145 



CENTLIVRE, SUSANNA. 



CESAROTTI, MELCTIIORRE. 



1)6 



treatise of some unknown author, and published it with the title ' De 

 Natural! Institutions." A treatise on accents by Censorinus is men- 

 tioned by Cassiodorus, and one on geometry is also mentioned ; but 

 both are lost. A fragment, ' De Metris,' is still extant. 



The first edition of Censorinus is probably that of Bologna, fol., 

 1497. The edition of L. Carrio was published at Paris, 1585, 8vo. 

 The edition of Haverkamp, Leyden, 8vo, 1743, was published after 

 Haverkamp's death by hia sons; it contains also the fragments of 

 the satires of Lucilius. The edition of 1767 is the same as that of 

 1743, with a new title-page. The last edition is that by J. S. Gruber, 

 Nurnberg, 8vo, 1805 ; the edition of 1810 has only a new title-page. 



CESTLIVRE, SUSANNA, was the daughter of -a Lincolnshire 

 gentleman named Freeman, who, being a Dissenter and zealous Parlia- 

 mentarian, was compelled, upon the restoration of Charles II., to seek 

 refuge with his wife in Ireland, in which kingdom it is presumed 

 that Susanna was born, about the year 1680. At three years she lost 

 her father, and before she had attained her thirteenth year she was 

 left by the death of her mother completely an orphan, and according 

 to some accounts utterly destitute. As the scandalous story which 

 ' Whincop relates of her does not appear to have any foundation in fact 

 we gladly pass over it, and come at once to her marriage at the early 

 age of sixteen to a nephew of Sir Stephen For. A twelvemonth had 

 scarcely elapsed before death deprived her of this new protector. But 

 the wit and the beauty which had probably been the only dower she 

 brought the first, soon procured her a second husband, an officer of 

 the name of Carrol, to whom she appears to have been much attached. 

 About a year and a half after the marriage this gentleman had the 

 mfefortOM to be killed in a duel, and Mrs. Carrol became a second 

 time a widow. In this stato of desolation and distress she first applied 

 to her pen, as well for support as for the amusement of her lonely 

 hours, and several of her early productions were published under the 

 name of Carrol. Among the first was a tragedy, called 'The Perjured 

 Husband ;' but the natural bent of her genius being towards comedy, 

 we find but one more perious drama amongst the nineteen which bear 

 her name. Such was her attachment to the stage, says her biographer, 

 that she became herself a performer, but her success does not seem to 

 have been great, and her stay in it was of short duration. In 1706, 

 while sustaining the character of Alexander the Great, in Lee's 'Rival 

 Queens,' at Windsor, where the court then wan, she won the heart of 

 Mr. Joseph Centlivre, Yeoman of the Mouth, or principal cook to 

 Queen Ann*) and eventually married him. They lived happily 

 together for some years, and she died at his house in Spring Gardens, 

 December 1, 1723. Of her dramatic works, an alphabetical Hat is 

 given by Baker in hia ' Playhouse Companion ;' but only three out of 

 the nineteen there enumerated keep possession of the stage 'The 

 Busy Body,' ' A Bold Stroke for a Wife,' and ' The Wonder.' The 

 first was greatly objected to by the actors, and the coarse expression 

 of Wilks the player respecting the play and its author is well known. 



CERINTHUS, whence the word ' Cerinthians,' by which his fol- 

 lowers were denominated, was by descent a Jew, and born not many 

 years after, if not before, the death and ascension of Christ. His 

 family appears to have been one of those who were settled without 

 the limits of Palestine towards the north. Perhaps he studied in the 

 schools of Alexandria. But of his own history little is known, and the 

 preservation of his name and memory is owing to certain peculiarities 

 of opinion, by which he was distinguished from other followers of 

 Christ, having led to the mention of him in the writings of some 

 of the earliest Christian fathers, and in catalogues which were early 

 formed of Christian heretics. The fathers who especially notice him 

 are Irenxus, Epiphanius, and Theodoret. 



Cerinthus was one of those persons who looked upon the doctrine 

 of our Saviour as not intended to supersede the doctrine of Moses and 

 the Scribes, but to be engrafted upon it, and when perfectly received 

 to be taken in union with the doctrine and institutions of his own 

 nation, even to the point of circumcision. This opinion prevailed 

 very extensively in the first age of the Church, as is evident from 

 much of the New Testament But Cerinthus had some notions more 

 peculiar concerning the creation of the world and the person of 

 Christ. Departing from the simplicity of the Mosaic doctrine, that 

 "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth," he 

 maintained that the creation was the effect of some angelic virtue, to 

 ne the almost unintelligible phrase of the self-called philosophy of 

 that age and nation. He maintained that Jesus of Nazareth was the 

 son of Joseph and Mary, and that at his baptism the Christ, the Son 

 of God, descended upon him in the form of a dove, and became united 

 tn him, and that thus it was that Jesus became acquainted with the 

 great unknown r'ather, and was empowered to work miracles ; that at 

 the crucifixion Jesus only Buffered, while Christ remained untouched, 

 and leaving Jesus returned to Heaven. These opinions are attributed 

 to him by In-nseus, a very early Christian writer. Authorities less 

 respectable represent him as having denied the resurrection, and as 

 having taught men to expect the reign of Christ for a thousand years 

 on earth, when the saints should delight themselves in all terrestrial 

 enjoyment. 



Howevsr, he seems by common consent to have been placed among 



those who held singular opinions in the Christian church, called 



'heresiiH.' Epiphanius names him as one of those who opposed 



'.'r and St. Paul. St. John the apostle and evangelist is also 



said to have personally opposed him. The following story is told : 

 The baths in ancient times were places of public resort : St. John, 

 being at Ephesus, repaired to the bath, but happening to ftnd 

 Cerinthua there, he left the place without bathing, observing to his 

 friends, that it was proper to leave it lest the building should fall, so 

 great an enemy to the truth as Cerinthus being within it. This anec- 

 dote is related by Irenteus, who says they who told him had it from 

 Polycarp, a contemporary and frieud of St. John. Such an anecdote 

 is important, not so much on account of itself as of the way in which 

 it has been transmitted, showing how the writers of the New Testa- 

 ment, and the persons named in it, are connected with the writers and 

 persons of the succeeding age, and they again with the men of the age 

 succeeding them. Irenseus also says that St. John wrote hia Gospel 

 with the express intention of confuting the errors of Cerinthus. 



CE'SARI, GIUSEPPE, a celebrated Italian painter, commonly 

 called II Cavaliere d'Arpino from the birthplace of his father, who 

 was an obscure painter of votive tablets for the images of saints. The 

 elder Cesari settled in Rome, where Giuseppe, or Giuseppino, as he 

 was also called, was born, about 1568. When only thirteen years old, 

 and serving in a menial situation under the painters employed by 

 Gregory XIII. in the loggie of the Vatican, Giuseppe painted some 

 figures by stealth, which led Fra Ignazio Danti, the superintendent of 

 the works, to introduce him to the pope, with whom he eventually 

 became a great favourite, as he was also with four of his successors 

 Sixtus V., Clement VIII., Paul V., and Urban VIII. He thus enjoyed 

 the highest patronage, and was a great popular favourite, which pleased 

 him better, for more than half a century. He was made a knight of 

 the order del Abito di Cristo by Clement VIII., and was decorated 

 with the order of St. Michel by Henri IV. of France, on the occasion 

 of Henri's marriage with Maria de' Medici. Ho visited Paris in the 

 train of the Cardinal Pietro Aldobrandini, nephew of Clement VIII., 

 archbishop of Ravenna, and ambassador of the pope at Paris. 



Though Cesari's style is extremely superficial, and, with the excep- 

 tion of great animation of composition, scarcely displays a single 

 essential quality of art, he so carried with him the public taste of 

 Rome, that for many years he was without a rival. Annibale Caracci 

 strove in vain to turn the current of public favour, and the rivalship of 

 Michel Angelo Caravaggio himself was of too temporary a nature, and 

 rested upon too feeble a foundation, novelty, to have any permanent 

 effect. Cesari survived them both upwards of thirty years. He died 

 at Rome in 1640, and left a numerous school of imitators behind him; 

 but with his life ended his influence also, for there was not a singlo 

 painter of ability among his scholars : his brother Bernardino, who 

 was one of his assistants, died some years before him. During the life of 

 Caravaggio, the scholars of that ptiinter formed a strong party against 

 Cesari, and a challenge passed between the two principals, but Cesari 

 declined to cross swords with Caravaggio, as he was not a cavaliere. 

 He however himself sent a challenge to Aunibalo Caracci, who on his 

 part responded, that his weapon was the pencil, and he would contend 

 with no other. The partisans of Cesari and Caravaggio were called 

 respectively ' Idealist! ' and ' Naturalists.' 



The works of Cesari, in fresco and in oil, are very numerous : tho 

 chief of them is the series in illustration of Roman history in the 

 Conservatorio in the Capitol, commenced for Clement VIII., but not 

 finished until many years after that pope's death. Cesari undertook 

 to complete the paintings in four years, by the year 1600 ; he did not 

 complete them however until after a lapse of forty years. They are 

 executed with great spirit, but with an utter disregard of nature ; the- 

 design is slight and incorrect ; the extremities have little variety, and 

 are merely indicated ; the draperies also are undefined, the heads want 

 character, and the colouring is flat. The horses, of which there are 

 many in the battles, are better than the figures, yet they are heavy. 



(Baglione, Vile de' Pittori, <kc.) 



CESARO'TTI, MELCHIORRE, born at Padua in May 1730, studied 

 in the seminary of that city, and showed from his early youth a great 

 taste for learning, and especially for philological studies. Struck by 

 the peculiarity and novelty of tho style of Ossian's poems recently 

 published by Macpherson, Cesarotti in 1762 translated Ossian into 

 Italian blank verse : the translation is a fine specimen of Italian 

 versification, being harmonious and fluent, and in many parts highly 

 poetical. Cesarotti broke through the lameness into which Italian 

 poetry had sunk for more than a century before him, and gave the 

 example of a new style and a bolder flight of imagination. He however 

 was not of a mind likely to be restrained within rational bounds. 

 Born in a country then stationary in learning, and brought up among 

 writers tame and timid in their investigations, Cesarotti seems to have 

 determined on breaking through all the boundaries of language, taste, 

 and composition, and attempting to effect a complete revolution in 

 literature. His language is full of neologisms, and he had the hardihood 

 to assert his preference of Ossian's poems to those of Homer. He 

 attempted a version, or, as he called it, a reform of the ' Iliad,' which 

 he styled ' La Morte di Ettore,' in which he took such liberties with 

 his text, that it may be considered as a parody rather than a transla- 

 tion. A caricature appeared at Rome, representing the head of Homer 

 placed on the shoulders of a French dandy, with the legend ' Trans- 

 lation of Homer.' The ' Saggio della Filosofia delle Lingue applicata 

 alia Lingua Italiana,' Padua, 1785, is perhaps Cesarotti's best critical 

 and philosophical work. In it he contends for the necessity of the 



