THE 



PHILOSOPHICAL MAGAZINE 



AND 



ANNALS OF PHILOSOPHY. 



[NEW SERIES.] 



MARCH 1827. 



XXXIV. Biographical Notice of M. Piazzi.* 



T^HE sciences have recently lost Joseph Piazzi ; he died at 

 •*- Naples the 22d of July 1826. He was born atPonte, in 

 the Valteline, on the 16th of July 1746; he took the garb of 

 the theatins at Milan, and finished his novitiate in the convent 

 of St. Anthony. In his studies, which were conducted suc- 

 cessively at Milan, Turin, and Rome, he had the advantage 

 of being under the tuition of Tiraboschi, Beccaria, Leseur, 

 and Jacquier. Intending to engage himself in a similar course 

 of teaching, he went as professor of philosophy to Genoa, where 

 expressing his opinions too freely, he alarmed the zeal of the 

 Dominicans, who would have disturbed his tranquillity if 

 the grand -master Pinto had not engaged him to teach ma- 

 thematics with him in the new University of Malta. On the 

 suppression of this body, Piazzi went to Rome, and afterwards 

 to Ravenna, where he occupied the philosophical and mathe- 

 matical chair at the College of the Nobles : he there made 

 himself enemies by publishing some philosophical theses which 

 appeared to be too bold as coming from a young monk. He 

 was nevertheless thought worthy to succeed the preacher at 

 Cremona, where he had retired after the theatins had given 

 up the management of the college at Ravenna. He was ap- 

 pointed reader on theological dogmas at Saint-Andre della 

 Valle, at Rome, where Father Chiaramonte (Pius VII.) was 

 his colleague, and wlio retained lor him on the throne, the 

 same sentiments which he had expressed in the cloister. In 

 1780, Piazzi, by the advice of Father Jacquier, accepted the 



♦ Bulletin des Sciences, Nov. 1826, p. 341. 



New Series. Vol. 1. No. 3. March 1827. Y pro- 



