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parts of his "Grounds of the Contempt, &c." may be mistaken, he cannot be too highly praised for turning the philosophy of Hobbes into contempt.

In the catalogue of the printed books in the 'British museum, a piece is attributed to Dr. Eachard, which was published in 1673, in 12mo, under the following title: "A free and impartial enquiry into the causes of that very great esteem and honour that the Nonconforming Preachers are generally in with their followers. In a letter to his honoured friend, H. M. By a lover of the church of England and unfeigned piety." But if written by Dr. Eachard, it certainly has not his wit, or his manner.

1

EAGLESFIELD. See EGGLESFIELD.

EADMER, or EDMER, the faithful friend and historian of archbishop Anselm, was an Englishman, who flourished in the twelfth century, but we have no information respecting his parents, or the particular time and place of his nativity. He received a learned education, and very early discovered a taste for history, by recording every remarkable event that came to his knowledge. Being a monk in the cathedral of Canterbury, he had the happiness to become the bosom friend and inseparable companion of the two archbishops of that see, St. Anselm, and his successor Ralph. To the former of these he was appointed spiritual director by the pope; and that prelate would do nothing without his permission. In 1120 he was elected bishop of St. Andrew's, by the particular desire of Alexander I. king of Scotland; but on the very day after his election, an unhappy dispute arose between the king and him respecting his consecration. Eadmer would be consecrated by the archbishop of Canterbury, whom he regarded as primate of all Britain, while Alexander contended that the see of Canterbury had no pre-eminence over that of St. Andrew's. After many conferences, their dispute becoming more warm, Eadmer abandoned his bishopric, and returned to England, where he was kindly received by the archbishop and clergy of Canterbury, who yet thought him too precipitate in leaving his bishopric. Eadmer at last appears to have been of the same opinion, and wrote a long and submissive letter to the king of Scotland, but without producing the desired effect. Wharton fixes his death in 1124, which was not long after this

1 Life prefixed to his works.-Biog. Brit.

affair, and the very year in which the bishopric of St. Andrew's was filled up. Eadmer is now best known for his history of the affairs of England in his own time, from 1066 to 1122, in which he has inserted many original papers, and preserved many important facts that are nowhere else to be found. This work has been highly commended, both by ancient and modern writers, for its authenticity, as well as for regularity of composition and purity of style. It is indeed more free from legendary tales than any other work of this period, and affords many proofs of the learning, good sense, sincerity and candour of its author. The best edition is that by Selden, under the title of "Eadmeri monachi Cantuarensis Historia Novorum, sive sui Sæculi, Libri Sex," Lond. 1623, fol. His other works are, 1. A Life of St. Anselm, from 1093 to 1109, often printed with the works of that archbishop, and by Wharton in the "Anglia Sacra." 2. The Lives of St. Wilfrid, St. Oswald, St. Dunstan, &c. &c. and others inserted in the "Anglia Sacra," or enumerated by his biographers, as in print or manuscript.'

EARLE (JABEZ), a dissenting minister of considerable note, was born about 1676, and educated among the dissenters. Of his personal history we have little information. He officiated in the meetings in London between sixty and seventy years, and died in 1768. During this long life, he had never experienced a moment's ill health. He would scarcely have known what pain was, had he not once broke his arm. He preached to the last Sunday of his life, and died suddenly in his chair, without a groan or sigh. All his faculties continued in great perfection, excepting his eye-sight, which failed him some time before his death. He was remarkable for a vivacity and cheerfulness of temper, which never forsook him to his latest breath; and he abounded in pleasant stories. He had published in his earlier days several occasional sermons, some of them preached at Salters'-hall meeting, a "Treatise on the Sacrament," 1707, 8vo, and a small collection of poems, in Latin and English. His chief excellence, as a scholar, was in classical learning. When he was above ninety years old, he would repeat, with the greatest readiness and fluency, a hundred verses or more from Homer, Virgil,

Tanner.-Bale.-Pits.-Moreri.-Selden's Preface.-Henry's Hist. of Great

Britain.

Horace, Juvenal, or others of the ancient poets, upon their being at any time occasionally mentioned,'

EARLE or EARLES (JOHN), successively bishop of Worcester and Salisbury, was born at York in the year 1601, and entered of Merton-college, Oxford, in 1620, where he became M. A. in 1624, was senior proctor in 1631, and about that time was created chaplain to Philip earl of Pembroke, who presented him with the living of Bishopston, in Wiltshire. He was afterwards appointed chaplain and tutor to prince Charles, and chancellor of the cathedral of Salisbury. For his steady adherence to the royal cause, he was deprived of every thing he possessed, and at length was compelled to fly into exile with Charles II. who made him his chaplain, and clerk of the closet. He was intimate with Dr. Morley, afterwards bishop of Winchester, and lived with him a year at Antwerp, in sir Charles Cotterel's house, who was master of the ceremo nies; thence he went into France, and attended James, duke of York. On the restoration he was made dean of Westminster, and on Nov. 30, 1662, was consecrated bishop of Worcester, and in Sept. of the following year, was removed to the see of Salisbury, on the translation of Dr. Henchman to London. In 1665 he attended the king and queen to Oxford, who had left London on account of the plague. Here he lodged in University-college, and died Nov. 17, of the same year. He was buried in Mertoncollege chapel, near the high altar, where, on a monument of black and white marble, is a Latin inscription to his memory. Walton sums up his character by saying that since the death of the celebrated Hooker, none have lived whom God hath blest with more innocent wisdom, more sanctified learning, or a more pious, peaceable, primitive temper." When the nonconformist clergy stepped forward to administer to the relief of the dying in the great plague, what is called the Five-mile Act was passed, forbidding them, unless they took an oath against taking up arms on any pretence whatever, &c. to come within five miles of any city or town. Our prelate before his death declared himself much against this act. Burnet, who informs us of this, adds, that "he was the man of all the clergy for whom the king had the greatest esteem."

Bishop Earle wrote an "Elegy upon Mr. Francis Beau

1 Biog. Brit. vol. I. p. 177.

mont," afterwards printed at the end of Beaumont's Poems, London, 1640, 4to. He translated also from the English. into Latin, the "Eikon Basilike," which he entitled "Imago regis Caroli, in illis suis Ærumnis et Solitudine," Hague, 1649, and Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity, which was destroyed by the carelessness of his servants. But his principal work, of which a very neat and accurate edition was lately superintended by Mr. Philip Bliss, fellow of St. John's college, Oxford, and published in 1811, is his "Microcosmographie, or a Peece of the World discovered, in essays and characters," a work of great humour and knowledge of the world, and which throws much light on the manners of the times. It appears to have been in his life-time uncommonly popular, as a sixth edition was published in 1630. As his name was not to it, Langbaine attributed it to Edward Blount, a bookseller in St. Paul's Church-yard, who was only the publisher.'

The

EARLE (WILLIAM BENSON), a very munificent benefactor, was born at Shaftesbury, July 7, 1740. He was possessed of literary endowments of the highest order; well versed in the whole circle of the belles lettres; and had an exquisite taste for music; yet while his time and talents seemed devoted to these engaging pursuits, amidst them he forgot not the humble and lowly, but was ever relieving their necessities, and lessening their wants. following bequests afford striking proofs of his extensive liberality. To the matrons of Bishop Seth Ward's college in the Close, he bequeathed the sum of two thousand guineas. To St. George's hospital, Hyde-park-corner, to Hetheringham's charity for the relief of the blind, to the Philanthropic society, and to the fund for the relief of decayed Musicians, a contingent legacy of one thousand guineas each. To the three hospitals established in Winchester, Salisbury, and Bristol, one hundred guineas each. To the respective parishes of the Close, St. Edmund, St. Thomas, and St. Martin in Salisbury, fifty guineas each. For different charitable purposes in the parish of Grately, Hants, the sum of four hundred guineas; and to the poor cottagers in Grately, his tenants, the fee simple of their cottages; and to the parish of North Stoke, in Somersetshire, thirty gui

1 Ath. Ox. vol. II.-Burnet's Own Times.-Salmon's Lives of the Bishops.Cens. Lit. vol. II.--Lloyd's Memoirs, 604.-Dean Barwick's Life; see Index. Life of Lord Clarendon, p. 40, 8yo edit,-Letters from the Bodleian Library, 1813, 8vo.

neas. As a man of literature, and a friend to the arts, he also bequeathed to the royal society, two hundred guineas; to the society of antiquaries, two hundred guineas; and to the president of the society for the encouragement of arts, manufactures, &c. two hundred guineas, all for the purchase of books for the public libraries of those three respectable societies. To the Bath agricultural society he gave one hundred guineas. Wishing to add a beauty to the many which now adorn one of the finest Gothic structures in the world, he also bequeathed the sum of four hundred guineas for erecting a window of painted glass in the great west nave of Salisbury cathedral. To encourage the art he loved, and give a grateful testimony of his partiality to the Salisbury concert, he left an annual subscription of five guineas for ten years, towards its support; and a further sum of one hundred and fifty guineas for the three next triennial musical festivals at Salisbury, after his decease. Besides the above public legacies, he amply remembered his friends, and bequeathed many others, with a view to the encouragement of merit, and the reward of industry and goodness. He died the 21st of March, 1796, at his house in the Close, Salisbury; and on the 30th his remains were privately interred in the parish-church of Newton Toney, near those of his ancestors, his own positive injunctions having prevented those public marks of respect to his memory, which would otherwise have been paid on the melancholy occasion by his numerous friends.

In 1775, Mr. Earle reprinted from a scarce pamphlet, "An exact relation of the famous earthquake and eruption of Mount Etna, in 1669," to which he added a letter from himself to lord Lyttelton, containing a description of the "late great eruption of Mount Etna, in 1766." Of this he had been an eye-witness, and his description is minute, classical, and elegant.'

EATON (JOHN), an English divine, reckoned by some the founder of Antinomianism, was a native of Kent, where he was born in 1575, and studied at Oxford, being the first of Blount's exhibitioners in Trinity-college, to which he was admitted in 1590. He took his degree of M. A. in 1603, and entering into holy orders, officiated as a curate for several years, and at length, in 1625, was

1 Gent. Mag. 1796.

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