BRAMHALL, JOHN. 



BRANDEKBUBO, ELECTORS OP. 



UM roll*. There be MOB obtained the archdeaconry of Meth, the 

 bt in thai kingdom. In 1654 ho wa* promoted to the bishopric of 

 Londonderry ; while he held which, he doubled UM yearly revenue by 

 advancing tho rtoU and recovering lands which had been detained 

 from hi. pndeeMwn. 



Bnmhall appear* to hare applied himself with about the tarn* Mai 

 to Inland that Laud wai then exhibiting in England for the increase 

 of the wraith and power of the clergy. In punuance of several acU 

 paawd in the Irish parliament, which met July 14. 1C34, he abolished 

 lee farm* that were charged on church-land* ; he obtained composition 

 for the rent inetead of the amall reeerved renU ; by grantt from the 

 crown, and by purchase, he obtained impropriation*. By theee and 

 other mean* he regained to the church, In the space of four yean, 

 thirty or forty thouaand poundi a year. He likewise prevailed upon 

 UM Church of Ireland to embrace the thirty-nine Article* of Religion 

 of the Church of England, agreed upon in the convocation holden at 

 London in the year 1662. He tried also to get the English Canons 

 Mtabluhed in Ireland, but did not succeed farther than that a few of 

 them abould be introduced, and other new one* framed. 



On UM 4th of March 1640-41, he wa* impeached, together with 

 even! other* of Straffbrd's coadjutor*, by the IrUh House of Commons. 

 He wa* in coneequenoe imprisoned, and after some time, through the 

 King's interference, let at liberty, but without any public acquittal. 

 Some time after, not considering himself safe in Ireland, he went over 

 to England, where he remained till the battle of Hanton Moor ; after 

 which he embarked with several persons of distinction, and landed at 

 Hamburg. July 8, 1644. It wa* during his exile, in the company of 

 the Marquis of Newcastle, that he had that argument with Hobbe* 

 about liberty and necessity, which gave rise to the celebrated contro- 

 Tersy, without which the prelate'* name might have perhaps been 

 forgotten. At the treaty of Uxbridge, Bramhall had the honour to be 

 nliMirt with Laud in being exeepted out of the general pardon. 



At the Restoration, Bramhall was made Archbishop of Armagh, 

 Primate and Metropolitan of all Ireland. He now renewed his exer- 

 tion* for the enrichment and aggrandisement of the church. He died 

 in 1863. By his wife he had four children, a son, Sir Thomas Bramhall, 

 bart., and three daughter*. 



Bnunball, whatever in hi* day might be his reputation as a bustling 

 and intriguing churchman, will be remembered, if he be remembered 

 at all, by posterity on account of bia controversy with Hobbes. As 

 this controversy throws considerable light not only on the character 

 of Bramhall but on that of his age, it is of importance to give some 

 account of it, which will be done much better than we could do it iu 

 the following passages, with which Hobbes concludes the work. As 

 the controversy is now very scarce, this extract, even though not 

 viewed a* by any mean* setting the question at rest, will scarcely be 

 considered too long, especially when it is regarded a* a specimen of 

 the style of Hobbes, and a fair statement of the views of the two 

 parlies. A* we have already remarked, the controversy originated in 

 a conversation at Paris in the company of the Marquis of Newcastle, 

 while they were all living there in exile. 



" I shall briefly draw up the sum of what we have both said. That 

 which I have maintained is that no man hath bis future will in his 

 own present power; that it may be changed by others, and by the 

 change of thing* without him ; and when it is changed, it ia not 

 changed nor determined to anything by itself; aud that when it is 

 undetermined, it is no will, because every one that willeth willeth 

 something in particular; that deliberation is common to men with 

 beaate, a* being alternate appetite, and not ratiocination ; and the last 

 act or appetite therein, and which is immediately followed by the 

 action, the only will that can be taken notice of by other*, and which 

 only maketh an action in public judgment voluntary; that to be 

 free is no more than to do, if a man will, and if he will, to forbear ; 

 and consequently that this freedom is the freedom of the man, and 

 not of the will ; that the will i* not free, but subject to change by 

 the operation of external causes; that all external causes depend 

 neoonarily on the first eternal cause, Ood Almighty, who workcth iu 

 us, both to will and to do, by the mediation of second causes; that 

 seeing neither man nor anything else can work upon itself, it is impo*- 

 sible that any man, in the framing of hi* own will, should concur 

 with Ood, cither a* an actor, or as an instrument; that there is nothing 

 brought to paw by fortune a* by a cause, nor anything without a 

 cause or concurrence of cause* sufficient to bring it so to pass ; and 

 that every mich cause, aud their concurrence, do proceed from the 

 providence, good pleasure, and working of Qodj and consequently, 

 though I do, with others, call many event* contingent, and lay they 

 happen, yet became they had evej-y of them their aevernl sufficient 

 cause*, 1 aay they happen necessarily ; and though wo perceive not 

 what they are, yet there are of the most contingent event* a* necessary 

 esnses a* of those event* whose cause* we perceive, or else they could 

 not powibly be foreknown, as they are by him that forekuoweth all 

 ' 



"On the contrary, the biahop maintainoth that the will is free 

 from necteaiution, and in order thereto that the judgment of the 

 understanding is not always jtracticl practical*, nor of such a nature 

 in itself as to oblige and determine the will to one, though it be true 

 that spontaneity and determination to one may consist together- 

 that the will dcteruiineth itself ; and tha', external things, when they 



clisngo the will, do work upon it not naturally but morally, not by 

 natural motion but by moral and metaphysical motion ; thnt when 

 the will i* determined naturally it i* not by God'* general influence, 

 whereon depend all second causes, but by special influence, Ood con- 

 curring and pouring something into the will ; that the will, when it 

 suspends not ill act, make* the act necessary ; but because it may 

 suspend and not assent, it is not absolutely neoeesary ; that sinful 

 act* proceed uot from God'* will, but are willed by him by a permis- 

 sive will, not an operative will, and he hardeneth the heart of man by 

 a negative obduration ; that man's will is in hi* own power, but his 

 wwtut prime primi not in his own power, nor necessary, aave only by 

 a hypothetical necessity; that the will to change i* not always a 

 change of will ; that uot all thing* which are produced are produced 

 from sufficient but some from deficient causes ; that if the power of 

 the will be present in ocfu primo, then there is nothing wanting to 

 the production of the effect ; that a cause may be sufficient for the 

 production of an effect, though it want something necessary to the 

 production thereof, because the will may be wanting; that a neces- 

 sary cause doth not always necessarily produce it* effect, but only 

 then when the effect is necessarily produced. He proveth also that 

 the will is free, by that universal notion which the world hath of 

 election ; for when of the six electors the vote* are divided equally, 

 the King of Bohemia hath a casting voice ; that the prescience of 

 Ood supposeth no necessity of the future existence of the thing* 

 foreknown, because Ood is not eternal but eternity ; and eternity is a 

 standing now, without succession of time, and therefore God sees all 

 things intuitively by the presentiolity they have in nuric ilcutt, which 

 couiprehendeth in it all time, past, present, and to come, not formally, 

 but eminently and virtually; that the will is free even then when it 

 acteth, but that is iu a compounded not iu a divided sense ; that to 

 bo made and to be eternal do consist together, because God's decrees 

 are made, aud are nevertheless eternal ; that the order, beauty, aud 

 perfection of the world doth require that in the universe there should 

 be agents of all aorta, some necessary, some free, some contingent ; 

 that though it be true that to-morrow ft shall rain or not rain, yet 

 neither of them is true dttcrminatt ; that the doctrine of necessity is 

 a blasphemous, desperate, aud destructive doctrine ; that it were- 

 better to be an atheist than to hold it, and he that inointaineth it i , 

 fitter to be refuted with rods than with arguments." ' The Question 

 concerning Liberty, Necessity, and Chance, clearly Stated and 

 Debated ' between Dr. Bramhall, Bishop of IJerry, aud 1 hoinas Hobboa 

 of Malinesbury. London, 1656, sub. I'm. 



BRANCALEO'NE D'ANDALO', a Bolognese noblo and Count of 

 Casalecchio, was chosen by the people of Rome as their senator in 



1 253, with the summary powers of a dictator. The pope, Innocent 1 V., 

 wa* absent at the time, and Rome was distracted by quarrels between 

 iU feudal nobles, who had fortified themselves in their respective 

 palaces or in some of the ancient monuments, such as the Colosseum, 

 the tomb of C.-ccilio Metella, the mausoleums of Hadrian and Augustus, 

 &o. They had also built a number of lofty towers, from which they 

 defied the attacks of their enemies. Each baron had a band formed 

 of his relatives, clients, or dependents, and of hired swordsmen. These 

 frequently sallied out of their strongholds, either to attack a rival 

 faction, or to plunder the unprotected citizens aud country people. 

 Such was at that time the general condition, not only of Rome but of 

 Florence, Milan, and other great Italian cities, which lived in what wait 

 called municipal independence, until the citizens, weary of this state 

 of anarchy, resorted to the establishment of the po<l ;>r.iry 

 magistrate, who was always chosen out of a foreign city or state, and 

 who had summary powers to put down the disturbers of the public 

 peace. The Roman* styled theirs ' Senator.' Brancaleoue was a man 

 of a stern, peremptory temper, and, being a stranger, had no sympathy 

 with any 01 the conflicting parties. He began a war of destruction 

 gainst the barons, attacked their stronghold*, razed their towers, 

 hanged them aud their adherents at the windows of their mansions, 

 and thus succeeded by terror in restoring peace and security to the 

 city. In the numerous conflicts that took place several of the ancient 

 monuments suffered greatly. He summoned the haughty Innocent 1 V. 

 in the name of the Roman people to leave Assisi, whither he had 

 retired, and to return to Rome, threatening him, in case of IK in- 

 compliance, with a visit from the armed citizens, with their senator ul 

 their head. The pope returned to Rome, where ho died soon after, iu 



1254. The people of Rome however, fickle as they have generally 

 shown themselves in modern history, become tired of Braucaleoiie'u 

 severity : they revolted against him, aud appointed another senator, 

 Maggi of Brescia, whom however they *oon after accused of being too 

 partial towards the nobles; and in 1257 they recalled Brancaleoue, 

 who resumed hi* authority, which he exercised with redoubled vigour. 

 In 1258 Brancaleoue died, much regretted by the citizens, who elected 

 his uncle, Castellauo d'Andal6, a* his successor, notwithstanding the 

 opposition of the pope. A column was raised in honour of Bran- 

 caleonc, with an urn at the top, iu which the head of the senator was 

 inclosed. 



BRANDENBURG, ELECTORS OF. The first known inhabitants 

 of the electorate of Brandenburg were the Suevi, a race recorded by 

 Julius Caesar as the most numerous and warlike in Germany. The 

 Suevi inhabited the territory extending from the banks of the Elbe and 

 Saale to the Vistula, nnd for a time held the whole region which 1 iy 



