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Ormeville in the diocese of Rouen, and lastly canon of Noyou. He died during the revolution. He commenced his literary career in 1754, with a small poem on the Canary-bird, "Le Serin des Canaries," which was followed by the translation of Quivedo, and a collection of Idyls. He published afterwards in 2 vols. 12mo, a poem on the Promised Land, which had little success, and was justly censured for containing an absurd mixture of sacred and profane history. He then attempted a work more suitable to his profession, had he executed it well, an "Ecclesiastical History," 24 vols. 12mo, 1778 and following years. This had some success, and a second edition was very recently (1811) published at Toulouse, but it is so far inferior to Fleuri, that it is somewhat surprising the French public should have endured it. He left an abridgment of it in manuscript, in 5 vols. 8vo. He was also employed on the "Journal Etranger."'

BERAULT (MICHAEL), pastor and professor of theology at Montauban, about the beginning of the seventeenth century, was chosen to enter into conference with cardinal du Perron at Mantes, in 1593; and in 1598, wrote against him "Brieve et claire defense de la vocation des ministres de l'Evangile," 8vo. The lively interest he took in the affairs of the duke of Rohan, during the civil wars of France, induced him to publish several writings, particularly one, in which he maintained that the clergy were bound to take up arms and shed blood, for which he was censured by the synod. Another BERAULT (CLAUDE) succeeded D'Herbelot, as professor of the Syriac in the royal college of Paris, but is best known by his edition of "Statius," 1685, 2 vols. 4to, which, owing to most of the copies having been burnt by a fire in the printing-office, is the most scarce and dear of all the Delphin quartos. This author died in 1705.-BERAULT (JOSIAS), an advocate of the parliament of Rouen under Henry III. was born in 1563, and died about 1640. He published a "Commentaire sur la Coutume de Normandie," 1650 and 1660, fol. The booksellers of Rouen, in 1626, republished this with the commentaries of Godefroi and Aviron, 2 vols. fol. which were again reprinted in 1684 and 1776.1

BERCHEM (NICOLAS), an eminent artist, was born at Haerlem, in 1624, and was taught the first principles of

Biog. Universelle,

2 Biog, Universelle.-Moreri,

painting by his father, Peter Van Haerlem, an artist of very mean abilities, whose subjects were fish, confectionary, vases of silver, and other objects of still life; but he afterwards had the good fortune to have some of the best masters of that time for his instructors, and successively was the disciple of Grebber, Vangoyen, Mojaart, Jan Wils, and Weeninx. He had an easy expeditious manner of painting, and an inexpressible variety and beauty in the choice of sites for his landscapes, executing them with a surprising degree of neatness and truth. He possessed a clearness and strength of judgment, and a wonderful power and ease in expressing his ideas; and although his subjects were of the lower kind, yet his choice of nature was judicious, and he gave to every subject as much of beauty and elegance as it would admit. The leafing of his trees is exquisitely and freely touched; his skies are clear; and his clouds float lightly, as if supported by air. The distinguishing characters of the pictures of Berchem, are the breadth and just distribution of the lights; the grandeur of his masses of light and shadow; the natural ease and simplicity in the attitudes of his figures, expressing their several characters; the just degradation of his distances; the brilliancy and harmony, as well as the transparency, of his colouring; the correctness and true perspective of his design; and the elegance of his composition: and, where any of those marks are wanting, no authority ought to be sufficient to ascribe any picture to him. He painted every part of his subjects so extremely well, as to render it difficult to determine in which he excelled most; his trees, buildings, waters, rocks, hills, cattle, and figures, being all equally admirable.

One of the most capital pictures of this master was painted for the principal magistrate of Dort, in whose family it is still preserved; being a prospect of a mountainous country, enriched with a great variety of sheep, oxen, goats, and figures, excellently penciled, and most beautifully coloured. While he was employed in painting that picture, the same burgomaster bespoke also a landscape from John Both, and agreed to pay eight hundred guilders for each picture; but to excite an emulation, he promised a considerable premium for the performance which should be adjudged the best. When the pictures were finished, and placed near each other for a critical examination, there appeared such an equality of merit in

each, that he generously presented both artists with an equal sum above the price which he had stipulated. Berchem was singularly curious, in purchasing the finest prints and designs of the Italian masters, as a means of improving his own taste; and after his death, that collection of drawings and prints sold for a very large sum. There was such a demand for his works, that he was generally paid beforehand; and although he was so indefatigable, that very often he would not move from his easel, in the summer months, from four in the morning till day-light failed, (by which close application, he finished a great number of pictures,) yet, at this day, they are rarely to be purchased, and always are sold at an extraordinary high price.

It is recorded of him, that his wife, the daughter of Jan Wils, one of his masters, through her avarice, allowed him no rest, and industrious as he was, she usually placed herself under his painting-room, and when she heard him neither sing nor stir, she struck upon the ceiling to rouse him. She insisted upon having all the money he earned by his labour, so that he was obliged to borrow from his scholars when he wanted money to buy prints, of which, as already noticed, he contrived to form an excellent collection. He passed part of his life in the castle of Bentheim, the situation of which furnished him with the views and animals which compose his pictures, but he died at Harlaem, in 1683. There are many prints engraven by, and after him; the former amounting to forty-eight, and the latter to one hundred and thirty three.'

BERCHET (PETER), a French artist, who practised in England, was born in France, in 1659, and at the age of fifteen was placed under the care of La Fosse, with whom his improvement was so considerable, that in three years he was qualified to be employed in one of the royal palaces. In 1681 he went to England, where he worked under Rambour, a French painter of architecture; and afterwards he was engaged in different works for several of the English nobility. The ceiling in the chapel of Trinity college, in Oxford, was painted by this master; he also painted the staircase at the duke of Schomberg's in London, and the. summer-house at Ranelagh. His drawings in the academy were much approved; but towards the latter part of his

1 Pilkington and Strutt.-Lives of Painters omitted by De Piles, 8vo. p. 94.Argenville.

life, he only painted small pieces in the historical style, for which the subjects were taken from fabulous history; and his last performance was a Bacchanalian, to which he affixed his name the very day before he died, in 1720.1

BERCHORIUS (PETER), whose name we find disguised under BERCHEURE, BERCHOIRE, BERCORIUS, BERCHERIUS, &c. was born in the beginning of the fourteenth century, at St. Pierre-du-Chemin, near Maillezais, in Poitou. He entered the order of the Benedictines, and became celebrated for his learning, and attached himself to cardinal Duprat, archbishop of Aix, whose advice was very useful to him in his writings. Among his other accomplishments, he is said to have been so well acquainted with his Bible, as to be able to quote texts and authorities on all subjects without any assistance but from memory. He died at Paris in 1362, prior of the monastery of St. Eloy, since occupied by the Barnabites, which has induced some biographers to think him a member of that order, but the Barnabites were not an order until a century after this period. Berchorius wrote several works which are lost: those which remain are in 3 vols. fol. under the title of "Reductorium, Repertorium, et Dictionarium morale utriusque Testamenti, Strasburgh, 1474; Nuremberg, 1499; and Cologne, 1631-1692. "Whoever," says Warton, in his "History of Poetry," shall have the patience to turn over a few pages of this immense treasure of multifarious erudition, will be convinced beyond a doubt, from a general coincidence of the plan, manner, method, and execution, that the author of these volumes, and of the "Gesta Romanorum," must be one and the same. The "Reductorium" contains all the stories and incidents in the Bible, reduced into allegories. The "Repertorium" is a dictionary of things, persons, and places; all which are supposed to be mystical, and which are therefore explained in their moral or practical sense. The "Dictionarium Morale" is in two parts, and seems principally designed to be a moral repertory for students in theology." Mr. Warton successfully pursues this argument in his "Dissertation on the Gesta Romanorum," to which we refer the reader. He mentions also that Berchorius was author of a comment on a prosody called "Doctrinale metricum," which was used as a schoolbook in France, till Despauter's manual on that subject

Lord Orford's Works, vol. III.-Pilkington.-Strutt.

appeared. Some biographers mention his "Tropologia," his "Cosmographia," and his "Breviarium;" but the "Tropologia" is nothing more than his "Reductorium" on the Bible, and probably the "Breviarium" is the same. The "Cosmographia" seems to be the fourteenth book of his "Repertorium Morale." He is said by his biographers to have written other smaller pieces, which they have not named nor described. Among these, Mr. Warton thinks his "Gesta" is comprehended: which we may conceive to have been thus undistinguished, either as having been neglected or proscribed by graver writers, or rather as having been probably disclaimed by its author, who saw it at length in the light of a juvenile performance, abounding in fantastic and unedifying narrations, which he judged unsuitable to his character, studies, and station. Besides the works above-mentioned, Berchorius translated Livy, by order of king John, of which there was a beautiful MS. in the library of the oratory of Troyes, and other copies, not less beautiful, are in the imperial library at Paris. This translation was published in 1514-1515, at Paris, 3 vols. fol.1

BERCKRINGER (DANIEL), who was born, according to Vossius, in the Palatinate, studied at Groningen. He became tutor to the children of the king of Bohemia, and was by the queen's interest appointed professor of philosophy at Utrecht, 1640, and eight years afterwards professor of eloquence. He succeeded also in poetry, but his style has been objected to as containing many new-coined words and affected phrases. He died July 24, 1667, leaving several works, of which the principal were, 1. "Exercitationes ethicæ, economicæ, politicæ," Utrecht, 1664. 2. "Dissertatio de Cometis, utrum sint signa, an causæ, an utrumque, an neutrum," Utrecht, 1365, 12mo. He wrote also against Hobbes, "Examen elementorum philosophicorum de bono cive," which remains in manuscript.2 BEREGANI (NICHOLAS, COUNT), an Italian author of the seventeenth century, was born at Vincenza, Feb. 21,

When only nineteen years old, he was honoured by the king of France, Louis III. with the ribbon of St. Michael and the title of chevalier. In 1649, his family were promoted to the rank of nobility at Venice. In that

1 Biog. Universelle.—Warton's Hist. vol. III.—Dupin.—Moreri. Moreri.-Biog. Universelle.

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