facility and expedition, being able to paint with both hands at once. I Carracci, Loudovico; Augus ting and Annibale ;...born at Bologna about 1560. Annibale is considered the greatest, his designs being grand, his colouring strong,and composition admirable. Their pictures are chiefly at Bologna. They there had a school of paint ing, where Guido, Albano, and Schedoni formed themselves. Bartholomeo Schedoni,born 1560, died 1616, he closely imitated Cor. regio. Guido Rheni, born at Bologna, 1575, died 1640. All that is tender, beautiful, and lovely in nature is in his pictures. The visage and form of his women are full of beauty and love. His most famous picture is that of Peter and Paul in the Palace Zampierri, at Bologna. He is said to have studied much the theatre of Niobe, and thereby attained that enchanting beauty, which remains unequalled. Albano, born 1578, died 1660. His pictures show much attention, nicety, and fine colouring; his infants are remarkable for beauty and nature. Benedetto Castigliane, born at Genoa, 1616, died 1670. He imitated all the painters with success, and excelled all in pastoral scenes and landscapes. The touches of his pencil delicate, and his light pure. OF THE VENETIAN SCHOOL. I Bellini, brothers, are considered as the founders of this school, born between 1440 and 1445, and lived to a great age; their pictures remarkable for clear and bright colouring. They were the masters of Georgione and Titian. Il Georgione deserves a rank amongst the first painters, born 1477, died 1511; his colouring is beautiful, and his pictures full of pature. His portraits admirable. The death Titiano, born 1477. of Georgione, at so early a period, gave full scope to his genius, and he became the head of the school of Venice. The expression and colouring of his figures and landscapes are in the fulness of nature, and his portraits teem with fresh and perpetual life. In this last branch of the art he excels all others. Sebastiano del Piombo: he was a successful scholar of Georgione. He was considered by Michael Angelo the first painter of his age, superiour even to Raphael. The famous Descent of the Cross, in fresco, at Rome, was sketched by this great master, and finished by Sebastiano. Gio Antonio Gegillo,born 1508, died 1580. He was a powerful rival of Titian. Paolo Veronese, born 1532, died 1588. His pictures will forever delight by their fulness of composition, beauty of colouring, and gracefulness of design. The churches of Rome, as well as of the other principal cities of Italy, have for ages been the hallowed sanctuaries of the magnificent works of these great masters. Some of them have been violated by the sacrilegious hands of French soldiers; and the Holy Virgin, who was drawn to shed a benign look on the devotee at the altar, is now smiling on the prinking Par isian petit maitre, in the Louvre. The French have, in some measure, been to the modern Romans what the ancient were to Greece, with this difference, the Romans took from Greece all that was minutely beautiful and exquisite in the arts; the French have despoiled Rome only of what was most striking and celebrated. Their hands were first laid on the Laocoon, the Apollo, the Venus, and the Venus of the Capitol, and on the six pictures, which, by distinction of pre-eminence, were called the Six pictures of Rome, viz. The Communion of St. Jerome, by Dominichino; the Slaughter of the Innocents, by Guido ; the Descent of the Cross, by Sebastiano del Piombo, as sketched by Mi chael Angelo; the Transfiguration, of Raphael; the Last Judgment, of Michael Angelo; and the Last Supper, by Leonardo da Vinci. The first and second of these, together with the Transfiguration, they succeeded in transporting to the Louvre; the others, being in fresco, they could not remove. But, in the barbarous attempt, the Last Supper, and the Descent of the Cross were ruined. M. BIOGRAPHY. LIFE OF RICHARD BENTLEY, D. D. Late Regius Professor of Divinity, and Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, Eng. [Continued from page 414.] Τιμιωτατα μεν και πρωτα τα πες την ψυχην αγαθα. TO return to Johnson. While he was censuring another writer for egotisms, he should have excluded them more carefully from his preface, in which the de se dicta are infinitely too numerous. At the end of the first part of these remarks, for he afterwards continued them, though in a less elaborate manner, through the rest of Horace's works, he published a stanza of an old English ballad, with English annotations, in the style of Bentley. There is some drollery in these remarks, but they never can diminish the value of his criticisms. Mr. Addison's tragedy of Cato was once burlesqued, and Gray's Elegy in a country churchyard has been frequently parodied. Homer and Virgil have been travestied; yet surely no reader ever perused these authors with less pleasure on this account. The test of truth will never be found in ridicule. These remarks were highly extolled by Bentley's enemies, and •See Wilkes' History of the Stage. See Johnson's lives. PLATO, de Legib. IV. 99 acquired their author some reputation. He had already introduced himself to the learned world, by his "Grammatical Commentaries," which were notes on Lilly's Grammar, published in 1706, in English. He was a very accurate grammarian, and investigated authorities with uncommon perseverance. As a critick, he was able to judge with accuracy of the Latinity of a phrase, but he was very deficient of taste, that rare qualification, which is so essential in the formation of a sound critick. The style of his commentaries is beneath criticism, at once vulgar and pedantick. Those who have read his book, without any knowledge of the time in which he lived, will scarcely believe that he was contemporary with Addison, and lived in the Augustan age of English literature. In 1716 or 1717, Bentley was elected Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, and soon after preached before his Majesty. The sermon was published. The attack on it, and the answer, we have already mentioned. But this and Johnson's Aristarchus Anti-Bentleianus, were not the only source of uneasiness which opened upon him in the year 1717. He found him self involved in a dispute with the University, about the fees which were usually paid by Doctors of Divinity on their creation. He was likewise accused of contempt towards the Vice-Chancellor. This dispute originated in October, on the day after his Majesty's visit to the University, when several Doctors in Divinity, who had been named by the royal mandate, attended at the senate house to receive their degrees. Dr. Bentley, on creation, demanded four guineas from each, besides the broad piece, which was the usual present on such occasions. A warm dispute ensued, but on his absolutely refusing to create those who would not give the extraordinary fee, Dr. Middleton and some others agreed to pay the money, upon condition that the Professor should return it, whenever it was declared by the King, or by any authority delegated from him, that the demand was illegal. Those who refused to acquiesce to this proposal he would not create doctors. The affair was laid before the Duke of Somerset, who was Chancellor of the University, and promised to take cognizance of the affair, if it was not soon settled. Dr. Bentley, however, still insisted upon his claim, but at last was contented with a promissory note from several of them, by which they engaged to pay the fee, if the dispute was determined in his favour, and even without money or bond he submitted to create one of the King's doctors. As the Chancellor had declared against this new fee, and as Dr. Bentley had created some doctors, without either fee or note, Dr. Middleton thought himself entitled to demand the return of his four guineas, although neither the sen timents of the King, nor of his lawyers, had pronounced the Professor's claim unjust. Bentley refused to give back the money; Dr. Middleton sent, and then called but the message and the visit proved equally fruitless. He next obtained a decree from the Vice-Chancellor, and a known enemy of the Professor was sent on September 23d, to arrest his person: either through mistake or design, however, the decree was left at Trinity Lodge, and the orders of the Vice-Chancellor were not executed. On Wednesday, the first of October, another beadle arrested him, and the Doctor, though he refused to obey it at first, put in bail, and the following Friday was appointed for the day of trial. Dr. Bentley did not appear, but sent his proctor. Dr. Middleton obtained permission of the court to appoint another proctor for himself, who accused the Professor of contempt, for not appearing. The beadle who went with the first decree was examined, and a complaint was made out of his ill usage at Trinity Lodge. Among other things it appeared that the Doctor had said, "I will not be concluded by what the Vice-Chancellor and two or three of his friends shall determine over a bottle." His words were accounted criminal, and Dr. Bentley was suspended by the Vice-Chancellor from all his degrees, without citation, without hearing, without notice, who declared that he would vacate the Divinity Professorship in a few days, if he did not make humble submission. For several years the affair remained in this situation. During this time several pamphlets were published. Of those against the Professor, Dr.Middleton, who must have felt the most unbounded exultation on the degradation of his enemy, Dr. Bentley, was the principal author. These are spright ly and well written, but facts are obstinate antagonists. The names of the writers who answered him, and took the apposite side, we have never heard, though one of them is pointed out by Middleton, who began his literary career in this dispute,† and now first started in to publick notice, as the action "which he commenced for the recovery of his money gave the first motion to this famous proceeding." During this suspense, it might be supposed, that Bentley, degrad ed from his honours, would have -lost his relish for his classical pur suits, and have found his spirits damped and courage sunk. But this was far from being the case: he gave no opportunity to his enemies to exclaim, "Qualis erat! Quantum mutatus ab illo !" He ceased to be Doctor of Divinity, indeed, but he never ceased to be Bentley! The University stripped him of his degrees, but they could not tear from him that conscious dignity of character, which, in all his disputes, proved a firm and certain support. He still continued to bestow his attention and leisure time on his long-promised and long expected edition of the Greek Testament. About the year 1721, he published his proposals, which consisted of eight articles. To these he added the last chapter of the Apocalypse, with a Latin version, and the vas *For a list of them see Gough's British Topography, vol. I. p. 244. Thirlby also wrote against Bentley. In one of his pamphlets he styles himself an author not used to the press. rious readings of his manuscripts in the notes. In this edition Bentley intended to have re-published the Latin version of St. Hierom, who asserts that a literal translation from Greek into Latin is only necessary in thé scriptures, where the very order of the words is mystery. From this passage our critick inferred, what on examination he found to be true, that on comparison the ex actest resemblance would be found between the original text and this translation. He, therefore, deter. mined to publish them together. He proposed to confirm his lec tions, by exhibiting the various reading of manuscripts and trans. lations. He altered not a single word without authority. He of fered no changes in the text, except in his Prologamena. He a dopted the mode of publishing by subscription, on account of the great expenses that must attend the printing of such a work. was to have made two volumes in folio, and the price was to have been three guineas for the smaller paper, and five for the larger. Mr. John Walker, of Trinity College," was to have corrected the press, and to have shared the profits or loss of the edition with Bentley. It here quoted may be lost and extinguished." Such were the views of Dr. Bentley, and such were his wishes with regard to his edition of the Greek Testament. He found, however, an opponent in Middleton, who had already, in a great measure, been the cause of reducing him to the situation of the lowest member of the University. He published an answer to the proposals, paragraph by paragraph. He was instigated to publish this answer, he says, by a thorough conviction, that Bentley possessed neither materials nor abilities adequate to the execution of so important a design. This pamphlet was published at a period when the name of Bentley had lost part of its dignity. This may, in some measure, account for its success, which was wonderful, and, in our opinion, far above its deserts. It is well written, indeed, and sometimes weighty in argument; but still he frequently refines too much, and does not treat his adversary with candour or propriety. An answer was published to these remarks, which was attribut ed to Bentley, and several pamphlets were published on both sides of the question. The event was, that he gave up his design. It were an endless task to pursue the disputes through all the pamphlets, which were published on the occasion. We must not, however, omit that Dr. Colbatch was supposed to be the author of the first remarks, and was stigmatized in the answer, which was published with the second edition of the proposal. Upon this attack, he publickly declared, that they were written without his concurrence and knowledge, and the Vice-Chancellor and heads pronounced the answer to the remarks a virulent and scandalous libel. Vol. III. No. 9. 3K Bentley never assigned any reasons for declining the publication of his Greek Testament. All who contributed to this event certainly injured the cause of sacred literature in the highest degree. The completion of his design was the principal employment of his latter life; and his nephew, Dr. Thomas Bentley, travelled through Europe, at his expense, in order to collate every manuscript that was accessible. A cold, cross Middleton was not the only champion who attacked our literary Goliah in 1721. Alexander Cuninghame, in the same year, published animadversions on the edition of Horace. critick, of northern extraction, with little genius; ill-natured and forbidding; correct, but spiritless. He dedicated his book to Bentley himself,but with such a marked air of imagined superiority, that it is absolutely disgusting. Let it not, however, be supposed, that we allow him no merit. We think that he was an opponent of much greater consequence, than any who preceded him; but his decisive mode of stating his objections, and offering his own emendations, though it might attract a few admirers, yet it must be condemned by the learned world in general. Sometimes, indeed, he improves greatly upon Bentley, and in one of the passages, which we formerly quoted, he would read estuatque, instead of ejus atque, which is certainly more poetical and better than exeatque, though, perhaps, not so near the reading of the manuscripts. His corrections, indeed, are frequently valuable, but, as a writer, he is very. deficient in that strength, that vigour, and that liveliness of fancy, which renders the critical works of Bentley and Toup so entertaining, as well as so instructive. To be continued. |