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undertake the charge of collector of the tenths, an office in that place of great honour, and which he accepted therefore as a proof of their confidence and esteem.

While he was engaged in this employment he married Eve Clotterboke, a young lady of a good family, and uncommon genius and beauty, by whom he had ten children, of which eight died young; and only two sons, Francis and Casper, lived to console their mother for their father's death.

Neither public business, nor domestic cares, detained Burman from the prosecution of his literary inquiries; by which he so much endeared himself to Grævius, that he was recommended by him to the regard of the university of Utrecht; and accordingly, in 1696, was chosen professor of eloquence and history, to which was added, after some time, the professorship of the Greek language, and afterwards that of politics; so various did they conceive his abilities, and so extensive his knowledge.

At his entrance upon this new province, he pronounced an oration upon eloquence and poetry.

Having now more frequent opportunities of displaying his learning, he arose, in a short time, to a high reputation, of which the great number of his auditors was a sufficient proof, and which the proficiency of his pupils showed not to be ac cidental or undeserved.

In 1714 he formed a resolution of visiting Paris, not only for the sake of conferring in person upon questions of literature with the learned men of that place, and of gratifying his curiosity with a more familiar knowledge of those writers whose works he admired, but with a view more important, of visiting the libraries, and making those inquiries which might be of advantage to his darling study.

The vacation of the university allowed him to stay at Paris but six weeks, which he employed with so much dexterity and industry, that he had searched the principal libraries, collated a great number of manuscripts and printed copies, and brought back a great treasure of curious observations.

In this visit to Paris he contracted an acquaintance, among other learned men, with the celebrated father Montfaucon; with whom he conversed, at his first interview, with no other character but that of a traveller; but, their discourse turning upon ancient learning, the stranger soon gave such proofs of his attainments, that Montfaucon declared him a very uncommon traveller, and confessed his curiosity to know his name; which he no sooner heard, than he rose from his seat, and, embracing him with the utmost ardour, expressed his satisfaction at having seen the man whose productions of various kinds he had so often praised; and, as a real proof of his regard, offered

not only to procure him an immediate admission to all the libraries of Paris, but to those in remoter provinces, which are not generally open to strangers, and undertook to ease the expenses of his journey by procuring him entertainment in all the monasteries of his order.

This favour Burman was hindered from accepting, by the necessity of returning to Utrecht at the usual time of beginning a new course of lectures, to which there was always so great a concourse of students, as much increased the dignity and fame of the university in which he taught.

He had already extended to distant parts his reputation for knowledge of ancient history by a treatise "de Vectigalibus Populi Romani," on the revenues of the Romans; and for his skill in Greek learning, and in ancient coins, by a tract called "Jupiter Fulgurator ;" and after his return from Paris he published "Phædrus," first with the notes of various commentators, and afterwards with his own. He printed many poems, made many orations upon different subjects, and procured an impres sion of the epistles of Gudius and Sanavius.

While he was thus employed, the professorships of history, eloquence, and the Greek language, became vacant at Leyden, by the death of Perizonius, which Burman's reputation incited the curators of the university to offer him upon very generous terms, and which, after some struggles with his fondness for his native place, his friends, and his colleagues, he was prevailed on to accept, finding the solicitation from Leyden warm and urgent, and his friends at Utrecht, though unwilling to be deprived of him, yet not zealous enough for the honour and advantage of their university, to endeavour to detain him by great liberality.

At his entrance upon this new professorship, which was conferred upon him in 1715, he pronounced an oration upon the duty and office of a professor of polite literature; "De publici humanioris Disciplinæ professoris proprio officio et munere;" and showed, by the usefulness and perspicuity of his lectures, that he was not confined to speculative notions on that subject, having a very happy method of accommodating his instructions to the different abilities and attainments of his pupils.

Nor did he suffer the public duties of this station to hinder him from promoting learning by labours of a different kind; for, besides many poems and orations which he recited on dif ferent occasions, he wrote several prefaces to the works of others, and published many useful editions of the best Latin writers, with large collections of notes from various commentators.

He was twice rector, or chief governor, of the university, and discharged that important office with equal equity and abili ty; and gained by his conduct in every station so much esteem,

that, when the professorship of history in the United Provinces became vacant, it was conferred on him as an addition to his honours and revenues which he might justly claim; and afterwards, as a proof of the continuance of their regard, and a testimony that his reputation was still increasing, they made him chief librarian, an office which was the more acceptable to him, as it united his business with his pleasure, and gave him an opportunity at the same time of superintending the library, and carrying on his studies.

Such was the course of his life, till, in his old age, leaving off his practice of walking and other exercises, he began to be afflicted with the scurvy, which discovered itself by very tormenting symptoms of various kinds; sometimes disturbing his head with vertigos, sometimes causing faintness in his limbs, and sometimes attacking his legs with anguish so excruciating, that all his vigour was destroyed, and the power of walking entirely taken away, till at length his left foot became motionless. The violence of his pain produced irregular fevers, deprived him of rest, and entirely debilitated his whole frame.

This tormenting disease he bore, though not without some degree of impatience, yet without any unbecoming or irrational despondency; and applied himself, in the intermission of his pains, to seek for comfort in the duties of religion.

While he lay in this state of misery, he received an account of the promotion of two of his grandsons, and a catalogue of the king of France's library, presented to him by the command of the king himself, and expressed some satisfaction on all these occasions; but soon diverted his thoughts to the more important consideration of his eternal state, into which he passed on the 31st of March, 1741, in the 73d year of his age.

He was a man of moderate stature, of great strength and activity, which he preserved by temperate diet, without medical exactness, and by allotting proportions of his time to relaxation and amusement, not suffering his studies to exhaust his strength, but relieving them by frequent intermissions; a practice consistent with the most exemplary diligence, and which he that omits will find, at last, that time may be lost, like money, by

unseasonable avarice.

In his hours of relaxation he was gay, and sometimes gave way so far to his temper, naturally satirical, that he drew upon himself the ill-will of those who had been unfortunately the subjects of his mirth; but enemies so provoked, he thought it beneath him to regard or to pacify; for he was fiery, but not malicious, disdained dissimulation, and in his gay or serious hours preserved a settled detestation of falsehood. So that he was an open and undisguised friend or enemy, entirely unacquainted VOL. VI.-2 X.

with the artifices of flatterers, but so judicious in the choice of friends, and so constant in his affection to them, that those with whom he had contracted familiarity in his youth, had for the greatest part his confidence in his old age.

His abilities, which would probably have enabled him to have excelled in any kind of learning, were chiefly employed, as his station required, on polite literature, in which he arrived at very uncommon knowledge, which, however, appears rather from judicious compilations than original productions. His style is lively and masculine, but not without harshness and constraint, nor, perhaps, always polished to that purity which some writers have attained. He was at least instrumental to the instruction of mankind, by the publication of many valuable performances, which lay neglected by the greatest part of the learned world; and, if reputation be estimated by usefulness, he may claim a higher degree in the ranks of learning than some others of happier elocution, or more vigorous imagination.

The malice or suspicion of those who either did not know or did not love him, had given rise to some doubts about his religion, which he took an opportunity of removing on his deathbed by a voluntary declaration of his faith, his hope of everlasting salvation from the revealed promises of God, and his confidence in the merits of our Redeemer; of the sincerity of which declaration his whole behaviour in his long illness was an incontestable proof; and he concluded his life, which had been illustrious for many virtues, by exhibiting an example of true piety.

Of his works we have not been able to procure a complete catalogue: he published,

"Quintilianus," 2 vols. 4to.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][graphic]

SYDENHAM.*

THOMAS SYDENHAM was born in the year 1624, at Winford Eagle in Dorsetshire, where his father, William Sydenham, Esq. had a large fortune. Under whose care he was educated, or in what manner he passed his childhood, whether he made any early discoveries of a genius peculiarly adapted to the study of nature, or gave any presages of his future eminence in medicine, no information is to be obtained; we must therefore repress that curiosity which would naturally incline us to watch the first attempts of so vigorous a mind, to pursue it in its childish inquiries, and see it struggling with rustic prejudices, breaking on trifling occasions the shackles of credulity, and giving proofs, in its casual excursions, that it was formed to shake off the yoke of prescription, and dispel the phantoms of hypothesis.

That the strength of Sydenham's understanding, the accuracy of his discernment, and ardour of his curiosity, might have been remarked from his infancy by a diligent observer, there is no reason to doubt. For there is no instance of any man, whose history has been minutely related, that did not in every part of life discover the same proportion of intellectual vigour; but it has been the lot of the greatest part of those who have excelled in science, to be known only by their own writings, and to have left behind them no remembrance of their domestic life, or private transactions, or only such memorials of particular passages as are, on certain occasions, necessarily recorded, in public registers.

From these it is discovered, that, at the age of eighteen, in 1642, he commenced a commoner of Magdalen-Hall in Oxford, where it is not probable that he continued long; for he informs us himself, that he was withheld from the university by the commencement of the war; nor is it known in what state of life he engaged, or where he resided during that long series of public commotion. It is indeed reported that he had a commission in the king's army, but no particular account is given of

Originally prefixed to the New Translation of Dr. Sydenham's Works, By John Swan, M. D. of Newcastle in Staffordshire, 1742. H.

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