His works which remain are five books of his History. His Annals. A Treatise on the different Nations who then inhabited Germany. The Life of Agricola. A Treatise on Eloquence. No ancient author has obtained a more splendid reputation than Tacitus. Kings, princes, and authors of all ranks have read and admired him; though a spirit of liberty runs through his whole works. Never were description and sentiment so beautifully blended, nor the actions and the characters of men delineated with such precision. In short, he has all the merits of other authors without their defects.

The best edition of his works is that of Brotier, 1771, 4 vols. 4to.; and of the English translations, that by Murphy.

APPIAN, an eminent writer of the Roman history in Greek, under the reign of Trajan and Adrian. He was a native of Alexandria in Egypt; whence he went to Rome, and distinguished himself so well as an advocate, that he was chosen one of the procurators of the empire, and the government of a province was committed to him. He did not complete the Roman history in a continued series; but wrote distinct histories of all nations, that had been conquered by the Romans, in which he placed every thing relating to those nations, in the proper order of time. His style is plain and simple. He has shown the greatest knowledge of military affairs, and the happiest talent at describing them of any of the historians; for while we read his work, we in a manner see the battles he describes. Of all this voluminous work there remains only what treats of the Punic, Syrian, Parthian, Mithridatic, and Spanish wars, with those against Hannibal, the civil wars, and the wars in Illyricum, and some fragments of the Celtic or Gallic wars. They were published at Geneva in 1592, folio, at Amsterdam in 1670, 2 vols. 8vo. and at Leipsic, in 3 vols. 8vo. 1784.

LUCIUS ANNÆUS FLORUS, a Latin historian of the same family, with Seneca and Lucan. He flourished in the reigns of Trajan and Adrian; and wrote an abridgement of the Roman history, of which there have been many editions. It is composed in a florid and poetical style; and is rather a panegyric on many of the great actions of the Romans, than a faithful and correct recital of their history. He also wrote poetry, and entered the lists against the emperor Adrian, who satirically reproached him with frequenting places of dissipation. The best edition of his works is that of Duker, 2 vols. 8vo. 1722.

CAIUS SUETONIUS TRANQUILLUS, a famous Latin historian, was born at Rome, and became secretary to the emperor Adrian, about A. D. 118, but that post was taken from him three years after, for not showing the empress Sabina all the respect she deserved. During his disgrace he composed many works, which are lost. Those extant, are his History of the XII Cæsars, and a part of his Treatise of the Illustrious

Grammarians and Rhetoricians. Pliny the Younger was his intimate friend, and persuaded him to publish his books. His History of the XII Cæsars, has been much commended by many of the literati. He represents, in a series of curious particulars, without digressions or reflections, the actions of the emperors, exposing their deformity, yet mentions their good qualities, but the horrid dissoluteness and obscene actions he relates of Tiberius, Caligula, Nero, &c. have made made some say, that he wrote the lives of the emperors, with the same licentiousness with which they lived. The edition of this history by Grævius at Utrecht, in 1672, with the excellent commentaries of Torrentius and Casaubon, and the notes of some other learned critics, is much esteemed. Other good editions are those of Patin, Basil, 1675, 4to.; of Grævius, 1691, 4to.; and of Pitiscus, 1714. There is an English translation, by Thomson, 8vo.

PAMPHILA, an ancient Grecian authoress, who flourished in Nero's reign, and wrote a general history in thirty-three books, much commended by the ancients, but not extant.

FABIUS RUSTICUS, an historian in the age of Claudius and Nero. He was intimate with Seneca; and the encomiums which Tacitus passes upon his style, make us regret the loss of his compositions.

SERVILIUS NONIANUS, a Latin historian, who flourished under Nero, and wrote a history of Rome, which is lost. POMPEIUS SATURNINUS, a Roman historian, poet, and orator, who flourished in the reign of Trajan. Pliny mentions him with great approbation, and always consulted him before he published his own works.

ABDIAS OF BABYLON, one of the boldest legend writers, who boasted he had seen our Saviour, that he was one of the seventy-two disciples, had been witness of the actions and prayers at the deaths of several of the apostles, and had followed into Persia St. Simon and St. Jude, who, he said, made him the first bishop of Babylon. His book entitled Historia certaminis Apostolici, was published by Wolfgang Lazius, at Basil, 1551; and it has since borne several impressions in different places.

HALICARNASSENSIS DIONYSIUS junior, flourished, according to Suidas, under the emperor Adrian, and wrote twenty-six books of the "History of Musicians," in which he celebrated not only the great performers on the flute and cithara, but those who had risen to eminence by every species of poetry.

MUSIC.

THEODORUS, an Athenian flute-maker, the father of Isocrates, the orator. How great the demand was at this time for

flutes at Athens, may be conceived from a circumstance mentioned by Plutarch, in his life of the orator. His father, says, he, acquired wealth sufficient by his business, not only to educate his children in a liberal manner, but also to bear one of the heaviest burdens to which an Athenian citizen was liable, of furnishing a choir or chorus for his tribe, or ward, at festivals and religious ceremonies.

MATHEMATICS, ASTRONOMY, &c.

MENELAUS, a celebrated mathematician, who flourished under the reign of the emperor Trajan, was of Grecian extraction, but a native of Alexandria. He is called by Ptolemy a geometrician, as having made astronomical observations at Rome, in the year 98, of the Christian era. He is supposed to have been the Menelaus referred to by Plutarch, in his dialogue, "De Facie quæ in orbe Lunæ apparet." He was author of "three books on Spherics," which have come down to the present times, through the medium of the Arabian language. A Latin version of this work was published at Paris, by father Mersenue, in 1664, with corrections, restorations, and additional illustrative propositions.

AQUILA, a mathematician of Pontus, who was employed by Adrian to rebuild Jerusalem, where he embraced the Christian religion, and was baptised; but being excommunicated for practising astrology, he turned Jew. He translated the Old Testament into Greek, of which only a few fragments remain. HELIODORUS, an eminent mathematician of Larissa in

Greece.

AGRIPPA, an astronomer, was a native of Bithynia. He was a very accurate observer.

THEON, a mathematician of the Platonic school, was a native of Smyrna, and flourished under the emperor Trajan and Adrian. His mathematical treatises are said to have been written for the purpose of elucidating the philosophy of Plato, and his discourses, treating of geometry, arithmetic, music, astronomy, and the harmony of the universe, may serve to throw some light upon the Pythagorean system.

BABILIUS, an astrologer in the time of Nero, who advised the emperor to put all the leading men of Rome to death, that he might avert the danger which seemed to hang over his head, from the appearance of a hairy comet. Nero strictly followed this advice.

CLAUDIUS PTOLEMY, a very celebrated geographer, astronomer and mathematician, among the ancients, was born at Pelusium, in Egypt, about the seventieth year of the Christian era, and died, it has been said, in the seventy-eighth year

of his age, and in the year of Christ, 147. He taught astronomy at Alexandria, in Egypt, where he made many astronomical observations, and composed his other works. It is certain that he flourished in the reigns of Marcus Antoninus and Adrian, for it is noted in his Canon, that Antoninus Pius reigned twenty-three years, which shows that he himself survived him; he also tells us in one place, that he made a great many observations upon the fixed stars, at Alexandria, in the second year of Antoninus Pius; and in another, that he observed an eclipse of the moon in the ninth year of Adrian; from which it is reasonable to conclude, that this astronomer's observations upon the heavens, were many of them made between the year 125 and 140. Ptolemy has always been reckoned the prince of astronomers, among the ancients, and in his works has left us an entire body of that science. He has preserved and transmitted to us the observations, and principal discoveries of the ancients, and at the same time augmented and enriched them with his own. He corrected Hipparchus's catalogue of the fixed stars; and formed tables, by which the motions of the sun, moon, and planets might be calculated and regulated. He was, indeed, the first who collected the scattered and detached observations of the ancients, and digested them into a system, which he set forth in his "sive Magna Constructio," divided into thirteen books. He adopts and exhibits here, the ancient system of the world, which placed the earth in the centre of the universe; and this has been called, from him, the Ptolemaic system, to distinguish it from those of Copernicus and Tycho Brahe.

About the year 78, this work was translated by the Arabians into their language, in which it was called "Almagestum," by order of one of their kings; and from Arabic into Latin, about 1230, by the encouragement of the emperor Frederic II. There were also other versions from the Arabic into Latin; and a manuscript of one, done by Girardus Cremonensis, who flourished about the middle of the fourteenth century; Fabricius says, it is still extant, in the library of All Souls' College, in Oxford. The Greek text of this work, began to be read in Europe in the fifteenth century, and was first published by Simon Grynæus, at Basil, 1538, in folio, with the eleven books of Commentaries by Theon, who flourished at Alexandria, in the reign of the Elder Theodosius. In 1541, it was reprinted at Basil, with a Latin version, by George Trapizond; and again at the same place in 1551, with the addition of other works of Ptolemy, and Latin versions by Camerarius. We learn from Kepler, that this last edition was used by Tycho Brahe.

Of this principal work of the ancient astronomers, it may not be improper to give here a more particular account. In general it may be observed, that the work is founded upon the hy

pothesis of the earth, being at rest in the centre of the universe, and that the heavenly bodies, the stars and planets, all move round it in solid orbs, whose motions are all directed by one, which Ptolemy calls the primum mobile, or first mover, of which he discourses at large. But, to be more particular, this great work is divided into thirteen books.

In the first book, Ptolemy shows that the earth is in the centre of those orbs, and of the universe itself, as he understood it; he represents the earth as of a spherical figure and but as a point in comparison of the rest of the heavenly bodies; he treats concerning the several circles of the earth and their distances from the equator; as also of the right and oblique ascension of the heavenly bodies in a right sphere.

In the second book, he treats of the habitable parts of the earth, and of the elevation of the pole in an oblique sphere, and the various angles which the several circles make with the horizon, according to the different latitude of places; also of the phenomena of the heavenly bodies depending on the same.

In the third book he treats of the quantity of the year, and of the unequal motion of the sun through the zodiac; he here gives the method of computing the motion of the sun, with tables of the same; and likewise treats of the inequality of days and nights.

In the fourth book he treats of the lunar motions, and their various phenomena; he gives tables for finding the moon's mean motions, with her latitude and longitude; he discourses largely concerning lunar epicycles; and by comparing the times of a great number of eclipses, mentioned by Hipparchus, Calippus, and others, he has computed the places of the sun and moon, according to their mean motions, from the first year of Nabonassar, king of Egypt, to his own time.

In the fifth book he treats of the instrument called the astrolabe; he treats also of the eccentricity of the lunar orbit, and the inequality of the moon's motion according to her distance from the sun; he also gives tables, and an universal canon for the inequality of the lunar motions; he then treats of the different aspects or phases of the moon, and gives a computation of the diameter of the sun and moon, with the magnitude of the sun, moon, and earth, compared together; he states also the different measures of the distance of the sun and moon, according as they are determined by ancient mathematicians and philosophers.

In the sixth Book he treats of the conjunctions and oppositions of the sun and moon, with tables for computing the mean time when they happen; of the boundaries of solar and lunar eclipses; of the tables and methods of computing the eclipses of the sun and moon, with many other particulars.

In the seventh Book he treats of the fixed stars, and shows