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DITTON, HUMPHREY. 



D0BRENTEI, OABOR. 



eis 



hu friends Kr. Thierscb, F. O. Welcker, and K. 0. Muller, from which 

 the alcove notice is derived. 



DITTON, HUMPHREY, an eminent divine and mathematician, 

 was born at Salisbury May 29, 1675. He was an only son; and 

 manifesting good abilities for learning, his father procured for him an 

 excellent private education. It doe* not appear that he was ever at 

 either of the universities, a ciroumitance owing probably to the reli- 

 gious principles of .his parent*. Contrary, it is understood, to his own 

 inclination, but in conformity with his father's wishes, he chose the 

 profession of theology ; and he filled a dissenting pulpit for several 

 years at Tunbridge with great credit and usefulness. His constitution 

 being delicate, and the restraints of his father's authority being 

 removed he also having married at Tunbridge he began to think 

 of turning his talents into another channel His mathematical attain- 

 ments having gained for him the friendship of Mr. Whiston and Dr. 

 Harris, they made him known to Sir Isaac Newton, by whom he was 

 greatly esteemed, and by whose recommendation and influence he was 

 elected mathematical master of Christ's Hospital. This office he held 

 during the rest of his life, which however was but short, as he died in 

 17 IS, in the foitieth year of his age. 



l>ittou was highly esteemed amongst his friends ; and great expec- 

 tation* were entertained that h would have proved one of the most 

 eminent men of his time. He however attained a high degree of 

 celebrity, and published several works and papers of considerable 

 value, of which the following lint contains the principal : 



1. ' On the Tangents of Curves,' &< ' Phil. Trans.,' vol. xxiii. 2. ' A 

 Treatise on Spherical Catoptrics,' in the ' Phil. Trans.' for 1 705 ; from 

 whence it was copied and reprinted in the 'Acta Eruditorurn,' 1707. 



8. 'General Laws of Nature au<l Motion,' 8vo, 1705. Wolfius men- 

 tions this work, and says that it illustrates and renders easy the 

 writings of Galileo, Huygens, nnd the 'Principia' of Newton. 4. 'An 

 Institution of Fluxions, containing the first Principles, Operations, and 

 Applications of that admirable Method, as invented by Sir Isaac 

 Newton,' 8vo, 1706. 5. In 1709 he published the 'Synopsis Alge- 

 braica' of John Alexander, with many additions and corrections. 



9. His ' Treatise on Perspective' was published in 1712. In this work 

 he explained the principles of that art mathematically; and besides 

 teaching the methods then generally practised, gave the first hints of 

 the new method, afterwards enlarged upon and improved by Dr. Brook 

 Taylor, nnd which wns published in the year 1715. In 1714 Mr. Ditton 

 published several pieces, both theological and mathematical, particu- 

 larly (7.) his ' Discourse on the Resurrection of Jesus Christ,' and (S.) 

 the ' New Law of Fluids, or a Discourse concerning the Ascent of 

 Liquids, in exact Geometrical Figures, between two nearly contiguous 

 Surface*.' To this was annexed a tract to demonstrate the impossi- 

 bility of tliinking or perception brini; the result of any combination 

 of the ports of matter and motion : a subject which was much agitated 

 about that time. Tu this work wns also added an advertisement from 

 him and Mr. Whiston concerning a method for discovering the longi- 

 tude, which it seems they had published about half a year before. 

 This attempt probably cost our author his life; for though it was 

 approved and countenanced by Sir Isaac Newton before it was pre- 

 sented to the Board of Longitude, and the method has since been 

 successfully put in practice in finding the longitude between Paris 

 and Vienna, yet that board determined against it. The disappoint- 

 ment, together with some ridicule (particularly in fame versos written 

 by Dean Swift), so far affected his health, that he died in the ensuing 

 year, 1715. 



In the account of Mr. Ditton, prefixed to the German translation of 

 bis discourse on the Resurrection, it is said that he had published, in 

 his own name only, another method for finding the longitude ; but this 

 Mr. Wbiston denied. However, Raphael Levi, a learned Jew, who liad 

 studied under Leibnitz, informed the German editor that he well knew 

 that Ditton and Leibnitz had made a delineation of a machine which 

 be bad invented for tl.at purpose, that it was a piece of mechanism 

 eoastructed with many whceU like a clock, and that Leibnitz highly 

 approved of it for land use, but doubted whether it would answer on 

 shipboard, on account of the motion of the ship. 



HIXOX, WILLIAM HKPWoKTH, was born in 1821. In 1846 

 be came to London, and soon became known by his writings in period- 

 ical works. In the 'Daily News' ho published a series of papers 

 . <>n the Literature of the Lower Orders,' which attracted attention ; 

 and another scries on ' London Prison*.' These papers, greatly 

 enlarged, formed an interesting volume, published in 1860. His volume 

 on ' London Prisons' had been preceded by ' John Howard and the 

 Prison World of Europe.' In 1851 appeared 'William Penn, on Historical 

 Biography.' Independently of the value of this Life, it hat attracted 

 rremt attention with reference to what Mr. Dixon calls ' The Mncaulay 

 Charges.' Mr. Macanlny, in the first two volumes of his ' History of 

 England.' made wveral strong statement* regarding the character of 

 Pe, which Mr. Dixon undertook to refute, especially with regard to 

 the conation of Penn having received a bribe for intervening to save 

 the live* of omo persons at Taunton, implicated iu Moumouth's 

 rebellion. To Mr. Pixon't statement* Mr. Macaulay never replied; 

 and upon the publication of his third and fourth volumes, contimu'd 

 to maintain his opinions of the conduct of the celebrated Quaker. Mr. 

 Dixon again came forward, in a temperate but firm Preface to a new 

 edition of his 'Biography' In 1852 he published the 'Life oi 



Blake;' and he also wrote in that year a pamphlet to repel the fear 

 of an invasion from France. Toward* the end of 1853 he was 

 appointed editor of the ' Athenaeum.' Mr. Dixon's biographical works 

 display a great amount of original research ; and the results of many 

 careful investigations of original documents are presented in an 

 agreeable form. 



DMITRIEV, IVAN IVANOVTTCH, was born in 1760, in the 

 government of Simbirsk, where his father, who was himself a man 

 of superior information, pomeaaed an estate. After being educated 

 at Kazan until his twelfth year, he was pursuing his studies at Sim- 

 birsk, when that part of the empire was thrown into an nniettli 

 by Pngatchev's rebellion, in consequence of which his family deter- 

 mined to leave it, and he was sent to St. Petersburg, where he was 

 entered in the Semenovsky regiment of guards, and within a short 

 time put on active service, in which he continued until the reitrn of 

 the emperor Paul, when an appointment in the civil service was 

 bestowed upon him. After the accession of Alexander he was made 

 successively minister of justice and privy councillor, and finally n tired 

 from public life with a pension and the order of St. Vladimir of the 

 first class. Although a life passed in such occupations was little 

 favourable to literary pursuits, particularly the earlier part of it, a 

 strong natural attachment to them led him to devote him>-lf to 

 them as sedulously as circumstances wonld permit, and with such 

 success, that, after Karamzin, be was, among contemporary writers, 

 the one who most contributed to polish the Russian language, impart- 

 ing to it more ease and gracefulness of style and elegance of diction. 

 His poems, which have passed through many editions, and are deser- 

 vedly popular, consist principally of odes, epistles, satires, tales, and 

 fables, in which last-mentioned species of composition a very favourite 

 one with his countrymen be particularly excelled; and if we except 

 Krilov, he occupies the first rank among the Russian fabulist*. By 

 some he bos been styled the Lafontaine of Rti'sia, as well on account 

 of the refined tone of his subjects as the studied simplicity of his 

 language. In his poetical tales he is unrivalled among his country- 

 men, not less for the playfulness and shrewdness of his satire than for 

 the peculiar happiness and finish of his style. His odes likewise possess 

 considerable merit ; but ai a lyric poet lie falls short of Louionosov, 

 Derzhavin, and Petrov. 



DOBREE, PKTKR PAUL, wa born in the island of Guernsey in 

 the year 1782. At an early age he was sent to Dr. Yalpy's school at 

 Reading, and stayed there till he became an under-graduate of Trinity 

 College, Cambridge, in 1800; and took his B. A, degree in 1804. Having 

 been elected a fellow of his college, he continued to reside at Cambridge, 

 devoting himself to classical studies, and enjoying the intimacy of 

 Parson, to whom he was devotedly attached, and from whom he derived 

 all the spirit of his scholarship. After Person's death, the books and 

 manuscripts of that great critic were purchased by Trinity Colle.L- 

 the task of editing part of Porson's notes was intrusted to Dobi 

 was prevented however by illness, a subsequent journey to Spain, and 

 other causes, from publishing the portion of these remains asai ; : 

 him till 1820, when he brought out an edition of the 1'lutus and of 

 all that Porson had left upon Aristophanes, along with some learned 

 notes of his own. In 1822 he published Porson's transcript of the 

 lexicon of Photius. Iu the following year he was elected Regius 

 professor of Greek. He died on the 24th of September 1825. He 

 wss engaged on an edition of Demosthenes at the time of his death : 

 hia notes on this and other Greek and Latin authors were collected 

 and published by his successor in 1831. Some of his remarks are very 

 acute, and some of his conjectures most ingenious ; but the greater 

 pan of bis observations were certainly never intended for the press. 

 Asa scholar, Dobree was accurate and fastidious ; he had some taste 

 and much common sense, which preserved him from committing 

 blunder*. His unwearying industry supplied him with a vast induction 

 of particular observations, but he was unwilling, perhaps unable, to 

 generalise ; and on the whole it must be allowed that he has neither 

 done nor shown a power of doing anything to justify the extravagant 

 encomiums of some of his friends. 



DOBRENTEI, OABOR or GABRIEL, an Hungarian author nnd 

 antiquary of distinguished merit, was born at Nagy-Szollos, i 

 county of Veszprim in 1786. He showed very early not only a remark- 

 able zeal for the Hungarian language and literature, but a singular 

 social talent for enlisting others in his views. At Oedenbnrg, a town 

 not far within the frontier from Austria, and chiefly inhabited by 

 Germans, he succeeded in getting up an Hungarian liti-rary society, of 

 which he became the secretary; ami under hi. Miprrin'. ndence, when 

 a youth of nineteen, a volume of ' Transactions ' was published. At 

 twenty he studied at Wittenberg and l.eipsic, and in 1807 wns recom- 

 mended by Kazinczy, then the almost acknowledged head of Hungarian 

 literature, t? the post of tut r to Count Louis Cjyulay, a nobleman of 

 Transylvania, which made him for some years a resident iu that 

 country. With the literary contributions of some of hi* Hungarian 

 and Transylvanian friends, and the pecuniary contributions of the 

 Transy Iranian magnates, he set on foot and edited a magazine, the 

 ' Erdclyi Muzlum,' of which the first number was Issued at Klausen- 

 burg and the remaining nine at Pesth, after which it ceased for want 

 of support; but it contained so many articles of interest that no 

 Hungarian library i r.,n<idcred complete ^vithout it.. In 1820 

 Dobrentel removed to Pesth, where he continued to reside for the 



