resolved to distribute all his property among the poor, and travel barefooted through the world to preach the Gospel. An early death, at the age of 32, put an end to his projects. The writings of Pico display an acute genius, and a vast extent of learning, but they added very little to true science. His principal works are "Hexaplus, or an Explanation of the Six Days of the Creation," "Adversus Astrologiam Divini tricem;" Epistolarum, lib. VIII.

MARCEL VIRGIL ADRIANI, chancellor of the republic at Florence, was born in 1464. He was an elegant scholar in the Greek and Latin languages, which is proved by his masterly translation of Dioscorides, from the former into the latter, with a commentary. He died in 1521.

GIOVANNI ANTONIO FLAMITO, a learned Italian, was a native of Imola, and born in 1464. He taught the belleslettres at Bologna, where he died in 1534. He wrote Latin poems, epistles, and the lives of St. Dominic, Albertus, Magnus, &c.

CONRAD PEUTINGER, a German, eminent in literature, was born at Augsburg, in 1465. He received his education in the principal universities of Italy. In the year 1493 the senate of Augsburg appointed him to the secretaryship of the city, and he was its deputy at the diets held during the reign of the emperor Maximilian. After the death of the emperor in 1519, he was sent to Bruges to compliment Charles V. on his accession to the empire. He was through almost the whole of a long life an active and useful member of the state to which he belonged, and died in the year 1547, at the age of 82, having passed his latter years in a state of second childhood. He left a large and well chosen library, which remained many years in the family, but which finally came to the Jesuits of Augsburg. The works of Peutinger are-1. Sermones Conviviales. 2. De Inclinatione Romani imperii, et gentium commigrationibus. 3. De rebus Gothorum, folio. 4. Romanæ vetustatis fragmenta, folio.

PETER CRINITUS, or more properly PETER RICCI, a learned Italian, descended from the noble family of the Ricci; and born in 1465. He became an associate in the literary and convivial meetings at the palace of the Medici at Florence and after the death of Lorenzo still continued to enjoy the society of Picus and Politian, till the death of these eminent scholars, in 1494. He died in 1505. Before his death he endured a long affliction, on which he wrote a beautiful and pathetic Latin ode, in which he resigned himself to his untimely fate, but asserted his claim to the esteem of posterity for his uprightness of life and conduct. He wrote the lives of the Latin poets, and a piece entitled "De Honesta Disciplina.' WILLIAM LILYE, the grammarian, was born in 1466, at

Oldham, in Hampshire; and in 1486, was admitted a semicommoner of Magdalen college, in Oxford. Having taken the degree of A. B. he left the university, and travelled to Jerusalem. Returning thence, he continued five years in Rhodes, where he studied the Greek; several learned men having retired thither after the taking of Constantinople. From Rhodes he travelled to Rome, where he improved himself in the Greek and Latin languages, under Sulpitius and P. Sabinus. He then returned to London, where for some time he taught a private grammar school, being the first person who taught Greek in that city. In 1510, when Dr. Colet founded St. Paul's school, Lilye was appointed the first master; at which time he was married, and had many children. In this employment he had laboured 12 years, when, being seized by the plague, which then raged in London, he died in Feb. 1523, and was buried in St. Paul's. He had the character of an excellent grammarian, and a successful teacher of the learned languages. He published several works.

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JOHN AVENTINE, was born in 1466, at Abensperg, in Bavaria. He studied first at Ingolstadt, and afterwards at Paris. In 1503, he taught eloquence and poetry at Vienna; and in 1507, he taught Greek at Cracow, in Poland. In 1509, he read lectures on Cicero, at Ingolstadt; and in 1512, was appointed preceptor to the princes Lewis and Ernest, sons of Albert the Wise, duke Bavaria; and travelled with the latter. After this he wrote the annals of Bavaria, being encouraged by the dukes, who settled a pension upon him. This work gained great reputation, and was first published in 1554, by Jerome Ziegler, professor of poetry in the university of Ingolstadt; and afterwards at Basil, in 1580, by Nicholas Cisner. 1529, he was forcibly taken ont of his sister's house at Abensperg, and hurried to jail; the true cause of which violence was never known; but it would probably have been carried to a much greater length, had not the duke of Bavaria interposed, and taken this learned man under his protection. Mr. Bayle remarks, that the incurable melancholy, which from this time possessed Aventine, was so far from determining him to lead a life of celibacy, as he had done till he was 64, that it induced him to think of marrying. He advised, however, with two of his friends, and consulted certain passages of the Bible relative to marriage. The result was, that it was best for him to marry; and having already lost too mnch time, considering his age, he took the first woman he met with, who happened to be his own maid, ill-tempered, ugly, and extremely poor. He died in 1534, aged 68; leaving one daughter, who was then only two months old. His other publications are-Chronica Bavarie; Henrici IV., vita, &c.; Chronicon, sive Annales Schirenses; VOL. IV. T

Liber de causis miseriarum, cum chronicis Turcicis; Antiquitates Danicæ, &c.

PETER DELPHINUS, general of the order of Camaldoli, and author of some letters. He died January 15, 1525. FRANCIS DE CATANEIS, an Italian author, born at Florence in 1466. He was the disciple of professor Marselius, whom he succeeded. He wrote a treatise on beauty, another on love, both on the doctrine of Plato. He died in 1522.

SANCTES PAGNEUS, an Italian dominican, eminent for his skill in Oriental languages and biblical learning, was born at Lucca in 1466, and became afterwards an ecclesiastic of the order of St. Dominic. He devoted twenty-five years to a translation of the Bible from the original Hebrew Text, which he followed with admirable precision. He afterwards translated the New Testament; and compiled a Hebrew Lexicon and grammar. He died in 1536, aged 70.

KARO ISAAC, a rabbi, who was obliged to leave Spain in consequence of the edict of Ferdinand and Isabella, in 1499, which compelled the Jews to leave that country within four months, or turn Christians. He first went to Portugal, and from thence to Jerusalem, where he led the life of a recluse. He was the author of a commentary on the Pentateuch, printed first at Constantinople, in 1558, and again at Amsterdam, in 1708.

LEVINUS AMMONIUS, a Carthusian monk in Flanders, was greatly esteemed by Erasmus, and other eminent men for his learning and piety. He died at Ghent, in 1556.

DESIDERIUS ERASMUS, a man of great celebrity in the republic of letters, was born at Rotterdam, October 28, 1467. He was the natural son of Gerard, a native of Tergou, by Margaret, the daughter of a physician, whom he intended to marry, but being deceived by a report of her death, he entered into the church, and on this account Erasmus has been called, by way of reproach, the son of a priest, though his father was not in orders at the time of his birth. When Erasmus was about nine years old he was sent to school at Deventer, where he made very considerable progress in learning, and was particularly distinguished by the excellence of his memory. His mother, who followed him to Deventer, to watch over his health, died of the plague, when he was about 13 years of age. He was now left an orphan, and his guardians, forgetful of the sacred trust reposed in them, forced him into the church, with a view of embezzling his property. Erasmus resisted their importunity a considerable time, but at length, when he was nineteen years old, he entered among the regular canons in the monastery of Stein, near Tergou. He was of a delicate constitution, and his health was not sufficiently

robust for the life of the monk. His temper and sentiments were likewise averse from the habits of the profession; he accordingly, with the leave of his superior, accepted, in his 23d year, an invitation to reside with the archbishop of Cambray; but finding the patronage of that prelate not equal to his expectations, he went to Paris, and studied in the college of Montaigue. Here he supported himself by giving private lectures to those who were less advanced in their learning than himself. His necessities required great exertions, and thus he acquired habits of industry, which raised him to the highest pitch of literary excellence. Some of his pupils at Paris were the sons of Englishmen of considerable consequence, by whose liberality and earnest request he visited their country, and contracted many valuable friendships. This was in the year 1497; from England he went to Italy, continued a year or more at Bologna, from thence to Venice, where he published his Adagia; he afterwards went to Padua, and at last he visited the capital, Rome, where his reputation was very high, and where he might have settled to great advantage, had he not determined, at the entreaties of his friends, and by the express invitation of Henry VIII., to return to England. Henry, while prince, had contracted a friendship and high respect for Erasmus, and in a few months after he succeeded to the crown, we find Erasmus at the court of London, high in favour with the monarch, with Wolsey, with the archbishop of Canterbury, and with other persons of distinction.

At first he lived with Sir Thomas More, under whose roof he wrote his "Morræ Encomium," or "Praise of Folly," a witty and satirical composition. He afterwards went to Cambridge, and read lectures to the students in Greek and theology. For this he was remunerated with a living and many valuable presents, though not of so substantial a nature as to satisfy his expectations. He wished for an independency, and not being able to secure that in England, he went over to Flanders in 1514, and was shortly after created nominal counsellor to prince Charles of Austria, with a stipend. Soon after this he paid a visit to Basil, where he formed an intimacy with some valuable friends, which induced him to spend his latter days in that place. At Basil he published, in the year 1516, his New Testament, in Greek and Latin, which was received with the utmost eagerness by all those whose minds were turned to theological pursuits. It was dedicated to Leo X. In the course of the same year, his edition of St. Jerome, a favourite author,. made its appearance, which he inscribed to his generous patron, archbishop Warham. Erasmus was ever inimical to that system of war which in his time, as in ours, was, but too much in fashion among the ambitious rulers of mankind; he published in 1517, a work entitled "Querela Pacis, indique gentium ejectæ pro

fligatæque," which is written with much strength of reasoning and true eloquence. By his contemporaries he was charged with maintaining the unlawfulness of war on all and every occasion; this, however, was a calumny invented by his enemies, of whom he had many, for, in the work alluded to, he expressly says, he is speaking only of wars undertaken on trifling and unjustifiable occasions. "I think," says he, "very differently of wars, which are strictly and purely defensive, such as with an honest and affectionate zeal for the country, repel the violence of invaders, and at the hazard of life, preserve the public tranquillity." He was aware of the horrors and atrocities of a state of warfare, and thought almost any sacrifice might be made by wise princes to prevent it. He undertook to vindicate the cause of peace, whom he makes the speaker on this occasion. But the arguments which he puts into her mouth, and the persuasive eloquence with which she addresses the sovereign princes of those dark times, as they are sometimes called, would scarcely be borne by the monarch of Europe in this enlightened age. His descriptions are vivid, and his reflections but too just: "Exuruntur vici, vastantur aqui, diripiuntur templa, trucidantur immeriti cives, dum princeps interim otiosus ludit aleam, dum saltitat, dum delectat se morionibus, dunnesiater, dum aurat, dum potat. O Brutorum genus jam olim extinctum! O fulmen Jovis aut obtusum." To whom this is particularly applied it does not appear, but the "Querela Pacis" was occasioned by the following remarkable circumstance.

It was a favourite project at this period to assemble a congress of kings at Cambray, consisting of the emperor of Germany, the kings of France, England, and the Low Countries; "of which," says the author, "I am a native." They were to enter into mutual and indissoluble engagements to preserve peace with each other, and throughout Europe. This momentous business was very much promoted by William a Ciervia, and by one, who seemed to have been born to advance the happiness of his country, and of human nature, John Sylvagius, chancellor of Burgundy. But certain persons, who got nothing by peace, and a great deal by war, threw obstacles in the way, which prevented this truly kingly purpose from being carried into execution. "After this great disappointment, I sat down and wrote, by desire of Sylvagius, my Querela Pacis." This work was dedicated to Philip of Burgundy, bishop of Utrecht, who was likewise a zealous promoter of peace, and who, so far from being offended with the free sentiments of the book, thanked the author, and even pressed him to accept a living, as a remuneration, which he civilly refused. Erasmus sought no preferment, though, says his biographer, he merited the highest; he sought the happiness of his fellow creatures, and felt himself abundantly rewarded by his own conscience, and their