70 Biographical Memoirs 



meer, a village near Amfterdam, on the 5th of Novembtr", 

 1 764. His father, by trade a carpenter, having a great foni- 

 nefs for books, and being tolerably well verfed in the mathe- 

 matics, inftru£ted his fon himfelf till he attained to his 

 eleventh year. Young Nieuwland appears to have difplayed 

 ftrong marks of genius at a very early period. "When about 

 the age of three, his mother put into his hands fome prints by 

 John Luiken, which had fifty verfes at the bottom of them 

 by way of explanation. Thefe verfes fhe read to him aloud, 

 without any intention that her fon fhould learn them i and 

 fhe was much furprifed fome time after to hear him repeat 

 the whole from memory with the utmofi correotnefs, on being 

 only fhewn the prints. Before he was feven years of age 

 he had read more than fifty different books, and in fuch a 

 manner that he could frequently repeat paffages from them 

 both in profe and in verfe. When about the age of eight, Mr. 

 Aeneae at Amfterdam, one of the greateft calculators of the 

 age, afked him if he could tell the folid content of a wooden 

 ftatue of Mercury which flood upon a piece of clock-work. 

 ** Yes," replied young Nieuwland, " provided you give me a 

 bit of the fame wood of which the ftatue was made j for I 

 will cut a cubic inch out of it, and then compare it with the 

 ftatire." Poems which difplay the utmoft livelinefs of ima- 

 gination, and which he compofed in his tenth year, while 

 walking or amufing himfelf near his father's houfe, were, 

 though written a: fo tender an age, received with admiration 

 and inferted in different poetical collections. 



Such an uncommon genius muft foon burft through thofe 

 obftacles which confine it. Bernardus and Jeronimo de 

 Bpfch, two of the firft and wealthieft men at Amfterdam, 

 became young Nieuwland's benefactors, and contributed very 

 much to call forth his latent talents, and to enable the 

 powers of his mind to expand. He was taken into the 

 houfe of the former in his eleventh year, and he received 

 daily instruction from the latter for the fpace of four 

 years. While in this fituation he made confiderable pro- 



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