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 ceremonies; 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.'

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. The 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, 8vo 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.

made minister and preacher at Wickham Market, in Suffolk, where he died and was buried in 1641. His works are, 1. "The discovery of a most dangerous dead faith,” Lond. 1641, 12mo; and 2. "The Honeycomb of free justification," Lond. 1642, 4to, published by Robert Lancaster, who informs us in his preface that " the author's faith, zeal, and diligence in doing his calling, and his faith, patience, and cheerfulness in suffering for the same," were highly exemplary. It appears that he was imprisoned in the Gate-house, Westminster, for his book on justification; and Neal admits that he committed some mistakes in his assertions about the doctrines of grace. Echard gives him in other respects a favourable character.1

EBERHARD (JOHN AUGUSTINE), a Swedish divine, who became professor of philosophy at the university of Halle, and died at Stockholm, Jan. 6, 1796, in the sixty-ninth year of his age, was a member of several learned societies, and owed much of his reputation to a work he published in German, called "An Inquiry into the doctrine respecting the salvation of Heathens," or "The New apology for Socrates," which was translated from German into. French by Dumas, and published at Amsterdam in 1773, 8vo. It contains also a defence of Marmontel's "Belisarius," which at that time had occasioned a controversy in Holland and Germany, Eberhard had among his countrymen the reputation of a man who was a powerful advocate for revealed religion in its original simplicity."

EBERT (JOHN ARNOLD), who was born at Hamburgh Feb. 8, 1725, is ranked among the revivers of true literary taste in Germany, in which undertaking, he associated with Gartner, Schlegel, Cramer, Gellert, Rabener, Schmidt, Klopstock, &c. who used to communicate their works to each other, and diffuse various knowledge by means of periodical papers. Ebert was professor of the Carolinean Institute at Brunswick, and in high esteem with the duke, who made him a canon of St. Cyriac, and afterwards conferred on him the title of counsellor. He wrote with equal elegance in prose and verse, and his songs are much esteemed in Germany. Besides many contributions to the periodical journals, he published two volumes of "Poems" at Hamburgh, the one in 1789, and the other in 1795, 8vo.

1 Ath. Ox. vol. II.-Neal's Puritans.-Echard's Hist. of England. 2 Dict. Hist.

66

He was well acquainted with the English language and English literature, and translated into German, Young's Night Thoughts," and Glover's "Leonidas," both which, we are told, are well executed. This writer died at Brunswick March 19, 1795.'

fort

EBERTUS (THEODORE), a learned professor at Francupon Oder, in the seventeenth century, and rector of that university in 1618 and 1627, acquired a considerable name, among oriental scholars particularly, by his works; the principal of which are: "Juvenilia philosophica," Franc. 1616, 4to; "Poetica Hebraica," Lips. 1628, 8vo; "Elogia Jurisconsultorum et politicorum centum illus-, trium, qui Sanctam Hebræam Linguam aliasque ejus propagines orientales propagarunt, auxerunt, promoverunt," Lips. 1628, 8vo, &c. He had a great enthusiasm for the study of the Hebrew language, and the other oriental languages connected with it, and wrote this collection of eulogies in compliment to other eminent scholars who had succeeded in the same pursuit. Moreri mentions another of his works, but without giving the date, entitled "Speculum Morale." 2

EBERUS (PAUL), one of the early reformers, was born at Kitzingen in Franconia, Nov. 8, 1511, and was first educated in the college at Anspach. In 1525 he went to Nuremberg, and in 1532 the senate of that city sent him to Wittemberg, where he took his master's degree in 1536. As he wrote a fair hand, Melancthon employed him as his amanuensis, and finding in him talents of a superior order, consulted him on all his undertakings, which made him be called by some, "Philip's Repertory." In 1544 he was appointed to the professorship of philosophy, and in 1556 to that of Hebrew, and this last year he took orders. Some time after he was sent to the college of Worms, along with Melancthon; and in 1558 was appointed first pastor of Wittemberg, in the room of Bugenhagius. He took the degree of doctor in 1559, and in 1568 went to Anspach, with Paul Crellius, to allay some disputes that had arisen among the clergy of that place. In this attempt he gave so much satisfaction to prince George Frederick, that he rewarded him liberally, and settled a pension on his son. He died Dec. 20, 1589. After the death of Melancthon, he was regarded as the first of his disciples who were

1 Dict. Hist.

2 L'Avocat.-Moreri.