a termagant spirit, which all his art could not lay, made him both poor and miserable. With this lady he was obliged to retire in 1637, to Hersham in Surrey, where he continued till Sept. 1641; and now seeing a prospect of advantage from the growing confusion of the times, and the prevalence of enthusiasm and credulity of all kinds, he returned to London. Here having purchased several curious books in his art, which were found in pulling down the house of another astrologer, he perused them with incessant diligence, and, in 1644, published his “Merlinus Anglicus Junior,” and several other astrological books. He had contracted an intimacy, the preceding year, with Bulstrode Whitelocke, esq. who was afterwards his friend and patron; and, in 1645, devoted himself entirely to the interests of the parliament, after the battle of Naseby, though he had before rather inclined to the king’s party. In 1647, upon the breaking out of the quarrel between the parliament and army, whose head quarters were at Windsor, he was sent for, together with Booker, another astrologer, by Fairfax, the general, who addressed him in these terms: “That God had blessed the army with many signal victories, and yet their work was not finished; that he hoped God would go along with them, until this work was done; that they sought not themselves, but the welfare and tranquillity of the good people, and the whole nation; and, for that end, were resolved to sacrifice both their own lives and fortunes; that he hoped the art, which they (Lilly and Booker) studied, was lawful and agreeable to God’s word; that he understood it not, but did not doubt they both feared God, and therefore had a good opinion of them.” To this speech Lilly returned the following answer: “My lord, I am glad to see you here at this time: certainly both the people of God, and all others of this nation, are very sensible of God’s mercy, love, and favour unto them, in directing fhe parliament to nominate and elect you general of their armies, a person so religious, so valiant. The several unexpected victories obtained under your excellency’s conduct will eternize the same unto all posterity. We are confident of God’s going along with you and your army, until the great work, for which he ordained you both, is fully perfected; which we hope will be the conquering and subversion of yours and the parliament’s enemies; and then a quiet settlement, and firm peace over all the nation, unto God’s glory, and full satisfaction of tender consciences. Sir, as for ourselves, we trust in God, and, as Christians, believe in him; we do not study any art, but what is lawful and consonant to the scriptures, fathers, and antiquity! which we humbly desire you to believe.” This audience, in November, seems to have been occasioned by a suspicion of his attachment to the royal party, of which he had afforded some ground, by receiving an application from the king, then in custody of the army at Hampton-court; for, in August preceding, when his majesty had framed thoughts of escaping from the soldiery, and hiding himself somewhere near the city, he sent, as Lilly tells us, Mrs. Whorwood, to know in what quarter of the nation he might be safely concealed, till he thought proper to discover himself. Lilly, having erected a figure, said, the king might be safely concealed in some part of Essex about twenty miles from London, where the lady happened to have a house fit for his majesty’s reception, and went away next morning to acquaint him with it. But the king was gone away in the night Westward, and surrendered himself at length to Hammond, in the Isle of Wight; and thus the project was rendered abortive. He was again applied to by the same lady, in 1648, for the same purpose, while the king was at Carisbrook- castle; whence having laid a design to escape by sawing the iron bars of his chamber-window, Mrs. Whorwood came to our author, and acquainted him with it. Lilly procured a proper saw, made by one Farmor, an ingenious locksmith, in Bow-lane, Cheapside, and furnished her with aquafortis besides; by which means his majesty had nearly succeeded, but his heart failing, he proceeded no farther. About September, the same lady came a third time to Lilly, on the same errand. The parliament-commissioners were now appointed to treat with his majesty; on which, our astrologer, after perusing his figure, told the lady the commissioners would be there such a day, appointed the day and hour when to receive them, and directed, as soon as the propositions were read, to sign them, and make haste with all speed to come up with the commissioners to London, the army being then far distant from London, and the city enraged stoutly against them. The king is said to have promised he would do so, but was diverted from it by lord Say.

All this while our astrologer continued true to his own interest, by serving that of the parliament party, from whom he received this year, 1648, fifty pounds in cash, and an order from the council of state for a pension of 100l. perann. which was granted to him for furnishing them with a perfect knowledge of the chief concernments of France. This he obtained by means of a secular priest, with whom he had been formerly acquainted, and who now was confessor to one of the French secretaries. Lilly received the pension two years, when he threw it up, with the employment, in disgust on some account or other. He read public lectures upon astrology, in 1648 and 1649, for the improvement of young students in that art and succeeded so well both as a practitioner and teacher, that we find him, in 1651 and 1652, laying out near 2000l. for lands and a house at Hersham. During the siege of Colchester, he and Booker were sent for thither, to encourage the soldiers, which they did by assuring them that the town would soon be taken, which proved true, and was perhaps not difficult to be foreseen. In 1650 he published that the parliament should not continue, but a new government arise, agreeably thereto; and in the almanack for 1653, he also asserted, that the parliament stood upon a ticklish foundation, and that the commonalty and soldiery would join together against them. On this he was called before the committee of plundered ministers; but, receiving notice before the arrival of the messenger, he applied to speaker Lenthal, always his friend, who pointed out the offensive passages, which he immediately altered; and attended the committee next morning with six copies printed, which six alone he acknowledged to be his. By this trick he escaped after having been only detained thirteen days in custody of the serjeant at arms. This year he was engaged in a dispute with Mr. Thomas Gataker, and, before the expiration of the year, he lost his second wife, to his great joy, and married a third in October following. In 1655 he was indicted at Hicks’s-hall, for giving judgment upon stolen goods, but acquitted: and, in 1659, he received, from the king of Sweden, a present of a gold chain and medal, worth above 50l. on account of his having mentioned that monarch with great respect in his almanacks of 1657 and 1658.

The following passage, from the life of Lilly the astrologer, contains a curious account of the meeting of those two illustrious men. “I will acquaint you,” says Lilly, “with one memorable story related unto me by John Marr, an excellent mathematician and geometrician, whom I conceive you remember. He was, servant to king James and Charles the First. At first when the lord Napier, or Marchiston, made public his logarithms, Mr. Briggs, then reader of the astronomy lectures at Gresham college in London, was so surprised with admiration of them, that he could have no quietness in himself until he had seen that noble person the lord Marchiston, whose only invention they were: he acquaints John Marr herewith, who went into Scotland before Mr. Briggs, purposely to be there when these two so learned persons should meet. Mr. Briggs appoints a certain day when to meet at Edinburgh; but failing thereof, the lord Napier was doubtful he would not come. It happened one day as John Marr and the lord Napier were speaking of Mr. Briggs; `Ah, John,‘ said Marchiston, `Mr. Briggs will not now come.’ At the very instant one knocks at the gate; John Marr hasted down, and it proved Mr. Briggs, to his great contentment. He brings Mr. Briggs up into my lord’s chamber, where almost one quarter of an hour was spent, each beholding other almost with admiration before one word was spoke. At last Mr. Briggs began: ‘My lord, I have undertaken this long journey purposely to see your person, and to know by what engine of wit or ingenuity you came first to think of this most excellent help into astronomy, viz. the logarithms; but, my lord, being by you found out, I wonder no body else found it out before, when now known it is so easy.’ He was nobly entertained by the lord Napier; and every summer after that, during the lord’s being alive, this venerable man Mr. Briggs went purposely into Scotland to visit him.”

, a physician and celebrated astrologer, was born Dec. 14, 1503, at St. Remy, in the diocese of Avignon. His father was a notary public, and his grandfather a physician, who instructed him in the elements of the mathematics. He Afterwards completed his courses of humanity and philosophy at Avignon, and studied physic at Montpelier; but the plague raging in 1525, he became a travelling physician for five years, and undertook all such patients as were willing to put themselves under his care. After this fee returned to Montpelier, and was created doctor of his faculty in 1529, and then revisited the places where he had practised physic before. At Agen, he contracted an acquaintance with Julius Caesar Scaliger, which induced him to make some stay in that town, where he married; but upon the death of his wife, four years after, he went first to Marseilles, and then, in 154-4, to Salon, where he married a second time.

Notwithstanding all Oughtred’s mathematical merit, he was, in 1646, in danger of a sequestration by the committee for plundering ministers; in order to which, several articles were deposed and sworn against him; but, upon his day of hearing, William Lilly, the famous astrologer, applied to sir Bulstrode Whitelocke and all his old friends, who appeared so numerous in his behalf, that though the chairman and many other presbyterian members were active against him, yet he was cleared by the majority. This Lilly tells us himself, in the “History of his own Life,” where he styles Oughtred the most famous mathematician then of Europe. “The truth is,” continues this writer, “he had a considerable parsonage and that alone was enough to sequester any moderate judgment besides, he was also well known to affect his majesty.” His merit, however, appeared so much neglected, and his situation was made so uneasy at home, that his friends procured several invitations to him from abroad, to live either in Italy, France, or Holland, but he chose to encounter all his difficulties at Albury. Aubrey informs us that the grand duke invited him to Florence, and offered him 500l. a year, but he would not accept it because of his religion. From the same author we learn that he was thought a very indifferent preacher, so bent were his thoughts on mathematics; but, when he found himself in danger of being sequestered for a royalist, " he fell to the study of divinity, and preached (they sayd) admirably well, even in his old age.

, an Italian by birth, but the author of many compositions in French prose and verse, was born at Venice about 1363, being the daughter of Thomas Pisan, of Bologna, much celebrated at that time as an astrologer. When she was five years old, her father settled with her in France, and her extraordinary beauty and wit procured her an excellent husband by the time she was fifteen. After ten years she lost this husband, Stephen Castel, by whom she was most tenderly beloved, and found her chief resource for comfort and subsistence in her pen; her husband’s fortune being entangled in several law-suits. Charles VI. of France, and other princes, noticed and assisted her on account of her talents, and provided for her children. When she died is uncertain. Some of her poems, which are full of tenderness, were printed at Paris in 1529, others remain in manuscript in the royal library. “The Life of Charles V.” written by desire of Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy, is considered as her best performance in prose. It is preserved in ms. in the library of the king of France, but a transcript was published by the abbé Le Beuf in the third volume of “Dissertations on the Ecclesiastical History of Paris,” where he gives a Life of Cnristina. She wrote also “An hundred Stories of Troy,” in rhyme “The Treasure of the City of Dames,” Paris, 1497 “The Long Way,” translated by John Chaperon, 1549, under the title of “Le Chemin de long etendue.” In the Harleian collection of Mss. (No. 219, 5) is a piece by Christina entitled “Epistre d'Otnea deese de Prudence a Hector, &c. Mis en vers Francois, et dedie a Charles V. de France.” Anthony WidviSle, earl Rivers, translated a work of hers, we know not whether included in any of the above, entitled “The Moral Proverbs of Christian of Pyse,” printed by Caxton. Lord Orford, who has noticed this work in his account of WidviUe, has also introduced an account of Christina, which, although written in his flippant and sarcastic manner, contains some interesting particulars of her history.

, a great geographer, mathematician, and astronomer of antiquity, was born at Pelusium, in Egypt, about the year 70, and flourished in the reigns of Adrian and Marcus Antoninus. He tells us himself, in one place, that he made a great number of ob* servations upon the fixed stars at Alexandria, in the second year of Antoninus Pius and in another, that he observed an eclipse of the moon in the ninth year of Adrian, whence it is reasonable to conclude that this astronomer’s observations upon the heavens were made between A. D. 125, and A. D. 140. Hence appears the error of some authors in supposing that this Claudius Ptolemy was the same with the astrologer Ptolemy, who constantly attended Galba, promised Otho that he should survive Nero, and afterwards that he should obtain the empire; which is as improbable as what Isidorus, an ecclesiastical writer of the seventh century, and some modems after him, have asserted; namely, that this astronomer was one of the kings of Egypt. We know no circumstances of the life of Ptolemy but it is noted in his Canon, that Antoninus Pius reigned three-and-twenty years, which shews that himself survived him.

Such is Warburton’s account, heightened a little, unqaestionnbly, by his regard for Pope, but, except where he calls him illiterate, not much beyond the truth for Ralph’s pen was completely venal, and both his principles and his distresses prevented any consideration on the moral part of his conduct. He had by this time produced on the stage, “The Fashionable Lady,” an opera, “The Fall of the Earl of Essex,” a tragedy and afterwards, “The Lawyer’s Feast,” a farce, and “The Astrologer,” a comedy, none of which had much success. He was a writer, iff 1739, in the “Universal Spectator,” a periodical paper; but from his letters to Dr. Birch* in the British Museum, it appears that he was no great gainer hy any of his performances. There is an excellent pamphlet, however* attributed tp him, which was published about 1731, a “Review of the Public Buildings of London” but from the style and subject, we should suppose his name borrowed. In 1735 he commenced a managing partner with Fielding- in the Haymarket theatre but, as Davies says, “he had no other share in the management than viewing and repining at his partner’s success.”

, a learned prelate, was born in 1663,at Lichfield in Staffordshire, where his father followed the business of a dyer, but appears not to have been in opulent circumstances, as he was unable to give his son a liberal education. For this our author was indebted to the celebrated antiquary Ashmole, also a native of Lichfield, who, discerning his capacity, sent him to Westminster-school in 1G78. Here he was soon distinguished as a young man of parts and application, and acquired particular notice by the classical turn of his exercises. Two years after, he wrote two elegies, one in Latin and the other in English, on the death of Lilly, the astrologer, out of gratitude, we are told, to his patron Ashmole, a great admirer of Lilly. Whatever the poetical merit of these elegies, we may say, in reference to the subject, that they would now be thought ironical.

, a loyal astrologer of the seventeenth century, was descended from an ancient family in Westmoreland, and born at Kirby-Kendal in that county April 4, 1617. He passed some time at the university of Oxford, but was more studious of mathematics and astronomy than of any other academical pursuits. After this, having some private fortune, he retired from the university, until the breaking out of the rebellion, when he converted his property into money, and raised a troop of horse for his majesty, of which he became captain. After other engagements, he was finally routed at Stow-on-the-Would in Gloucestershire, March 21, 1645, where sir Jacob Astley was taken prisoner, and Wharton received several wounds, the marks of which he carried to his grave. He then joined the king at Oxford, and had an office conferred upon him in the ordnance, but after the decline of the royal cause, he came to London and gained a livelihood by his writings, chiefly by that profitable article, the composing of almanacks, with predictions. In some of his productions he gave offence by his loyal hints and witticisms, and was several times imprisoned, particularly in Windsor-castle, where he found his brother conjuror William Lilly. Lilly showed him much kindness, which Wharton repaid afterwards by saving him from prosecution as a republican prophet. Upon the restoration, Whartori*s loyalty was rewarded by the place of treasurer and paymaster of the ordnance, and he was also created a baronet. He died Aug. 12, 1681. He wrote, besides his Almanacks, Mercuries, astronomical pieces, and chronologies of the events of his time. His works were collected and published by Gadbury in 1683, 8vo.