Page images
PDF
EPUB

of perfect union, having destroyed all the re"mains of the former factions; very wifely

[ocr errors]

66

judging, that England is a great animal which

can never die unless it deftroys itself: "Que "l'Angleterre est un grand animal qui ne peut jamais mourir s'il ne fe tue lui mefme.”

[ocr errors]

CARDINAL DE BERULLE.

THIS pious man died, as the late excellent Mr. Granger died, while he was celebrating the Sacrament. The Cardinal fell dead upon the steps of the altar, at the moment of Confecration, as he was pronouncing the words "hane igitur oblationem." This occafioned the following diftich:

[ocr errors]

Coepta fub extremis nequeo dum facra facerdos
Perficere, at faltem victima perficiam.

In vain the reverend Pontiff tries

To terminate the facrifice;

Himself within the holy walls

The Heav'n-devoted victim falls.

Cardinal Berulle came over with Henrietta Maria, Queen of Charles the Firft, to England, as her Confeffor, to the Court of which he endeared himself by the fanctity of his morals, and

[blocks in formation]

the extreme propriety of his behaviour. Like

the late learned and excellent Dr. Balguy, he poffeffed the nolo epifcopari in the extremeft purity of intention; for when his Sovereign Louis the Thirteenth of France preffed him to take the Bishopric of Leon, he refused; and on that Monarch's telling him that he should employ the folicitation of a more powerful advocate than himself (meaning the Pope) to prevail upon him to accept of it, he faid, "that "if his Majefty continued to prefs him, he "fhould be obliged to quit his kingdom."

He established the venerable Order of the Fathers of the Oratory in France, founded by San Philippo Neri, and was a man of fuch eminent goodness, that Pope Leo the XIth faid of him, when he faw him at Rome as a fimple friar, "Le Pere Berulle n'eft pas un homme, c'est "un ange."

JACQUES CALLOT.

THIS excellent Engraver was born a subject of the Duke of Lorraine. When Nancy was taken from that Prince by Cardinal Richelieu, he wished Callot to make a fet of prints defcriptive of the fiege of that important place. The

Artist

<

Artist refused; and, on the Cardinal's infisting with him very peremptorily, he replied, "My

[ocr errors]

66

Lord, if you continue to urge me, I will cut "off the thumb of my right hand with my pen-knife before your face. I will never "confent to perpetuate the calamity and dif66 grace of my Sovereign and protector."

Callot wore, attached to his button-hole, one of his fmall copper-plates, which he thought his chef-d'œuvre. Were every distinction of ornament as well applied, who would not envy Sovereigns the power of beftowing them?

This great Artift's mafter-piece is his "Mi"feries of War;" miferies which, in the prefent distracted state of Europe, do not require to be recalled to our minds by the powers of imitation,

CAMPANELLA.

THIS celebrated Dominican Friar of Naples is mentioned by Mr. Burke in his ingenious "Effay on the Sublime and Beautiful." He was accused of treafon and of herefy by an aged Friar of his own Order with whom he disputed, and over whom, moft probably, he had the advantage in the difpute. He was imprifoned

[blocks in formation]

for twenty-feven years, and was put to the rack seven times, for twenty-four hours each time. By the power of abftraction which his mind poffeffed, he bore the tortures inflicted upon him with the greateft tranquillity. He was delivered from his confinement at the folicitation of Pope Urban VIII. in 1624, and came to Paris, where he was much confidered by Cardinal Richelieu. Campanella wrote "Atheismus "Triumphatus" and "Monarchia Meffia;" books now become extremely fcarce, like many others, from their not being worth the reprinting.

AUGUSTE DE THOU.

Ir is fuppofed that the immediate caufe of the profecution of this excellent and intrepid man was, that his grandfather had mentioned Cardinal Richelieu's father in his celebrated Hiftory of His Own Times, in a manner not much to his credit. His Judges were anxious to fave him. "M. le Chancelier a beau dire," fays Richelieu," il faut que M. de Thou meure; "The Chancellor may fay what he pleases, "but M. de Thou must die *."

"He has put my father in his Hiftory," said the vindictive Richelieu, "and I will put his grandfon's name in "mine."

De

De Thou, whilft he was in prifon, had made a vow to endow a chapel whenever he gained his liberty. On the morning of his execution he compofed the following infcription for himfelf:

Chrifto Liberatori

Votum in carcere pro libertate conceptum,
T. AUGUSTUS THUANUS

E carcere vitæ jam jam liberandus
Morte folvit xii Junii, 1642.

Confitebar tibi Domine, quoniam exaudisti me & factus es mihi in falutem.

He died with great courage.

LA COMTESSE DE SAINT BALMONT.

"It was in the year 1638," fays Abbé Arnauld, in his very amufing Memoirs, "that "I had the honour to become acquainted with "that Amazon of our times Madame de Saint "Balmont, whose life was a prodigy of courage "and of virtue, uniting in her perfon all the "valour of a determined foldier, and all the modesty of a truly Chriftian woman. She "was of a very good family of Lorraine, and

[ocr errors]

was born with a difpofition worthy of her "birth. The beauty of her face correfponded "to that of her mind, but her fhape by no

66 means

« PreviousContinue »