Introduction to the Literature of Europe in the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Seventeenth Centuries, Vol. 2

[1102] Thomson’s Hist. of Chemistry.

Predecessors of Grew. 30. It is just to observe that some had preceded Grew in vegetable physiology. Aromatari, in a letter of only four pages, published at Venice in 1625, on the generation of plants from seeds, which was reprinted in the Philosophical Transactions, showed the analogy between grains and eggs, each containing a minute organised embryo, which employs the substances inclosing it for its own development. Aromatari has also understood the use of the cotyledons.[1103] Brown, in his Inquiry into Vulgar Errors, has remarks on the budding of plants, and on the quinary number they affect in their flower. Kenelm Digby, according to Sprengel, first explained the necessity in vegetation for oxygen, or vital air, which had lately been discovered by Bathurst. Hooke carried the discoveries hitherto made in vegetable anatomy much farther in his Micrographia. Sharrock and Lister contributed some knowledge, but they were rather later than Grew. |Malpighi.| None of these deserve such a place as Malpighi, who, says Sprengel, was not inferior to Grew in acuteness, though, probably, through some illusions of prejudice, he has not so well understood and explained many things. But the structure and growth of seeds he has explained better, and Grew seems to have followed him. His book is also better arranged and more concise.[1104] The Dutch did much to enlarge botanical science. The Hortus Indicus Malabaricus of Rheede, who had been a governor in India, was published at his own expense in twelve volumes, the first appearing in 1686; it contains an immense number of new plants.[1105] The Herbarium Amboinense of Rumphius was collected in the seventeenth century, though not published till 1741.[1106] Several botanical gardens were formed in different countries; among others that of Chelsea was opened in 1686.[1107]

[1103] Sprengel. Biogr. Univ.

[1104] Sprengel, p. 15.

[1105] Biogr. Univ. The date of the first volume is given erroneously in the B. U.

[1106] Id.

[1107] Sprengel. Pulteney.

Early notions of geology. 31. It was impossible that men of inquiring tempers should not have been led to reflect on those remarkable phenomena of the earth’s visible structure, which being in course of time accurately registered and arranged, have become the basis of that noble science, the boast of our age, geology. The first thing which must strike the eyes of the merest clown, and set the philosopher thinking, is the irregularity of the surface of our globe; the more this is observed, the more signs of violent disruption, and of a prior state of comparative uniformity appear. Some, indeed, of whom Ray seems to have been one,[1108] were so much impressed by the theory of final causes that, perceiving the fitness of the present earth for its inhabitants, they thought it might have been created in such a state of physical ruin. But the contrary inference is almost irresistible. A still more forcible argument for great revolutions in the history of the earth is drawn from a second phenomenon of very general occurrence, the marine and other fossil relics of organised beings, which are dug up in strata far remote from the places where these bodies could now exist. It was common to account for them by the Mosaic deluge. But the depth at which they are found was incompatible with this hypothesis. Others fancied them to be not really organised, but sports of nature, as they were called, the casual resemblances of shells and fishes in stone. The Italians took the lead in speculating on these problems; but they could only arrive now and then at a happier conjecture than usual, and do not seem to have planned any scheme of explaining the general structure of the earth.[1109] The Mundus Subterraneus of Athanasius Kircher, famous for the variety and originality of his erudition, contains probably the geology of his age, or at least his own. It was published in 1662. Ten out of twelve books relate to the surface or the interior of the earth, and to various terrene productions; the remaining two to alchemy and other arts connected with mineralogy. Kircher seems to have collected a great deal of geographical and geological knowledge. In England, the spirit of observation was so strong after the establishment of the Royal Society, that the Philosophical Transactions, in this period, contain a considerable number of geognostic papers, and the genius of theory was aroused, though not at first in his happiest mood.[1110]

[1108] See Ray’s Three Physico-Theological Discourses on the Creation, Deluge, and final Conflagration. 1692.

[1109] Lyell’s Principles of Geology, vol. i., p. 25.

[1110] Thomson’s Hist. of Royal Society.

Burnet’s Theory of Earth. 32. Thomas Burnet, master of the Charterhouse, a man fearless and somewhat rash, with more imagination than philosophy, but ingenious and eloquent, published in 1694 his Theoria Telluris Sacra, which he afterwards translated into English. The primary question for the early geologists had always been how to reconcile the phenomena with which they were acquainted to the Mosaic narratives of the creation and deluge. Every one was satisfied that his own theory was the best; but in every case it has hitherto proved, whatever may take place in future, that the proposed scheme has neither kept to the letter of Scripture, nor to the legitimate deductions of philosophy. Burnet gives the reins to his imagination more than any other writer on that which, if not argued upon by inductive reasoning, must be the dream of one man, little better in reality, though it may be more amusing, than the dream of another. He seems to be eminently ignorant of geological facts, and has hardly ever recourse to them as evidence. And accordingly, though his book drew some attention as an ingenious romance, it does not appear that he made a single disciple. |Other geologists.| Whiston opposed Burnet’s theory, but with one not less unfounded, nor with less ignorance of all that required to be known. Hooke, Lister, Ray, and Woodward came to the subject with more philosophical minds, and with a better insight into the real phenomena. Hooke seems to have displayed his usual sagacity in conjecture; he saw that the common theory of explaining marine fossils by the Mosaic deluge would not suffice, and perceived that, at some time or other, a part of the earth’s crust must have been elevated and another part depressed by some subterraneous power. Lister was aware of the continuity of certain strata over large districts, and proposed the construction of geological maps. Woodward had a still more extensive knowledge of stratified rocks; he was in a manner the founder of scientific mineralogy in England, but his geological theory was not less chimerical than those of his contemporaries.[1111] It was first published in the Philosophical Transactions for 1695.[1112]

[1111] Lyell, p. 31.

[1112] Thomson, p. 207.

Protogæa of Leibnitz. 33. The Protogæa of Leibnitz appears, in felicity of conjecture and minute attention to facts, far above any of these. But this short tract was only published in 1749, and on reading it, I have found an intimation that it was not written within the seventeenth century. Yet I cannot refrain from mentioning that his hypothesis supposes the gradual cooling of the earth from igneous fusion; the formation of a vast body of water to cover the surface, a part of his theory but ill established, and apparently the weakest of the whole; the subsidence of the lower parts of the earth, which he takes to have been once on the level of the highest mountains, by the breaking in of vaulted caverns within its bosom;[1113] the deposition of sedimentary strata from inundations, their induration, and the subsequent covering of these by other strata through fresh inundations; with many other notions which have been gradually matured and rectified in the process of the science.[1114] No one can read the Protogæa without perceiving that of all the early geologists, or indeed of all down to a time not very remote, Leibnitz came nearest to the theories which are most received in the English school at this day. It is evident that if the literal interpretation of Genesis, by a period of six natural days, had not restrained him, he would have gone much farther in his views of the progressive revolutions of the earth.[1115] Leibnitz had made very minute inquiries, for his age, into fossil species, and was aware of the main facts which form the basis of modern geology.[1116]

[1113] Sect. 21. He admits also a partial elevation by intumescence, but says, ut vastissimæ Alpes ex solida jam terra eruptione surrexerint, minus consentaneum puto. Scimus tamen et in illis deprehendi reliquias maris. Cum ergo alterutrum factum oporteat, credibilius multo arbitror defluxisse aquas spontaneo nisu, quam ingentem terrarum partem incredibili violentia tam alte ascendisse. Sect. 22.

[1114] Facies teneri adhuc orbis sæpius novata est; donec quiescentibus causis atque æquilibratis, consistentior emergeret status rerum. Unde jam duplex origo intelligitur firmorum corporum; una cum ignis fusione refrigescerent, altera cum reconcrescerent ex solutione aquarum. Neque igitur putandum est lapides ex sola esse fusione. Id enim potissimum de prima tantum massa ex terræ basi accipio; Nec dubito, postea materiam liquidam in superficie telluris procurrentem, quiete mox reddita, ex ramentis subactis ingentem materiæ vim deposuisse, quorum alia varias terræ species formarunt, alia in saxa induruere, e quibus strata diversa sibi super imposita diversas præcipitationum vices atque intervalla testantur. Sect. 4.

This he calls the incunabula of the world, and the basis of a new science, which might be denominated “naturalis geographia.” But wisely adds, licet conspirent vestigia veteris mundi in præsenti facie rerum, tamen rectius omnia definient posteri, ubi curiositas eo processerit, ut per rejar regiones procurrentia soli genera et strata describant. Sect. 5.

[1115] See sect. 21, et alibi.

[1116] Sect. 24, et usque ad finem libri.

Sect. III.

ON ANATOMY AND MEDICINE.

34. Portal begins the history of this period, which occupies more than 800 pages of his voluminous work, by announcing it as the epoch most favourable to anatomy: in less than fifty years the science put on a new countenance; nature is interrogated, every part of the body is examined with an observing spirit; the mutual intercourse of nations diffuses the light on every side; a number of great men appear, whose genius and industry excite our admiration.[1117] But for this very reason I must, in these concluding pages, glide over a subject rather foreign to my own studies and to those of the generality of my readers with a very brief enumeration of names.

[1117] Hist. de l’Anatomie, vol. iii, p. 1.

Circulation of blood established. 35. The Harveian theory gained ground, though obstinate prejudice gave way but slowly. It was confirmed by the experiment of transfusing blood, tried on dogs, at the instance of Sir Christopher Wren, in 1657, and repeated by Lower in 1661.[1118] Malpighi in 1661, and Leeuwenhoek in 1690, by means of their microscopes, demonstrated the circulation of the blood in the smaller vessels, and rendered visible the anastomoses of the arteries and veins, upon which the theory depended.[1119] From this time it seems to have been out of doubt. Pecquet’s discovery of the thoracic duct, or rather of its uses, as a reservoir of the chyle from which the blood is elaborated, for the canal itself had been known to Eustachius, stands next to that of Harvey, which would have thrown less light on physiology without it, and like his, was perseveringly opposed.[1120]

[1118] Sprengel, Hist. de la Médecine, vol. iv., p. 120.

[1119] Id. p. 126, 142.

[1120] Portal. Sprengel.

Willis-Vieussens. 36. Willis, a physician at Oxford, is called by Portal, who thinks all mankind inferior to anatomists, one of the greatest geniuses that ever lived; his bold systems have given him a distinguished place among physiologers.[1121] His Anatomy of the Brain, in which, however, as in his other works, he was much assisted by an intimate friend, and anatomist of the first character, Lower, is, according to the same writer, a masterpiece of imagination and labour. He made many discoveries in the structure of the brain, and has traced the nerves from it far better than his predecessors, who had in general very obscure ideas of their course. Sprengel says that Willis is the first who has assigned a peculiar mental function to each of the different parts of the brain; forgetting, as it seems, that this hypothesis, the basis of modern phrenology, had been generally received, as I understand his own account, in the sixteenth century.[1122] Vieussens of Montpelier carried on the discoveries in the anatomy of the nerves, in his Neurographia Universalis, 1684; tracing those arising from the spinal marrow which Willis had not done, and following the minute ramifications of those that are spread over the skin.[1123]

[1121] P. 88. Biogr. Univ.

[1122] Sprengel, p. 250. See vol. iii., p. 204.

[1123] Portal, vol. iv., p. 5. Sprengel, p. 256, Biogr. Univ.

Malpighi. 37. Malpighi was the first who employed good microscopes in anatomy, and thus revealed the secrets, we may say, of an invisible world, which Leeuwenhoek afterwards, probably using still better instruments, explored with surprising success. |Other anatomists.| To Malpighi anatomists owe their knowledge of the structure of the lungs.[1124] Graaf has overthrown many errors, and suggested many truths in the economy of generation.[1125] Malpighi prosecuted this inquiry with his microscope, and first traced the progress of the egg during incubation. But the theory of evolution, as it is called, proposed by Harvey, and supported by Malpighi, received a shock by Leeuwenhoek’s or Hartsoeker’s discovery of spermatic animalcules, which apparently opened a new view of reproduction. The hypothesis they suggested became very prevalent for the rest of the seventeenth century, though it is said to have been shaken early in the next.[1126] Borelli applied mathematical principles to muscular movements in his treatise De Motu Animalium. Though he is a better mathematician than anatomist, he produces many interesting facts, the mechanical laws are rightly applied, and his method is clear and consequent.[1127] Duverney, in his Treatise on Hearing, in 1683, his only work, obtained a considerable reputation; it threw light on many parts of a delicate organ, which, by their minuteness, had long baffled the anatomist.[1128] In Mayow’s Treatise on Respiration, published in London, 1668, we find the necessity of oxygen to that function laid down; but this portion of the atmosphere had been discovered by Bathurst and Henshaw in 1654, and Hooke had shown by experiment that animals die when the air is deprived of it.[1129] Ruysch, a Dutch physician, perfected the art of injecting anatomical preparations, hardly known before, and thus conferred an inestimable benefit on the science. He possessed a celebrated cabinet of natural history.[1130]

[1124] Portal, iii., 120. Sprengel, p. 578.

[1125] Portal, iii., 219. Sprengel, p. 303.

[1126] Sprengel, p. 309.

[1127] Portal, iii., 246. Biogr. Univ.

[1128] Portal, p. 464. Sprengel, p. 288.

[1129] Portal, p. 176, 181.

[1130] Id. p. 259. Biogr. Univ.

Medical theories. 38. The chemical theory of medicine which had descended from Paracelsus through Van Helmont, was propagated chiefly by Sylvius, a physician of Holland, who is reckoned the founder of what was called the chemiatric— school. His works were printed at Amsterdam, in 1679, but he had promulgated his theory from the middle of the century. His leading principle was that a perpetual fermentation goes on in the human body, from the deranged action of which diseases proceed; most of them from excess of acidity, though a few are of alkaline origin. “He degraded the physician,” says Sprengel, “to the level of a distiller or a brewer.”[1131] This writer is very severe on the chemiatric school, one of their offences in his eyes being their recommendation of tea; “the cupidity of Dutch merchants conspiring with their medical theories.” It must be owned that when we find them prescribing also a copious use of tobacco, it looks as if the trade of the doctor went hand-in-hand with those of his patients. Willis, in England, was a partisan of the chemiatrics,[1132] and they had a great influence in Germany; though in France the attachment of most physicians to the Hippocratic and Galenic methods, which brought upon them so many imputations of pedantry, was little abated. A second school of medicine, which superseded this, is called the iatro-mathematical. This seems to have arisen in Italy. Borelli’s application of mechanical principles to the muscles has been mentioned above. These physicians sought to explain everything by statical and hydraulic laws; they were, therefore, led to study anatomy, since it was only by an accurate knowledge of all the parts that they could apply their mathematics. John Bernouilli even taught them to employ the differential calculus in explaining the bodily functions.[1133] But this school seems to have had the same leading defect as the chemiatric; it forgot the peculiarity of the laws of organisation and life which often render those of inert matter inapplicable. Pitcairn and Boerhaave were leaders of the iatro-mathematicians; and Mead was reckoned the last of its distinguished patrons.[1134] Meantime, a third school of medicine grew up, denominated the empirical; a name to be used in a good sense, as denoting their regard to observation and experience, or the Baconian principles of philosophy. Sydenham was the first of these in England; but they gradually prevailed to the exclusion of all systematic theory. The discovery of several medicines, especially the Peruvian bark, which was first used in Spain about 1640, and in England about 1654, contributed to the success of the empirical physicians, since the efficacy of some of these could not be explained on the hypotheses hitherto prevalent.[1135]

[1131] Vol. v., p. 59. Biogr. Univ.

[1132] Sprengel, p. 73.

[1133] Sprengel, p. 159.

[1134] Id. p. 182. See Biographie Universelle, art. Boerhaave, for a general criticism of the iatro-mathematicians.

[1135] Sprengel, p. 413.

Sect. IV.

ON ORIENTAL LITERATURE.

Polyglott of Walton. 39. The famous Polyglott of Brian Walton was published in 1657; but few copies appear to have been sold before the restoration of Charles II., in 1660, since those are very scarce which contain in the preface the praise of Cromwell for having facilitated and patronised the undertaking; praise replaced in the change of times by a loyal eulogy on the king. This Polyglott is in nine languages; though no one book of the Bible is printed in so many. Walton’s Prolegomena are in sixteen chapters or dissertations. His learning, perhaps, was greater than his critical acuteness or good sense; such, at least, is the opinion of Simon and Le Long. The former, in a long examination of Walton’s Prolegomena, treats him with all the superiority of a man who possessed both. Walton was assailed by some bigots at home for acknowledging various readings in the Scriptures, and for denying the authority of the vowel punctuation. His Polyglott is not reckoned so magnificent as the Parisian edition of Le Long; but it is fuller and more convenient.[1136] Edmund Castell, the coadjutor of Walton in this work, published his Lexicon Heptaglotton in 1669, upon which he had consumed eighteen years and the whole of his substance. This is frequently sold together with the Polyglott.

[1136] Simon, Hist. Critique du Vieux Testament, p. 541. Chalmers. Biogr. Britan. Biogr. Univ. Brunet. Man. du Libraire.

Hottinger. 40. Hottinger of Zurich, by a number of works on the Eastern languages, and especially by the Bibliotheca Orientalis, in 1658, established a reputation which these books no longer retain since the whole field of Oriental literature has been more fully explored. |Spencer.| Spencer, in a treatise of great erudition, De Legibus Hebræorum, 1685, gave some offence by the suggestion that several of the Mosaic institutions were borrowed from the Egyptian, though the general scope of the Jewish law was in opposition to the idolatrous practices of the neighbouring nations. |Bochart.| The vast learning of Bochart expanded itself over Oriental antiquity, especially that of which the Hebrew nation and language is the central point; but his etymological conjectures have long since been set aside, and he has not, in other respects, escaped the fate of the older Orientalists.

Pococke. 41. The great services of Pococke to Arabic literature, which had commenced in the earlier part of the century, were extended to the present. His edition and translation of the Annals of Eutychius in 1658, that of the History of Abulfaragius in 1663, with many other works of a similar nature, bear witness to his industry; no Englishman, probably, has ever contributed so much to that province of learning.[1137] A fine edition of the Koran, and still esteemed the best, was due to Marracci, professor of Arabic in the Sapienza or university of Rome, and published at the expense of Cardinal Barbadigo, in 1698.[1138] |D’Herbelot.| But France had an Orientalist of the most extensive learning, in D’Herbelot, whose Bibliothèque Orientale must be considered as making an epoch in this literature. It was published in 1697, after his death, by Galland, who had also some share in arranging the materials. This work, it has been said, is for the seventeenth century what the History of the Huns, by De Guignes, is for the eighteenth; with this difference, that D’Herbelot opened the road, and has often been copied by his successor.[1139]

[1137] Chalmers. Biogr. Univ.

[1138] Tiraboschi, xi., 398.

[1139] Biographie Universelle.

Hyde. 42. Hyde, in his Religionis Persarum Historia, published in 1700, was the first who illustrated in a systematic manner the religion of Zoroaster, which he always represents in a favourable manner. The variety and novelty of its contents gave this book a credit which, in some degree, it preserves; but Hyde was ignorant of the ancient language of Persia, and is said to have been often misled by Mohammedan authorities.[1140] The vast increase of Oriental information in modern times, as has been intimated above, renders it difficult for any work of the seventeenth century to keep its ground. In their own times, the writings of Kircher on China, and still more those of Ludolph on Abyssinia, which were founded on his own knowledge of the country, claimed a respectable place in Oriental learning. It is remarkable that very little was yet known of the Indian languages, though grammars existed of the Tamul, and perhaps some others, before the close of the seventeenth century.[1141]

[1140] Id.

[1141] Eichhorn, Gesch. der Cultur, v., 269.

Sect. V.

ON GEOGRAPHY AND HISTORY.

Maps of the Sansons. 43. The progress of geographical science long continued to be slow. If we compare the map of the world in 1651, by Nicholas Sanson, esteemed on all sides the best geographer of his age, with one by his son in 1692, the variances will not appear, perhaps, so considerable as we might have expected. Yet some improvement may be detected by the eye. Thus, the Caspian sea has assumed its longer diameter from north to south, contrary to the old map. But the sea of Aral is still wanting. The coasts of New Holland, except to the east, are tolerably laid down, and Corea is a peninsula, instead of an island. Cambalu, the imaginary capital of Tartary, has disappeared;[1142] but a vast lake is placed in the centre of that region; the Altai range is carried far too much to the north, and the name of Siberia seems unknown. Africa and America have nearly the same outline as before; in the former, the empire of Monomotopa stretches to join that of Abyssinia in about the 12th degree of south latitude; and the Nile still issues, as in all the old maps, from a lake Zayre, in nearly the same parallel. The coasts of Europe, and especially of Scandinavia, are a little more accurate. The Sanson family, of whom several were publishers of maps, did not take pains enough to improve what their father had executed, though they might have had material helps from the astronomical observations which were now continually made in different parts of the world.

[1142] The Cambalu of Marco Polo is probably Pekin; but the geographers frequently placed this capital of Cathay north of the wall of China.

De Lisle’s map of the world. 44. Such was the state of geography when, in 1699, De Lisle, the real founder of the science, at the age of twenty-four, published his map of the world. He had been guided by the observations, and worked under the directions of Cassini, whose tables of the emersion of Jupiter’s satellites, calculated for the meridian of Bologna in 1668, and, with much improvement, for that of Paris in 1693, had prepared the way for the perfection of geography. The latitudes of different regions had been tolerably ascertained by observation; but no good method of determining the longitude had been known before this application of Galileo’s great discovery. It is evident that the appearance of one of those satellites at Paris being determined by the tables to a precise instant, the means were given to find the longitudinal distance of other places by observing the difference of time; and thus a great number of observations having gradually been made, a basis was laid for an accurate delineation of the surface of the globe. The previous state of geography and the imperfect knowledge which the mere experience of navigators could furnish, may be judged by the fact that the Mediterranean sea was set with an excess of 300 leagues in length, being more than one third of the whole. De Lisle reduced it within its bounds, and cut off at the same time 500 leagues from the longitude of Eastern Asia. This was the commencement of the geographical labours of De Lisle, which reformed, in the first part of the eighteenth century, not only the general outline of the world, but the minuter relations of various countries. His maps amount to more than one hundred sheets.[1143]

[1143] Eloge de De Lisle, in Œuvres de Fontenelle, vol. vi., p. 253. Eloge de Cassini, in vol. v., p. 328. Biogr. Universelle.

Voyages and travels. 45. The books of travels, in the last fifty years of the seventeenth century, were far more numerous and more valuable than in any earlier period, but we have no space for more than a few names. Gemelli Carreri, a Neapolitan, is the first who claims to have written an account of his own travels round the world, describing Asia and America with much detail. His Giro del Mondo was published in 1699. Carreri has been strongly suspected of fabrication, and even of having never seen the countries which he describes; but his character, I know not with what justice, has been latterly vindicated.[1144] The French justly boast the excellent travels of Chardin, Bernier, Thevenot, and Tavernier in the East; the account of the Indian archipelago and of China by Nieuhoff, employed in a Dutch embassy to the latter empire, is said to have been interpolated by the editors, though he was an accurate and faithful observer.[1145] Several other relations of voyages were published in Holland, some of which can only be had in the native language. In English there were not many of high reputation: Dampier’s Voyage round the World, the first edition of which was in 1697, is better known than any which I can call to mind.

[1144] Tiraboschi, xi., 86. Selfi, ix., 442.

[1145] Biogr. Univ.

Historians. 46. The general characteristics of historians in this period are neither a luminous philosophy, nor a rigorous examination of evidence. But, as before, we mention only a few names in this extensive province of literature. |De Solis.| The History of the Conquest of Mexico by Antonio De Solis, is “the last good work,” says Sismondi, perhaps too severely, “that Spain has produced; the last where purity of taste, simplicity, and truth are preserved; the imagination, of which the author had given so many proofs, does not appear.”[1146] Bouterwek is not less favourable; but Robertson, who holds De Solis rather cheap as an historian, does not fail to censure even his style.

[1146] Littérature du Midi, iv., 101.

Memoirs of De Retz. 47. The French have some authors of history who, by their elegance and perspicuity, might deserve notice; such as St. Real, Father D’Orleans, and even Varillas, proverbially discredited as he is for want of veracity. The Memoirs of Cardinal De Retz rise above these; their animated style, their excellent portraitures of character, their acute and brilliant remarks, distinguish their pages, as much as the similar qualities did their author. “They are written,” says Voltaire, “with an air of greatness, an impetuosity and an inequality which are the image of his life; his expression, sometimes incorrect, often negligent, but almost always original, recalls continually to his readers what has been so frequently said of Cæsar’s Commentaries, that he wrote with the same spirit that he carried on his wars.”[1147] The Memoirs of Grammont, by Antony Hamilton, scarcely challenge a place as historical, but we are now looking more at the style than the intrinsic importance of books. Every one is aware of the peculiar felicity and fascinating gaiety which they display.

[1147] Biogr. Univ., whence I take the quotation.

Bossuet on universal history. 48. The Discourse of Bossuet on Universal History is perhaps the greatest effort of his wonderful genius. Every preceding abridgment of so immense a subject had been superficial and dry. He first irradiated the entire annals of antiquity down to the age of Charlemagne with flashes of light that reveal an unity and coherence which had been lost in their magnitude and obscurity. It is not perhaps an unfair objection that, in a history calling itself that of all mankind, the Jewish people have obtained a disproportionate regard; and it might be almost as reasonable, on religious grounds, to give Palestine a larger space in the map of the world, as, on a like pretext, to make the scale of the Jewish history so much larger than that of the rest of the human race. The plan of Bossuet has at least divided his book into two rather heterogeneous portions. But his conceptions of Greek, and still more of Roman history, are generally magnificent; profound in philosophy, with an outline firm and sufficiently exact, never condescending to trivial remarks or petty details; above all, written in that close and nervous style which no one certainly in the French language has ever surpassed. It is evident that Montesquieu in all his writings, but especially in the Grandeur and Decadence des Romains, had the Discourse of Bossuet before his eyes; he is more acute, sometimes, and ingenious, and has reflected longer on particular topics of inquiry, but he wants the simple majesty, the comprehensive eagle-like glance of the illustrious prelate.

English historical works. 49. Though we fell short in England of the historical reputation which the first part of the century might entitle us to claim, this period may be reckoned that in which a critical attention to truth, sometimes rather too minute, but always praiseworthy, began to be characteristic of our researches into fact. |Burnet.| The only book that I shall mention is Burnet’s History of the Reformation, written in a better style than those who know Burnet by his later and more negligent work are apt to conceive, and which has the signal merit of having been the first, as far as I remember, which is fortified by a large appendix of documents. This, though frequent in Latin, had not been usual in the modern languages. It became gradually very frequent and almost indispensable in historical writings, where the materials had any peculiar originality.

* * * * *

General character of 17th century. 50. The change in the spirit of literature and of the public mind in general, which had with gradual and never receding steps been coming forward in the seventeenth century, but especially in the latter part of it, has been so frequently pointed out to the readers of this and the last volume, that I shall only quote an observation of Bayle. “I believe,” he says, “that the sixteenth century produced a greater number of learned men than the seventeenth; and yet the former of these ages was far from being as enlightened as the latter. During the reign of criticism and philology, we saw in all Europe many prodigies of erudition. Since the study of the new philosophy and that of living languages has introduced a different taste, we have ceased to behold this vast and deep learning. But in return there is diffused through the republic of letters a more subtle understanding and a more exquisite discernment; men are now less learned but more able.”[1148] The volumes which are now submitted to the public contain sufficient evidence of this intellectual progress both in philosophy and in polite literature.

[1148] Dictionnaire de Bayle, art. Aconce, note D.

Conclusion. 51. I here terminate a work, which, it is hardly necessary to say, has furnished the occupation of not very few years, and which, for several reasons, it is not my intention to prosecute any farther. The length of these volumes is already greater than I had anticipated; yet I do not perceive much that could have been retrenched without loss to a part, at least, of the literary world. For the approbation which the first of them has received I am grateful; for the few corrections that have been communicated to me I am not less so; the errors and deficiencies of which I am not specially aware may be numerous; yet I cannot affect to doubt that I have contributed something to the general literature of my country, something to the honourable estimation of my own name, and to the inheritance of those, if it is for me still to cherish that hope, to whom I have to bequeath it.

THE END.

S. Cowan & Co., Strathmore Printing Works, Perth.

• Aberlard, Poetry of, 17
• Academies, Italian Literary, 229
• Academy del Cimento, The, 831
• —— French, Established, 630
• —— Neapolitan, 112
• Afra Behn, Plays of, 808
• Agricola, The first Mineralogist, 227
• —— Works of, 103
• Agrippa, Cornelius, 192
• Augustine, Antonio, 201
• Alamanni, 202
• Alciati, Andrew, 201
• Aldine Editions, The, 109
• Aldus, Press of, 125
• Algebra, Descartes on, 650
• —— Earliest Work on, 118
• Alchemy, Study of, 58
• Amadis de Gaul, The, 66, 152
• Aminto, Passo's, 351
• Amyot, His Translations, 371
• Ana, The, 820
• Anatomy, Fallopius on, 397
• —— Leaders in studying, 842
• Andreæ, John Valentine, 532, and note
• Anglo-Saxon, Change of, to English, 22
• Antiquaries, Society of, founded, 405
• Apianus, Cosmography of, 228
• Apology, Jewell's, 272
• Arabic, Rise of Study of, 399
• Arcadia, Sir Philip Sydney's, 383
• —— Character of, 383
• —— Walpole on, 383
• Aretin, Leonard, 44
• —— Plays of, 211
• Argensola, The Brothers, 570
• Arianism in Italy, 181
• Ariosto, Satires of, 203
• Aristotle countenanced by Melancthon, 189
• —— Veneration shown for, 189
• Arithmetic of Sacro Bosco, 56
• Arnauld on true and false ideas, 725
• Art of Rhetoric, Cox's, 219
• Ascham, His Character of Cambridge, 168
• —— Writings of, 372
• Astronomy in Middle Ages, 58
• Augsburg, Confession of, 173
• —— Diet of, 259
• Averroes on the Soul, 93
• Avis aux Refugiéz, 772
• Ayala, Balthazar, on War, 315

• Bacon, Lord, 468
• —— Conception of his Philosophy, 469
• —— Essays of, 293, 529
• —— his fame on the Continent, 489
• —— his Instauratio Magna, 469
• —— —— Analysis of, 469
• —— ignorant of Mathematics, 488
• —— Nature of his Philosophy, 472
• —— Novum Organum, 478
• —— Plan of Philosophy, 469
• Bacon, Roger, 57
• Balbi, Catholicon of, 40
• Baldi, Sonnets of, 319
• Ballads, Early Spanish, 59
• Balzac, Letters of, 628
• Bandello, Novels of, 380
• Barbarism, A relapse into, 38
• Barbarus, Hermolaus, 111
• Barclay, his works, 642
• Barlæus, Gaspar, 589
• Barrow, Sermons of, 703
• Basson, Sebastian, 463
• Bath, Adelard of, 56
• Bayle on the Comet, 819
• —— his Dictionary, 819
• —— Philosophical Commentary of, 700
• Beaumont, Fletcher and, 611
• Bellarmin, Works of, 273
• Bellenden, de Statu, 534
• Bello Francesco, 113
• Belon, Zoology of, 394
• Belphegor, Machiavel's, 215
• Bembo, Care of, 159
• —— Life of, 217
• —— Works of, 159, 201
• Berigard, Claude, 463
• Benserade, Poems of, 781
• Bentley, Richard, the Critic, 682
• Berchonius, 59
• Beza, Works of, 27
• Bible, Cranmer's, 187
• —— First printed, 76
• —— Latin Versions of the, 137
• —— Mazarin, 77
• —— The Authorised Version, 457
• Bibles, Early English, 187
• Block-books, 75
• Blood, Circulation of the, discovered, 665
• Boccalini, Trajan, 624
• Bodin, compared with Aristotle and Machiavel, 310
• Bodleian, Foundation of the, 674
• Boehm, Jacob, 464
• Boethius, his Consolation of Philosophy, 1
• —— Poem on, 13
• Boiardo, Works of, 112
• Boileau, Works of, 780
• Bookselling, Rise of, 121
• —— The Universities and, 123
• Books, Early, price and form of, 122
• —— Number of, printed at close of the Fourteenth Century, 120
• —— Price of in Middle Ages, 52
• —— Sold by printers, 121
• Bossu on Epic Poems, 816
• Bossuet, Exposition of Faith, 688
• —— other Works, 689
• —— Sermons of, 702
• Botany, Turner's, 395
• Botero, Giovanni, 301
• Boucher, Treatise of, 299
• Bouhours, Works by, 813
• Bourdalone, Style of, 701
• Boyle, Works of, 833
• Brahé, Tycho, 387
• —— System of, 387
• Brandt, Sebastian, 117
• Browne, Thomas, 531
• —— his Religio Medici, 531
• —— William, 581
• Bruno, characteristics of his system, 285
• Buchanan, de Jure Regni, 296
• —— Poetry of, 349
• Buda, Royal Library at, 81
• Budæus, Budé on, 115
• —— his Commentaries, 161
• —— Style of, 162
• Bunyan, John, 828
• Burnet, his Theory of Earth, 841
• Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy, 637
• Bury, Richard of, 39
• Butler, Hudibras of, 783
• Byzantine Literature, 48

• Cabbala, The Jewishp, 100
• Calderon, his Comedies, 593
• ——- his Tragedies, 595
• Calendar, Gregorian, 390
• Calisto and Melibœa, Drama of, 128
• Calvin, John, 177
• —— Institutes of, 177
• Camoenss, The Lusiad of, 330
• Cancionero General, The, 61
• Cardan, Jerome, 193
• —— Discoveries of, 221
• Carew, Poetry of, 584
• Cartesian Theory, The, 655
• Casa, Poems of, 318
• Casaubon, Isaac, 248, 410
• —— Wavering of, 428, 430, note
• Cassander, Consultation of, 265
• Castalio, Sebastian, 270
• Castelvetro, Ludovico, 377
• Castile, Rhymes in Language of, 60
• —— The Language of, 21
• Castillejo, 329
• Casuistry, Schemes of, 523
• Casuists, English, 527
• —— Literature of the, 521
• Cathani, Labours of, 276
• Catholicon, Balbi's, 40
• Cats, Father, 577
• Caxton, First Works of, 79
• Celio Magno, Odes of, 319
• Celso Minop, 271
• Cena de li Ceneri, The, 282
• Century, Twelfth, Progress during, 6
• Cervantes, his Don Quixote, 638
• —— Minor Novels, 640
• Cesalpin, System of, 280
• Ceva, Poems of, 791
• Chapman, his Translation of Homer, 341
• Charlemagne, Few schools before, 4
• —— Greeks under, 45
• —— Work effected by, 4
• Charron, Pierre, 529
• —— on Wisdom, 529
• Chaucer, Gower and, 24
• Chaulieu, Poems of, 781
• Cheke, Teaching of, 168
• Chiabrera, Poems of, 569
• —— Style of, 569
• Chillingworth, his Religion of Protestants, 436
• China, Jesuits in, 401
• Chivalry, Effects of, on Poetry, 64
• —— Romances of, 215
• Christianismi Restitutio, The, 268, note
• Christianity, Vindicators of, 699
• Chronicle, The Saxon, 23
• Chronology, Lydiat's, 420
• —— Scaliger's, 258
• Chrysoloras, Disciples of, 49
• Chrysostom, Saville's, 412
• Church, Early Learning in the, 2
• —— High, Rise of in England, 427, 435
• Cicero, Editions of, 160
• Ciceronianus, The, 159
• —— Scaliger on the, 160
• Cid, The, 597
• Citizens, Privileges of, 303
• Clarendon, History of, 636
• Classics, First Editions of, 231
• Clergy, Discipline of the, 261
• —— Prejudices of, against profane learning, 2
• —— Use of their prejudices, 3
• Codex, Chartaceus, 30
• Colleges at Alcala and Louvain, 134
• —— not derived from Saracens, 9
• Colonna, Vittoriap, 202
• Columbus, the Anatomist, 398
• Columns, Double, use of, 241
• Comedies of the Restoration, 807
• Comedy, First English, 214
• Comenius, Popularity of, 409
• Commès, Philip de, 118
• Commentators, English, about 1600, 453
• Commonwealths, Origin of, 303
• Concord, Form of, 267
• Congreve, Plays of, 807, 808
• Conti, Account of the East by, 72
• Controversy raised by Baius, 267
• Copernican Theory, The, 386
• Copernicus, Labours of, 222
• Corneille, Pierre, Plays of, 597
• —— Style of, 598
• Corneille, Thomas, 799
• Cortesius, Paulus, 89
• Costanzo, Poems of, 319
• Cowley, Johnson's Character of, 580
• Crashaw and Donne, 580
• Crellius, Ruanus and, 440
• Cremonini, 281
• Criticism in the Sixteenth Century, 375
• Critics about 1600, 414
• Cruquius of Ypres, 236
• Cudworth, Ralph, 707
• Cumberland, Richard, 747

• Daillé on the Fathers, 435
• Dalgarno, George, 735
• Daniel, his History of England, 635
• Dante, Petrarch and, 22
• De Bergerac, Novels of, 827
• De Gongora, Luis, 572
• —— Style of, 572
• —— Works of, 572
• De Leon, Luis, 328
• De Lisle, Map of the World by, 845
• De Retz, Memoirs of, 846
• De Sevigné, Madame, 812
• De Vega, Lope, 353
• —— Fertility of, 353
• —— Popularity of, 354
• —— Style of, 354
• —— Versification of, 354
• De Villegas, Manuel Estevan, 571
• Dead, Dialogues of the, 811
• Decline of German Poetry, 20
• Defensio Fidei Nicenæ, The, 695
• Deistical Writers, 277
• Delineation, Arts of, 93
• Della Causa, The, 282
• Delphin Editions, 680
• Denham, Sir John, 579
• Descartes, René, 491
• —— Attacked by Gassendi, 497
• —— Charged with Plagiarism, 505
• —— Early Life, 491
• —— his Meditations, 495
• —— his Mental Labours, 492
• —— his Paradoxes, 499
• —— his Publications, 492
• —— his Superiority, 497
• —— Merits of his Writings, 503
• —— on Free-will, 503
• —— on Intuitive Truth, 501
• Desportes, Poems of, 335
• Deventes, College at, 54
• Devotional Works in 1600, 454
• Dictionary, Della Crusca, 625
• Dodorus, Clusius and, 396
• D'Oliva, Perez, 195
• Don Quixote, 638
• Don Sancho Ortiz, Analysis of, 355
• Donne, Crashaw and Cowley, 580
• Dramatic Mysteries, Origin of, 105
• Drayton, Michael, 581
• —— His Polyolbion, 591
• Dryden, Early Poems, 787
• —— Fables, 789
• —— Odes, 790
• —— Style of, 821
• —— Tragedies, 805
• —— Translations, 790
• Ductor Dubitantium, Taylor's, 745
• Dunbar, Poems of, 130
• Dupin on Ancient Discipline, 686
• Du Vair, Works of, 371

• Earle, John, Works of, 637
• Eastern Languages, Early Study of, 128
• Ecclesiastical Polity, The, 289
• Elizabeth, Learning under, 249
• Encomium Moræ, The, 143
• Encyclopædias of Middle Ages, 58
• England, Reformed Tenets in, 178
• England, Revival of Learning in, 3
• English, Use of, 22
• Equations, Cubic, Invention of, 220
• Episcopius, Works of, 440
• Erasmus, Adages of, 139
• —— Character of, 139
• —— Epistles of, 175
• —— First Visit to England, 116
• —— His Controversy with Luther, 174
• —— Jealousy of, 139
• —— Quotations from, 140
• —— Testament of, 142
• —— Zeal of, 114
• Erastianism, Disputes on, 444
• Ercilla, The Araucana of, 329
• Erpenius, Works of, 671
• Essays, Bacon's, 293
• —— Montaigne's, 290
• —— Sir W. Temple's, 824
• Essex, Earl of, 633
• Etherege, Plays of, 808
• Euclid, Early Translations of, 56
• Europe, Language in, in 1400, 25
• Eustachius on Anatomy, 397
• Evelyn, Works of, 821

• Faber of Savoy, 313
• Fabricius on the Language of Brutes, 663
• Faery Queen, The, 343
• —— Style of, 344
• —— Superiority of First Volume, 343
• Fallopius on Anatomy, 397
• Fanaticism, Growth of, 172
• Farces, First Real, 107
• Farquhar, Plays of, 809
• Fenelon on Female Education, 761
• —— Works of, 696
• Fermat, the Geometer, 651
• Fernel, Works of, 220
• Ferreira, 331
• Ficinus, Works of, 98
• Fiction, Popular Moral, 66
• Figures in MSS. of Boethius, 55
• Filacaja, Vincenzo, 777
• Filli di Sciro, The, 592
• Fléchier, Style of, 703
• Fletcher, Beaumont and, 611
• —— Phineas and Giles, 577
• Fleury, Ecclesiastical History, 687
• Florence, Academy of, 22 9
• —— History of, 199
• Fontenelle, Character of, 810, 817
• —— Poems of, 782
• Ford, John, 621
• France, Troubadours of, 21
• Francesca of Rimini, 26
• Franco-Gallia, The, 295
• Free-will, Molina on, 268
• France, Classical Study in, 53
• French, Diffusion of, 19
• —— During Eleventh Century, 14
• —— Early, 13
• —— in England, Disuse of, 24
• —— Whence it came, 13
• Friars, Mendicant, The, 9
• Fuchs, Leonard, 226
• Fur Prædestinatus, Sancroft's, 693

• Galileo, compared with, Bacon, 486
• —— Discoveries of, 653
• Gallantry, Effects of on Poetry, 64
• —— Probable Origin of, 64
• Garnier, 357
• Gascoyne, George, 337
• Gasparin, Style of, 43
• —— Works of, 42, 43
• Gassendi, Syntagma Philosophicum of, 710
• —— Bernier on, 713
• —— Works of, 467, 468
• Gemalis Dies, The, 160
• Genius, Want of, in Dark Ages, 5
• Gentilis, Albenius, 316
• —— De Jure Belli, 377
• Geology, Rise of the Science, 840
• Gerard, Herbal of, 397
• German Poetry, Decline of, 20
• —— of Swabian Period, 19
• Germany, Schools in, 89
• Gesner, Conrad, 241, 392
• —— His Zoology, 392
• —— Quadrupeds discovered by, 393
• Gilbert, his Treatise on the Magnet, 392
• Glanvil, his Scepsis Scientifica, 733
• —— the Plus Ultra, 735
• Glosa, Nature of the, 61
• Glosses, Meaning of, 31
• —— Use of, 31
• Gloucester, Library of Duke of, 54
• Godefroy, James, 775
• Gomberville, 641
• Gorboduc, Sackville's, 359
• Governor, Sir T. Elyot's, 195
• Gower, Chaucer and, 24
• Grammars of the Sixteenth Century, 239 note.
• —— Provençal, 14
• Greek, better known after 1580, 251
• —— Corruption of Language, 47
• —— Dawn of in England, 115
• —— Early Grammars and Lexicons, 112
• —— Latin Translations of, 50
• —— Learned by Petrarch, 48
• —— Learning in Middle Ages, 45
• —— Printing, Early, 84
• —— Revival of Study of, 44
• —— Study of at Paris, 91
• —— Taught by Chrysoloras, 49
• —— Taught to Boys, 167
• Greeks, Emigration of, to Italy, 52
• Grew, Discoveries of, 839
• Grocyn, Linaire and, 135
• Groot, Gerard, College of, 54
• Grotius, De Imperio Circa Sacra, 444
• —— De Jure Belli, 544 et seq.
• —— his Arrangement, 565
• —— his Defects, 565
• —— Objections to, 561
• —— Religious Doubts of, 428
• —— Vindicated against Rousseau, 565
• —— Works of, 414
• Gruchius, Works of, 255
• Gruter, his Collection of Inscriptions, 419
• —— his Suspicions, 413
• Grymæus, Geography of, 228
• Guevara, Treatise of, 194
• Guiciardini, History of, 402
• Guidi, Poems of, 777
• Gymnasium, Roman, 131

• Habington, 585
• Hales on Schism, 438
• Hardy, Plays of, 596
• Harmonia Apostolica, Bull's, 694
• Harriott, Works of, 649
• Harvey, his Anatomical Discoveries, 665
• Havelok the Dane, 18
• Hawes, Stephen, 153
• Hebraists of the Fifteenth Century, 227
• Hebrew, First Printed, 95
• —— in the Sixteenth Century, 670
• Heinsius, Daniel, 413
• Herbert, Lord, of Cherbury, 456, 465
• Herrera, Works of, 329
• Herrick, Robert, 586
• Heterodoxy, Italian, 179
• Heywood, Plays of, 622
• —— Thomas, 363
• Hippocrates, Study of, 224
• History, Natural, from 1600-1650, 662
• Hobbes, Political Works of, 538
• —— The Leviathan of, 506
• —— Analysis of, 506 et seq.
• Hooft, Peter, 577
• Hooke, Works of, 834
• Hooker, Ecclesiastical Polity, 289
• —— his Theory of Natural Law, 290
• Horace, Lambinus's, 235
• Hottoman, Francis, 295
• Hudibras, Butler's, 783
• Huet, The Censura of, 715
• Hymns, German, 206

• Icon Basilice, The, 636
• Immutable Morality, Cudworth's, 745
• Index Expurgatorius, The, 407
• Ingulfus, History of, 15
• Instauratio Magna, The, 469
• Irnerius, Works of, 31
• Italian, Early, 22
• —— Language, Origin of, 10
• Italy, Printing in, 83

• Jansenism, Rise of, 441
• Jansenius, Tenets of, 691
• Jesuits, Colleges of the, 262
• —— Patronized by Popes, 263
• —— Rise of the, 181
• —— Rising Influence of the, 261
• —— their Popularity, 181
• Jewell, Apology of, 272
• Joachim, Rhæticus, 388
• Jodelle, Father of the French Theatre, 357
• John II., Poetry under, 62
• —— of Ravenna, 41
• —— of Salisbury, 36
• Jonson, Ben, 585
• —— his Every Man in his Humour, 369
• —— Plays of, 609
• Journal des Sçavans, The, 817
• Julian Period, Invention of the, 258
• Jurisprudence, Golden Ages of, 311
• —— in 1500, 200
• Jurists, Decline of, after Accursius, 32
• —— Early, 32
• —— Scholastic, 33

• Kempis, Thomas à, Works of, 68
• Kepler, Discoveries of, 652
• King's Quair, The, 63
• Knolles, his History of the Turks, 634
• Knowledge, Limited by Sense, 481

• La Bruyere, Characters of, 758
• La Fayette, Madame, 826
• La Fontaine, Fables of, 779
• La Forge, Regis and, 714
• La Motte le Vayer, 632
• La Noue, Works of, 301
• Labbe, Philip, 411
• Lacteals, Discoveries of the, 668
• Land, Views of, 427
• Lanfrance and his Schools, 35
• Language, A New, formed from Latin, 12
• Language, Early Imperfections of, 6
• —— Modern, Metres of, 15
• Languet, Vindicæ of, 295
• Latin becomes a New Language, 12
• —— Colloquial Corruption of, 11
• —— in the Lower Empire, 11
• —— in the Seventh Century, 12
• —— Origin of Rhyme in, 16
• —— Poems, Mediæval, 210
• Latinists, Apology for the, 217
• —— in 1600, 415
• Laws, Abridgments of, 31
• Layamon, Works of, 23
• Leaguers, Tenets of the, 298
• Learned, Persecution of the, 81
• Learning, Decline of in Sixth Century, 2
• —— Encouraged by a Pope, 51
• —— General, Rise of, 26
• —— in England, Revival of, 3
• —— in England under Edward VI., 249
• Lebrixa, Character of, 86
• Legal Study, Importance of, 30
• Leibnitz on Roman Law, 775
• —— The Protogæa of, 841
• Leipsic Acts, The, 819
• Leo X., a Patron of Letters, 131
• Letters, The Paston, 82
• Lexicon, Constantin's, 237
• —— Feirari's, 672
• —— Scapula's, 238, note.
• Libraries, New Public, 230
• —— Public, Want of, 169
• Library, Bodleian, Founded, 674
• —— of Charles V., 39
• —— Vatican, Founded, 230
• Lilly, his Euphues, 373
• —— Popularity of, 373
• Lipsius, and other antiquaries, 256
• Lister, Studies of, 836
• Literature, Checks upon, 407
• —— Theological, of Sixteenth Century, 183
• Loci Communes, The, 275
• Locke on Education, 759
• —— on Government, 768
• —— on Human Understanding, 736
• —— on the Coin, 773
• —— on Toleration, 700
• Logarithms, Invention of, 645
• Logic, Aconcio's, 286
• —— Campanella on, 460
• —— Inductive, 481 et seq.
• —— Ramus's, Success of, 288
• Lombard, Peter, 7
• London, First Theatre in, 360
• Lotichius, 347
• Love songs, Abelard's, 17
• —— Spanish, 61
• Lucan, May's supplement to, 591
• Lully, Raymond, 155
• —— his method, 155
• Lusiad, The, 330
• —— Defects of, 330
• —— Excellencies of, 330
• Luther, Character of, 182
• —— Dangerous tenets of, 148
• —— Differences from Zwingle, 172
• —— Theses of, 146
• Lutrin, The, 780
• Lydgate, Works of, 63
• Lyndsay, Poems of, 207
• Lyrics, Portuguese, early, 117

• Machiavel, Nicolas, 196, 211
• —— Motives of, 197
• —— some of his rules not immoral, 197
• —— The Prince, of, 197
• —— Works of, 198
• Malebranche, Theory of, 717
• Malherbe, Poems of, 573
• —— Style of, 573
• Malpighi, Discoveries of, 840
• Manana, de Rege, 299
• Mantuan, Works of, 111
• Manuscripts, Copying of, 36
• Manutius, de Civitate, 253
• —— Epistles of, 245
• Maps, Early, 94
• Maranta on gardening, 395
• Margarita, Antoniana, The, 287
• Marlowe, Plays of, 360
• Marot, Poems of, 206
• Marsham, Sir John, 685
• Massinger, Philip, 618
• Matthiola, System of, 226
• Medici, Lorenzo de, 80
• Medicine, Early Study of, 58
• —— Revival of Greek methods of, 223
• Meigret, Orthography of, 219
• Melancthon, Early Studies of, 127
• —— Tenets of, 266
• Melville, Andrew, 253
• Memoirs, Political, 301
• Mendicant Friars, The, 9
• Mendoza, Works of, 208, 673
• Mercator, Gerard, 402
• Metre, Romances in, 18
• Metres of Modern Languages, 15
• —— Spanish, 60
• Microscope, first used in Anatomy, 842
• Milton, John, 586
• —— Allegro, 587
• —— Compared with Dante, 784
• —— Comus, 586
• —— Il Penseroso, 587
• —— Lycidas, 587
• —— Paradise Lost, 783
• —— Paradise Regained, 787
• —— Samson Agonistes, 787
• —— Sonnets, 588
• Minot, Lawrence, 24
• Mirandola, Picus of, 101
• —— Credulity of, 101
• —— Literary Works of, 102
• Miscellanies of Politian, 95
• Moliére, Plays of, 799
• Montaigne, Essays of, 290
• —— Characteristics of, 291
• Montesquieu, Bodin compared with, 310
• Moralities, Early, 107
• Morals, Italian writers on, 292
• More, Henry, 709
• More, Utopia of, 137
• Morgante Maggiore, The, 97
• Morison, Robert, 837
• Motion, Laws of, 658
• Mun, Thomas, on Foreign Trade, 773
• Muretus, Marc Antony, 233
• Mysteries, Desire to explore, 99
• —— Early English, 105

• Naudé, Gabriel, 534
• Napier, Works of, 645
• Nizolius, Marius, 286
• Norris, Essay of, 725
• Northern Seas, Discoveries in, 401
• Nosce Teipsum, The, 340
• Novum Organum, The, 478
• Numencia, The, of Cervantes, 356
• Numerals, Arabic, 55
• Numismatics, Works on, 257

• Oceana, Harrington's, 766
• Opinion, Religious, in Fifteenth Century, 67
• Opitz, Martin, 575
• —— Followers of, 576
• Optics, Discoveries in, 660
• Opus Magnus, Bacon's, 57
• Oracles, The History of, 811
• Orientalists, Celebrated, 844
• Orlando Furioso, The, 150
• —— a continuation of Boiardo, 150
• —— its popularity, 150
• —— its want of seriousness, 150
• —— Style of, 151
• Orlando Innamorata, The, 112
• Ortelius, Works of, 401
• Otway, Plays of, 806
• Oxford, University of, founded, 8

• Paley, Compared with Puffendorf, 707
• Pallavicino, Ferrante, 625
• Pantheism, Bruno and, 283
• Papal Power, Decline of, 425
• Papal Power, Discussion of, 274
• Paper, Cotton, First use of, 28
• —— Invention of, 28
• —— Linen, as old as 1100, 29
• —— —— First use of, 28
• —— —— Known to Peter of Clugni, 29
• —— of mixed materials, 29
• Papias, Vocabulary of, 36
• Papyrus, Use of the, 28
• Paracelsus, Theophrastus, 191, 463
• —— his extravagances, 192
• —— his impostures, 192
• Paradise Lost, Milton's, 783
• Parchment, Use of, 28
• Paris, University of, founded, 6
• —— increase of, 8
• Paruta, Paolo, 302
• Pascal, Malebranche and, 724
• —— Provincial letters of, 744
• —— Thoughts of, 697, 725
• Pastor Fido, Guarini's, 351
• Pastourelles, Early, 18
• Patrizzi, 281
• Pearson on the Creed, 704
• Peele, Greene and, 362
• Pelletier, Algebra of, 385
• Pellican, 227
• Perkins, his Cases of Conscience, 527
• Perrault, Charles, 816
• Petavius, the Jesuit, 421
• Peter Martyr, Epistles of, 156
• Petrarch, Dante and, 22
• —— Latin Poems of, 41
• —— Restoration of Letters by, 40
• —— Style of, 41
• Philology, Stephens's Works on, 243
• Philosophy, Consolation of, 1
• —— Scholastic, Defeat of, 188
• —— Scholastic, Origin of, 7
• —— Speculative, 188
• —— Stanley's History of, 707
• Pibrac, 335
• Pilgrim's Progress, The, 828
• Pinelli, Occupations of, 404
• Platonists, Aristotelians and, 74
• Poem, Early, on Boethius, 13
• Poetry, Early English, 62
• —— German, Decline of, 20
• —— German, of Swabian Period, 19
• —— Provençal, 16
• Poets, Early Spanish, 203
• —— Elizabethan, 342
• —— Minor, from 1650-1700, 790
• Poggio, Bracciolini, 42
• —— on the Views of Rome, 72
• Politian, Works of, 95, 105
• Political Philosophy in the Sixteenth Century, 294
• Polyglott, Walton's, 843
• Pontanus, Works of, 111
• Popery, Taylor's Dissuasive from, 690
• Port-Royal Writers, 679
• Poynet on Politique Power, 296
• Prerogative Argument, 485, note.
• Press, The, of Aldus, 125
• Printing, Effects of, on Reformation, 124
• —— Invention of, 75
• —— Progress of, 79
• —— Restraint of, 124
• Progress in the Tenth Century, 4
• Prophesying, Taylor's Liberty of, 449
• Prose-writers under Elizabeth, 373
• Protestantism Extinguished in Italy, 260
• —— And Spain, 261
• Protestants, use of the Term, 173
• —— The Religion of, 426
• Provençal Grammar, 14
• Psalter, Early Printed, 77
• Publications, Early European, 85
• Puffendorf, his Theory of Politics, 762
• —— The Law of Nature, 753
• Pulci, Works of, 97
• Purbach, Discoveries of, 78

• Quevedo, Satires of, 571
• —— Visions of, 825

• Rabelais, 216
• Racine, Plays of, 793, 802
• —— Style of, 798
• Raleigh, his History of the World, 635
• Ramus, Peter, mentioned by Bacon, 191
• —— Peter, New Logic of, 190
• Ramusio, Voyages of, 400
• Rapin, René, on Gardens, 792
• —— Critical Works of, 815
• Ray, Works of, 835, 838
• Reading and Writing, Ignorance of, 25
• Réflexions sur l'Eloquence, Les, 815
• Reformation, Burnet's History of the, 846
• —— Origin of the, 146
• Regiomontanus, 93
• Regnard, Plays of, 802
• Regnier, Statues of, 574
• Religion, Differences of, Effects of, on Poetry, 66
• Republic, Analysis of the, 302
• Reuchlin,, 104
• —— The Monks and, 145
• Reviews, Early, 817
• Rhetoric, Cox's Art of, 219
• Rhetorique, Wilson's Art of, 379
• Rhyme, Origin of in Latin, 16
• Ribeyro, Works of, 205
• Richard of Bury, 39
• Richelieu, his Care for Liberty, 426
• Rienzi, The Story of, 52
• Rivinus, System of, 838
• Rochefoucault, 757
• Roger Bacon, Works of, 57
• Roman Laws, never wholly unknown, 31
• Romances, Metrical, 18
• —— of Chivalry, The, 65
• Rome, Loss of Learning on Fall of, 1
• —— Conversions to, 263
• —— Supremacy of, 422
• Ronsard, Poems of, 333
• Roscelin, Story of, 7
• Rose, Bishop of Senlis, 298
• Rosmunda, The, 132
• Rota, Bernardino, 320
• Rowley, Thomas, 83
• Royal Society, Origin of the, 832
• Ruanus, Crellius and, 440
• Rueda, Lope de, 212
• Ruel, Studies of, 226
• Rymer on Tragedy, 823

• Sachs, Hans, Dramas of, 213
• Sackville, Works of, 336
• St. Evremond, 812
• Salmasius, Works of, 412, 415
• Salvator, Rosa, Satires of, 778
• Sanchez, Minerva of, 244
• —— Sceptical Theory of, 285
• Sansons, Maps of the, 844
• Santeul, Latin Poems, 793
• Sarpi, Fra Paolo, 423
• Saville on Roman Militia, 257
• Saxon Chronicle, The, 23
• Scaliger, Joseph, 247
• —— as a Critic, 375
• Scaliger assisted by Gruter, 419
• Scarron, Roman Comique of, 826
• Schools, Early teaching in, 136
• —— Greek Taught in, 251
• Science in Sixteenth Century, 645
• Sciences, Academy of, at Paris, 832
• —— of Middle Ages, 55
• Scioppius, Work of, 416
• Scot, Reginald, 278
• Scotland, Learning in about 1550, 253
• Scotus, 91
• —— Reasonings of, 92
• Scripture, Early Translation of, 85
• Sebonde, Raymond de, 69
• —— Real Objects of, 70
• Secchia Rapita, The, 568
• Secular Variation, Law of, 176
• Segrais, Novels of, 827
• Seicentisti, Opinions on the, 566
• Selden, De Jure Naturali, 528
• Semi-Pelagian School, The, 439
• Sermons, Donne's and Taylor's, 454
• —— Latimer's, 184
• Serra, Antonio, 537
• Servetus, Labours of, 180
• —— Life of, 269
• Servitude, Domestic, 303
• Shadwell, Plays of, 808
• Shakspeare, William, 364, 602
• —— As You Like it, 369
• —— Comedy of Errors, 365
• —— First Writings, 364
• —— Historical Plays, 368
• —— Love's Labours Lost, 365
• —— Lear, 604
• —— Lucrece, 340
• —— Measure for Measure, 603
• —— Merry Wives of Windsor, 603
• —— Midsummer Night's Dream, 365
• —— Pericles, 605
• —— Poems, 340
• —— Roman Tragedies, 606
• —— Romeo and Juliet, 366
• —— Sonnets, 582
• —— Twelfth Night, 602
• —— Two Gentlemen of Verona, 365
• —— Venus and Adonis, 340
• Shirley, Plays of, 621
• Skelton, Works of, 154
• Smith, Teaching of, 167
• Societies, German Literary, 575
• Socinianism, Rise of, 181
• Sonnets, Shakspeare's, 583
• Soto, Dominic, 289
• South, Sermons of, 704
• Southern, Plays of, 807
• Spain, Pastoral Romances of, 117
• Spanish Language, Origin of, 10
• Spenser, his Sense of Beauty, 344
• —— Resembles Ariosto, 344
• —— Shepherd's Kalendar of, 337
• —— Style of, 345
• Spregel, the Dutch Ennius, 576
• Spinosa, Ethics of, 726, 746
• —— Politics of, 764
• Stampa, Gaspara, 321
• —— her Love for Collalto, 321
• —— her Second Love, 322
• —— her Style, 322
• Statics, Galileo's, 657
• Stephens, Thesaurus of, 163, 237
• —— Works of, 236
• Stevinus, Statics of, 391
• Strada, his Prolusiones, 627
• Sturm on German Schools, 165
• Suarez, of Granada, 524
• —— on Laws, 544
• —— Works of, 525
• Surrey, Wyatt and, 207
• Surville, Clotilde de, 83
• Swift, his Tale of a Tub, 831
• Sydney, Algernon, on Government, 767
• —— Sir Philip, his Defence of Poesie, 338
• —— his Poetry, 339
• Syriac, New Testament in, 399

• Table Talk, Selden's, 532
• Tacitus of Lipsius, The, 235
• Tale of a Tub, The, 831
• Talent, Deficiency of Poetical, in Tenth Century, 5
• Tasso, Bernardo, The Amadigi of, 323
• —— Torquato, 324
• —— compared with others, 326
• —— his Jerusalem, 324
• —— —— Characters of, 325
• —— —— Faults in, 325
• —— his Styles, 324
• —— Virgil and, 326
• Tassoni, Alessandro, 568
• Taste, Prevalence of Bad, 5
• Tauler, John, 25
• Taylor, Bishop Jeromy, 447
• Telemaque, Fenelon's, 828
• Telesio, System of, 281
• Theatre, English, Revival of, 804
• —— First French, 107
• Theosophists, Paracelsists, and, 463
• Thesauri of Grævius and Gronovius, 683
• Thesaurus Criticus, Gruter's, 234
• Thomas À Kempis, School of, 55
• Tillotson, Sermons of, 704
• Toleration, Arguments for, 446
• Tournebœuf, or Turnebus, 233
• Tournefort, System of, 838
• Tractate, Milton's, 758
• Tracts, Statistical, 775
• Treatise de Imitatione Christi, 68
• Trent, Council of, 182
• —— —— Efforts of, 264
• Trinitarian Controversy, The, 268
• Turkish Spy, The, 829
• Tyndale, Bible of, 187
• Tyrannicide, Poynet and, 297

• Universities, Rise of, 8
• Usher, Chronology of, 684
• Usury, Noodt on, 776
• Utopia, More's, 137

• Valla, Laurentius, 72
• —— Defects of his Work, 73
• —— Heeren's Praise of it, 73
• —— Testament, Annotations on New, 73
• Valors, Henry, 681
• Van Helmont, 669
• Vanbrugh, Plays of, 809
• Vanini, Writings of, 455
• Vatican Library, The, 230
• Vesalius, Works of, 224
• Victa, Francis, 385
• Victoria, Learning of, 44
• Vincent of Beauvais, 59
• Vinci, Leonardo de, 108
• Vocabulary of Papias, 36
• Voiture, Poems of, 574
• Vondel, 577
• Vossius, Gerard, 417
• Vulgar Errors, Browne's, 677
• Vulgate, The, 187
• —— Authenticity of, 278

• Waller, Poetry of, 782
• Walton, the Complete Angler, 824
• Webster, Plays of, 622
• White, Thomas, 706
• Wilkins, Bishop, 736
• Wit, Whetstone of, The, 385
• Witchcraft, Scot on, 278
• Writers, Romish, 183
• Writing, Rise of Knowledge of, 27
• Wyatt, Surrey and, 207
• Wycherley, Plays of, 803

• Ximenes, Cardinal, 134

• Zerbi, Anatomy of, 130
• Zwingle, Work of, 147