, a learned divine and antiquary, was born at Ey worth, in Bedfordshire, and was the son of Paul Chishull, formerly bible clerk of Queen’s college,
, a learned divine and antiquary,
was born at Ey worth, in Bedfordshire, and was the son of
Paul Chishull, formerly bible clerk of Queen’s college,
Cambridge, and master of arts, as a member of Pembroke
college, Oxford. His son being intended for the church,
was sent to Oxford, became a scholar of Corpus Christi
college, and received the degree of master of arts in
February 1693; and he was chosen, likewise, a fellow of
his college. Previously to his commencing master of arts,
he had published in 1692, a Latin poem, inquarto, on
occasion of the famous battle of La Hogue, entitled, “Gulielmo Tertio terra manque principi invictissimo in Gallos
pugna navali nuperrime devictos, ' carmen heroic urn,
”
Oxon. When queen Mary died, on the 28th of December 1694, Mr. Chishull was one of the Oxford gentlemen
who exerted their poetical talents in deploring that melancholy event, and his tribute of loyalty is preserved in
the third volume of the Musse Anglicans, but is rather a
school exercise, than a production of genius. In 1698,
having obtained a grant of the traveller’s place, from the
society of Corpus Christi college, he sailed from England
on the 12th of September, and arrived on the 19th of November following at Smyrna. Before he set out on his
voyage, he preached a sermon to the Levant company,
which was published, and probably procured him to be
appointed chaplain to the English factory at Smyrna, in.
which station he continued till the 12th of February,
1701-2. On the 16th of June, 1705, he was admitted to
the degree of bachelor in divinity. In the next year he
engaged in a controversy, which at that time excited
considerable attention, by publishing “A charge of Heresy maintained against Mr. Dodwell’s late Epistolary Discourse concerning the Mortality of the Soul,
” London,
8vo. This was one of the principal books written in
answer to Dodwell on that subject. In 1707, Chishull
exerted his endeavours in opposing the absurdities and
enthusiasm of the French prophets, and their followers, in
a sermon, on the 23d of November, at Serjeant’s-inn
chapel, in Chancery-lane, which was published in the
beginning of 1708, and was entitled, “The great Danger
and Mistake of all new uninspired Prophecies relating to
the End of the World,
” with an appendix of historical
collections applicable to subject. On the 1st of September, in the same year, he was presented to the vicarage of
Walthamstow, in Essex; and in 1711, he had the honour
of being appointed one of the chaplains in ordinary to the
queen. About the same time, he published a visitation
and a few other occasional sermons, preached on public
occasions, all which were favourably received. But he,
soon became more distinguished for his researches in ancient literature and history.
D‘Ewes (Sir Symonds), an English historian and antiquary, was the son of Paul D’Eues, esq. and born in 1602, at Coxden in Dorsetshire,
D‘Ewes (Sir Symonds), an English historian and antiquary, was the son of Paul D’Eues, esq. and born in
1602, at Coxden in Dorsetshire, the seat of Richard Syxnonds, esq. his mother’s father. He was descended from
an ancient family in the Low Countries, from whence his
ancestors removed hither, and gained a considerable settlement in the county of Suffolk. In 1618, he was entered a
fellow- commoner of St. John’s college in Cambridge and
about two years after, began to collect materials for forming a correct and complete history of Great Britain. He
was no less studious in preserving the history of his own
times; setting down carefully the best accounts he was
able to obtain of every memorable transaction, at the time
it happened. This disposition in a young man of parts
recommended him to the acquaintance of persons of the
first rank in the republic of letters, such as Cotton, Selden,
Spelman, &c. In 1626, he married Anne, daughter to sir
William Clopton of Essex, an exquisite beauty, not fourteen years old, with whom he was so sincerely captivated,
that his passion for her seems to have increased almost to
a degree of extravagance, even after she was his wife. He
pursued his studies, however, as usual, with great vigour
and diligence, and when little more than thirty years of
age, finished that large and accurate work for which he is
chiefly memorable. This work he kept by him during his
life-time it being written, as he tells us, for his own private use. It was published afterwards with this title
“The Journals of all the Parliaments during the reign of
queen Elizabeth, both of the House of Lords and House
of Commons, collected by sir Symonds D'Ewes, of Stowhall in the county of Suffolk, knt. and bart. revised and
published by Paul Bowes, of the Middle Temple, esq.
1682,
” folio. In
, a very eminent mathematician, was born at Basil, on the 14th of April, 1707: he was the son of Paul Euler and of Margaret Brucker (of a family illustrious
, a very eminent mathematician,
was born at Basil, on the 14th of April, 1707: he was the
son of Paul Euler and of Margaret Brucker (of a family illustrious in literature), and spent the first year of his life
at the village of Richen, of which place his father was protestant minister. Being intended for the church, his father,
who had himself studied under James Bernoulli!, taught
him mathematics, as a ground-work of his other studies, or
at least a noble and useful secondary occupation. But
Euler, assisted and perhaps secretly encouraged by John
Bernoulli, who easily discovered that he would be the
greatest scholar he should ever educate, soon declared his
intention of devoting his life to that pursuit. This intention the wise father did not thwart, but the son did not so
blindly adhere to it, as not to connect with it a more than
common improvement in every other kind of useful learn-,
ing, insomuch that in his latter days men often wondered
how with such a superiority in one branch, he could have
been so near to eminence in all the rest. Upon the foundation of the academy of sciences at St. Petersburgh, in,
1723, by Catherine I. the two younger Bernouillis, NichoJas and Daniel, had gone thither, promising, when they
set out, to endeavour to procure Euler a place in it: they
accordingly wrote to him soon after, to apply his mathetics to physiology, which he did, and studied under the
best naturalists at Basil, but at the same time, i. e. in 1727,
published a dissertation on the nature and propagation of
sound; and an answer to the question on the masting of
ships, which the academy of sciences at Paris judged
worthy of the accessit. Soon after this, he was called to
St. Petersburgh, and declared adjutant to the mathematical
class in the academy, a class, in which, from the circumstances of the times (Newton, Leibnitz, and so many other eminent scholars being just dead), no easy laurels were to
be gathered. Nature, however, who had organized so
many mathematical heads at one time, was not yet tired
of her miracles and she added Euler to the number. He
indeed was much wanted the science of the calculus integralis, hardly come out of the hands of its creators, was
still too near the stage of its infancy not to want to be made
more perfect. Mechanics, dynamics, and especially hydrodynamics, and the science of the motion of the heavenly bodies, felt the imperfection. The application of
the differential calculus, to them, had been sufficiently
successful; but there were difficulties whenever it was necessary to go from the fluxional quantity to the fluent.
With regard to the nature and properties of numbers, the
writings of Fermat (who had been so successful in them),
and together with these all his profound researches, were
lost. Engineering and navigation were reduced to vague
principles, and were founded on a heap of often contradictory observations, rather than a regular theory. The
irregularities in the motions of the celestial bodies, and
especially the complication of forces whitfh influence that
of the moon, were still the disgrace of geometers. Practical astronomy had jet to wrestle with the imperfection of
telescopes, insomuch, that it could hardly be said that any
rule for making them existed. Euler turned his eyes to
all these objects he perfected the calculus integralis he
was the inventor of a new kind of calculus, that of sines
he simplified analytical operations and, aided by these
powerful help-mates, and the astonishing facility with
which he knew how to subdue expressions the most intractable, he threw a new light on all the branches of the mathematics. But at Catherine’s death the academy was
threatened with extinction, by men who knew not the connection which arts and sciences have with the happiness of
a people. Euler was offered and accepted a lieutenancy
on board one of the empress’s ships, with the promise of
speedy advancement. Luckily things changed, and the
learned captain again found his own element, and was
named Professor of Natural Philosophy in 1733, in the
room of his friend John Bernouilli. The number of memoirs which Euler produced, prior to this period, is astonishing, but what he did in 1735 is almost incredible,
An important calculation was to be made, without loss of
time; the other academicians had demanded some months
to do it. Euler asked three days—in three days he did it;
but the fatigne threw him into a fever, and the fever left
him not without the loss of an eye, an admonition which
would have made an ordinary man more sparing of the
other. The great revolution, produced by the discovery
of fluxions, had entirely changed the face of mechanics;
still, however, there was no complete work on the science
of motion, two or three only excepted, of which Euler felt
the insufficiency. He saw, with pain, that the best works
on the subject, viz. “Newton’s Principia,
” and “Herman’s Phoronomia,
” concealed the method by which these
great men had come at so many wonderful discoveries,
under a synthetic veil. In order to lift this up, Euler
employed all the resources of that analysis which had
served him so well on so many other occasions; and thus
uniting his own discoveries to those of other geometers, had
them published by the academy in 1736. To say that
clearness, precision, and order, are the characters of this
work, would be barely to say, that it is, what without these
qualities no work can be, classical of its kind. It placed
Euler in the rank of the first geometricians then existing,
and this at a time when John Bernouilli was still living.
Such labours demanded some relaxation; the only one
which Euler admitted was music, but even to this he could
not go without the spirit of geometry with him. They
produced together the essay on a new theory of music,
which was published in 1739, but not very well received,
probably, because it contains too much geometry for a
musician, and too much music for a geometrician. Independently, however, of the theory, which is built on Pythagorean principles, there are many things in it which
may be of service, both to composers, and to makers of
instruments. The doctrine, likewise, of the genera and
the modes of music is here cleared up with all the clearness and precision which mark the works of Euler. Dr.
Burney remarks, that upon the whole, Euler seems not to
have invented much in this treatise; and to have done little
more than arrange and methodize former discoveries in a
scientific and geometric manner. He may, indeed, not
have known what antecedent writers had discovered before; and though not the first, yet to have imagined himself an inventor. In 1740, his genius was again called
forth by the academy of Paris (who, in 1738, had adjudged the prize to his paper on the nature and properties of fire)
to discuss the nature of the tides, an important question,
which demanded a prodigious extent of calculations, aud
an entire new system of the world. This prize Euler did
not gain alone; but he divided it with Maclaurin and D.
Bernouilli, forming with them a triumvirate of candidates,
which the realms of science had not often beheld. The
agreement of the several memoirs of Euler and Bernouilli,
on this occasion, is very remarkable. Though the one
philosopher had set out on the principle of admitting vortices, which the other rejected, they not only arrived at
the same end of the journey, but met several times on the
road; for instance, in the determination of the tides under
the frozen zone. Philosophy, indeed, led these two great
men by different paths; Bernouilli, who had more patience
than his friend, sanctioned every physical hypothesis he
was obliged to make, by painful and laborious experiment.
These Euler’s impetuous genius scorned; and, though his
natural sagacity did not always supply the loss, he made
amends by his superiority in analysis, as often as there was
any occasion to simplify expressions, to adapt them to
practice, and to recognize, by final formulae, the nature
of the result. In 1741, Euler received some very advantageous propositions from Frederic the Second (who had just ascended the Prussian throne), to go and assist him in
forming an academy of sciences, out of the wrecks of the
Royal Society founded by Leibnitz. With these offers the
tottering state of the St. Petersburgh academy, under the
regency, made it necessary for the philosopher to comply.
He accordingly illumined the last volume of the “Melanges de Berlin,
” with five essays, which are, perhaps,
the best things in it, and contributed largely to the academical volumes, the first of which was published in 1744.
No part of his multifarious labours is, perhaps, a more
wonderful proof of the extensiveness and facility of his
genius, than what he executed at Berlin, at a time when
he contrived also that the Petersburgh acts should not
suffer from the loss of him. In 1744, Euler published a
complete treatise of isoperimetrical curves. The same
year beheld the theory of the motions of tb.e planets and
comets; the well-known theory of magnetism, which gained the Paris prize; and the much-amended translation of
Robins’ s “Treatise on Gunnery.
” In Theory
of Light and Colours
” overturned Newton’s “System of
Emanations;
” as did another work, at that time triumphant,
the “Monads of Wolfe and Leibnitz.
” Navigation was
now the only branch of useful knowledge, for which the
labours of analysis and geometry had done nothing. The
hydrographical part alone, and that which relates to the
direction of the course of ships, had been treated by geometricians conjointly with nautical astronomy. Euler was
the first who conceived and executed the project of making
this a complete science. A memoir on the motion of floating bodies, communicated to the academy of St. Petersburgh, in 1735, by M. le Croix, first gave him this idea.
His researches on the equilibrium of ships furnished him
with the means of bringing the stability to a determined
measure. His success encouraged him to go on, and produced the great work which the academy published in
1749, in which we find, in systematic order, the most
sublime notions on the theory of the equilibrium and mo.
tion of floating bodies, and on the resistance of fluids.
This was followed by a second part, which left nothing to
be desired on the subject, except the turning it into a
language easy of access, and divesting it of the calculations which prevented its being of general use. Accordingly in 1773, from a conversation with admiral Knowles,
and other assistance, out of the “Scientia Navalis,
” 2 vols.
4to, was produced, the “Theorie complette de la Construction et de la Manoeuvre des Vaisseaux.
” This work
was instantly translated into all languages, and the author
received a present of 6000 livres from the French king: he
had before had 300l. from the English parliament, for the
theorems, by the assistance of which Meyer made his lunar
tables .
And now it was time to collect into one systematical and
continued work, all the important discoveries on the infinitesimal analysis, which Euler had been making for
thirty years, and which lay dispersed in the memoirs of the
different academies. This, accordingly, the professor undertook; but he prepared the way by an elementary work,
containing all the previous requisites for this study. This
is called “An Introduction to the analysis of Infinitesimals,
” and is a work in which the author has exhausted
all the doctrine of fractions, whether algebraical or transcendental, by shewing their transformation, their resolution, and their developernent. This introduction was soon,
followed by the author’s several lessons on the “calculus
integralis, and differentialis.
” Having engaged himself
to count Orlow, to furnish the academy with papers sufficient to fill their volumes for twenty years after his death,
the philosopher is likely to keep his word, having presented
seventy papers, through Mr. Golofkin, in the course of his
life, and left two hundred and fifty more behind him; nor
is there one of these that does not contain a discovery, or
something that may lead to one. The most ancient of
these memoirs form the collection then published, under
the title of “Opuscula Analytica.
” Such were Euler’s
labours, and these his titles to immortality His memory
shall endure till science herself is no more! Few men of
letters have written so much as Euler no geometrician,
has ever embraced so many objects at one time or has
equalled him, either in the variety or magnitude of his
discoveries. When we reflect on the good such men do
their fellow-creatures, we cannot help indulging a wish
(vain, alas as it is) for their illustrious course to be prolonged beyond the term allotted to mankind. Euler’s,
though it has had an end, was very long and very honourable; and it affords us some consolation for his loss, to
think that he enjoyed it exempt from the ordinary consequences of extraordinary application, and that his last labours abounded in proofs of that vigour of understanding
which marked his early days, and which he preserved to
his end. Some swimmings in the head, which seized him
on the first days of September, 1783, did not prevent his
laying hold of a few facts, which reached him through the
channel of the public papers, to calculate the motions of
the aerostatical globes; and he even compassed a very difficult integration, in which the calculation had engaged
him . But the decree was gone forth: on the 7th of September he talked with Mr. Lexell, who had come to dine
with him, of the new planet, and discoursed with him upon
other subjects, with his usual penetration. He was playing with one of his grand-children at tea-time, when he
was seized with an apoplectic fit. “I am dying,
” said he,
before he lost his senses; and he ended his glorious life a
few hours after, aged seventy-six years, five months, and
three days. His latter days were tranquil and serene. A
few infirmities excepted, which are the inevitable lot of
an advanced age, he enjoyed a share of health which allowed him to give little time to repose. Euler possessed
to a great degree what is commonly called erudition he
had read all the Latin classics was perfect master of ancient mathematical literature and had the history of all
ages, and all nations, even to the minutest facts, ever present to his mind. Besides this, he knew much more of
physic, botany, and chemistry, than could be expected
from any man who had not made these sciences his peculiar
occupation. “I have seen,
” says his biographer, Mr.
Fuss, “strangers go from him with a kind of surprise mixed
with admiration; they could not conceive how a man,
who for half a century had seemed taken up in making
and publishing discoveries in natural philosophy and mathematics, could have found means to preserve so much
knowledge that seemed useless to himself, and foreign to
the studies in which he was engaged. This was the effect
of a happy memory, that lost nothing of what had ever
been entrusted to it nor was it a wonder that the man
who was able to repeat the whole Æneis, and to point out
to his hearers the first and last verses of every page of his
own edition of it, should not have lost what he had learned,
at an age when the impressions made upon us are the
strongest. Nothing can equal the ease with which, without expressing the least degree of ill-humour, he could
quit his abstruse meditations, and give himself up to the
general amusements of society. The art of not appearing
wise above one’s fellows, of descending to the level of those
with whom one lives, is too rare in these days not to make
it a merit in Euler to have possessed it. A temper ever
equal, a natural and easy chearfulness, a species of satirical wit, tempered with urbane humanity, the art of telling
a story archly, and with simplicity, made his conversation
generally sought. The great fund of vivacity which he
had at all times possessed, and without which, indeed, the
activity we have just been admiring could not have existed,
carried him sometimes away, and he was apt to grow warm,
but his anger left him as quickly as it came on, and there
never has existed a man to whom he bore malice. He
possessed a precious fund of rectitude and probity. The
sworn enemy of injustice, whenever or by whomsoever
committed, he used to censure and attack it, without the
least attention to the rank or riches of the offender. Recent examples of this are in the recollection of all who hear
me.
” As he was filled with respect for religion, his piety
was sincere, and his devotion full of fervour. He went
through all his Christian duties with the greatest attention.
Euler loved all mankind, and if he ever felt a motion of
indignation, it was against the enemy of religion, particularly against the declared apostles of infidelity. He was
of a very religious turn of mind. He published a New Demonstration of the Existence of God, and of the Spirituality
of the Soul, which last has been admitted into several divinity schools as a standard book. With scrupulous exactness he adhered to the religion of his country, that of
Calvinism, and, fortified by its principles, he was a good
husband, a good father, a good friend, a good citizen, a
good member of private society.
, M. D. an eminent physician and polite writer, was born in Holland in 1718. He was the son of Paul Maty, a protestant clergyman, and was originally
, M. D. an eminent physician and polite writer, was born in Holland in 1718. He was the son of Paul Maty, a protestant clergyman, and was originally intended for the church; but, in consequence of some mortifications his father received from the synod, on account of particular sentiments which he entertained about the doctrine of the Trinity, he turned his thoughts to physic. He took his degree at Leyden, and in 1740, came to settle in England, his father having determined to quit Holland for ever.
, a valuable collector of voyages and travels, the son of Paul Ramusio, a lawyer, was born at Venice in 1486. He
, a valuable collector of voyages and travels, the son of Paul Ramusio, a lawyer, was born at Venice in 1486. He made
great proficiency in his classical and philosophical studies,
but had a particular turn for politics, and was thought so
accomplished in the knowledge of public affairs, that he was
frequently deputed by the state to Switzerland, Rome,
and France. He was also made secretary of the council of
ten at Venice, and was for forty-three years more or less
employed in that post, or in embassies. When old and
infirm, he retired to Padua, where he died in July 1557,
in the seventy- second year of his age. His principal work
was entitled “Raccolta delleNavigazioni e de Viaggi,
” and
was published at different periods in three volumes folio.
Of this valuable work complete copies are not easily to be
met with. Brunei recommends the following selection as
forming the best copy: vol. I. of the edition 1563 or 1588;
vol. II. of 1583, and vol.111, of 1565. To this last volume
should be added the supplement to the edition of 1606, p.
386—430, which contains “Viaggio di M. Cesare de Fredrici nelP Inclia-Orientale.
”
, an eminent burlesque French writer, was the son of Paul Scarron, a counsellor in parliament, and born at
, an eminent burlesque French writer, was the son of Paul Scarron, a counsellor in parliament, and born at Pari’s in 1610. Although deformed, and
of very irregular manners, his lather designed him for an
ecclesiastic, and he went to Italy for that purpose, in his
twenty-fourth year, whence he returned equally unfit for
his intended profession, and continued his irregularities until he lost the use of his limbs, and could only use his
hands and tongue. This happened in his twenty-seventh
year but, melancholy as his condition was, his burlesque
humour never forsook him he was continually talking and
writing in this strain and his house became the rendezvous of all the men of wit. Afterwards, a fresh misfortune
overtook him: his father, who had hitherto supplied his
wants, incurred the displeasure of cardinal Richelieu, and
was banished, and although Scarron presented an humble
request to Richelieu, which from its humour pleased
that minister, no answer appears to have been returned,
and both Richelieu and his father died soon after. Scarron at length, helpless, and deformed as he was, conceived thoughts of marriage; and, in 1651, was actually
married to mademoiselle d'Aubigne, afterwards the celebrated madam de Maintenon, who lodged near him, and
was about sixteen years of age. Unequal as this match
was, she, had influence enough to produce some salutary
change in his manners and habits, and her wit and beauty
served to increase the good company which frequented his
house. Scarron died in 1660, and within a few minutes of
his death, when his acquaintance were about him all in
tears, “Ah! my good friends, 7 ' said he,
” you will never
cry for me so much as I have made you laugh."
, the son of Paul, was born at Geneva in 1594, studied at Lyons, and
, the son of Paul, was born at Geneva in 1594, studied at Lyons, and came to Paris at the age of eighteen. He abjured the protestant religion, and in 1614 obtained the title of printer to the king and to the clergy. The cardinal Duperron became his patron, and gave him a pension of 500 livres, which he enjoyed as long as that prelate lived. He reprinted for the booksellers of Paris, the Greek fathers, and published other important works, as Merin’s Bible, Duval’s Aristotle, Strabo, Xenophon, Plutarch, &c. He had by his wife Jean Leclerc several children, and a son Henry, who would have succeeded him, but he died in 1661. Anthony himself became unfortunate, and when infirm and blind, was obliged to solicit a place in the Hotel-Dieu, where he died in 1674, in the eightieth year of his age.
, an eminent artist of Holland, was born at Haerlem, in 1620, and was the son of Paul Wouvermans, a tolerable history-painter, of whom,
, an eminent artist of Holland, was born at Haerlem, in 1620, and was the son of Paul Wouvermans, a tolerable history-painter, of whom, however, he did not learn the principles of his art, but of John Wynants, an excellent painter of Haerlem. It does not appear that he ever was in Italy, or ever quitted the city of Haerlem; though no man deserved more the encouragement a-nd protection of some powerful prince than he did He is one instance, among a thousand, to prove that oftentimes the greatest merit remains without either recompence or honour. His works have all the excellences we can wish; high finishing, correctness, agreeable composition, and a taste for colouring, joined with a force that approaches to the Caracci’s . The pieces he painted in. his latter time have a grey or blueish cast; they are finished with too much labour, and his grounds look too much like velvet: but those he did in his prime are free from these faults, and equal in colouring and correctness to any thing Italy can produce. Wouvermans generally enriched his landscapes with huntings, halts, encampment of armies, and other subjects where horses naturally enter, which he designed better than any painter of his time: there are also some battles and attacks of villages by his hand. These beautiful works, which gained him great reputation, did not make him rich; on the contrary, being charged with a numerous family, and but indifferently paid for his work, he lived very meanly; and, though he painted very quick, and was very laborious, had much ado to maintain himself. The misery of his condition determined him not to bring up any of his children to painting. In his last hours, which happened at Haerlem in 1688, he burnt a box filled with his studies and designs; saying, I have been so ill-paid for my labours, that I would not have those designs engage my son in so miserable a profession." Different authors, however, ascribe the burning of his designs to different motives. Some say it proceeded from his dislike to his brother Peter, being unwilling that he should reap the product of his labours; others allege that he intended to compel his son (if he should follow th'e profession) to seek out the knowledge of nature from his own industry, and not indolently depend on copying those designs; and other writers assign a less honourable motive, which seems to be unworthy of the genius of Wouvermans, and equally unworthy of being perpetuated.