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, a native of Cento in the duchy of Ferrara, lived in the sixteenth century. He published in 1545, a “Vocabulary, Grammar, and Orthography of the Vulgar Tongue,” which Fontanini praises very highly, but is wrong in supposing it the first Italian vocabulary, Lucilio Minerbi having published a Vocabulary from Boccacio in 1535, and Fabricio Luna another in 153ft. Accarisi also wrote “Observations on the vulgar Tongue,” which were printed by Sansovino in 1562, 8vo, with other observations on the same subject by Bembo, Gabriello, Fortunio, and others.

, an Italian architect, who died in 1630, was born of parents so poor that in his youth he was obliged to carry bricks and mortar to the workmen; but having a natural turn for architecture, by hearing others talk, he learned all the rules of it, as well as those of geometry; and was even able to publish works in those sciences. He took great part in those famous controversies that arose concerning the three provinces, Ferrara, Bologna, and the Romagna, which were much exposed to inundations in the commencement of the seventeenth century, and published a plan for stopping their progress. Pope Clement VII. employed him to build the citadel of Ferrara, and at Mantua, Modena, Parma, and Venice, are several monuments after his designs. The only work we have seen of his on the subject of the inundations is entitled “Difesa per riparare alia sommersione del Polesine,” Ferrara, 1601, fol.

, an architect and geometrician of the sixteenth century, was born at Carpi, in Modena. He was employed as architect by the duke of Ferrara, but applied himself principally to the art of fortification. Hia work on that subject, “Delle Fortificazioni,” divided into three books, was printed at Venice in 1570, in a most splendid form, in folio. Modern engineers have been much, indebted to him.

, an Italian scholar and mathematician, was a native of Ferrara, and lived in the fifteenth century. The three works on which his fame rests are, 1. “Observations on Petrarch,” which are inserted in the edition of that poet, Venice, 1539, 8vo. 2. “Le Richesse della Lingua Volgare,” Venice, 1545, fol. in which he has collected, alphabetically, the most elegant words and phrases used by Boccaccio. 3. “Della Fabbrica del Mondo,” Venice, 1526, 1556, 1557, 1558, 1562, consisting of ten books, in which are enumerated all the words used by the earliest Italian writers, but with no very happy arrangement. Alunno was likewise distinguished for a talent perhaps more curious than useful, that of being able to write an exceeding small hand. We are told, that when at Bologna he presented Charles V. with the belief and the first chapter of the gospel of St. John, in the size of a denier, or farthing; and Aretine adds, that the emperor employed a whole day in decyphering this wonderful manuscript.

, a monk, and general of the monks of Camalduli, was born in 1373, at Portico in the Romagna. Eugene IV. sent him to the council of Basil, where he much distinguished himself, as well as at those of Ferrara and Florence. He acquired a high degree of reputation by his profound knowledge of the Greek language, by his uncommon acquaintance with Grecian literature, by the zeal and industry he discovered in the attempts he made to effectuate a reconciliation between the Greek and Latin churches. He was no less admired for his candid and liberal spirit, and placid and serene temper. Having failed in an attempt to reconcile those literary rivals Poggius and Valla, he told them that men who made use of abusive language could not be supposed to possess either the charity of Christians, nor the politeness of men of letters. His talents would have recommended him to the purple, which the pope intended, but this was prevented by his death, Oct. 23, 1439. He was employed, by order of pope Eugenius IV. to reform several convents of both sexes, which had become irregular; and he has described the result of his labours in this difficult work in his “Hodseporicon,” which contains particulars of the behaviour of the inhabitants of those convents, which he found it necessary to express in Greek. This was printed at Florence, 1431 and 1432, 4to, both scarce editions, and 1678, 8vo. The other works of this learned monk were Latin translations from the fathers. Martenne, in his “Collectio amplissima,” has published twenty books of his letters, which contain many curious particulars of the history of his time. He also translated Diogenes Laertiusinto Latin, which was printed at Venice, 1475, and is a book of great price, as being prior in date by nearly sixty years to any edition of that author.

, an Italian historian of some reputation, was born at Ferrara in the sixteenth century. He was an able lawyer, and had the management of the affairs of the dukes of Ferrara. He afterwards settled at Parma, and became the historian of the place. Clement, in his “Bibliotheque curieuse,” informs us, that Angeli having collected materials from actual observation respecting the geography of Italy, with a view to correct the errors of Ptolomey, Pliny, and the modern geographers, took Parma in his way, and was requested to write its history. For this purpose Erasmus Viotto, the bookseller, accommodated him with his library, and the history was finished within six months, but was not published until after his death, if he died in 1576, as is asserted by Baruffaldi, in the supplement to his history of the university of Ferrara, and by Mazzuchelli in his “Scrittori Italiaui.” The work was entitled “Istoria della citta di Parma e descrizione del Fiume Parma, lib. VIII.” Parma, 1591, 4to. Each book is dedicated to some one of the principal lords of Parma, whose pedigree and history is included in the dedication. The copies are now become scarce, and especially those which happen to contain some passages respecting P. L. Farnese, which were cancelled in the rest of the impression. The year before, a work by the same author was published which ought to be joined with his history, under the title “Descrizione di Parma, suoi Fiumi, e lar^o terntorio.” He wrote also the “Life of Ludovico Catti,” a lawyer, 1554, and some other treatises, “De non sepeliendis mortuis;” “Gli elogi degli eroi Estensi,” and “Discorso intorno l'origine de Cardinali,” - 1565.

The fame of Guido’s invention soon spread abroad, and among other honours bestowed upon him, the pope John XX. or XIX. for this is not agreed on, sent three messengers to invite him to Rome; he complied, and being presented, was received by his holiness with great kindness. The pope had several conversations with him, in all which he interrogated him as to his knowledge in music: and upon the sight of an antiphonary which Guido had brought with him, marked with the syllables agreeable to his new invention, the pope looked on it as a kind of prodigy, and ruminating on the doctrines delivered by Guido, would not stir from his seat till he had learned perfectly to sing a verse; upon which he declared, that he could not have believed the efficacy of the method, if he had not been convinced by the experiment he himself had made of it. The pope would have detained him at Rome; but labouring under a bodily disorder, and fearing an injury to his health from the air of the place, and the heat of the summer, which was then approaching, Guido left that city with a promise to revisit it, and explain to his holiness the principles of his new system. On his return homeward, he made a visit to the abbot of Pomposa, a town in the duchy of Ferrara, who was very earnest to have Guido settle in the monastery of that place: to which invitation it seems he yielded, being, as he says, desirous of rendering so great a monastery still more famous by his studies there.

While he was busied in these literary pursuits, Alphonso duke of Ferrara, having occasion to send ambassadors to Rome, in order to appease the anger of pope Julius II. who prepared to make war against him, was, by his brother the cardinal, recommended to Ariosto, as a proper person to be entrusted with such a negotiation, and he acquitted himself so well in his commission, that he returned with an answer much more favourable than was expected. However, the pope, still continuing at enmity with the duke, made a league with the Venetians, and collected a powerful army against Ferrara: but was defeated at the battle of Ravenna. Part of a Meet was sent up the Po, against Ferrara, and met with a repulse from the duke’s party. In this engagement, Ariosto, who was present, behaved with great courage, and took one of the largest of the enemy’s vessels, filled with stores and ammunition. The papal army being dispersed, Alphonso thought it advisable to send an ambassador again to Rome, and dispatched Ludovico a second time, who found his holiness so incensed against the duke, that his indignation was very near showing itself to the ambassador; and it was not without difficulty that Ariosto escaped with life to Ferrara. The duke’s affairs being established, Ariosto returned to his studies; but was employed in various public occupations, that often broke in upon his retirement, and obliged him to defer the completion of his Orlando. However, he found means to bring it to a conclusion; and though it was far from that perfection which he desired, yet, in order to avail himself of the opinion of the public, he caused it to be first printed in 1515.

The name of this poet is still held in that kind of veneration by his countrymen with which the English consider their Shakspeare. Antonio Zatta, in his edition of Ariosto' s works of 1772, relates, that a chair and ink-standish, which, according to tradition, belonged to Ariosto, were then in the possession of II signor Dottore Giovanni Andrea Barotti, at Ferrara, and that a specimen of his hand -writing was preserved in the public library of that city. The republic of Venice did him the honour to cause his picture to be painted, and hung up with the senators and other illustrious men in the great council hall, which was afterwards destroyed by fire. It appears, however, that Ariosto did not finally receive from his professed patrons those rewards, or obtain that establishment, to which he thought his merits had entitled him. Probably the government of Grafagnana added more to his reputation than his fortune; and, from what he says in several parts of his Satires, he was by no means satisfied with his patrons of Ferrara. Nothing particular is recorded of the benefactions of the cardinal to him, before he incurred the displeasure of that prelate. The duke, indeed, gave him two assignments on certain gabels or taxes, the first of which ceased with the abolition of the tax; and the second, which produced him only twenty-five crowns every fourth month, collected, as he says himself, with great trouble, was contested and withheld from him during the wars of Lombardy; and some say, that the cardinal, upon withdrawing his patronage, deprived him of this slender advantage^ Such were the great advantages which he derived from those in whose service he had engaged, and whose names he had immortalized by his Muse.

But it seems that Ariosto had raised his thoughts to some great ecclesiastical preferment; on which occasion signor Rolli observes, that one reason why he was not preferred was, that he was devoted to Alphonso of Ferrara, whom the pope hated, and therefore could not give our author a cardinal’s hat. Leo died in 1521, six years after the finst publication, and the year in which Ariosto published the third edition of his poem. Perhaps had he lived longer, the poet might have experienced further marks of his generosity.

Concerning the person of Ariosto, he was rather above the common size, of a countenance generally grave and contemplative, as appears from the admirable picture painted by Titian: his head was partly bald; his hair black and curling; his forehead high; his eye-brows raised; his eyes black and sparkling; his nose large and aquiline; his lips well formed; his teeth even and white; his cheeks rather thin, and his complexion inclining to the olive; he was well made, except that his shoulders were somewhat large, which made him appear to stoop a little; his walk was slow and deliberate, as indeed were his actions in general. Ariosto left behind him two sons by Alexandra, who were always considered illegitimate; Virginio before named, and J. Baptista; the first of whom being brought up under his father, who took great pains to instruct him, was made a canon of the house of Ferrara, and Ariosto resigned a great part of his benefices to him; the latter went very young into the army, and, having acquired considerable reputation as a soldier, returned to Ferrara a little while before Ariosto’s death, and died himself an officer in the duke’s service.

After the lapse of a few years, which he spent partly at Venice and partly at Padua in the prosecution of his studies, his father being appointed vicedomino of Ferrara, young Bembo accompanied him thither, where he had an opportunity of attending the philosophical lectures of Nicolao Leoniceno, and commenced an acquaintance with Sadoleto, other learned men. He was also favourably received court, but did not desist from the prosecution of his studies. When about twenty -eight years of age, he began his “Asolani,” so called from its having been finished at Asolo, a town in the Venetian territory. This work, in which the subject of love is attempted in a moral and philosophical point of view, soon became so popular as to contribute much to his fame. It was first printed at the Aldine press in 1505, 4to, and was often reprinted. He afterwards returned with his father to Venice, where, and at Padua, he continued his studies principally with a view of improving his native language. At length, unwilling to continue burthensome to his father, he determined to try his fortune at the court of Urbino, at that time the centre of genius, fashion, and taste, and where Castiglioni laid the scene of his “II Cortegiano,” and introduced Bembo as one of the speakers. Bembo was recommended here in 1506, and soon became admired for his address, eloquence, and manners, while he still prosecuted his favourite studies, and produced his “Rime,” and various Latin compositions. He also occasionally visited the court of Rome, where the duchess of Urbino Elizabetha Gonzaga zealously endeavoured to promote his interest. In the last year of the pontificate of Julius II. he accompanied Sadoleto and other persons of distinction to that city; and among other literary services rendered by him to the pope, he decyphered an ancient manuscript written in abbreviated characters, a task which others had in vain attempted, and which the pope appears to have rewarded by some ecclesiastical preferments of the sinecure kind.

, one of the best Italian poets of the sixteenth century, was born at Bologna in 1506, of one of the most illustrious families of that city and of all Italy. His father, Hannibal II. being obliged, by pope Julius II. to leave his country, of which his ancestors had been masters from the commencement of the fifteenth century, and to go to Milan, he took his son with him, then an infant. Seven years after, he settled with his whole family at Ferrara, under the protection of the princes of the house of Este, to whom he was nearly related. His son here made rapid progress in his studies, and became distinguished at the court of duke Alphonso I. He was accomplished in music, singing, and the sports and exercises of manly youth; and to all this he added a solidity of judgment which procured him to be employed by the dukes of Ferrara in state-affairs of importance. He was employed on one of these negociations when he died, Nov. 6, 1573. His works, which were printed at first separately, and inserted in many of the collections, were published together under the title of “Opere poetiche del sig. Ercole Bentivoglio,” Paris, 1719, 12mo. They consist of sonnets, stanzas, eclogues, satires, which for easy elegance of style are inferior only to those of Ariosto; five epistles or capitoli, in the manner of Berni, and two comedies of great merit. Of these last there was a French translation by Fabre, printed at Oxford, 1731, 8vo.

, celebrated in the Romish church as a cardinal, and in literature as a historian, was of the same family with the preceding, and born at Ferrara in 1579. After studying there for some time, he went to Padua, where he soon had occasion to display his prudence and address. When pope Clement VIII. was determined to take possession of Ferrara, under the pretence that Caesar of Este, who succeeded the childless duke Alphonsus, was of an illegitimate branch, the marquis Hippolyto Bentivoglio, brother to Guy, a general officer in the service of Alphonsus, and attached to Caesar, excited the anger of cardinal Aldobrandini, who commanded the expedition, under the title of General of the holy church. Guy, who was now only nineteen years old, went immediately to the cardinal, to negociate for his brother, by the mediation of cardinal Bandini, a friend to his family, and contributed very essentially to make his brother’s peace, after the treaty had been concluded between the pope and the duke in January 1598. The pope having gone in person to take possession of Ferrara, admitted young Bentivoglio into his presence, and gave him the title of his private chamberlain.

, of Arragon, of the family of the Bentivoglios of Bologna, but only collaterally related to that of the cardinal, was born at Ferrara, about the middle of the sixteenth century. He bore the titles of a nobleman of Ferrara, Venice, and Bologna, was marquis of Magliano and count of Antignato. He studied first in Italy, and afterwards at Paris, and then embraced a military life, and served in the rank of captain, in Flanders, in 1588. On his return to Italy, he made the tour of the different courts, and being at that of Modena when the duke Francis was about to depart for the siege of Pavia, he went with him as colonel of cavalry, and distinguished himself. To the science of arms he joined those of literature, was well acquainted with Greek, Latin, several modern languages, music, and architecture, both civil and military. He is said likewise to have invented some ingenious machinery for the Italian stage, his turn being particularly to dramatic poetry; and he was also a member of various academies. He died at Ferrara, February 1, 1685. On the Ferrara stage he produced three dramas: “L'Annibale in Capoa,” “La Filli di Tracia,” and “L‘Achille in Sciro’;” the latter was printed at Ferrara, 1663, 12mo. He wrote also “Tiridate,” represented on the Venetian stage, and printed 1668, 12mo; and a comedy in prose, “Impegni per disgracia,” which was published after his death, at Modena, 1687, His lyric poems are in various collections, but principally in “Rime scelte de' poeti Ferraresi.”

, so called from Castel Bolognese in the Romania, where he was born in 1495, distinguished himself for his admirable skill in engraving on precious stones. After having resided for several years with Alphonso duke of Ferrara, where his works excited universal admiration, he went to Rome, and attached himself to the cardinal Hyppolito de Medicis, whose friendship he preferred to the brilliant offers made by Charles V. who was very desirous of his residing in Spain. At Rome, Bernard executed some medals in honour of Clement VII. of such exquisite beauty, as to meet with the applause even of his rivals. Among the chefsd'oeuvre which he left, are two engravings on crystal, which have been particularly noticed by connoisseurs. The subjects are the “Fall of Phaeton,” and “Tityus with the vulture,” from designs by Michael Angelo, both which were thought to approach to the perfection of the ancients. Enriched by the patronage of cardinal de Medicis, and esteemed by all who knew him, he passed his latter days in a charming retreat, at Faenza, which he had enriched with a fine collection of pictures, and where he died in 1555.

, an ecclesiastic and saint, was born at Massa, in Tuscany, Sept. 8, 1380. Having lost his mother at three years of age, and his father at seven, his relations in 1392 sent for him to Sienna, where he learned g ammar under Onuphrius, and philosophy under John JSpoletanus. In 1396 he entered himself among the confraternity of the disciplinaries in the hospital de la Scala in that city and in 1400, when the plague ravaged all Italy, he attended upon the sick in that hospital with the utmost diligence and humanity. In 1404 he entered into a monastery of the Franciscan order, near Sienna, and, having been ordained priest, became an eminent preacher. He was afterwards sent to Jerusalem, as commissary of the holy land and upon his return to Italy, visited several cities, where he preached with great applause. His enemies accused him to pope Martin V. of having advanced in his sermons erroneous propositions upon which he was oidered to Rome, where he vindicated himself, and was allowed to continue his preaching. The cities of Ferrara, Sienna, and Urbino, desired pope Eugenius IV. to appoint him their bishop but Bernardine refused to accept of ibis honour. He repaired and founded above 300 monasteries in that country. He died at Aquila in AbruzzO, May 20, 1444, and was canonised in 1450, by pope Nicholas.

, a lawyer, philosopher, orator, and poet, of Ferrara, was born in 1610. After having pursued his studies with great success, and taken his law degrees, in the university of his native city, he was chosen professor of the belles lettres, then first secretary, and in that quality was sent to compliment pope Innocent X. on his election to the papal chair. He lived in considerable favour with that pope, as well as with Alexander VII. and Clement IX. his successors, and the dukes of Mantua, Charles I. and II. who conferred upon him the title of Count. His poetical talents were principally devoted to the drama and one of his plays “Gli Sforzi del Desiderio,” represented at Ferrara in 1652, was so successful, that the archduke Ferdinand Charles, struck with its popularity, no sooner returned home than he sent for the author and some architects from Ferrara, to build two theatres for similar representations. Berni was married seven times, and had, as might be expected, a numerous family, of whom nine sons and daughters survived him. He died Oct. 13, 1673. Eleven of his dramas, formerly published separately, were printed in one volume, at Ferrara, 1666, 12mo. He published also a miscellany of discourses, problems, &c. entitled “Accademia,” Ferrara, 2 vols. 4to, without date, and reprinted in 1658. Many of his lyric poems are in the collections.

, one of the revivers of literature in the fifteenth century, was born, not at Constantinople, as some writers assert, but at Trebisond, in 1389, a date which is ascertained by his epitaph written by himself, but as all the copies of this epitaph do not agree, Bandini, one of his biographers, gives 1395, as the time of his birth. He entered into the order of St. Basil, and passed twentyone years in a monastery of Peloponnesus, employed in the study of divinity and polite literature. The philosopher Gemistus Pletho was one of his masters. In 1438, when the emperor John Paleologus formed the design of going to the council of Ferrara, to re-unite the Greek with the Latin church, he drew Bessarion from his retirement, made him bishop of Nice, and engaged him to accompany him into Italy with Pletho, Marcus Eugenius, archbishop of Ephesus, the patriarch of Constantinople, and several other Greeks eminent for talents or rank. In the sittings of this council, the archbishop of Ephesus distinguished himself by his powers of reasoning, and Bessarion by the charms of his eloquence, but unfortunately from being rivals in talents, they soon became enemies. Eugenius was not favourable to the scheme of uniting the Greek and Latin churches; and Bessarioii, after having been of a contrary opinion, declared for the Latins, which was the side the emperor took. The union was accordingly announced, and in December 1439, pope Eugenius IV. to reward the zeal of Bessarion, created him a cardinal priest. ‘ Being now, in consequence of his new dignity, fixed in, Italy, a step which was at the same time rendered necessary by the commotions in Greece, where he was very unpopular, and the union universally rejected, Bessarion returned to the studious and simple life he had led in his convent in the Peloponnesus. His house became the resort of the learned, and when he appeared abroad, his train was composed of such men as Argyropulus, Philelphus, Valla, Theodore Gaza, George of Trebisonde, and Calderino. He obtained the confidence and friendship of several popes. Nicholas V. appointed him archbishop of S’ponto, and cardinal-bishop; and Pius II. in 1463, conferred upon him the title of Patriarch of Constantinople. On the death of Nicholas V. the college of cardinals would have elected him his successor, but this purpose was defeated by the intrigues of cardinal Alain. Some years after, Bessarion, was likely to have succeeded Paul II. but to accomplish this, it was necessary to secure the vote of the cardinal Orsini by an act of injustice, which he refused. Orsini, however, tendered his vote on the same terms to the cardinal de Rovere, who had none of Bessarion’s scruples, and was elected. Paul Jovius tells a foolish story of Bessarion’s having lost this election, by the blundering reply of his servant; and Gibbon, credulous enough when the object of belief is worth nothing, has repeated it after him, nor knowing that our countryman Hody had amply refuted it.

, count of Scandiano, an Italian poet, was born at the castle of Scandiano, near Reggio in Lombardy, about the year 1434. He studied at the university of Ferrara, and remained in that city the greater part of his life, attached to the ducal court. He was particularly in great favour with the duke Borso and Hercules I. his successor. He accompanied Borso in a journey to Rome in 1471, and the year following was selected by Hercules to escort to Ferrara, Eleonora of Aragon, his future duchess. In 1481 he was appointed governor of Reggio, and was also captain-general of Modena. He died at Reggio, Dec. 20, 1494. He was one of the most learned and accomplished men of his time, a very distinguished Greek and Latin scholar, and at a time when Italian poetry was in credit, one of those poets who added to the reputation of his age and country. He translated Herodotus from the Greek into Italian, and Apuleius from the Latin. He wrote also Latin poetry, as his “Carmen Bucolicum,” eight eclogues in hexameters, dedicated to duke Hercules I. Reggio, 1500, 4 to Venice, 1528; and in Italian, “Sonetti e Canzoni,” Reggio, 1499, 4to; Tenice, 1501, 4to, in a style rather easy than elegant, and occasionally betraying the author’s learning, but without affectation. Hercules of Este was the first of the Italian sovereigns who entertained the court with a magnificent theatre on which Greek or Latin comedies, translated into Italian, were performed. For this theatre Boiardo wrote his “Timon,” taken from a dialogue of Lucian, which may be accounted the first comedy written in Italian. The first edition of it, according to Tiraboschi, was that printed at Scandiano, 1500, 4to. The one, without a date, in 8vo, he thinks was the second. It was afterwards reprinted at Venice, 1504, 1515, and 1517, 8vo. But Boiardo is principally known by his epic romance of “Orlando Innamorato,” of which the celebrated poem of Ariosto is not only an imitation, but a continuation. Of this work, he did not live to complete the third book, nor is it probable that any part of it had the advantage of his last corrections, yet it is justly regarded as exhibiting, upon the whole, a warmth of imagination, and a vivacity of colouring, which rendered it highly interesting: nor is it, perhaps, without reason, that the simplicity of the original has occasioned it to be preferred to the same work, as altered or reformed by Francesco Berni (See Brrni). The “Orlando Innamorato” was first printed at Scandiano, about the year 1495, and afterwards at Venice, 1500, which De Bure erroneously calls the first edition. From the third book where Boiardo 1 s labours cease, it was continued by Niccolo Agostini, and of this joint production numerous editions have been published.

, a famous physician, was born at Ferrara, in 1500, of a noble family. His knowledge was not confined to medicine. In consequence of his having maintained at Paris, for three days successively, theses “de omni scibile,” the surname of Musa was given him by Francis I. He was physician to that prince, who made him chevalier of the order of St. Michael; to the emperor Charles V. who bestowed on him the title of count palatine; and to Henry VIII. of England. He was not of less consequence in his own country. Successively first physician to the popes Paul III. Leo X. Clement VII. and Julius III. cherished and favoured by all the other princes of Italy, and particularly the dukes of Ferrara, he was proceeding in this brilliant career, when he died at Ferrara in 1555, at the age of 55, after having long been a professor of medicine there with universal applause; leaving a great number of works, principally on medicine, and among others, 1. “Commentaries on the aphorisms of Hippocrates and Galen,” printed at Basle, in 1542, folio. 2. “Index refertissimus in Galeni libros,” Venice, 1623, fol. which Castro, in his Biblioth. Med. styles “opus indefessse elucubrationis & utilitatis inexplicabilis.”

, a canon of the church of Ferrara, and a poet and orator of considerable distinction, was born at Ferrara in 1479, and, as generally supposed, was the natural son of a person who was an apostolic notary. He studied under Peter Pomponazzo, but devoting himself to a military life, served under the emperor Maximilian. He afterwards engaged in the service. of Julius II. and was employed in several important negociations. Returning to Ferrara, he obtained the particular favour of the family of Este, and was chosen to accompany the cardinal Ippolito on his journeyMiuo Hungary. About the year 1520, he was appointed professor of the belles lettres in the university of Ferrara, which situation he filled with great credit until his death in 1541. He was interred in the library of the Jacobins, to which he bequeathed his books, and on which are two inscriptions to his memory, one signifying that “by continual study, he had learned to despise earthly things, and not to be insensible of his own ignorance,” (ignorantiam suam non ignorare.) His works were published at Basil in 1541, one vol. folio, or according to Moreri, in 1544, and contain sixteen books of epistles, and philosophical, political, and critical dissertations on various subjects, and he also wrote some Latin poetry, which the critics of his time prefer to his prose, the latter being heavy, unequal, and affected; his poetry was published with the poems of John Baptista Pigna and Louis Ariosto, at Venice, 1553, 8vo. He appears to have corresponded with Erasmus, whom, like many others, he blamed for his undecided character in the questions which arose out of the reformation.

, called IL Cremonese, an eminent artist of Ferrara, where he was born about 1600, studied and imitated, beyond all others, the tones of Titian, and carried the illusion to such a degree, that his half-figures, bacchanals, and small histories, entered the best galleries of Rome and Bologna as originals: nor is he easily discovered by the best eye or taste, but from the admission of some more modern conceit, or carelessness of execution. That he possessed talents superior to what mere mimickry can confer, is evident from his St. Mark, in the church of S. Benedetto at Ferrara, a majestic, correct, expressive figure, girt by a profusion of volumes, whose picturesque arrangement and truth of touch procured him the name of the Book-Painter (Pittor da' Libri). Immediately after the execution of this work, some say that he disappeared, and was heard of no more: whilst others, with less probability of conjecture, extend the date of his death to 1660.

, one of the chief reformers of the church, was born at Noyon in Picardy, July 10, 1509. He was instructed in grammar at Paris under Maturinus Corderius, to whom he afterwards dedicated his Commentary on the first epistle of the Thessalonians, and studied philosophy in the college of Montaigu under a Spanish professor. His father, uho discovered many marks of hitf early piety, particularly in his reprehensions of the vices of his companions, designed him for the church, and got him presented, May 21, 1521, to the chapel of Notre Dame de la Gesine, in the church of Noyon. In 1527 he was presented to the rectory of Marteville, which he exchanged in 1529 fortlie rectory of Pont I‘Eveque near Noyon. His father afterwards changed his resolution, and would have him study law; to which Calvin, who, by reading the scriptures, had conceived a dislike to the superstitions of popery, readily consented, and resigned the chapel of Gesine and the rectory of Pont l’Eveque in 1534. He had never, it must here be observed, been in priest’s orders, and belonged to the church only by having received the tonsure. He was sent to study the law first under Peter de l'Etoile (Petrus Stella) at Orleans, and afterwards under Andrew Alciat at Bourges, and while he made a great progress in that science, he improved no less in the knowledge of divinity by his private studies. At Bourges he applied to the Greek tongue, under the direction of professor Wolmar. His father’s death having called him back to Noyon, he staid there a short time, and then went to Paris, where he wrote a commentary on Seneca’s treatise “De dementia,” being at this time about twenty- four years of age. Having put his name in Latin to this piece, he laid aside his surname Cauvin, for that of Calvin, styling himself in the title-page “Lucius Calvinus civis Romanus.” He soon made himself known at Paris to such as had privately embraced the reformation, and by frequent intercourse with them became more confirmed in his principles. A speech of Nicholas Cop, rector of the university of Paris, of which Calvin furnished the materials, having greatly displeased the Sorbonne and the parliament, gave rise to a persecu^ tion against the protestants; and Calvin, who narrowly escaped being taken in the college of Forteret, was forced to retire to Xaintonge, after having had the honour to be introduced to the queen of Navarre, who allayed this first storm raised against the protestants. Calvin returned to Paris in 1534. This year the reformed met with severe treatment, which determined him to leave France, after publishing a treatise against those who believe that departed souls are in a kind of sleep. He retired to Basil, where he studied Hebrew; at this time he published his “Institutions of the Christian Religion,” a work well adapted to spread his fame, though he himself was desirous of living in obscurity. It is dedicated to the French king, Francis I. This prince being solicitous, according to Beza, to gain the friendship of the Protestants in Germany, and knowing that they were highly incensed by the cruel persecutions which their brethren suffered in France, he, by advice of William de Bellay, represented to them that he had only punished certain enthusiasts, who substituted their own imaginations in the place of God’s word, and despised the civil magistrate. Calvin, stung with indignation at this wicked evasion, wrote this work as an apology for the Protestants who were burnt for their religion in France. The dedication to Francis I. is one of the three that have been highly admired: that of Thuanus to his history, and Casaubon’s to Polybius, are the two others. But this treatise, when first published in 1555, was only a sketch of a larger work. The complete editions, both in Latin and in French, with the author’s last additions and corrections, did not appear till 1558. After the publication of this work, Calvin went to Italy to pay a visit to the duchess of Ferrara, a lady of eminent piety, by whom he was very kindly received. Prom Italy he came back to France, and having settled his private affairs, he purposed to go to Strasbourg, or Basil, in company with his sole surviving brother Antony Calvin; but as the roads were not safe on account of the war, except through the duke of Savoy’s territories, he chose that road. “This was a particular direction of Providence,” says Bayle; “it was his destiny that he should settle at Geneva, and when he was wholly intent on going farther, he found himself detained by an order from heaven, if I may so speak.” William Farel, a man of a warm enthusiastic temper, who had in vain used many entreaties to prevail with Calvin to be his fellow-labourer in that part of the Lord’s vineyard, at last solemnly declared to him, in the name of God, that if he would not stay, the curse of God would attend him wherever he went, as seeking himself and not Christ. Calvin therefore was obliged to comply with the choice which the consistory and magistrates of Geneva made of him, with the consent of the, people, to be one of their ministers, and professor of divinity. It was his own wish to undertake only this last office, but he was gbliged to take both upon him in August 1536. The year following he made all the people declare, upon oath, their assent to a confession of faith, which contained a renunciation of Popery: and because this reformation in doctrine did not put an entire stop to the immoralities that prevailed at Geneva, nor banish that spirit of faction which had set the principal families at variance, Calvin, in concert with his colleagues, declared that they could not celebrate the sacrament whilst they kept up their animosities, and trampled on the discipline of the church. He also intimated, that he could not submit to the regulation which the synod of the canton of Berne had lately made *. On this, the syndics of Geneva summoned an assembly of the people; and it was ordered that Calvin, Farel, and another minister, should leave the town in two days, for refusing to administer the sacrament. Calvin' retired to Strasbourg, and established a French church in that city, of which he was the first minister; he was also appointed to be professor of divinity there* During his stay at Strasbourg, he continued to give many marks of his affection for the church of Geneva; as appears, amongst other things, by the answer which he wrote in 1539, to the beautiful but artful letter of cardinal Sadolet, bishop of Carpentras, inviting the people of Geneva to return into the bosom of the Romish church. Two years after, the divines of Strasbourg being very desirous that he should assist at the diet which the emperor had appointed to be held at Worms and at Ratisbon, for accommodating religious differences, he went thither with Bucer, and had a conference with Melancthon. In the mean time the people of Geneva (the syndics who promoted his banishment being now some of them executed, and others forced to fly their country for their crimes), entreated him so earnestly to return to them, that at last he consented. He arrived at Geneva, Sept. 13, 1541, to the great satisfaction both of the people and the magistrates; and the first measure ha adopted after his arrival, was to establish a form of church, discipline, and a consistorial jurisdiction, invested with, the power of inflicting censures and canonical punishments,

, a celebrated sculptor and engraver of Florence, was born in 1500, and intended to be trained to music but, at fifteen years of age, bound himself, contrary to his father’s inclinations, apprentice to a jeweller and goldsmith, under whom he made such a progress, as presently to rival the most skilful in the business. He had also a turn for other arts: and in particular an early taste for drawing and designing, which he afterwards cultivated. Nor did he neglect music, but must have excelled in some degree in it; for, assisting at a concert before Clement VII. that pope took him into his service, in the double capacity of goldsmith and musician. He applied himself also to seal-engraving; learned to make curious damaskeenings of steel and silver on Turkish daggers, &c. and was very ingenious in medals and rings. But Cellini excelled in arms, as well as in arts; and Clement VII. valued him as much for his bravery as for his skill in his profession. When the duke of Bourbon laid siege to Rome, and the city was taken and plundered, the pope committed the castle of St. Angelo to Cellini; who defended it like a man bred to arms, and did not suffer it to surrender but by c?.pitulation. Meanwhile, Cellini was one of those great wits, wh'o may truly be said to have bordered upon madness; he was of a desultory, capricious, unequal humour, which involved him perpetually in adventures that often threatened to prove fatal to him. He travelled among the cities of Italy, but chiefly resided at Rome where he was sometimes in favour with the great, and sometimes out. He consorted with all the first artists in their several ways, with Michael Angelo, Julio Romano, &c. Finding himself at length upon ill terms in Italy, he formed a resolution of going to France; and, passing from Rome through Florence, Bologna, and Venice, he arrived at Padua, where he was most kindly received by, and made some stay with, the famous Pietro Bembo. From Padua he travelled through Swisserland, visited Geneva in his way to Lyons, and, after resting a few days in this last city, arrived safe at Paris. He met with a gracious reception from Francis I. who would have taken him into his service; but, conceiving a dislike to France from a sudden illness he fell into there, he returned to Italy. He was scarcely arrived, when, being accused of having robbed the castle of St. Angelo of a great treasure at the time that Rome was sacked by the Spaniards, he was arrested and sent prisoner thither. When set at liberty, after many hardships and difficulties, he entered into the service of the French king, and set out with the cardinal of Ferrara for Paris: where when they arrived, being highly disgusted at the cardinal’s proposing what he thought an inconsiderable salary, he abruptly undertook a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. He was, however, pursued and brought back to the king, who settled a handsome salary upon him, assigned him a house to work in at Paris, and granted him shortly after a naturalization. But here, getting as usual into scrapes and quarrels, and particularly having offended madame d'Estampes, the king’s mistress, he was exposed to endless troubles and persecutions; with which at length being wearied out, he obtained the king’s permission to return to Italy, and went to Florence; where he was kindly received by Cosmo de Medici, the grand duke, and engaged himself in his service. Here again, disgusted with some of the duke’s servants (for he could not accommodate himself to, or agree with, any body), he took a trip to Venice, where he was greatly caressed by Titian, Sansovino, and other ingenious artists; but, after a short stay, returned to Florence, and resumed his business. He died in 1570. His life was translated into English by Dr. Nugent, and published in 1771, 2 vols. 8vo, with this title: “The Life of Benevenuto Cellini, a Florentine artist; containing a variety of curious and interesting particulars relative to painting, sculpture, and architecture, and the history of his own time.” The original, written in the Tuscan language, lay in manuscript above a century and a half. Though it was read with the greatest pleasure by the learned of Italy, no man was hardy enough, during this long period, to introduce to the world a book, in which the successors of St. Peter were handled so roughly; a narrative, where artists and sovereign princes, cardinals and courtezans, ministers of state and mechanics, are treated with equal impartiality. At length, in 1730, an enterprising Neapolitan, encouraged by Dr. Antonio Cocchi, one of the politest scholars in Europe, published it in one vol. 4to, but it soon was prohibited, and became scarce. According to his own account, Cellini was at once a man of pleasure and a slave to superstition; a despiser of vulgar notions, and a believer in magical incantations; a fighter of duels, and a composer of divine sonnets; an ardent lover of truth, and a retailer of visionary fancies; an admirer of papal power, and a hater of popes; art offender against the laws, with a strong reliance on divine providence. Such heterogeneous mixtures, however, generally form an amusing book, and Cellini’s life is amusing and interesting in a very high degree. It must not, however, be omitted, that Cellini published two treatises on the subject of his art, “Duo trattati, uno intorno alle oito principal! arti dell* oreficiera, Paltro in materia dell* arte della scoltura,” &c. 1568, 4to.

, an illustrious Italian poet, descended from one of the first families of Florence, of the name of Caccia Guida. Alighieri was the surname of the maternal line, natives of Ferrara, so called from a golden wing which the family bore on their arms. He was born in 1265, a little after the return of the Guelfs or pope’s faction, who had been exiled from their native country in consequence of the defeat at Monte Aperte. The superiority of his genius appeared early, and if we may credit his biographer Boccaccio, his amorous disposition appeared almost as soon. His passion for the lady whom he has celebrated in his poem by the name of Beatrice, is said to have commenced at nine years of age. She was the daughter of Eoleo Portinari, a noble citizen of Florence. His passion seems to have been of the platonic kind, according to the account he gives of it in his “Vita Nuova,” one of his earliest productions. The lady died at the age of twenty-six and Dante, affected by the afflicting event, fell into a profound melancholy, to cure which his friends recommended matrimony. Dante took their advice, but was unfortunate in choosing a lady of a termagant temper, from whom he found it necessary to separate, but not until they had lived miserably for a considerable time, during which she bore him several children. Either at this period, or after the death of his first mistress, he seems by his own account to have fallen into a profligate course of life, from which he was rescued by the prayers of his mistress, now a saint, who prevailed on the spirit of Virgil to attend him through the infernal regions. It is not easy to reduce this account to matter of fact, nor is it very clear indeed whether his reigning vice was profligacy, or ambition of worldly honours. It is certain, however, that he possessed this ambition, and had reason to repent of it.

, a very learned scholar of the sixteenth century, was born at Zano, a seat belonging to the family of Nogarola, in the diocese of Verona in Italy. He became professor of Greek and Latin at Padua, whence he went to teach the same languages at Capo d'Istria, as mentioned by Bembo in his letters. He taught also at Parma, and there printed a Latin oration in 1532 on the praises of Parma, and the study of classical literature, “De laudibus Parmae et de studiis humanioribus.” After this he appears to have given lessons in the duchy of Ferrara, whence he returned and died in his own country, much regretted as an accomplished scholar. He made the Latin translation of the Evangelical Demonstration of Eusebius, which was magnificently printed, and afterwards used in a Paris edition, Greek and Latin, but without noticing that it was his. He translated also some pieces of Galen, Xenophon, and Aristotle; and was editor of the first Greek edition of Chrysostom the first edition of Œcumenius of Aretas on the Apocalypse two books of John Damascenus on Faith; and superintended an edition of Macrobius and Censorinus. In 1540 he published “De Pldtonicae, et Aristotelicae philosophise, differentia,” Venice, 8vo, but this was a posthumous work, if according to Saxius, he died in 1540.

, an artist, was a native of Dosso in the Ferrarese territory, and from the school of Costa went to Rome, where he studied six years, and five at Venice; and formed a style which is sometimes compared to that of Raphael, sometimes to that of Titian, and sometimes is said to resemble Coreggio. His name, with that of Gio. Batista his brother, has been ranked with the first names of Italy by Ariosto, their countryman; and the pictures of Dosso prove that he did not owe the high rank in which he is placed by the poet, to partiality. The head of his St. John at Patmos, in the church a' Lateran at Ferrara, is a prodigy of expression. Of his most celebrated picture in the church of the Dominicans at Faenza, there remains now only a copy: time destroyed the original. It represents Christ among the Doctors, and even in the copy the simplicity of the composition, the variety of the characters, and the breadth and propriety of the drapery, deserve admiration. Seven of his pictures, and perhaps of his best time, are at Dresden, and the best of these is that much praised one of the Four Doctors of the Church. Dosso, in partnership with his brother, was much employed in works for the court of Alphonso and Ercole II. dukes of Ferrara; and to that connection with him, a character so much inferior to himself, we may probably ascribe the aspersions and illiberal criticism of Vasari. The style of Dosso retains something more obsolete than the style of the great masters with whom he is compared; but he has a novelty of invention and drapery all his own; and withal a colour which with variety and boldness unites a general harmony. This excellent artist died about 1560, but his age has not been ascertained.

, an Italian poet of the sixteenth century, was a native of Savona, in the state of Genoa. He published in 1557 a poem, in ottava rima, on the wars of Charles V. in Flanders, and other miscellaneous poems; and in 1558, twelve of his orations were published at Venice by Aldus, in folio. He wrote on the causes of the German war under Charles V. and an Italian translation of Athenagoras on the resurrection, 1556, 4to. He was also one of the authors of the celebrated collection under the title of “Polyanthea.” He was distinguished as a statesman, an orator, and an historian, as well as a poet, and was deputed on an embassy to Venice by Hercules Antestini, duke of Ferrara.

, of Ferrara, an artist born in 1532, was nicknamed Gratella by his countrymen, because he was the first who introduced the method of squaring large pictures, in order to reduce them with exactness to smaller proportions, which the Italians call graticolare, a method which he had learned from Michel Angelo, whose scholar he was at Rome, though unknown to Vasari, at least not mentioned in his life. He was the son of Camillo Filippi, who died in 1574, an artist of uncertain school, but who painted in a neat and limpid manner and if we may judge from a half-figure of S. Paul, in an Annunziata of his in S. Maria in Vado, not without some aim at the style of Michel Angelo. From him therefore Bastiano probably derived that ardent desire for it which made him secretly leave his father’s house, and journey to Rome, where he became one of the most indefatigable copyists and dearest pupils of Buonarotti. What powers he acquired is evident from the “Universal Judgment,” which he painted in three years, in the hoir of the metropolitan a work nearer to Michel Angelothau what can be produced by the whole Florentine school. It possesses grandeur of design with great variety of imagery, well disposed groupes, and repose for the eye. It appears incredible that in a subject pre-occupied by Buonarotti, Filippi should have been able to appear so novel and so grand. He imitated the genius, but disdained to transcribe the figures of his model. He too, like Dante and Michel Angelo, made use of that opportunity to gratify his affections or animosities, by placing his friends among the elect, and his enemies with*the rejected. In that hapless host he painted the faithless mistress who had renounced his nuptials, and drew among the blessed another whom he had married in her place, casting a look of insult on her rival. At present it is not easy to decide on the propriety or intemperance of Barui Taldi and other Ferrarese writers, who prefer this painting to that of the Sistina, for decorum and colour, because it has been long retouched; and already made Barotti, in his description of Ferrarese pictures, lament " that the figures which formerly appeared living flesh, now seem to be of wood. 7 ' Of Filippi’s powers, however, as a colourist, other proofs exist at Ferrara in many an untouched picture: they appear to advantage, though his flesh-tints are too adust and bronzed, end his colours too often united into a misty mass.

It is, perhaps, equally curious, that even when metaphysics and ethics had become his professed avocations, he never so much indulged in the study of them as to produce any other work in their several departments. He rather availed himself of his situation at Pisa, in cultivating natural science with greater ardour than before; and he seemed to have the best opportunity for the purpose. The veteran professor Perelli was still alive, and still retained his amiable disposition of communicating to his friends those valuable discoveries which were the fruits of his long meditations, and which, from his great modesty, had never been published under his own name. By this powerful assistance, and by his own extensive learning, Frisi, whilst at Pisa, was enabled to publish the two volumes of dissertations which appeared at Lucca under the title of “Dissertationum Variarum,” &c. 1759 and 1761, and the two hydraulic performances relative to the preservation of the provinces of Ferrara and Ravenna, from the inundation of rivers, which were likewise published at Lucca, in 1762. Among his dissertations, the most remarkable were that “De Atmosphaera Ccelestium corporuro,” which in 1758 obtained the prize from the royal academy of sciences in Paris, and that “De intequalitate MoiCls Planetarum,” which in 1768 received the honour of the accessit from the same corporation. The lust work published by Mr. Frisi at Pisa, was a tribute to the memory of his worthy and beneficent friend Perelli, which appeared in the 53d volume of the Journal of that university.

, an eminent Italian writer, and a man of extraordinary qualities, was born of mean parents at Florence in 1498, and was brought up a taylor. Such, however, was his industry and capacity, that he acquired a knowledge of languages, and made uncommon progress in the belles lettres. Thuanus says, that he did not understand Latin, but this must be a mistake, as he translated, from Latin into Italian, “The Life of Alphonsus duke of Ferrara,” by Paul Jovius, and a treatise of iion Porzio, “De<OolQribus Oculorum,” at the request of those writers. His knowledge of Greek, however, was probably limited, as he translated the “Hecuba” of Euripides into Italian, from the Latin version. His principal excellence was in his native tongue, and he acquired the highest reputation, by the works he published in it. He was acquainted with all the wits and learned men of Florence; and his merit was universally known. He was chosen a member of the academy there,; and the city made him one of their burgesses. Yet he continued the exercise of his trade as a taylor, to the end of his life; and he tells us, in a letter lo F. Melchior, March 3, 1558, that he devoted workingdays to the careof his body, and Sundays and festivals to the culture of his understanding. The same letter shews his modesty, as hereproaches his friend for giving him honourable titles, which did not agree with the lowness of his condition. He died in 1563.

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

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

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

, a lady of the sixteenth century, remarkable for her wit and high birth, is chiefly known, and that very imperfectly, from a collection of her letters, printed at Venice in 1552. By these she appears to have been learned, and somewhat of a criticin Aristotle and yEschylus. All the wits of her time are full of their encomiums on her: and Hortensio Landi, besides singing her praises most zealously, dedicated to her a piece, “Upon moderating the passions of the soul,” written in Italian. If, however, it be true that this Horatio Landi wrote the whole of the letters attributed to Lucretia, it is difficult to know what to believe of the history of the latter. Her marriage at the age of fourteen with John Paul Manfroni was unhappy, He engaged in a conspiracy against the duke of Ferrara; was detected and imprisoned by him; but, though condemned, not put to death. Lucretia, in this emergency, applied to all the powers in Europe to intercede for him; and even solicited the grand signior to make himself master of the castle, where her husband was kept. During this time, although she was not permitted to visit him, they could write to each other. But all her endeavours were vain; for he died in prison in 1552, having shewn such an impatience under his misfortunes as made it imagined he lost his senses. She never would listen afterwards to any proposals of marriage, though several were made her. Of four children, which she had, there were but two daughters left, whom she placed in nunneries. All that came from her pen was so much esteemed, that a collection was made e^-en of the notes she wrote to her servants: several of which are to be met witli in the above-mentioned edition of her letters. She died at Mantua in 1576.

, a philosopher and mathematician, was born Oct. 1, 1671, at Cremona, where his father, a branch of a decayed family, carried on the business of ai> embroiderer. His mother, a woman of considerable talents, taught him Latin, and gave him some taste for poetry. Being disposed to a studious life, he cliose the profession of theology, that he might freely indulge his inclination. He entered into the religious order of Camaldolitesj at Raverrna, in 1687, where he was distinguished for his proficiency in the different branches of literature and science, but was much dissatisfied with the Peripatetic philosophy of the schools. He had not been here long before he established an academy of students of his own age, which he called the Certanti, in opposition to another juvenile society called the Concordi. To his philosophical studies he added those of the belles lettres, music, and history. It appears to have been his early ambition to introduce a new system in education, and with that view he obtained the professorship of philosophy at Florence, by the influence of father Caramelli, although not without some opposition from the adherents to the old opinions. He now applied himself to the introduction of the Cartesian philosophy, while, at the same time, he became zealously attached to mathematical studies. The works of the great Torricelli, of our countryman Wallis, and of other celebrated mathematicians, were his favourite companions, and the objects of his familiar intercourse. His first publication was a treatise to resolve the problems of Viviani on the construction of arcs, entitled “Geometrica Demonstnuio Vivianeorum problematum,” Florence, 1609, 4to. He dedicated this work to the grand duke. Cosmo Til. who appointed the author professor of philosophy in the university of Pisa. From this time Grandius pursued the higher branches of mathematics with the stmost ardour, and had the honour of ranking the ablest mathematicians among his friends and correspondents. Of the number may be named the illustrious Newton, Leibnitz, and Bernoulli. His next publications were, “Geometrica dernonslratio theorematum Hugenianorum circa logisticam, seu Logarithmicam lineatn,” 1701, 4to, and “Quadratura circuii et hyperbola3 per infinitas hyperbolas et parabolas geometrice exhibita,” Pisa, 1703, 8vo. He then published “Sejani et Rufini dialogus de Laderchiana historia S. Petri Damiani,” Paris, 1705, awd “Dissertationes Camaldu lenses,” embracing inquiries into the history of the Camaldolites, both which gave so much offence to the community, that he was deposed from the dignity of abbot of St. Michael at Pisa; but the grand duke immediately appointed him his professor of mathematics in the university. He now resolved some curious and difficult problems for the improvement of acoustics, which had been presented to the royal society in Dublin, and having accomplished his objecvt, he transmitted the solutions, by means of the British minister at the court of Florence, to the Royal Society at London. This was published under the title of “Disquisitio geometrica in systema sonorum D. Narcissi (Marsh) archiepiscopi Armachani,” in 1709, when he was chosen a fellow of the royal society. This was followed by his principal work, “De infinitis infinitorum, et infinite parvorum ordinibus disquisitio geometrica,” Pisa, 1710, 4to, and by many other works enumerated by his biographer, few of which appear in the catalogues of the public libraries in this country. Among other subjects he defended Galileo’s doctrine respecting the earth’s motion, and obtained a complete victory over those who opposed it. He was deeply versed in subjects of political economy; and various disputes were referred to his decision respecting the rights of fishery, &c. He was appointed commissioner from the grand duke and the court of Rome jointly, to settle some differences between the inhabitants of Ferrara and Bologna, concerning the works necessary to preserve their territories from the ravages of inundation. For these and other important public services, he was liberally rewarded by his employers. He died at the age of sevejity-two, in July 1742.

, surnamed Veronese, the first branch of a family celebrated in the republic of letters, and one of the revivers of literature, was born at Verona in 1370. After being taught Latin by John of Ravenna, he went to Constantinople, with the sole view of learning Greek in the school of Emanuel Chrysoloras, who had not then come to Italy. Pontico Virunio, in his life of Chrysoloras, says that Guarino was of an advanced age when he set out for Constantinople, and that he returned to Italy with a large collection of Greek manuscripts, the loss of which by shipwreck so affected him, that his hair turned white in one night; but Maffei and Apostolo Zeno have justly considered this as a fable. It appears, on the other hand, on comparing various circumstances, that Guarino was very young when he went into Greece, and was only twenty years of age when he returned. After this return he first kept school at Florence, and afterwards successively at Verona, Padua, Bologna, Venice, and Ferrara, in which last city he resided longest. Nicolas III. of Este had invited him thither in 1429 to superintend the education of his son Lionel. Six or seven years after, he was appointed professor of Greek and Latin in the university of Ferrara. This office he filled until the assembling of the grand council, to which the emperor John Paleologus came, accompanied with several Greeks, who found Guarino. sufficient employment, as he mentions in his letters, and on the council being removed to Florence, he accompanied them thither as interpreter between the Latins and Greeks. He returned again to Ferrara, where he held his professorship until his death in 1460. His principal works consist of Latin translations from Greek authors; particularly of many of Plutarch’s lives, part of Plutarch’s morals, and Strabo’s geography. Of this author he at first translated only ten books, by order of pope Nicholas V.; the other seven were translated by Gregory of Typhernuin, and in this state the work was first printed at Rome in 1470, folio. But, at the request of the Venetian senator Marcello, Guarino made a translation of these seven books, of which there are manuscript copies at Venice, Modena, &c. Maffei, in his “Verona Illustrata,” mentions also a translation of the whole seventeen in the hand-writing of Guarino, which was at one time in the library of the senator Soranzo at Venice. To his translation of Plutarch’s lives, he added those of Aristotle and Plato. He also compiled a Greek grammar, “Em. Chrysolorae erotemata lingusc Graecse, in compendium redacta, a Guarino Veronesi,” Ferrar. 1509, 8vo and a Latin grammar, “Grammatical institutiones,” without date or place, but printed at Verona, 1487, and reprinted in 1540, the model, says Maffei, from which all others have been taken. Annexed are some lesser treatises, “Carmina ditiferentialia,” “Liber de Diphtongis,” &c. Guarino also wrote commentaries or notes on various authors, both Greek and Latin, among the latter on Cicero’s orations and Persius’s satires, and was the author of various Latin orations delivered at Verona, Ferrara, and other places, and of some Latin poems, and a great number of letters which have not been printed. He was the first who recovered the poems of Catullus, a manuscript which was mouldering in a garret, and almost destroyed, and rendered the whole legible, with the exception of a very few verses. If it be thought that even all this is insufficient to justify the high reputation which Guarino enjoyed in his lifetime, and for ages afterwards, we must add that, independently of rendering these services to the cause of learning, which were of great importance at its revival, Guarino derived no small share of fame from the vast number of scholars whom he formed, with a like taste for classical literature, which they dispersed throughout all Europe. Guarino, likewise, was one of the most indefatigable student* of his time. Even in old age his memory was extraordinary, and his application incessant. He took little nourishment and little sleep, and rarely went abroad, yet he preserved his strength and faculties to the last. By his wife he had at least twelve children, two of whom followed his steps Jerome became secretary to Alphonso, king of Naples and Baptist, or Battista, rather better known, was professor of Greek and Latin at Ferrara, like his fathev, and like him educated some eminent scholars, among whom were Giraldi and Aldus Manutius. He left a collection of Latin poetry, “Baptists Guarini Veronensis poemata Latina,” Modena, 1496; a treatise on study, “De ordine docendi ac studendi,” without place or date; but there is a subsequent edition of Heidelberg, 1489. He wrote also other treatises, translations from the Greek, discourses, and letters, which latter remain in manuscript. It is to him we owe the first edition of the Commentaries of Servius on Virgil; and he assisted his father in recovering and making legible the manuscript of Catullus above mentioned.

Guarino had the misfortune to be early involved in family law-suits, and had to apply for the heritage of his grandfather and grand- uncle in opposition to francis Guahuo, his father, who has left no other character than that of a keen sportsman, and who was the only one of the family that had no taste for literature. Having lost his first wife, he married again to injure his son’s interest; hut the duke Hercules II. interposed, and assigned to our poet a proportion of the family property, which was very considerable. Battista married himself about this time Taddea Bendedei, a lady of a noble family of Ferrara.

After his return to Ferrara, he spent his time in the service of his prince, in study, and in managing some lawsuits, from which it was his misfortune to be seldom free; but finding still more fatigue and uneasiness in attending the court, he made these law-suits a pretext for asking leave to resign, which was granted. Become now his own master, at the age of forty-five years, fifteen of which he had spent in a service by no means of any advantage to himself, he retired in 1582, with his family to la Guarina, a pleasant country-seat at Polesina de Itovigo, which duke Borso had presented to his grand-father, as a reward for his services as envoy in France. Here he determined to pass the five finest months of the year, and the rest at Padua. He had now eight children, three sons and five daughters; he was also involved in lawsuits and in debts; all his time and every effort appeared necessary to recover from such a situation, and he seems at one time to have despaired of finding any leisure to cultivate polite literature. After he had been, however, quietly settled at this country seat, he found that he could relax a little from his more serious and pressing occupations. The fame which accompanied the publication of Tasso’s “Aminta” recalled Guarino’s attention to a work which he had sketched many years before, and had occasionally touched and re-touched, but without completing it. Tasso and he, we have already observed, were friends in their youth, but when they met at the court of Ferrara, rivulship in, court gallantries and poetry had separated them. Some satirical sonnets passed between them, but here their animosity ended, and they henceforth had the liberality to do justice to each other’s talents. Tasso’s misfortunes were now begun, and Guarino, shocked at the incorrect manner in which the first editions of the “Jerusalem delivered” were printed without the knowledge of the author, took every pains to prepare it for a correct edition, and bestowed the same care on the other published works of that poqt. The only thing be would not yield toTasso was superiority, and though unable to rival him in his larger poems, he thought he could surpass him in pastoral, and his “Pastor Fido” was to be the criterion. Besides submitting the manuscript to some men of taste, he read it before the duke Ferdinand II. of Gonzaga, at Guastalla, and a large company, composed of poets, admirers of poetry, and ladies of the first rank and taste, who were unbounded in their applauses. It is said to have been first performed at Turin in 1585, where were celebrated the nuptials of Charles Emmanuel to the infanta Catherine, daughter of Philip II. of Spain. This, however, appears doubtful, although it is more clear that it was much read on this occasion, and that the fame which it required reached the ears of Guarino’s old master, duke Alphonso, who invited him most pressingly, to return to Ferrara, with the title of secretary of state.

Having accepted this offer, he was employed, as formerly, on missions to Umbria, Milan, and other places, but now his tranquillity was disturbed by a domestic affair, in which he fancied he had been improperly treated;Alexander, his eldest son, who, in 1587, had married a rich heiress, niece to cardinal Canani, being weary of living under the subjection of his father, and disgusted, whether justly or not, with the treatment he met with from him, resolved to leave his house, and live apart with his wife. Guarino was so highly offended at their departure, that he immediately seized their income, on pretence of debts due to him for money expended at their marriage. His son, deprived of his income for nine months, at last applied to the duke of Ferrara to interpose his authority, which he did, commanding the chief judge to take cognizance of the affair, who immediately decided it in favour of Alexander. This sentence exasperated the father still more; so that, looking on it as a proof that the duke had no regard for him, he addressed a letter to him in the most respectful but strongest terms, to be dismissed the service; which the duke granted, though not without intimating some displeasure at Guarino, for shewing so little regard to the favours he had conferred on him. The treatment, however, which Tasso had suffered was a recent lesson for the poets who iiad the misfortune to be patronized by Alphonso, and Guarino immediately went into the service of the duke of Savoy, where he had some reason to expect a better lot; but here he did not remain many months; and during a year of repose in the country, he resumed his labours on his favourite pastoral, which at length was published in 1590, at Venice, 4to, and the same year at Ferrara, in 12mo. The great applause which he received from this poem, was followed by a most severe loss in the death of his wile, Dec. 25, 1590, at Padua. This misfortune appears to have greatly affected him. His two eldest sons had left him two of his daughters were married three others he had placed in convents and from being surrounded by a numerous family, he was now left with one boy only often years old. In this desolate state he appears to have entertained thoughts of going to Home and becoming an ecclesiastic. He was, however, diverted from this step by an invitation received in 1592 from the duke of Mantua, who sent him to Inspruck to negociate some affairs at the archduke’s court. But he afterwards was dismissed this service, as he had been that of Ferrara, by the solicitations of duke Alphonso; who, it is said, could not bear that a subject of his, of Guarino’s merit, should serve other princes. Thus persecuted, he went to Rome apparently with the design just mentioned, but was again prevented from executing it by a reconciliation with Alphonso, which brought him back to Ferrara in 1595. This reconciliation was obtained by his son Alexander, who was very much beloved at court. However, fresh quarrels between father and son soon broke out again, which were afterwards carried to a great height; and, great changes happening upon the death of Alphonso in 1597, Guarino thought himself ill used, and left Ferrara to go to Ferdinand de Medicis, grand duke of Tuscany, who expressed a great esteem for him.

He was a member of several academies, besides other societies; as that of the Ricouvrati of Padua, the Intrepidi of Ferrara, and the Umoristi of Rome. Notwithstanding the reputation he had gained by his “Pastor Fido,” he could not endure the title of poet, which he thought was so far from bringing any honour to the bearers, that it rather exposed them to contempt. He wrote other things, a complete catalogue of which may be seen in Niceron; but his “Pastor Fido” was his principal work, has gone through a vast number of editions, and is regarded as one of the standard productions of Italian poetry, although it has all the defects peculiar to the poetry of his age. Hjs personal character, from the preceding account, appears to have been somewhat equivocal. It would not be fair to accuse him of a capricious and irritable temper, unless we were better acquainted with the circumstances of his life. He appears, however, to have owed little of his happiness to his patrons, and less to his family, and was highly unfortunate in public as well as domestic life, whatever share of blame might attach to him.

His merit in this government recommended him, in 1521, to that of Parma, whence he drove away the French, and confirmed the Parmesans in their obedience; and this at a time when the holy see was vacant by the death of Leo, and the people he commanded full of fears, disheartened, and unarmed. He retained the same post under Adrian VI, to whom he discovered the dangerous designs of Alberto Pio da Carpi, and got him removed from the government of Reggio and Rubiera. Clement VII. on his exaltation to the pontificate, confirmed him in that government. This pope was of the house of Medici, to which Guicciardini was particularly attached; and, in return, we find him presently raised to the highest dignities in the ecclesiastical state. Having in 1523 prevented the duke of Ferrara from seizing Modena, the pope, in acknowledgement thereof, not only made him governor of that city, but constituted him president of Romagna, with unlimited authority. This was a post of great dignity and power, yet as factions then ran very high, the situation was both laborious and dangerous. However, he not only by his prudence overcame all these difficulties, but found means, in the midst of them, to improve the conveniences and delight of the inhabitants. Their towns which lay almost in rubbish, he embellished with good houses and stately buildings; a happiness, of which they were so sensible, that it rendered the name of Guicciardini dear to them, and they were overjoyed, when, after a farther promotion of Francis, they understood he was to be succeeded in his government by his brother. This happened June 6,

, a physician, was born at Ferrara, October 26th, 1663, and after a careful education under the bestmasters, distinguished himself particularly in the schools of philosophy and of medicine, and graduated in both these sciences in 1683. In the following year he was appointed ordinary professor, and displayed talents which did honour to the university of Ferrara, during the long period in which he filled that office. He died in February, 1730.

Lanzoni acquired a high reputation by the success of his practice, and obtained the confidence and esteem of many illustrious personages. His attachment to study increased with his years; and every moment in which he was not employed in the duties of his profession, was devoted to literature, philosophy, or antiquarian research. His character as a physician and philosopher, indeed, ranked so high, that if any question upon these subjects was agitated in Italy, the decision was commonly referred to him. He was distinguished likewise by his genius in Latin and Italian poetry; and he was the restorer and secretary of the academy of Ferrara, and a member of many of the learned societies of his time. He left a considerable number of works, a collection of which was printed at Lausanne, in 1738, in 3 vols. 4to, with an account of his life, under the title of “Josephi Lanzoni, Philosophise et Medicinae Doctoris, in Patria Universitate Lectoris primarii, &c. Opera omnia Medico-physica et PhU lologica.”

The warlike disposition of Selim. the reigning Turkish emperor, excited great alarms in Europe, and gave occasion to Leo to attempt a revival of the ancient crusades, by means of an alliance between all Christian princes; he probably hoped, by this show of zeal for the Christian cause, that he should recover some of his lost credit as head of the church. He had, likewise, another object in view, viz. that of recruiting his finances, by the contributions which his emissaries levied upon the devotees in different countries. By the death of Maximilian in 1519, a competition for the imperial crown between Charles V. and Francis 1. took place. Leo was decidedly against the claims of both the rival candidates, and attempted to raise a competitor in one of the German princes, but he was unable to resist the fortune of Charles. At this period he incurred a very severe domestic misfortune in the death of his nephew Lorenzo, who left an infant daughter, afterwards the celebrated Catherine de Medicis, the queen and regent of France. The death of Lorenzo led to the immediate annexation of the duchy of Urbino, with its dependencies, to the Roman see, and to the appointment of Julius, Leo’s cousin, to the supreme direction of the state of Florence. The issue of his contest with Luther will occur hereafter in our account of that reformer. It may here, however, be noticed that Leo conferred on Henry VIII. of England, the title of “Defender of the Faith,” for his appearance on the side of the church as a controversial writer. The tranquil state of Italy, at this period, allowed the pope to indulge his taste for magnificence in shows and spectacles. His private hours were chiefly devoted to indolence, or to amusements, frequently of a kind little suited to the dignity of his high station. He was not, however, so much absorbed in them as to neglect the aggrandizement of his family and see. Several cities and districts in the vicinity of the papal territories, and to which the church had claims, had been seized by powerful citizens, or military adventurers; some of these the pope summoned to his court to answer for their conduct; which not being able to do, he caused them to be put to death. Having next set his heart on the possession of the territory of Ferrara, he had recourse to treachery, and is thought to have even meditated the assassination of the duke, but his plot being discovered by the treachery of one whom he had bribed, he was disappointed in his plans. Another of his designs was the expulsion of the French from Italy,* and he had made some progress in this when he was seized with an illness which put an end to his life in a few days. He died Dec. 1, 1521, in the forty-sixth year of his age.

, an eminent Italian phy-, sician, was born in one of the Venetian states in 1428. He was professor of medicine at Ferrara during upwards of, sixty years, and was the first person who undertook to translate the works of Galen into Latin. His attachment to literary pursuits alienated him from practice; and in excuse he used to say, “I do more service to the public than if I visited the sick, by instructing those who are to cure them.” Extending his attention also to the belles lettres, he wrote some poetry, and translated into Italian the history of Dion Cassius, and the dialogues of Lucian. Until the age of thirty, Leonicenus was tormented with frequent attacks of epilepsy, which reduced him at times to melancholy and despair. This disease, however, afterwards left him, and, by means of great regularity and temperance, he attained the age of ninety-six years, and died in 1524, possessed of all his faculties. To one who in quired, with astonishment, by what secret he had preserved this entire possession of his faculties, together with an erect body and vigorous health, at so great an age, he replied, that it was the effect of innocence of manners, tranquillity of mind, and frugality in diet. The duke and senate of. Ferrara erected a monument to his memory. He left several works, most of which have been several times reprinted, but are not now in request, except perhaps his examination of the errors of Pliny, &c. “Plinii et aliorurn plurimum auctorum qui de simplicibus medicaminibui scripserunt, crrores notati,” Bude, 1532, folio, which involved him in a controversy, sustained with his usual tranquillity; and his “Liber de Epidemia quam Itali morbum Gallicum vocant,” Venice, 1497, 4to, a book of great rarity. He was the first in Italy who treated of this disorder 1 There is an edition of all his works, printed at Bale, 1533, fol.

, an eminent painter, was, according to some, born at Coldra, and to others, at Lugano, 1609. He was at first the disciple of Gesari d'Arpino, but formed a style of his own, selected from the principles of Albani and Guercino. He never indeed arrived at the grace of the former, but he excelled him in vigour of tint, in variety of invention, in spirited and resolute execution. He had studied colour with intense application at Venice, and excelled in fresco and in oil. Of the many pictures with which he enriched the churches and palaces of Rome, that of Joseph recognised by his brothers, on the Quirinal, is considered as the most eminent. If Mola possessed a considerable talent for history, he was a genius in landscape: his landscape every where exhibits in the most varied combination, and with the most vigorous touch, the sublime scenery of the territory in which he Was born. His predilection for landscape was such, that in his historic subjects it may often be doubted which is the principal, the actors or the scene; a fault which may be sometimes imputed to Titian himself. In many of Mola’s gallery-pictures, the figures have been ascribed to Albano. He reared three disciples, Antonio Gherardi of Rieti, who after his death entered the school of Cortona, and distinguished himself more by facility than elegance of execution Gia. Batista Boncuore of Rome, a painter at all times of great effect, though often somewhat heavy and Giovanni Bonati of Ferrara, called Giovannino del Pio, from the protection of that cardinal, who painted three altar-pieces of consideration at Rome, but died young. Mola died in 1665, aged fifty-six. He had a brother, John Baptist, who was born in 1620, and also learned the art of painting in the school of Albani. He proved a very good painter in history, as well as in landscape; but was far inferior to his brother, in style, dignity, taste, and colouring. In his manner he had more resemblance to the style of Albani, than to that of his brother; yet his figures are rather hard and dry, and want the mellowness of the master. However, there are four of his pictures in the Palazzo Salviati, at Rome, which are universally taken for the hand of Albani.

, a learned Italian lady, was born at Ferrara, in 1526. Her father taught the belles lettres in several cities of Italy: and his reputation as a teacher advanced him to be preceptor to the young princes of Ferrara, sons of Alphonsus I. The uncommon parts and turn for literature which he discovered in his daughter, induced him to cultivate them; and she soon made a very extraordinary progress. The princess of Ferrara was at that time studying polite literature, and a companion in the same pursuit being thought expedient, Morata was called to court; where she was heard, by the astonished Italians, to declaim in Latin, to speak Greek, to explain the paradoxes of Cicero, and to answer any questions that were put to her. Her father dying, and her mother being an invalid, she was obliged to return home, in order to tuke upon her the administration of the family affairs, and the education of three sisters and a brother, all which sho conducted with judgment and success. But some have said that the immediate cause of her removal from court, was a dislike which the duchess of Ferrara had conceived against her, by the misrepresentations of some of the courtiers. In the mean time, a young Oerman, named Grunthlcrus, who had studied physic, and taken his doctor’s degree at Ferrara, fell in love with her, and married her. Upon this she went with her hushand to Germany, and took her little brother with her, whom she carefully instructed in the Latin and Greek languages. They arrived at Augsburg in 1548; and, after a short stay there, went to Schweinfurt in Franconia, but had not been long there, before Schweinfurt was besieged and burnt. They escaped, however, with their lives, but remained in great distress until the elector Palatine invited Grunthler to be professor of physic at Heidelburg. He entered upon this new office in 1554, and be'gan to enjoy some degree of repose; when illness, occasioned by the hardships they had undergone, seized upon Morata, and proved fatal Oct. 26, 1555, before she was quite twenty-nine years old. She died in the Protestant religion, which she embraced upon her coming to Germany, and to which she resolutely adhered. Her husband and brother did not long survive her, and were interred in the same grave in the church of St. Peter, where is a Latin epitaph to their memory.

, a learned critic, was born in 1531, at Paris. His taste for the belles lettres induced him to visit Italy, where Paul Manutius employed him in his printingoffice at Venice. He afterwards taught Greek and cosmography at Vicenza, but was called from 'thence by the duke of Ferrara, in 1555. Morin at length acquired the esteem of St. Charles Boromeo, and pope Gregory XIII. and Sixtus V. engaged him in the edition of the Greek Bible of the LXX. 1587, the Latin translation is 1588, fol. and in the edition of the Vulgate, 1590, fol. He died in 1608. He was well acquainted with the belles lettres and languages, and has left among his works published by Quetif in 1675, an excellent treatise on the proper use of the sciences, of which Dupin has given a long analysis, as well as of his other works, and bestows great praise on his extensive knowledge of languages and ecclesiastical history.

, an Italian poet, who flourished in the sixteenth century, was born at Stellada, in Ferrara, upon the bank of the Po. We are told by some, that his true name was Pietro Angelo Manzolli, of which “Marcello Palingenio” is the anaigram . He is chiefly known by his “Zodiacus Vitae,” a poem in twelve books, dedicated to Hercules II. of Este, duke of Ferrara. Some say he was physician to that prince, but this will admit of a doubt; at least it is certain he was not so when he wrote the dedication to his “Zodiac.” This poem, on which he had employed several years, brought him into trouble, as it contained many sarcastic attacks on monks and church-abuses and his name therefore appears in the “Index librorum prohibitorum,” as a Lutheran heretic of the Brst class, and as an impious author. It is thought, he carries too far the objections of libertines and scoffers at religion; otherwise his work is interspersed with judicious maxims, and some have considered it as a truly philosophical satire against immorality and prejudice. In the close of the dedication, he declares himself a good catholic, so far as to submit all his opinions to the censure of the church; and this declaration might perhaps have secured him against the inquisition, had the affair related only to some particular tenet; but it could not acquit him of that impiety, which Palingenius was, not without reason, suspected to teach. In his third book, for instance, he inculcates the doctrine of Epicurus without the least reserve. He published this book in 1536, and again at Basil, in1537 ; and seems not to have lived long after that date. Gyraldus, who wrote about 1543, relates, that, after his burial, his body was ordered to be dug up, in order to be burnt; which execution was prevented by the duchess of Ferrara, who, it is thought, had received him at her court among the Lutherans.

, a platonic philosopher and man of letters, was born, in 1529, at Clissa in Illyricum, and was educated at Padua. In 1553 he began to appear as an author by some miscellaneous Italian tracts. In 1557, with the view of obtaining the patronage of the duke of Ferrara, he published a panegyrical poem on the house of Este, entitled “L'Eridano,” in a novel kind of heroic verse of thirteen syllables. After this, for several years, he passed an unsettled kind of life, in which he twice visited the isle of Cyprus, where he took up his abode for seven years, and which he finally quitted on its reduction by the Turks in 1571. He also travelled into France and Spain, and spent three years in the latter country, collecting a treasure of ancient Greek Mss. which he lost on his return to Italy. In 1578 he was invited to Ferrara by duke Alphonso II. to teach philosophy in the university of that city. Afterwards, upon the accession of Clement VIII. to the popedom, he was appointed public professor of the Platonic philosophy at Rome, an office which he held with high reputation till his death, hi 1597. He professed to unite the doctrines of Aristotle and Plato, but in reality undermined the authority of the former. He wholly deserted the obscurity of the Jewish Cabbala, and in teaching philosophy closely followed the ancient Greek writers. During his lecturing at Rome, he more openly discovered his aversion to the Aristotelian philosophy, and advised the pope to prohibit the teaching pf it in the schools, and to introduce the doctrine of Plato, as more consonant to the Christian faith. His “Discussiones Peripatetics,” a learned, perspicuous, and elegant work, fully explains the reason on which his disapprobation of the Peripatetic philosophy was founded. He was one of the first of the moderns who attentively observed the phenomena of nature, and he made use of every opportunity, that his travels afforded him, for collecting remarks concerning various points of astronomy, meteorology, and natural history. In one of his “Dialogues on Rhetoric,” he advanced, under the fiction of an Ethiopic tradition, a theory of the earth which some have thought similar to that afterwards proposed by Dr. Thomas Burnet. His other principal works were, “Nova Geometria,” 1587; “Parallels Militari,” 1594, both of which are full of whimsical theories and an elaborate edition of “Oracula Zoroastris, Hermetis Trismegisti, et aliorum ex scriptis Platonicorum collecta, Graece et Latine, prefixa Dissertation^ Historica,” 1591.

During this early period he distinguished himself likewise as a poet, by his compositions both in the Latin and Italian languages, almost all which, however, as they were disapproved either by the nicety of his maturer judgment, or by the purity of his religious and moral feelings, at a later period, he was induced to destroy. Many also of his letters, which are still extant, were written whilst he was yet very young; and from them proofs might be selected, tending greatly to support the high juvenile reputation of their author. We have, indeed, few other documents to illustrate his literary career; and the little we know of his progress, during the seven years that he spent in visiting the universities, must be taken from them, as Mr. Gressvvell has done with great judgment. Among the academies where he passed the greater part of the above period, were those of Ferrara, Padua, Florence, and Perugia; and among the eminent scholars, with whom he entered into friendship and correspondence, were Guarinus, Marsilius Ficinus, Politian, and Nic. Leonicenus. When not engaged in any literary excursion, he spent his time at Fratta, a rural retreat in the neighbourhood of Mirandula. In 1482, he informs Leanicenns that he had erected this villa, and had written a poem in its, praise. With the commencement of 1484, the literary career of Picus became more distinct and conspicuous: he was now approaching the age of manhood; and went to Florence to perfect himself in the Greek. Within a few months after his arrival here, he composed his well-known panegyrical criticism on the Italian poems of Lorenzo de Medici. It is drawn up in the form of a letter, and addressed to Lorenzo himself. With many remarks in the true spirit of criticism, there is, perhaps, rather too much of a courtly partiality to the productions of Lorenzo. While at Florence, we find Picus employed in investigating the manuscripts of ancient authors, both in Greek and Latin, of the value of which he was already enabled to form a just estimate. Indeed the mere discovery of them was a service of high importance at that time, when the invention of printing was forming a new oera in literature. He had now added to his correspondents Jerome Donatus, Hermolaus Barbarus, Philip Beroaldus, and Alexander Cortesius, the latter of whom seems to carry his admiration of Picus to the very borders of gross and extravagant flattery; which, however, a little moderated, was a distinguishing feature in the literary correspondence of that age.

, was the son of Galeoti Picus, the eldest brother of John Picus, just recorded, and born fcbout 1409. He cultivated learning and the sciences, after the example of his uncle; but he had dominions and a principality to superintend, which involved him in great troubles, and at last cost him his life. Upon the death of his father, in 1499, he succeeded, as eldest son, to his estates; but was scarcely in possession, when his brothers Louis and Frederic combined against him; and, by the assistance of the emperor Maximilian I. and Hercules I. duke of Ferrara, succeeded. John Francis, driven from his principality in 1502, was forced to seek refuge in different countries for nine years; till at length pope Julius II. becoming master of Mirandula, put to flight Frances Trivulce, the widow of Louis, and re-established John Francis in 1511. But he could not long maintain his post; for the pope’s troops being beaten by the French at Ravenna, April 11, 1512, John James Trivulce, general of the French army, forced away John Francis again, and set up Frances Trivulce, who was his natural daughter. John. JFrancis now became a refugee a second time, and so continued for two years; when, the French being driven out of Italy, he was restored again in 1515. He lived from that time in the quiet possession of his dominions, till October 1533; and then Galeoti Picus, the son of his brother Louis, entered his castle by night with forty armed men, and assassinated him, with his eldest son Albert Picus. He died embracing the crucifix, and imploring pardon of God for his sins,

, an Italian historian and miscellaneous writer, was born at Ferrara in 1530, and prosecuted his studies with so much success, that at the age of twenty he obtained the professorship of rhetoric in his native city. Alphonsus II. who was then hereditary prince of Ferrara, having heard some of his lectures, conceived a high opinion of him, and when he succeeded his father, extended his friendship to Pigna in a manner calculated to raise ambition in him, and envy among his contemporaries. Pigna, however, while he set a proper value on his prince’s favours, studiously avoided every occasion of profiting by them, and refused every offer of preferment which was made, employing such time as he could spare from his attendance at court, on his studies. He died in 1575, in the forty-sixth year of his age, greatly lamented by the citizens of Ferrara, who had admired him as a favourite without pride, and a courtier without ambition. His chief work, as an historian, was his history of the house of Este, “Historia de' Principi di Este, in sino al 1476,” published at Ferrara, 1570, folio. This is a well- written account, but contains too much of the fabulous early history of that illustrious family, which was never judiciously investigated until Muratori and Leibnitz undertook the task. Pigna’s other works are, I. “11 Principe,” Venice, 1560, 8vo, in imitation of Machiavel’s Prince, but written upon sound principles, which, says one of his biographers with too much truth, is the reason why it is almost unknown. 2. “II duello, &c.” 1554, 4to. 3. “I Romanzi in quali della poesia e della vita d'Ariosto si tratta,” Venice, 1554, 4to. 4. “Carminum libri quatuor,” in a collection consisting likewise of the poems of Calcagnini and Ariosto, printed at Venice in 1553, 8vo.

, a learnedwriter of the sixteenth century, was a native of Candia, where he was born in 1511, but was brought up at the court of Renee of France, daughter of Louis XII. and consort of Hercules II. duke of Ferrara, and afterwards taught Greek in that city. There also an acquaintance with Calvin induced him to embrace the reformed religion, for the quiet enjoyment of which he went to Geneva in 1561, and was appointed Greek professor, an office which he appears to have held until his death in 1581. He published commentaries and annotations upon Pindar, Sophocles, some of the works of Xenophon, Thucydides, Aristotle’s Rhetoric, Longinus, and some other writers, a Latin version of the Psalms, and the Hymns of Synesius, an improved edition of Constantine’s Greek Lexicon, a reply to Peter Charpentier’s defence of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, and other pieces.

Several other works of his were printed after his death, or left in manuscript. I. “God made man, A Tract proving the nativity of our Saviour to be on the 25th of December,” Lond. 1661, 8vo, with his portrait. This was answered in the first postscript to a treatise entitled tc A brief (but true) account of the certain Year, Month, Day, and Minute of the birth of Jesus Christ,“Lond. 1671, 8vo, by John Butler, B. D. chaplain to James duke of Ormonde, and rector of Litchborow, in the diocese of Peterboroup-h. 2.” Discourse of the office of Lord Chancellor of England,“London, 1671, in fol. printed with Dugdale’s catalogue of lord chancellors and lord keepers of England from the Norman conquest. 3, Several treatises, viz.” England’s Epinomis;“already mentioned, published 1683, in fol. by Redman Westcot, alias Littleton, with the English translation of Selden’s” Jani Anglorum Facies altera.“4.” Ta. ble talk: being the discourses or his sense of various maU ters of weight and high consequence, relating especially to Religion and State,“London, 1689, 4to, published by Richard Mil ward, amanuensis to our author. Dr. Wilkins observes, that there are many things in this book inconsistent with Seiden’s great learning, principles, aud character. It has, however, acquired popularity, and still continues to be printed, as an amusing and edifying manual. 5.” Letters to learned men;“among which several to archbishop Usher are printed in the collection of letters at the end of Parr’s life of that prelate; and two letters of his to Mr. Thomas Greaves were first published from the originals by Thomas Birch, M. A. and F. R. 8. in the life prefixed to Birch’s edition of the” Miscellaneous works of Mr. John Greaves,“Lond. 1737, in two volumes, 8vo. 6.” Speeches, Arguments, Debates, &c. in Par! lament.“7. He had a considerable hand in, and gave directions and advice towards, the edition of” Plutarch’s Lives,“printed in 1657, with an addition of the year of the world, and the year of our Lord, together with many chronological notes and explications. His works were collected by Dr. David Wiljvins, and printed at London in three volumes fol. 1726. The two first volumes contain his Latin works, and the third his English. The editor has prefixed a long life of the author, and added several pieces never published before, particularly letters, poems, &c. In 1675 there was printed at London in 4to,” Joannis Seldeni Angli Liber de Nummis, &c. Huic accedit Bibliotheca Nummaria.“But this superficial tract was not written by our author, but by Alexander Sardo of Ferrara, and written before Selden was born, being published at Mentz, 1575, in 4to. The” Bibliotheca Nummaria" subjoined to it was written by father Labbe the Jesuit.

, a celebrated traveller, second son of Thomas Shirley of Weston, in Sussex, was born in 1565. He studied at Hart-hall, Oxford, where he took his bachelor’s decree in 1581, and in the same year was elected probationer fellow of All Souls College. Leaving the university, he spent some time in one of tru 1 inns of court, after which he travelled on the continent, and joined the English troops, which, at that time, were serving in Holland. In 1596 he was one of the adventurers who went against the Spaniards in their settlements in the West Indies; and on his return, the earl of Essex, with whom he was a great favourite, employed him in the wars in Ireland, for his services in which he was knighted. After this he was sent by the queen into Italy, in order to assist the people of Ferrara in their contest with the pope: but finding that before he arrived, peace had been, signed, he proceeded to Venice, and travelled from thence to Persia, where he became a favourite with Shah Abbas, who sent him as his ambassador to England in 1612. By the 'emperor of Germany he was raised to the dignity of count, and by the king of Spain he was appointed admiral of the Levant seas. Such honours excited the jealousy of James I. who ordered him to return, but this he thought proper to disobey, and is supposed to have died in Spain about the year 1630. There is an account of his West Indian expedition in the third volume of Hakluyt’s collection, under the following title: “A true Relation of the Voyage undertaken by Sir Anthony Shirley, Knight, in 1596, intended for the island San Tome, but performed to St. Jago, Dominica, Margarita, along the Coast of Tien a Firma to the Isle of Jamaica, the Bay of Honduras, thirty leagues up Rio Dolce, and homewards by Newfoundland, with the memorable Exploits achieved in all this Voyage.” His travels into Persia are printed separately, and were published in London in 1613, 4to; and his travels over the Caspian sea, and through Russia, were inserted in Purchas’s Pilgrimages.

, father and son, were two poets of Ferrara, who both wrote in Latin. Their poems were printed together at Venice, 1513, 8vo, and consist of elegies and other compositions, in a pure and pleasing style. Titus died about 1502, at the age of eighty. Hercules, his son, was killed by a rival in 1508. Strozzi was also an illustrious name at Florence, which migrated with the Medici’s into France, and there rose to the highest military honours, as they had in their own country attained the greatest commercial rank. There have been several other writers of the name, of whom we shall notice only one, as most remarkable, Cyriac Strozzi, who was a profound student in the works of Aristotle, and therefore considered as a peripatetic philosopher. He was born at Florence in 1504. He travelled over a great part of the world, and pursued his studies wherever he went. He was a professor of Greek and of philosophy at Florence, Bologna, and Pisa, in all which places he was highly esteemed. He died in 1565, at the age of sixty-one. He added a ninth and a tenth book to the eight books of Aristotle’s politics, and wrote them both in Greek and Latin. He had so completely made himself master of the style and sentiments of his great model, that he has been thought, in some instances, to rival him. He had a sister, Laurentia, who wrote Latin poems. Considerable information may be found respecting the Strozzi in our authorities.

Here Tasso formed the design of his celebrated poem, ie Jerusalem Delivered:“he invented the fable, disposed the different parts, and determined to dedicate this work to the glory of the house of Este. He was greatly esteemed by Alphonso II. the last duke of Ferrara, that great patron of learning and learned men, and by his brother, cardinal Luigi. There was a sort of contest between these two brothers, in relation to the poem: the cardinal imagined that he had a right to he the Maecenas of all Tasso‘ s works, as ’fRinaldo,” hi? first piece, had been dedicated to him: the duke, on the other bane), thought that, as his brother had already received his share pf honour, he ought not to be offended at seeing the name qf Alphonso at the head of the “Jerusalem Delivered.” Tasso for three or four years Suspended his deterrainatipn: at length, being earnestly pressed by both the brothers to take up his residence in Ferrara, he suffered himself to be prevailed upon. The duke gave him an apartment in his palace, where he lived in peace and affluence, and pursued his design of completing his “Jerusalem,” which be riov resolved to dedicate to Alphonso. The duke, who was desirous of fixing Tasso near him, had thoughts of marrying hiin advantageously, but he always evaded any proposal of that kind: though he appeared peculiarly devoted to Alphonso, yet he neglected not to pay his court to the cardinal.

The second Leonora that was given him for a mistress was the countess of San Vitale, daughter of the count of Sala, who lived at that time at the court of Ferrara, and passed for one of the most accomplished persons in Italy. Those who imagined that Tasso would not presume to lift his eyes to his master’s sister, supposed that he loved this lady. It is certain that he had frequent opportunities of discoursing with her, and that she had frequently been the subject of his verses. The third Leonora was a lady in the service of the princess Leonora of Este. This person was thought by some to be the most proper object of the poet’s gallantry. Tasso, several times, employed his muse in her service: in one of his pieces he confesses that, considering the princess as too high for. his hope, he had fixed his affection upon her, as of a condition more suitable to his own. But if any thing can be justly drawn from this particular, it seems rather to strengthen the opinion, that his desires, at least at one time, had aspired to a greater height. It appears, however, difficult to determine with certainty in relation to Tasso' s passion; especially when we consider the privilege allowed to poets: though M. Mirabuud makes no scruple to mention it as a circumstance almost certain, and fixes it without hesitation on the princess Leonora. Tasso, himself, in several of his poems, seems to endeavour to throw an obscurity over his passion. In the mean while Tasso proceeded with his <c Jerusalem," which he completed in the thirtieth year of his age; but this poem was not published by his own authority; it was printed against his will, as soon as he had finished the last book, and before he had time to give the revisals and corrections that a work of such a nature required. The public had already seen several parts, which had been sent into the world by the authority of his patrons. The success of this work was prodigious: it was translated into the Latin, French, Spanish, and even the oriental languages, almost as soon as it appeared-, and it may be said, that no such performance ever before raised its reputation to such a height in so small a space of time. But the satisfaction which Tasso must have felt, in spite of all his philosophy, at the applause of the public, was soon disturbed by a melancholy event. Bernardo Tasso, who spent his old age in tranquillity at Ostia upon the P<>, the government of which place had been given him by the duke of Mantua, fell sick. As soon as this news reached his son, he immediately went to him, attended him with the most filial regard, and scarce ever stirred from his bedside during the whole time of his illness: but all these cares were ineffectual; Bernardo, oppressed with age, and overcome by the violence of his distemper, paid the unavoidable tribute to nature, to the great affliction of Torqua:o. The duke of Mantua, who had a sincere esteem lor Bernardo, caused him to be interred, with much pomp, in the church of St. Egidius at Mantua, with this simple inscription on his tomb:

This death seemed to forebode other misfortunes to Tasso; for the remainder of his life proved almost one continued series of vexation and affliction. About this time a swarm of critics began to attack his “Jerusalem,” and the academy della Crusca, in particular, published a criiicisnii of his poem, in which they scrupled not to prefer the rhapsodies of Pulci and Boyardoto the “Jerusalem Delivered.” During Tasso’s residence in the duke’s court, he had contracted an intimacy with a gentleman of Ferrara, and having entrusted him with some transactions of a very delicate nature, this person was so treacherous as to speak of them again. Tasso reproached his friend with his indiscretion, who received his expostulation in such a manner, that Tasso was so far exasperated as to strike him: a challenge immediately ensued: the two opponents met at St. Leonard’s gate; but, while they were engaged, three brothers of Tasso’s antagonist came in and basely fell all at once upon Tasso, who defended himself so gallantly that he wounded two of them, and kept his ground against the others, till some people came in and separated them. This affair made a great noise at Ferrara: nothing was talked of but the valour of Tasso; and it became a sort of proverb, “That Tasso with his pen and his sword was superior to all men.” The duke, being informed of the quarrel, expressed great resentment against the four brothers, banished them from his dominions, and confiscated their estates; at the same time he caused Tasso to be put under arrest, declaring he did it to screen him from any future designs of his enemies. Tasso was extremely mortified to see himself thus confined; he imputed his detention to a very different cause from what was pretended, and feared an ill use might be made of what had passed, to ruin him in the duke’s opinion.

Though writers have left us very much in the dark with regard to the real motives that induced the duke to keep Tasso in confinement, yet, every thing being weighed, it seems highly probable that the affair of a delicate nature, said to have been divulged by his friend, must have related to the princess Leonora, the duke’s sister : and indeed it will be extremely difficult, from any other consideration, to account for the harsh treatment he received from a prince, who had before shown him such peculiar marks of esteem and friendship. However, Tasso himself had undoubtedly secret apprehensions that increased upon him every day, while the continual attacks which were made upon his credit as an author, not a little contributed to heighten his melancholy. At length he resolved to take the first opportunity to fly from his prison, for so he esteemed it, which after about a year’s detention he effected, and retired to Turin, where he endeavoured to remain concealed; but notwithstanding all his precautions, he was soon known, and recommended to the duke of Savoy, who received him into his palace, and showed him every mark of esteem and affection. But Tasso’s apprehensions still continued; he thought that the duke of Savoy would not refuse to give him up to the duke of B'errara, or sacrifice the friendship of that prince to the safety of a private person. Full of these imaginations he set out for Rome, alone and unprovided with necessaries for such a journey. At his arrival there he went directly to his old friend Mauritio Cataneo, who received him in such a manner as entirely to obliterate for some time the remembrance of the fatigue and uneasiness he had undergone. He was not only welcomed by Cataneo, but the whole city of Rome seemed to rejoice at the presence of so extraordinary a person. He was visited by princes, cardinals, prelates, and by all the learned in general. But the desire of revisiting his native country, and seeing his sister Cornelia, soon made him uneasy in this situation. He left his friend Mauritio Cataneo one evening, without giving him notice; and, beginning his journey on foot, arrived by night at the mountains of Veletri, where he took up his lodging with some shepherds: the next morning, disguising himself in the habit of one of these people, he continued his way, and in four days time reached Gaieta, almost spent with fatigue: here he embarked on board a vessel bound for Sorrento, at which place he arrived in safety the next day. He entered the city and went directly to his sister’s house: she was a widow, and the two sons she had by her husband being at that time absent, Tasso found her with only some of hr i <-n:ale attendants. He advanced towards her, without discovering himself, and pretending he came with news from her brother, gave her a letter which he had prepared for that purpose. This letter informed her that her brother’s life was in great danger, and that he begged her to make use of all the interest her tenderness might suggest to her, in order to procure letters of recommendation from some powerful person, to avert the threatened misfortune. For further particulars of the affair, she was referred to the messenger who brought her this intelligence.The lady, terrified at the news, earnestly entreated him to give her a detail of her brother’s misfortune. The feigned messenger then gave her so interesting an account of the pretended story, that, unable to contain her affliction, she fainted away. Tasso was sensibly touched at this convincing proof of his sister’s affection, and repented that he had gone so far: he began to comfort her, and, removing her fears by little and little, at last discovered himself to her. Her joy at seeing a brother whom she tenderly loved, was inexpressible after- the first salutations were over, she was very desirous to know the occasion of his disguising himself in that manner. Tasso acquainted her with his reasons, and, at the same time, giving her to understand, that he would willingly remain with her unknown to the world, Cornelia, who desired nothing further than to acquiesce in his pleasure, sent for her children and some of her nearest relations, whom she thought might be entrusted with the secret. They agreed that Tasso should pass for a relation of theirs, who came from Bergamo to Naples upon his private business, and from thence had come to Sorrento to pay them a visit. After this precaution, Tasso took up his residence at his sister’s house, where he lived for some time in tranquillity, entertaining himself with his two nephews Antonio and Alessandro Sersale, children of great hopes. The princess Leonora of Este, however, who was acquainted with the place of his retreat, invited him to return to Ferrara, which he did in company with Gualingo, ambassador from the duke to the pope. Concerning the motive of Tasso’s return to Ferrara, some authors think that, weary of living in obscurity, he had resolved to throw himself upon the duke’s generosity. This opinion seems indeed drawn from Tasso’s own words in a letter written by him to the duke of Urbino, in which he declares, “that he had endeavoured to make his peace with the duke, and had for that purpose written severally to him, f the duchess of Ferrara, the duchess of Urbino, and the princess Leonora; yet never received any answer but from the last, who assured him it was not in her power to render him any service.” We see here that Tasso acknowledges himself the receipt of a letter from the princess; and in regard to what he says to be the purport of it, it is highly reasonable to suppose, that he would be very cautious of divulging the real contents to the duke of Urbino, when his affairs with that lady were so delicately circumstanced. This apparent care to conceal the nature of his correspondence with her, seems to corroborate the former suppositions of his uncommon attachment to her; and when all circumstances are considered, it seems more than probable that he returned to Ferrara at the particular injunction of Leonora.

He then went to Mantua, where he found duke Guglielmo in a decrepid age, and little disposed to protect him against the duke of Ferrara: the prince Vincentio Gonzaga received him indeed with great caresses, but was too young to take him under his protection. From thence he went to Padua and Venice, but carrying with him in every part his fears of the duke of Ferrara, he at last had recourse to the duke of Urbino, who shewed him great kindness, but perhaps was very little inclined to embroil himself with his brother-in-law, on such an account: he advised Tasso rather to return to P'errara, which counsel he took, resolv ing once more to try his fortune with the duke. Alphonso, it may be, exasperated at Tasso’s flight, and pretending to believe that application to study had entirely disordered his understanding, and that a strict regimen was necessary to restore him to his former state, caused him to be strictly confined in the hospital of St. Anne. Tasso tried every method to soften the duke and obtain his liberty; but the duke coldly answered those who applied to him, “that instead of concerning themselves with the complaints of a person in his condition, who was very little capable of judging for his own good, they ought rather to exhort him patiently to submit to such remedies as were judged proper for his circumstances.” This confifiement threw Tasso into the deepest despair; he abandoned himself to his misfortunes, and the methods that were made use of for the cure of his pretended madness had nearly thrown him into an absolute delirium. His imagination was so disturbed that he believed the cau&e of his distemper was not natural; he sometimes fancied himself haunted by a spirit, that continually disordered his books and papers; and these strange notions were perhaps strengthened by the tricks that were played him by his keeper. This second confinement of Tasso was much longer than the first; but after seven years confinement, his release was procured by Vincentio Gonzaga, prince of Mantua, who took him with him to Mantua. It is said that the young prince, who was naturally gay, being desirous to authorize his pleasures by the example of a philosopher, introduced one day into Tasso’s company three sisters, to sing and play upon instruments: these ladies were all very handsome, but not of the most rigid virtue. After some short discourse, he told Tasso, that he should take two of them away, and would leave one behind, and bade him take his choice. Tasso answered “that it cost Paris very dear to give the preference to one of the goddesses, and, therefore, with his permission, he designed to retain the three.” The prince took him at his word, and departed; when Tasso, after a little conversation, dismissed them all handsomely with presents.

Cardinal Cynthio dying without putting his design in execution, cardinal Bonifacio Bevilacqua, of an illustrious family of Ferrara, caused a stately sepulchre to be erected, in the church of St. Onuphrius, over the remains of a man whose works had made all other monuments superfluous.

In order to acquire a greater knowledge of the principles of architecture, Vignola went to Rome, and at first returned to painting fora maintenance; but not reaping much profit, abandoned that art a second time, and procured employment as a draughtsman from Melighini, of Ferrara, then architect to pope Paul III. and who had established a school of architecture at Rome. Yignola was afterwards employed to make drawings, for the use of this academy, of the ancient edifices of the city, from which he derived great advantage in his studies. While here, about 1537, or J 540, he met with Primaticcio, who was employed by Francis I. king of France, to purchase antiques (See Primaticcio); and Vignola was of so much service in making casts for him, that Primaticcio engaged him to go with him to France. There Vignola assisted that celebrated artist in all his works, and particularly in making the bronze casts which are at Fontainebleau. He also made various architectural designs for the king, who was prevented from having them executed, by the wars in which France was then involved. After a residence of about two years, he was invited to Bologna, to undertake the new church of St. Petronius, and his design was allowed the preference, and highly approved by Julio Romano, the celebrated painter, and Christopher Lombard, the architect. At Minerbio, near Bologna, he built a magnificent palace for count Isolani, and in Bologna the house of Achilles Bocchi. The portico of the exchange in that city is also of his designing, but it was not built until 1562, in the pontificate of Pius IV. His most useful work at Bologna was the canal of Navilio, which he constructed with great skill for the space of a league. But happening to be ill rewarded for this undertaking, he went to Placentia, where he gave a design for the duke of Parma’s palace, which was executed by his son Hyacinth, who was now able to assist him in his various works. He afterwards built several churches and chapels in various parts of Italy, which it is unnecessary to specify. These, it is supposed, he had finished before his return to Rome in 1550, where Vasari presented him to pope Julius III. who appointed him his architect. While at Rome, he was employed in various works, both of grandeur and utility, the last of which, and reckoned his finest work, was the magnificent palace or castle of Caprarola, so well described and illustrated by plates in his works.