of animation they exhibit are when they touch on political topics.-A.

enriched the illustrations from the stores of philosophy and poetry, that it would be injurious to deny him the claims of an original writer. No poem of so elevated and abstracted a kind was ever so popular. It went through several editions soon after its appearance, and is still read with enthusiasm by those who have acquired a relish for the lofty conceptions of pure poetry, and the strains of numerous blank verse. Its merit, and that of the writer, have probably never been so well appreciated as by Mrs. Bar-bauld, in an Essay, prefixed to an ornamented edition of this poem, published by Cadell and Davies in 1795 We shall copy part of the We shall copy part of the summary with which it concludes.

"If the genius of Akenside is to be estimated from this poem, it will be found to be lofty and elegant, chaste, correct, and classical; not marked with strong traits of originality, not ardent nor exuberant. His enthusiasm was rather of that kind which is kindled by reading, and imbibing the spirit of authors, than by contemplating at first hand the works of nature. As a versifier, Akenside is allowed to stand amongst those who have given the most finished models of blank verse. His periods are long but harmonious, the cadences fall with grace, and the measure is supported with uniform dignity. His muse possesses the mien erect, and high commanding gait. We shall scarcely find a low or trivial expression introduced, a careless and unfinished line permitted to stand. His stateliness, however, is somewhat allied to stiffness. His verse is sometimes feeble through too rich a redundancy of ornament, and sometimes laboured into a degree of obscurity from too anxious a desire of avoiding natural and simple expres

sions."

The author was known to have been employed many years in correcting or rather newmodeling this work. The unfinished draught of it on this new plan, which he left behind him, seems to render t probable that it would have lost as much in poetry as it would have gained in philosophy.

Of his other pieces, the "Hymn to the Naiads," also in blank verse, is the longest and best. With the purest spirit of classical literature, it contains much mythological ingenuity, and many poetical ideas beautifully expressed. With respect to his lyric productions, their copiousness and elevation of thought does not compensate for their total want of grace, ease, and appropriate harmony. They are cold, stiff, and affected. They do not appear ever to have been great favourites with the public, and are not likely ever to become so. The only sparks

In

AKIBA, a Jewish rabbi, who is said to have been born early in the first century, and to have lived to a great age, was one of those profound doctors who studied and taught the mysteries of the Jewish cabbala. Till forty years of age, he was employed in the humble occupation of a shepherd, in the service of a rich citizen of Jerusalem: but his master's daughter promising to marry him on condition of his becoming a learned man, he devoted himself to study. After some years, he was so famous for learning, that his school, first at Lydda, and afterwards at Jafna, was crowded with scholars. The account given by the Jews, that he had twenty-four thousand disciples, is, however, incredible: it is hard to say whence such an immense number of pupils should have been collected; and impossible to believe, that these disciples, as the Jews relate, all died between the passover and pentecost, and were buried near Tiberias, at the foot of a hill, with Akiba and his wife. (Basnage, Hist. des Juifs, lib. vi. c. 9.) Akiba was one of the first compilers of the Jewish traditionary institutes, which he enlarged by inventions of his own. Many of these were, in the highest extreme, absurd and ridiculous; and extended the ceremonial precepts to the most mechanical actions. gressus sum aliquando post R. Josuam in Jedis secretæ locum, et tria ab eo didici: Didici primo, quod non versus orientem et occidentem, sed versus septentrionem et austrum nos convertere debeamus, &c. &c. (Talm. Massech. Berach. fol. 62. col. 1.) Yet this rabbi was held in such veneration among the Jews of Palestine, that they thought him immediately instructed by God to deliver to them the oral law, and asserted, that those things which were not revealed to Moses, were revealed to rabbi Akiba. He is commonly supposed to be the author of a book called "Jezirah," concerning the creation; a work which teaches the cabbalistic doctrine, and which probably originated from the Jewish schools in Egypt. Some of the Jews have given it a more ancient origin, and ascribed it to the patriarch Abraham. Akiba is said to have understood seventy languages; but this perhaps only expresses an indefinite number by a definite term, by a figure of speech common to all nations. When far advanced in life, Akiba espoused the cause of the false messiah Barchochebas, and maintained, that the words of Balaam, "A star shall come out of Jacob," were fulfilled in him, and that he was the true messiah. An army of two hundred thousand men is said to have repaired about the year 132 to

the standard of this pretended deliverer of Israel: Akiba anointed him as Samuel did Saul, and attended him as armour-bearer at the head of his army. (Joh. a Lent. Schediasm. de Pseudo-Mess. p. 9.) The forces which the Roman emperor Adrian sent against these insurgents, who had committed dreadful devastation, after a doubtful contest were successful. This pretended messiah and his army were shut up in the city of Bitterah, and, after a long siege, were put to the sword. Akiba was taken, and imprisoned. It is said, that during his confinement, when he was nearly perishing for want of water, he chose rather to make use of a small portion in washing his hands, according to the rabbinical law, than in quenching his thirst, saying, "that it was better to die of thirst than to transgress the precepts of their fathers." With his son Pappus he was flayed alive. This happened about the year 135. After his death the Jews paid great honour to his memory, and his tomb at Tiberias was visited with great solemnity. Akiba is said to have altered the text of the Hebrew bible, with respect to the age of the patriarchs when they began to have children, which is greater according to the Septuagint, than in the Hebrew text; and to have done this to make it believed, that the time of the coming of the Messiah was not yet arrived, because that, according to the tradition of the Jews, the Messiah was not to appear till the completion of six thousand years. In support of this conjecture it is urged, that the translation of Aquila, published in the twelfth year of Hadrian, agrees with the Hebrew text of this time; and that this Aquila, having gone over from the Christian to the Jewish religion, and becoming a pupil of Akiba, probably persuaded his master to make this alteration, which, it is said, his high character among the Jews in Palestine might enable him to effect. (Pezron. Antiq. c. 16.) The charge, however, is feebly supported, and the dissonance between the Septuagint and Hebrew text still remains to be satisfactorily accounted for. The book entitled Jezirah was first printed at Paris, in 8vo. in the year 1552, and translated into Latin by Postel, with notes: it was reprinted, with other Jewish books, in folio, at Basil, in 1587; and a Latin translation, with notes, was published in 1642, by Rittangel, a converted Jew, professor at Koningsberg. Zemach. David. ad Ann. M. 370. Lightfoot, Hora Heb. t. ii. p. 449. Otthonis Hist. Doct. Misnicorum. p. 132. Bayle. Brucker, Hist. Phil. lib. iv. c. 2.-E.

ALABASTER, WILLIAM, an English divine, born at Hadleigh in Suffolk, in the sixteenth century, and educated in Trinity Col

lege, Cambridge, accompanied the earl of Essex, as his chaplain, in his expedition to Cadiz in the reign of queen Elizabeth. He was a man of a restless and fickle temper, and affords a singular example of sudden and violent changes of opinion. While he was abroad with the earl of Essex he became a convert to the Romish church; but on his return, came back into the bosom of his mother church, and was provided with a living in Hertfordshire, and a prebend in St. Paul's, London. He now de voted himself to the study of the Hebrew lan guage, and became an enthusiastic admirer of the mysteries of the Jewish Cabbala, according to which he interpreted, or rather perverted, the scriptures. As a specimen of his method of explaining scripture, may be mentioned a sermon which he preached on taking his degree of doctor of divinity in Cambridge: he took for his text the beginning of the first book of Chronicles, Adam, Seth, Enech; and having touched upon the literal sense, fell into the mystical, explaining Adam as signifying misery, &c. He lived to the year 1630. He wrote a Lexicon Pentaglotton, printed in folio, in 1637, and other works, from the titles of which the mystical turn of his mind will sufficiently appear. "Apparatus in Revelationem Jesu Christi: Spiraculum Tubarum, seu, Fons spiritualium Expositionum ex æquivocis Pentateuchi Significationibus:" and "Ecce Sponsus venit, seu, Tuba Pulchritudinis, hoc est, Demonstratio quod non sit illicitum, nec impossibile, computare Du-rationem Mundi et Tempus secundi Adventus. Christi." [Preparation for the Revelation of Jesus Christ: The Mouth of the Trumpet, or the Fountain of spiritual Expositions from the double Meanings of the Pentateuch.-Behold the Bridegroom cometh, or the Trump of Beauty, a Demonstration, that it is not unlawful nor im-possible to compute the End of the World, and the Time of the second Advent of Christ.] This mystic, in the former of these works, undertakes to provide a new and admirable method of investigating the mysterious sense of the pro-phecies, by making the scripture its own interpreter; but a writer, who, in order to bring out his interpretation, did not scruple to assign new significations to words, to alter the grammatical construction, and even to separate the syllables and letters of the Hebrew words at his pleasure, (Rivet. Isagoge ad Script. Sac. c. 15.) can only be considered as an egregious trifler, or a mad enthusiast, whose works can deserve notice merely as monuments of human folly. This learned enthusiast died in 1640. Fuller's Worthies. Bayle. Wood's Fasti Oxen.-E.

ALAIN, JOHN, a Danish writer, was born in 1563, and died in 1630. He published a treatise On the Origin of the Cimbri, and their various Establishments;" another, "On Logic, natural, and artificial" and a third, "On the Pronunciation of the Greek Language, with an Apology for Saxo Grammaticus." Konig. Bibl. vet. et nov. Moreri. — E.

ALAIN, DE LISLE, a native of Lisle, in Flanders, who flourished in the thirteenth century, was so celebrated for his skill in theology, philosophy, and poetry, that he was called the Universal Doctor. He died in the year 1294, and left behind him many pieces in prose and verse, collected into one volume, in folio, at Antwerp, in 1653. When he was alive, his fame was so great, that it was thought a felicity to have known him; and it was proverbially said, "Suffice it to have seen Alain." Probably, in the present more enlightened age, the sight of his voluminous work on the shelf of a library will be thought enough, and it will be again said, "Suffice it to have seen Alain." Dupin. Moreri.-E.

ALAMANNI, LUIGI, born at Florence in 1495, of a family of distinction, rendered himself celebrated from early youth for his progress in philosophy and Greek literature. He was originally attached to the Medici party, and ingratiated himself with cardinal Julio de' Medici, afterwards pope Clement VII; but upon some disgust, he entered into a conspiracy against the cardinal, and in consequence was obliged to take refuge in Venice. He was afterwards imprisoned in Brescia, and with great difficulty obtained the liberty of expatriating himself. He wandered about some years, living partly in France, partly in Genoa, till 1527, when he was recalled to Florence on the expulsion of the Medici family. Here he was engaged in Here he was engaged in various public affairs for the support of the liberties of his country, till that family finally regained and perpetuated their authority in 1530. Alamanni was detained three years in Provence, and then declared a rebel. Taking refuge at length in France, he passed there some time in retirement, chiefly occupying himself in poetical compositions. Francis I. at length called him to court, honoured him with the order of St. Michael, gave him a considerable office in the household of Catharine de' Medici, and employed him in various concerns at Rome and Naples. In 1544 he sent him on an embassy to the emperor Charles V. In his complimentary harangue before this prince, having frequently introduced the word aquila (eagle) Charles replied by a quotation from a satirical poem of

Alamanni's own, in which the cock is made to call the eagle “ Aquila grifagna, che, per più divorar, due becchi porta ;" [The rapacious eagle, who has two beaks to devour the more.] Alamanni, not disconcerted, apologised for his lines as written in the fervour of youth, and with the licence of poetical fiction, but that it was now his business, as an embassador and a man of mature age, to speak the truth. He was afterwards employed in various negotiations by Henry II; and died at Amboise in 1556, leav ing two sons, one of whom was made bishop of Maçon. The works of Alamanni are all in Italian poetry. The first publication of them was at Lyons in 1532 and 33, containing elegies, eclogues, satires, sonnets, hymns, psalms, &c. and a translation of the Antigone of Sophocles. These are much esteemed for their elegance and grace. His poem "Della Coltivatione," a didactic piece on agriculture, in blank verse, greatly added to his fame. It was first printed at Paris in 1546. In 1548 he published a piece of greater bulk, entitled "Girone il cortese," taken from a French romance of "Giron the courteous." He left behind him an epic poem called "l'Avarchide," on the siege of Bourges, which had not much success, any more than his comedy entitled "la Flora." But his Tuscan epigrams, a species of writing, first successfully attempted by himself, were well received, and produced several imitators. On the whole, Alamanni is considered as one to whom Italian poetry lies under particular obligations.

Antonio Alamanni, whose burlesque poems are printed with those of Burchiello, was a relation of Luigi. Moreri. Tiraboschi. - A.

ALAN, of Lynn, a divine of the fifteenth century, born at Lynn in Norfolk, and educated at Cambridge, acquired great reputation both as a student and a preacher. He was fond of allegorical explications of scripture, and applied the historical parts of the Old and New Testament to the concerns of religion and moral conduct. He wrote tracts on the interpretation of scripture, sermons, and elucidations of Aristotle. He became a Carmelite in a monastery at Lynn, where he died. He is celebrated for the great pains which he took in making indexes to the books which he read, a long list of which is given by Bale. The modern method of annexing indexes to books is so exceedingly useful, that no book of value ought to be published without an index; for, though they may in some instances encourage indolence, they greatly facilitate and expedite the labours of the real scholar, and in truth are perhaps, as Fuller remarks, most used by those who pretend to despise them,

Bale. Leland. Pits. Fuller's Worthies, Biogr. Brit.-E.

ALAN, or ALLEN, WILLIAM, an Englishman of good family, a zealous son of the Romish church, was born at Rossal in Lancashire, in the year 1532. Educated at Oxford by a tutor warmly attached to popery, he entered upon the world under a strong prepossession in favour of the catholic faith. Though at college he had acquired considerable reputation, particularly for his skill in logic and his knowledge of philosophy, and obtained the honour of being made principal of St. Mary's hall, and afterwards proctor of the university; on the accession of queen Elizabeth to the crown he not only despaired of further preferment, but apprehended himself in danger, and therefore determined to withdraw from his native country. In 1560 he took up his residence at Louvain, whither many English catholics had already fled, and where an English college was erected, of which he became the chief support. His zeal for the popish cause was for a long time displayed only in those kinds of exertion which every man, who is convinced of the truth and importance of his opinions, has a right to make for their support and propagation. He wrote, in reply to a work of the learned bishop Jewel, "A Defence of the Doctrine of Catholics, on the Subjects of Purgatory and Prayers for the Dead," which was printed at Antwerp in 1565, and occasioned a continued controversy. When, for the recovery of his health, which had been impaired by hard study, he revisited his native country, his zeal for the Romish cause induced him, without regard to his personal safety, to support it by writing and distributing small tracts in its defence; and when these rendered him so obnoxious to government, that he was obliged to conceal himself, in his retreat, under the protection of the duke of Norfolk, or in the house of a friend near Oxford, he wrote an apology for his party, under the title of "Brief Reasons concerning the Catholic Faith." After renewed attempts to recall the wavering, and convert the apostate, to the ancient faith, finding it no longer safe to remain in England, where it was deemed by the reigning powers an incontrovertible maxím, that popery ought not to be tolerated, he, in 1568, with some difficulty made his escape into Flanders.

Allen's zeal for popery, so courageously displayed during a stay of three years in England, secured him a cordial welcome on his return to a country where orthodoxy was still considered as the test of merit. In a monastery at Mechlin he was received with great applause as a lecturer

VOL. I.

in divinity; at Douay, the academic honour of doctor of divinity was conferred upon him; and he was preferred to the honourable and profitable canonry of Cambray, and soon afterwards to that of Rheims. Still solicitous to serve the interests of the Roman catholic religion in England, Allen established a seminary for the education of English youth at Douay, which he afterwards transferred to Rheims; and he continued to write books in defence of popery, and against the church of England, which were sent over to his native country, and circulated by his friends, till it was thought necessary to issue a proclamation from the queen, prohibiting such books to be sold or read. (Strype's Annals, vol. i. p. 557.) His zeal even prompted him to make several journeys into Spain and Italy, for the purpose of instituting schools for English students; and he procured the establishment of one at Rome, and two in Spain, in which the young men were not only provided with various kinds of instruction, but were even furnished with gratuitous support.

Though these proceedings might admit of apology, on the ground of a conscientious attachment to the religious principles which the church of England had forsaken, it is not surprising that Allen was reputed by the English government an enemy to his country, especially as he had by this time given pretty strong proofs that the same principles which led him to attempt the restoration of popery, also led him to undermine the authority of the reigning queen by his writings. To correspond with him was considered as a treasonable offence; and a Jesuit, Thomas Alfield, was tried and executed, in 1585, for bringing some of his writings into England. The treasonable expressions on which the indictment was grounded, chiefly taken from a scarce tract, entitled, "The Defence of the Twelve Martyrs in one Year," and still found among the papers of the lord-treasurer Burleigh, are as follows: (Strype's Annals, vol. iii. p. 562.) "The bond and obligation we have entered into for the service of Christ and the church, far exceedeth all other duty which we owe to any human creature; and therefore, where the obedience to the inferior hindereth the service of the other, which is superior, we must, by law and order, discharge ourselves of the inferior. The wife, if she cannot live with her own husband, being an infidel, or an heretic, without injury or dishonour to God, she may depart from him; or, contrariwise, he from her for the like cause: neither oweth the innocent party, nor can the other lawfully claim, any conjugal duty, or debt in this case. The bond-slave,