COLVILLK, JOHX. 



COMBE, QROROK. 



340 



Juliui Gnccinu*, the father of Agricola, who teems to bar* shown his ' 

 predilection fur the science by the name ha selected for hi* ion. Bat | 

 ili author of whom he speak* in tb highest terms, and to wbom he 

 most wiiliu.-ly appeal*, b Mago the ('rthaxiiiiu, wboce work on 

 agriculture, a* he tel) us, containing right n.l-tmty book*, wai 

 tnuulat. d from the Pha-uicisu into Latin, under a special decree of 

 the Roman enate. The latinity of Columella has nearly all the 

 purity of the Augustan age; but wherever bu subject cives him an 

 opportunity, he discover* a taste fur that sentimental and declamatory 

 ntjle which distinguiab.es the writers of the fint and aeoond c niuri- *. 

 Columella U often cited by Pliny the Elder in bu 'Natural History,' 

 bat generally with an expreation of dissent He U also quoted by 

 Vegetiu* and Palladia*. But the treatise on agriculture by Palladiua 

 appear* to hare superseded Columella's work, and to have thrown it 

 altogether into oblivion, lietides the great work of Columolls, which 

 we have described, there U a single book entitled ' De Arboribus,' in 

 which reference is made to a preceding book now lost. Thi-se two 

 appear to hare been a portion of an rarly edition of the work on 

 agriculture, probably in four books, which being afterwards enlarged, 

 swelled into the twelve we now possess. Accordingly the matter of 

 the ' De Arbohbu* ' will be found with some alterations and many 

 additions in the third, fourth, and fifth books of the greater work ; 

 and Csssiodorus actually speaks of sixteen books written by Colu- 

 mbia. In ignorance of thin, the writers of many of the manuscripts, 

 as well as the early editors, have inserted the minor treatise after the 

 BMond book of the more complete work, thus causing many cjntr.i- 

 diciioos and great confusion in the numbers of the following books. 



The writings of Columbia hare generally been published together 

 with the works of the other authors 'Do Ite Rustic*.' The chief 

 islitions are these: 'The Prineeps,' Venice, fol., 1472; Bologna, fol, 

 1494; by Aldus, Svo, I.MS, or rather 1514; by U. Stephen*, 8vo, 

 1513; by Qesner, Leipzig, 2 vols. 4 to, 1735 ; and that which is much 

 the best aa well as most complete, the edition by J. O. Schneider, 

 4 Tola, STO, 1704-7. 



COLVILLE, JOHX, of the family of Colville, of East Wemyu, 

 county of Fife, was some time minister of Kilbride, and chantor of 

 Glasgow, of which latter office the church of Kilbride was the appro- 

 priate prebend ; but disliking the poverty which, on the Reformation, 

 had become incident to the condition of a Scots clergyman, he aban- 

 doned that profession about the year 1678, got introduced to court, 

 and the following year we find him attending the Privy Council as 

 Master of Requests. (< Act I'arl.' iii. 1 50.) 



He was soon afterwards engaged in the treasonable conspiracy of the 

 Raid of Ruthven, when be was sent by the party that had seized the 

 king, as ambassador to Queen Elizabeth. On the king recovering 

 his liberty, Colville was relied at the instance of Arrau, the king's 

 adviser, and imprisoned in Edinburgh Castle. He was probably restored 

 to royal favour not loug after; for on the 2nd of June 1587 he was 

 appointed by the king a lord of session in the room of his uncle, 

 Alexander Colville, couimendator of Culross. But on the 21st of the 

 same month he gave up the place again in favour of his uncle, and 

 got some appointment, as it seems, in relation to the supply granted 

 by parliament for the king's marriage expenses. About the same time 

 also he tat in parliament for the burgh of Stirling. Soon afterward* he 

 joined the Earl of Bothwell in his attack upon the king in December, 

 1691, for which he was again forfeited in parliament. The next year 

 be accompanied Bothwell to Holyrood House in a new attack upon 

 James. Hut the party being discovered and defeat*), Bothwoll wax 

 obliged to flee; and Colville, by betraying his associates, obtained a 

 pardon. Botbwell afterwards fled to Orkney, and thence to France, 

 whither Colville also proceeded. Colville, in the hope of obtaining 

 permission to return, used various arts to ingratiate himself with tho 

 king. In the year 1600 ho published at Edinburgh a treatise entitled 

 ' The Palinode,' which he represented as a refutation of a former 

 treatise of his own against James's title to the En.-li h crown, which, 

 " in malice, in time of his exile, be had penned ; " whereas, in fact, 

 no such treatise wan ever penned by him. (Spottisw. 'Hist.' 467.) 

 All bis arts to obtain hi* recall to his native country proving unauc- 

 OM*ful, he at length profaned himself a Roman Catholic, and became 

 a keen writer against the Protetant faith. In 1601 he wrote a 

 ' Pararn*ls ad MinUtros Sooto* super sua Converxione,' which ws* 

 translated and printed at Paris the following year. He' wrote also 

 Capita Controversa,' and 'De Canst Comitis Bothwelli,' who, like 

 him.. If, bad tiiin .1 Roman Catholic. Chartcris ('Lives of Sooto 

 Writer* *) mentions another work of bi, ' On.'io Kuii.'brii Exi-qii 

 Elizabeth*} destinnta ;' ami the author of the ' Hi-tory of Sutherland' 

 speaks of a manuscript left by him touching the affairs of Scotland. 

 He died while on a pilgrimage to Rome in the year 1807. 



COMBE, DR. AXIiRKVV, was born in Edinburgh, October 27, 

 1797, the fifteenth child and seventh son of a family, which numbered 

 Mrenteen in all. His father was a respectable brewer in Edinburgh, 

 and a man of superior mind and integrity ; his mother also was a 

 superior person. Educated in hi* boyhood and youth very much 

 under the care of hi* elder brother George, the subject of the 

 following notice, he chose the medical profearlm ; and, having studied 

 at Edinburgh and 1'aris, and taken the degree of Ml), he began 

 practice in Edinburgh in 1823. A pulmonary complaint under which 

 be hid laboured since 181, and which obliged him to make frequent 



journey* into warmer climates, precluded him from such an active 

 career as a physician as he might otherwise have I>< P. In 



1888 he was appointed Consulting Physician to the King of the 

 Belgian*. A* early a* 181S he ha I, like l.i brother <':; uivt-n Ms 

 attention to phrenology and become a convert to it; and both during 

 his practice as a pin M ::m and afu-rwards, he continued lo advocate 

 it* doctrines through the 'Phrenological Journal' lie was 

 distinguished writer on general scientific and medical subject'. The 

 following i n list of his most important separata work": 'Observa- 

 tions on Mental Derangements,' 12mo, Edinburgh, 1> ;i ; -Tin- I'.in- 

 dple* of Physiology applied to the preservation of I 

 improvement of physical and mental I Kdinhurgh, 



1834 a work which has been highly appreciated, and has gone through 

 sixteen or seventeen editions ; ' The Physiology o con- 



sidered with relation to the principles of Dietetics,' Edinburgh, 1830. 

 also a most popular and useful work ; ' A Treatise on the Physiological 

 and Moral Management of Infancy,' 8vo, Edinburgh, 1840, 

 editions of which have been sold. These works were writ-, n l,y I >r. 

 Combe in the intervals during which he enjoyed comparative IV 

 from the malady which he knew was to carry him away. The last 

 years of his life were spent by him u a confirmed invalid, either shut 

 up in his room in Edinburgh, or seeking health by continued travelling 

 and sea-voyages. In 1S42 he was in Madeira. The mildness 

 demeanour during his long illness, and the zeal with which he con- 

 tinued to forward every scheme of benevolence which accorded with 

 his sense of what was right and expedient, obt lined him the peculiar 

 regards of all who knew him. His death, loug expected, took place 

 on the 9th of August 1847 ; and an interesting and affectionate account 

 of big 'Life and Correspondence' was published in I860 by bis 

 brother George. 



COMBE, GEORGE, an elder brother of the subject of the pre- 

 ceding notice, was born at Edinburgh, October 21, 1788. Educated 

 for the legal profession, he became in 1812 a writer to the Sign it in 

 Edinburgh, and remained in practice for about twenty-five 

 Led, about his thirtieth year, to take an interest in phrenolo. 

 ex|K>nnded by Gall and Spurzheim (with the latter of wh< 

 became personally acquainted in Edinburgh in 1816), he grew to be a 

 firm believer in their speculation)* ; and during the whole of his subse- 

 quent life he has devoted himself to the propagation of phreuol 

 a science, to it* improvement by stu lies and observations of his own, 

 and to the exposition of its possible applications. In 1819 he pub- 

 lished his 'Essays on Phrenology, or an Inquiry into the System of 

 Qall acd Spurzheim,' subsequently developed into 

 Phrenology,' and his ' System of Phrenology,' numerous editions of 

 which have been sold. Under his auspice* was subsequently (1823) 

 established the ' Edinburgh Phrenological Journal ; ' and "l> 

 1820 and 1830 he engaged in various controversies, both on the plat- 

 form and through the press, iu behalf of his favourite system. Cine 

 of these controversies was with Jeffrey, iu Ifc'Jii. in with a 



criticism on phrenology which appeared in tin 



another was with Sir William Hamilton. In 1--'^ Mr. Combo pub- 

 lished his principal work entitled 'The Constitution of Ma 

 sidered in relation to External Objects,' a work partly phrenological, 

 but elucidating alm> the general doctrine that the intellectual and 

 moral procedure of man, as well as the physical procedure of thu 

 universe, is regulated by natural laws, which laws must be etu.lieil, 

 < the basin of any rational treatment of human b ings, educat 

 or legislatively. The work provoked many attacks from cL 

 points of view, but proved highly popular, and having been enlarged 

 and reprinted in a cheap form it has of late y. 



luted, both in Britain and America. Iu 1S33 Mr. Combe delivered in 

 various part* of Itritain a course of lectures, afterward* published, on 

 ' Popular Education,' besides being translated into French, German, 

 and Swcdi-h. In 1836 he WR a iv r the chair of logii 



VSICK in the University of Edinburgh, on which ocoa>i 

 William Hamilton obtained the np' 



I luring the je.ir* IS:!*, 1S39, and 1840, Mr. Con. 

 resided in the United State.*, and the results of this to 

 lishcd at Edinburgh on his return in a work in three volti; 

 ' Notes on tho United States of Xorth America during a plirein> 

 viit.' There had already appeared, as the produce of his p"U during 

 this visit, his ' Lectures on Phrenology,' delivered in Am-rica r 

 his 'Lectures on Moral Philosophy,' delivered in 1840. and v.-ui. MIS 

 other phrenological pamphlet*. Between 1838 and 1813 he pai i 

 rnl visits to Germany. Alive, fnin the nature of his up' 

 all movements of social reform or philanthropy as well as to phi! 

 cal question", Mr il.li*h.'d in 1-1.". ' Not.-s on tl. 



Reformation in Germany, and on Natural Education mid tl.. Common 

 Schools of Massachusetts,' and in 1847 'Thought* on C.ipital Punish- 

 tncnts,' ' Itemarks on Natural (education, ' and a tractate on the ' Rela- 

 tion between Religion and Science.' In 1850 he cdr if<> and 

 Correspondence ' of his eminent brother, Dr. Andrcn 

 he deli linburgh and published a ' Leoturi Edu- 

 cation;' and about the came time he took much interest in the 

 establishment in Edinburgh of a secular school, in whi h .<! 

 should be imparted on the principle of familiarising the pupils with 

 the natural 1 iw., physiological and economical, on which correct and 

 prudent life is to bo based. Among Mr. Combe's most recent publics- 



