tions and conduct.'-The fermon was preached on Trinity Sunday; he might think there was a kind of propriety in attending to the diftinction by which the day has been marked ; but the fubject of his difcourfe, wifely chofen in our view, is that of doing justice, &c. in recommendation of which duty he principally addreffes his audience.

In his preface, we obferve that Mr. Stockdale expresses an approbation of authorizing and guarding, by the law, what he calls the effential doctrines of Christianity; yet we perceive, with pleasure, that however ftrenuous he may be for such extenfions of power, his difpofition, and his religion, are wholly abhorrent from perfecution* :- Thofe,' he tells us, who have been appointed the guardians and explainers of the scriptures, have, perhaps, in ancient, as well as in modern times, done more injury both to them, and to religion, than any other clafs or defcription of men; by making the facred oracles the inftruments of their fecular or intellectual ambition:'-He proceeds to cenfure thofe acrimonious and unchriftian zealots, who have excited furious and fcurrilous difputes; and have fet on foot cruel and fanguinary perfecutious, because they could not prevail on thofe whom they fhould have treated as brethren, to accept their jargon for a clear and full interpretation of the fecrets of heaven. Thefe men totally loft fight of the fubflance of Chriftianity; they furely forgot that all our doings without charity, are nothing worth.'-Once more, he argues,' Of all the enemies to the celeftial morality of the gospel (I do not mean with a cold and timid caution, to restrain my remark to the church of Rome) the most mischievous foes to this divine morality, have always been priefts who are licentious in their manners, or ambitious in their schemes.' This breathes the true fpirit of the old Reformers! On another occafion, we find him not fo biaffed in favour of the ecclefiaftical constitution of his own country, as not to allow of fome defects :-'No human inftitutions, (he fays,) were ever perfect: therefore I flatter myfelf, that it will not be thought illiberal and invidious to obferve, that we are apt to praife the rights, the privileges, the laws, and the cuftoms of England, with too partial and indifcriminate an eulogium. Our laws are, in general, equitable and excellent, their adminiftration is, undoubtedly, in fome refpests exceptionable. Even the noble right of being tried by our peers, is not without its inconveniencies: juries are fometimes warped, and fometimes intimidated; fimple and honest witneffes are embarraffed, and confounded, by feifith and venal lawyers; and we pay dearly even for justice, which

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ought

ought to be as free and unexpenfive as the air: hence a poor man is often legally injured, oppreffed, and ruined by the malignant and tyrannical oppofition of a rich and powerful antagonift.-There is both juftice and generosity in this remark.

Oliver Cromwell, however, falls under Mr. Stockdale's fevereft lash with him he contrafts his fon Richard, and concludes with Voltaire's reflection ;-" the life of the fon was a life of health, virtue, felf-fatisfaction; while the father knew nothing but folicitude and torment."-The preacher might, no doubt, if he had chofen it, have found inftances, equally, or more familiarly adapted, for cautioning his audience against an unjuftifiable love of the world, than that on which he has here fixed. We are somewhat inclined to number this among the eccentricities by which this Gentleman's writings have, in fome inftances, been distinguished: but which more feldom occur in the present than in his former publications.

On the whole, we have perused this volume with fatisfaction; the fubjects are proper; the remarks are often fenfible and ftriking; and the exhortations are delivered with energy: yet there is ftill fomewhat defultory and wandering, at times, in his manner: but there are alfo certain evidences of ability, of inquiry, and of knowlege, together with appearances of an honeft mind, which wishes for truth, and can but reluctantly be fhackled by the dogmas and commandments of men. might felect paffages which would be acceptable in point of compofition, and yet more for their juft difplay and recommendation of religion and virtue. It gives us pleasure to obferve a fteady endeavour to render people eafy and contented in their ftations, and to lead them to regard the practice of righteousness, founded on real piety, as the fure method for present peace and enjoyment; at the fame time that it tends to their future reft and happiness. We mult fuppofe that if Mr. Stockdale's naval hearers did not duly profit by his difcourfes, the fault must have been in themselves: but this remark will, indeed, equally apply to audiences of every other description.

ART. XVIII. Sermons; now first published from the original Manufcripts of John Wallis, D.D. fome Time Savilian Profeffor of Geometry in the University of Oxford, Keeper of the Archives, Member of the Royal Society, and Chaplain in Ordinary to King Charles 11. 8vo. PP. 623. 6s. Boards. Robin

fons.

THES HESE difcourfes are very properly introduced by memoirs of the author; a man of great ability, learning, worth, and celebrity, in his day; although, as it must happen, in the pro

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grefs of years, to numbers who, like Dr. Wallis, merit a favourable report, his memory has been too much disregarded. He lived during a remarkable period of the British history; being born in the year 1616, and dying, at the age of eightyfeven, A. D. 1703. In what manner he conducted himself, amid the difcords and confufions with which regal oppreffion and ecclefiaftic infolence marked fo large a portion of this time, does not diftinctly appear. On the one hand, we learn that he was an epifcopalian, and a friend to the royal party; and on the other, we find him, in 1644, one of the secretaries to the Affembly of Divines then convened at Westminster; during his attendance on which, we also observe him an officiating minifter in Fenchurch-ftreet, and afterward in Ironmongerlane; where, he himself says, he continued till his removal to Oxford, in 1649; for then it was, that he became public profeffor of geometry, on the foundation of Sir Henry Savile;' and he paffed the remainder of his days in the cultivation of those sciences, which, he has fo much improved to the honour of his country, as well as of himself.' He had been early and deeply grounded in grammatical learning; and was verfed in the languages before he went to Cambridge, where he spent fome years but it is remarkable, that though he was afterward fo great a proficient in geometrical fcience, the whole of what he learned of it in his youth was during a fortnight's vacation which he spent at his mother's houfe, when he was only fourteen years of age. At that time he obtained fome inftruction in this refpect from one of his younger brothers:

This (fays he) was my firft entry into mathematics, and all the teaching I had; but did afterwards profecute it as a pleafing diverfion at fpare hours, as books of arithmetic or other mathematical fubjects fell occafionally in my way; for mathematies were not at that time looked on as academical learning, but the bufinefs of traders, merchants, feamen, carpenters, land-meafurers, or the like, or perhaps fome almanac-makers in London; and of more than two hundred ftudents at that time in our college, I do not know of any two that bad more mathematics than myself, which was but very little, having never made it my ferious study till fome time before I was defigned for a profeffor in it.'

Though Dr. Wallis did not apply to this fcience, as a bufinefs, until he was upward of forty years of age, it presently appeared that he had a genius particularly fitted for the pursuit. He foon became eminent: of which he gave proof by the works that he published *. One accidental teftimony of this, is his Commercium Epiftolicum,' occafioned by a challenge given by

He was allowed to be the first mathematician of the time in which he lived, next to Sir Ifaac Newton.

Mr.

Mr. Fermate (a Frenchman,) to the English, Dutch, and French mathematicians (except those of Paris,) to answer a numerical queftion. The Doctor accomplished it with great applaufe, and received, among other commendations, in a letter addreffed to Sir Kenelm Digby, the farther acknowlegement, "Now muft Holland yield to England, and Paris to Oxford.'

In connection, it is proper to mention his acuteness as a decypherer; in which art he was employed for several years, with great fuccefs, although for fome time with but inconfi derable emolument to himself. His attention to this bufinefs also seems to have been accidental. One night, as they were fitting down to fupper, at Lady Vere's, about the beginning of the year 1643, the Doctor informs us, that a chaplain of Sir William Waller fhewed him, as a curiofity, an intercepted letter in cypher, the first thing he had ever seen of the kind; and, between jeft and earneft, afked if he could make any thing of it. Before he went to bed, he discovered it to be an alphabet. This inftance of penetration introduced him to a variety of employment of this kind, often very difficult and laborious. The account here given is chiefly confined to his engagements with the Earl of Nottingham and the Earl of Shrewsbury, fucceffively fecretaries to K. William the Third. His painful affiduities were handfomely acknowleged in words: but, as may be expected from courts and courtiers, (of past times, we mean, not of the present,) other rewards were inconfiderable: nor was he better treated by the elector of Brandenburgh; to whom he seems to have rendered fome important services. It muft, however, be added, that, after delays, he did at length obtain fomething more like a fuitable acknowlegement from each. In 1700, King William fettled on him an annual penfion of one hundred pounds, with furvivorfhip to his grandfon, Mr. William Blencowe. The elector of Brandenburgh, in a courfe of time, alfo fent him a rich gold medal and chain of near feventeen ounces; with fuitable embellishments. The editor of this volume adds, and we read it with fome concern, that after this medal had been for many years in the family, he difpofed of it as old gold; having first offered it for fale to the Oxford and British Museums, and to feveral antiquaries.

The Doctor exhibited other proofs of his learning and ability in different ways: in his Tractus de Loquela GrammaticoPhyficus, published in 1653, and fince often reprinted, he particularly defcribes the phyfical or mechanical formation of founds used in fpeech, or expressed by the letters of several languages; and informs us farther, that, in agreement to this plan, he undertook, with fuccefs, to teach dumb perfons to

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fpeak. His method was, by directing them to apply the tongue, lips, and other organs of fpeech, to fuch postures and motions as are proper for fuch and fuch founds, whether the person speaking do hear himself or not; according, it is faid, to the Doctor's own words, extracted from the Philofophical Tranfactions for the year 1666.

He was not only a member of the Royal Society, but one of the gentlemen who firft occafioned its eftablishment. The relation here given of his numerous works is also faid to have been drawn from the memoirs of that learned body. The remark made in one of them, concerning K. Richard the Third, may be new to fome readers, or may at leaft ferve to confirm an opinion which has been occafionally advanced, though not generally admitted. It appears, in his Latin Grammar of the English tongue, for the use of foreigners*; fpeaking of words which begin with cr, as if, fays he, they took their meaning from the cross-among other illuftrations, he adds, Richard III. formerly king of England, was called, Crouched-back, not because his back was crooked, but because he wore on his back the form of the cross.

After Dr. Wallis entered on his Savilian profefforship, his attention was principally directed to thofe mathematical inquiries, which, in former years, he had regarded only as an amufement: for, certainly, regular ministers, of real piety, benevolence, and virtue, find other more important cares connected with their stations, if they would be useful, and comport with the defign of their office: but to thefe, the Profeffor now ably and profitably applied for his future days: he tranflated feveral ancient Greek authors, connected with the subject, befide the volumes which he compofed and published.

On the whole, Dr. W. must be regarded as a man who ftands high in the learned world. As a theologian, he ranked

Of this valuable work, a new handsome edition was printed, in 1765, at the expence of the late Mr. THOMAS HOLLIS, who was remarkable for appropriating a confiderable part of his large fortune to acts of peculiar benevolence, particularly to the patriotic purpose of reprinting scarce and valuable publications. Of his impreffions of thefe, he usually gave away great numbers, especially to feminaries of learning, in most parts of the globe, as well as to private perfons, whom he deemed friends to liberty and fcience; and fuch prefents were often clothed in the most elegant and expenfive binding. He caufed a fine portrait of Dr. Wallis to be prefixed to his edition of the Latin Grammar, from a drawing by Cypriani; which print is well copied, and placed as a frontispiece to thefe fermons. For a more particulated account of Mr. Hollis's edition of the Grammar, and of the utility of the work itself, fee Monthly Review, vol. xxxii. p. 305.

with