hemence of party, and was viewed in opposite lights by the friends and enemies of the government; but it seems now to be generally agreed, both that the bishop was really guilty of what was laid to his charge, and that the proceedings against him were, at least, carried to the utmost bounds of legality. He left the country in June 1723, accompanied by his beloved daughter Mrs. Morrice, and was landed at Calais. Thence he went to Brussels, and afterwards to Paris, at which capital he spent the remainder of his days, chiefly occupied in study, and in correspondence with men of letters. There is good evidence, however, that in 1725 he was actively engaged in fomenting discontents in the highlands of Scotland, with the intention of favouring another rebellion. The letters which passed on this subject were published at Edinburgh in 1768, and their authenticity has never been called in question. In 1729 he lost his daughter, an event which deeply affected him, but which he bore with due resignation. He himself died in February 1731, and his body was privately interred in Westminster abbey.

The character of Atterbury was marked with that turbulent ambition and contentious violence which animated the Beckets and Lauds of former times, and which was ill disguised by the affected mildness and moderation of his epistolary writings. His party zeal sufficiently appears from the events of his life above recited, and various anecdotes might be added in confirmation of it. Lord Harcourt affirmed, that on the queen's death, Atterbury came to him and Bolingbroke, and urged the immediate proclamation of the pretender, offering to put on his lawn sleeves and head the procession. The very rancour of party was shown in his suspension of a worthy clergyman, Mr. Gibbin, curate of Gravesend, for allowing the use of his church to the chaplain of the Dutch troops, who were called over to suppress the rebellion. Such a man, however, would probably feel an equally warm attachment to his friends; and nothing can be more cordially affectionate than his letters to Pope, with whom he maintained a close intimacy only terminated with life. From an anecdote which lord Chesterfield related to Dr. Maty, as told him by Pope, it would seem that Atterbury was long a sceptic as to the grounds of that religion for the established form of which he was so zealous. Yet the same anecdote implies that he ceased to be so; and he appears to have derived much of the consolation of his adversity from his religious principles.

His literary character has, perhaps (through

VOL. I.

his connections with those who were at that time the chief dispensers of literary fame), been raised beyond its true level. But, to this day, few English authors rank above him as a composer of sermons; in which, if he is not sublime, he is sometimes pathetic, and always eloquent, clear, and striking. As a controversialist he is keen, lively, and dexterous, but rather popular than deep or exact. His letters are admirable specimens of elegant familiarity, and are preferred to the more laboured ones of Pope, with which they are printed. His critical efforts have done more honour to his taste than to his erudition; and in particular, his attempt to prove that Virgil meant to allude to Antonius Musa, under the fictitious person of lapis in the Æneid, is reckoned futile by judicious commentators. His translations of two odes of Horace have received more than their due share of applause. Biogr. Britan.-A.

ATTERBURY, LEWIS, an English divine, elder brother of Francis, bishop of Rochester, was born at Newport Pagnel in Buckinghamshire, and was educated at Westminster school, and at Christ-church college, Oxford. He was in 1695 elected lecturer to the chapel at Highgate, where, notwithstanding his brother's high station and great interest in the state, he remained through life with no other preferment than the rectory of Hornsey, the parish in which the chapel of Highgate is situated. He solicited from the bishop the archdeaconry of Rochester, urging, that Lanfranc, archbishop of Canterbury, had a brother for his archdeacon; that when Sir Thomas More was lord chancellor, his father was a puisne judge; and that God himself appointed, that the family of the patriarch Jacob should owe their safety and advancement to a younger brother. To all these powerful analogical arguments, bishop Atterbury coolly replied, that there were objections in point of decency, and that it would have been a very proper post for his nephew, had it pleased God to spare his life. It is probable, that this coolness in the bishop was not so much the effect of delicacy, as of a mean opinion of his brother. Yet Lewis Atterbury appears to have been a very good parish priest; for he studied physic, that he might give advice gratis among his poor parishioners, and he discharged his clerical duties with great regularity for upwards of forty years, and acquired the character of a plain, useful, and solid preacher; a character which is confirmed by the sermons which he published during his life, and which appeared after his death in 1731. Besides single sermons on special occasions, he published, "Ten Ser3 M

mons preached before the Princess Anne of Denmark, printed in 8vo. in 1699;" "A second Volume of Sermons," in 1703; "Letters relating to the History of the Council of Trent;"An Answer to Colson's Defence of Popery against Archbishop Tillotson;" and some translations from the French. Two volumes of his posthumous sermons were published by archdeacon Yardley, in 1743. Brief Account prefixed to Lord Atterbury's PSS. Sermons. Biogr. Brit.-E.

ATTIČUS, HERODES. Tiberius Claudius Atticus Herodes was born at Marathon, in the territory of Athens. His father, Julius Atticus, descended from the family of Miltiades, had been reduced to a low condition by the proscription of his father, when he was suddenly raised to great wealth by the discovery of a vast treasure in an old house remaining to him. He acquainted the emperor Nerva with the circumstance, who told him to make what use he pleased of the treasure; and on his further representation, that the sum was too considerable for a private man to use; Nerva bid him abuse it, then, for it was his own. Julius Atticus employed his wealth in the most liberal He lived at Athens in a style of great magnificence, gave frequent largesses to the people, and offered splendid sacrifices to the gods. He also extended his munificence to other towns; and is recorded to have defrayed more than half the expence of a project of supplying Troas, with fresh water which he had persuaded the emperor Adrian to execute, but which cost above double of the estimate given in. Such a father was not likely to be sparing in the education of his son; accordingly, finding in him the happiest dispositions for learning, he engaged the ablest masters for him, and among the rest, Scopelian, one of the most eminent orators of the age, whose services he rewarded with great liberality. It was, indeed, principally to rhetoric that the studies of the time were directed; and this seems rather to have been the vain and ostentations art of declaiming according to rule upon any given topic for the purpose of being admired, than the useful instrument of convincing the reason and guiding the passions of men. Herodes was extremely attached to this pursuit, and spared no pains in obtaining a proficiency in it. Besides his proper master, he attended upon the lectures of Polemon and Favorinus, who were illustrious at Smyrna and Ephesus. Such was his early reputation for eloquence, that he was deputed when very young to harangue the emperor Adrian then in Pannonia; but his

courage failed him in the attempt; he was struck dumb, and through chagrin was near throwing himself into the Danube.

It is not known when he lost his father; but his death involved him in some difficulty. Julius had indulged his disposition to munificence in bequeathing to every Athenian one silver mina annually, which would almost have exhausted the property of his son. Herodes prevailed upon the people to accept a composition of five mine paid at once; and this benefaction he found means to reduce to a small súm, by paying great part of it with the obligatory bonds which individuals had given his father for money advanced. The Athenians showed no little dissatisfaction on the occasion; and it is said that in revenge they interpreted the name of Panathenaicum given to the stadium he afterwards erected, as if it were built at the cost of the whole people of Athens.

When Herodes had finished his attendance on the schools of orators, he returned to his own country, and gavè public lectures on eloquence, which were much frequented, partly, as we may suppose, through curiosity and the love of improvement, partly from adulation. He was attended by sophists, philosophers and rhetoricians, some of whom were munificently rewarded for their praise; and his more intimate disciples were treated with refreshments in the intervals of the lessons. Some were invited to the delicious country seats which he possessed in the neighbourhood, and which were converted into rural academies. A story related by A. Gellius, who was himself a disciple, will give some idea of the urbanity of Herodes, as well as of the character of some of his visitants. A man clad in a long mantle, with a beard descending to his waist, one day presented himself, and asked for alms. Herodes inquired who he was. "Do you not see (said the man angrily) that I am a philosopher?" "I behold (replied Herodes) the beard and mantle, but I do not yet discern the philosopher." One of the company then observed, that he was a sturdy beggar, who went about insulting those who refused to relieve him. "Well, then (said Herodes), let us give as men, though not to a man:" tanquam homines, non tanquam homini.

The fame of Herodes extended not only throughout Greece, but to Rome; and the emperor Titus Antoninus thought him the fittest person for the post of master of eloquence to his adopted sons Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus. This promotion put him in the way of higher advancement; and he was created

consul in 143. Either before or after this period he was appointed to the prefecture of the free cities of Asia, and the presidency at the Panhellenic and Panathenian games, at which he was crowned. On this occasion he testified his gratitude to his countrymen by one of the most sumptuous works ever erected by a private man. It was a stadium six hundred feet in length, entirely built of white marble, the relics of which are still visible. He also constructed a magnifi cent theatre at Athens, which he named Regillum, in honour of his wife Regilla. These two edifices are said to have been scarcely equalled in the Roman empire. He likewise repaired and beautified the famous odeum of Pericles, which was fallen to decay; nor did he confine his bounty to his own city, but decorated many other places in Greece and Asia with useful and ornamental works. His great ambition was to cut through the isthmus of Corinth, a project ineffectually entertained by various kings and emperors; but he was afraid of asking permission for the purpose. While all the productions of his eloquence have sunk in oblivion, his name has been perpetuated by the liberal employment of his wealth; and perhaps no person in a private condition ever expended so much upon the public. It is painful to relate that such a benefactor to his countrymen should have been made the subject of their accusation; but the party dissentions of Athens were always too powerful for her gratitude. Two brothers named the Quintilii, who commanded in Greece, were jealous of the influence of Herodes; and they gladly seized the occasion of some animosities which his exercise of the office of appointing masters in the schools of philosophy had excited, as well as some other subjects of complaint imagined by a restless people, to transmit a charge against him to the emperor Aurelius. Herodes thought proper to go and meet it; and when arrived in presence of the emperor, instead of attempting to soften him by eloquence, he rudely reproached him with a pre-determination to ruin him. The prefect-prætorio who stood by, exclaimed that this insolence merited death. "A man of my age (said Herodes) does not fear death!" The mild emperor, however, on hearing the cause, contented himself with punishing the freedmen of Herodes, who probably had really abused his indulgence. Herodes retired to Attica, and some time afterwards wrote a letter to the emperor to try whether he could not revive his kindness for him; and Aurelius sent him a very friendly answer. A still greater mortification to Herodes was a malicious charge raised against him, as having been accessory to

the death of his wife; and he was actually accused of the crime before the senate by her brother, who had been consul; but was acquitted. To prove his sorrow at her loss he erected a statue to her memory, with an inscription, still subsisting. Herodes spent the close of his life at Marathon, where he died at the age of seventy-six, and was honoured by his countrymen with a public funeral at Athens. Vie de Herode Atticus par M. Burigny; Mem de l'Acad. des Inscript. vol. xxx.-A.

ATTICUS, TITUS POMPONIUS, a Roman knight, who lived in the latter period of the Roman republic, has acquired great celebrity from the splendour of his private character. Descended from an ancient family, he inherited great wealth from his father, and his uncle Q. Cæcilius, who adopted him. He was very liberally educated, and such was his success in his studies, that he served for an example to his schoolfellows, among whom were the younger Marius and Cicero. A peculiar elegance of taste and suavity of manners seem from the first to have characterised him, and to have given him that aversion to civil contentions, which governed the whole tenor of his life. The bloody factions of Cinna and Sylla began to rage when he arrived at manhood. To avoid embroiling himself with either of these parties, both equally destructive to the republic, he retired to Athens, whither he conveyed the greatest part of his property; and following the bent of his inclination in this seat of philosophy and letters, he addicted himself entirely to study, and drank more deeply of Grecian literature than almost any Roman of his time. He ingratiated himself with the Athenians, not only by the affability of his demeanour, but by the essential benefits he was continually conferring on their city. He frequently lent the state sums of money without interest, and thereby freed it from the necessity of applying to usurers; at the same time he properly insisted upon punctual repayment at the period agreed upon. He also in seasons of scarcity made gratuitous distributions, of corn to the whole people. Hence he became so popular at Athens, that there were no public honours which the people were not desirous of heaping upon him. They wished to make him a citizen; but an opinion that such an act would amount to á renunciation of the citizenship of Rome, induced him to decline that honour. Nor would he suffer them to erect statues to him while he resided among them; though he could not prevent this testimony of respect after his departure, an event which caused a general mourning at Athens

The surname of Atticus, which he acquired from his attachment to this city, and his familiarity with its language and manners, became his usual appellation during his life, and continued to distinguish him in after ages.

His retirement from the scene of political contention did not make him indifferent to the welfare of the actors in it; nor did his prudential maxims render him timid in serving a friend of a distressed party, at the hazard of displeasing the triumphant one. When young Marius was declared a public enemy, he supplied him with money to escape from his foes. Yet so pleasing were his manners, and such affection did his amiable qualities inspire, that when Sylla, in his way from Asia to Rome, called at Athens, he would never suffer young Pomponius to be out of his company, and strongly urged him to return with him to Rome. "Do not, I beseech you (said Pomponius) insist upon my going with you to combat those, whom I left, that I might not be obliged to take up arms against you. "He occasionally made journies to Rome in order to assist his friends in elections, and never failed to do them kind offices when they most wanted them. Cicero appears to have been the most intimate of his friends. Their tastes in many respects were congenial, and the different course of life they pursued was rather useful than disadvantageous to their connection. Atticus exerted himself greatly during the dangers which pressed upon Cicero, and when that eminent statesman was banished, he accommodated him with a large sum of money. Yet he was scarcely less intimate with Cicero's great rival in oratory, Hortensius; and, by mutual good offices, he preserved a good understanding between them. With the family of Cicero he had, indeed, a close affinity; for his sister Pomponia was married to Quintus Cicero; a match promoted by Marcus.

Atticus returned to reside in Rome when affairs were in a settled state. There he continued steadily to follow his original plan of keeping himself disengaged from all public business; nor would he accept of any of the numerous opportunities offered him of aggrandizing his fortune by accompanying his consular or prætorian friends to their provinces. He took in good part the honour of their nomination to offices, but disregarded the emolument. He never engaged in a law-suit; nor was ever concerned in an accusation either as principal or second. He never bid for estates at public auctions, or in any way shared in the spoils of the unfortunate. At the breaking out of the war between Cæsar and Pompey, he was about sixty years old, and

any

gladly made use of the pretext of his age to avoid engaging on either side. He remained in Rome, and assisted with his fortune those of his friends who thought themselves obliged to leave it with Pompey; but owing, himself, no gratitude for favours to Pompey, he did not offend him by staying quiet at home. Cæsar, whose maxim it was to reckon all as friends who were not enemies, was highly pleased with his conduct; and when victor, forbore from levying contributions on him as he did on others, and granted him the pardon of his sister's son, and of his brother-in-law, Quintus Cicero. After the death of Cæsar, when it was proposed in the order of knights to establish a private treasury for the use of the party which had taken him off, Atticus, though upon the most intimate terms with Brutus, opposed the measure, and prevented it from taking place. Yet when Brutus and Cassius were obliged to leave Italy, he sent a large sum to Brutus from his own property, and ordered a still larger to be paid him in Epirus. Soon after, Antony was judged a public enemy, and compelled to leave Italy, with no prospect of a restoration of his affairs. His friends in Rome, and especially his wife Fulvia, were exposed to innumerable vexations and dangers from the enemies of the family, who attempted to strip them of all their possessions, and even threatened their lives. Atticus exerted himself to the utmost in their favour. He advanced them money in their necessities, and stood forwards as the surety for Fulvia in all cases where bail was required from her. In the desperate state of Antony's affairs, no one thought that Atticus had a view to his interest by this conduct; but some of his friends censured him "for not sufficiently hating bad citizens." Antony afterwards returned triumphant. The bloody proscription was begun, and every known friend of Cicero, Brutus, and the republican party, was brought into imminent danger. Atticus thought it prudent to retire along with the friend of his youth, Canius, of the house of P. Volumnius, an Antonian, whom he had highly obliged. When Antony discovered his place of refuge, though urged to the destruction of Atticus by some of the greedy villains about him, he had gratitude enough to remember his benefactor. He wrote with his own hand to Atticus, assuring him of the safety of himself and his friend Canius, and sent a guard to protect him. Even in these bad times Atticus did not fear to perform acts of friendship to the fallen party. He caused all the proscribed, who fled to Epirus, to be liberally relieved from his large estates in that country; and he paid no

less respect to Servilia, the mother of Brutus, after the death of that patriot, than he had done during his prosperity. He also, by his interest with the triumvirs, recovered the forfeited estates of some of his friends, and procured their exemption from the list of the proscribed.

Such was his credit with the young Octavius, that his daughter was preferred to all the great matches in Rome as a wife for M. Agrippa, the great friend and favourite of Octavius; and by the issue of this marriage, the family of Atticus became allied to the imperial family. Octavius himself cultivated the closest intimacy with Atticus, and when absent from Rome, continually wrote to him respecting all his motions and designs; and scarcely did a day pass in which, when at home, he did not either converse with Atticus, or consult him upon some point of letters or antiquity. While Antony lived, an equally intimate correspondence was carried on between him and Atticus. Thus he maintained, from the first to the last, the character of the general friend of all parties, in all fortunes. This conduct has been the subject of some curious discussion by political casuists; and it has been warmly censured by those, who hold a neutrality in the civil contentions of one's country to be base and criminal. Certainly it appears more noble, vigorously to act and bravely to suffer for the cause which conscience approves. But in that corrupt age of the Roman republic, was there any cause which a wise man could without much hesitation approve? Atticus may be charged with selfishness, yet his desire of keeping on good terms with all parties never made him the tool or flatterer of any; nor did he shun actual hazard in performing services to his friends in adversity. He even chose the period of distress for the display of peculiar attachment to individuals. As a medium of friendship, a reconciler of differences, a softener of misfortune, and a protector against the ferocity of party hatred, he sustained a part of eminent utility in those calamitous times; nor, perhaps, was it possible that a man in his situation, and of his cast of temper and talents, could have pursued any line of conduct so beneficial to his country as well as to himself. His sect of philosophy, which was the Epicurean, has been suggested as the spring of his indifference to public affairs, and his steady pursuit of a tranquil life. But the zealous Cassius, and many other warm and active partisans in civil contention, were Epicureans. It is more probable, that native disposition and early habits formed the character of Atticus, than any set of speculative principles. In every thing besides, he dis

played the same easy and accommodating disposition. He bore with admirable good temper the moroseness of his uncle Cæcilius, with whom no other person could live. He was an excellent son and brother; and when, at sixty-seven years of age, he buried his mother of ninety, he could say that he had never in his life had occasion to be reconciled to her, and had never had a single difference with his sister, who was nearly of the same age with himself.

The mode of living of Atticus was that of a man of fortune, whose great passion was literature, and whose mind was fashioned by philosophy. He dwelt in a good but old house left him by his uncle. His domestics were not numerous, but choice; several born and brought up in his own family. There was a large proportion of readers and copyists, and others devoted to the purposes of letters. His table was elegant, not costly. Reading was always an accompanyment of the supper; and he had no guests to whom such an entertainment was not acceptable. Moderation presided over all his enjoyments; and though his wealth exceeded the measure of a large fortune, he contented himself with the expenditure of a middling one. He was extremely studious, and was particularly attached to enquiries relative to the antiquities of his country; its laws, treaties, customs, and the genealogies of its illustrious families. He wrote several treatises on these subjects, which appear to have been much valued. He also tried his talent at verse; but the topics he chose were connected with his other studies; for they were the characters and actions of illustrious men, concisely described in a few lines to be placed under their statues. He wrote in Greek a history of the consulate of his friend Cicero. Though nothing is extant of the writings of Atticus, a large number of the letters of Cicero to him have reached us, written from the year of his consulship almost to the time of his death. They are confidential, and replete with curious particulars, both political and literary.

The conclusion of the life of Atticus was conformable to the principles which had governed the course of it. He had reached the age of seventy-seven, and had passed the last thirty years in such a state of health, as never to have needed medical assistance; when a disorder of the intestines came on, which terminated in an ulcer, judged incurable, and attended with fever and increasing pain. When he was convinced of the nature of the case, he ordered his son-in-law Agrippa and other friends to be sent for, and to them he declared his intention of putting a period to a life, now no longer valua