913 



FILIPEPI, SANDRO. 



FILLMORE, MILLARD. 



OH 



nary talent, but after being put under the care of Monsignor de Luoa, 

 bishop of Trivento, he made rapid progress in the classical languages, 

 mathematics, and philosophy. In 1774 a reform ia the judicial 

 administration was determined on by the ministers of King Ferdinand, 

 by which the judges of the various courts were in future to explain 

 the grounds of their decisions by referring to some existing law appli- 

 cable to each respective case, and in default of such a law to ask the 

 king for his decision. This determination, which checked the till then 

 absolute discretion of the courts, was strongly opposed by the judges, 

 supported by most of the law practitioners, as offensive to the dignity 

 and independence of the courts, and they published a violent memorial 

 on the occasion. Filangieri took up the matter, and wrote a reply, 

 showing the absurdity and impertinence of the objection, as insulting 

 alike to the liberty of the citizen and to the authority of the crown : 

 'Riflessioni politiche sulla Legge Sovrana del 23 di Settembra, del 

 1774.' The work was favourably noticed by the government, which 

 enforced its decree regardless of the clamours of the interested party. 

 Those were times of useful reforms and enlightened administration at 

 Naples, when Genovesi, De lorio, Galanti, Palmieri, Galiani, and other 

 learned men were encouraged in suggesting improvements which were 

 at least in part acted upon. In 1780, Filangieri, then twenty-eight 

 years of age, published the first volume of his great work, ' Scienza 

 della Ltgislazione,' which made him known throughout Europe : he 

 went on publishing the successive volumes in the following years. In 



1787 he was appointed a member of the Supreme Council or Board of 

 Finances, a department which stood also in need of reforms. In July 



1788 he died, when only thirty-six years of age, regretted by all 

 Naples, and leaving his work on legislation incomplete. The work 

 however has gone through many editions, and has been translated 

 into several languages ; one of the beat editions of the Italian text is 

 that of the ' Classic! Italiani,' 6 vols. 8vo, Milan, 1822, to which are 

 added his ' Opuscoli Scelti," or minor works. Among the translations 

 the French one (Paris, 1822) contains a biography of Filangieri by his 

 countryman, Salli. Benjamin Constant wrote a ' Comraentaire sur 

 rOuvrage de Filangieri,' 2 vols. 8vo, Paris, 1822-21. 



Filangieri aimed at effecting a change in legislation without a cor- 

 responding change in the forms of the government, and in his time, 

 and especially in Italy, where numerous and important reforms 

 emanated from the sovereigns themselves, this course appeared both 

 reasonable and prudent He gays, in the introduction to his work, 

 that " his only object was to facilitate to the sovereigns of his age the 

 task of a new legislation," and his strong recommendation to them is 

 to abolish all pernicious or useless laws, and to be sparing in making 

 new ones without a real necessity. Like his contemporary, Beccaria, 

 he adopted the theory then prevailing in France, of an original social 

 contract, by which every individual had resigned for himself and his 

 descendants his right of self-defence which he possessed in a state of 

 nature to the collective body of society, giving it thereby the right of 

 punishing any one who made attempts against the security of another 

 ( Scienza della Legislazione,' 11, 26). This fiction has been since 

 overthrown by other writers, and in Italy especially by Romagnosi in 

 his ' Genesi del diritto Penale,' 1791, and in his ' Assunto primo della 

 Scienza del Diritto Naturale,' 1820. See also on this subject another 

 Italian, Professor Rossi, in his ' Traitd de droit Pdnal,' Paris, 1835. 



On some questions of political economy, on population, agriculture, 

 &c., Filangieri shared the opinions prevalent in his time, which have 

 been since exploded or modified by modern economists. Notwith- 

 standing these and other blemishes, tha work of Filangieri has still 

 great merit ; it suggests many useful ideas, and is throughout inspired 

 by a sincere love for mankind, and an honest sincerity of purpose. 

 The commentary of Benjamin Constant forms a very useful supple- 

 ment to it. 



FILIPE'PI, SANDRO or ALESSANDRO, commonly called Botti- 

 celli, from the name of a goldsmith to whom ho was apprenticed, was 

 born at Florence in 1437. He studied painting under Filippo Lippi, 

 and became one of the first painters of bis time, though his chief 

 excellence wa? in hig invention and expression. He painted many 

 pictures for the churches of Florence, some of which are still pre- 

 served, and are now in the gallery of the Florentine Academy. He 

 painted a small picture for the church of Santa Maria Novella, repre- 

 senting the adoration of the kings, in which the kings were portraits 

 of Cosmo, Julian, and Cosmo's son, Giovanni Medici. This was one 

 of Sandro's masterpieces, and was, in the early part of this century, in 

 the possession of Mr. Young Ottley, the author of the ' Inquiry into 

 the early History of Painting.' 



Sandro painted also for Sixtus IV., in the Capella Sistina, at Rome, 

 three pictures from the history of Moses and the Israelites his largest 

 and best works. After the completion of these works he returned to 

 Florence, neglected painting, and gave himself up to Savonarola, and 

 to Dante's ' Inferno,' which he illustrated, and he attempted himself 

 to engrave his designs ; it is not known exactly bow many he engraved, 

 bat those attributed to him are miserably executed ; they are however 

 scarce, and fetch very high prices. Nineteen altogether were engraved 

 for an edition of Dante published by Nicolo di Lorenzo at Florence in 

 1481, but they were nearly all engraved by lialdini from Sandro's 

 designs. [BALDinr, BACOIO.] Sandro, after his connection with 

 Savonarola, neglected his worldly concerns to such a degree that he 

 would probably have starved had it not been for tho bounty of 



Lorenzo de' Medici ; he survived Savonarola many years, and died at 

 Florence in 1515. Filipepi was one of the last of the old Italian or 

 quattro-cento school of painting, which passed away at the appearance 

 of the grand works of great cinquecentisti, Da Vinci, Michel Angelo, 

 and Raffaelle. 



(Vasari, Vite de' Plttori, &c. ; Lanzi, Storia Piltorica, <kc. ; Rumohr, 

 Italienische Forschnngen ; Ottley, History of Engrailing.) 



FILLANS, JAMES, sculptor, was born at Wilsontown, Lanark- 

 shire, on the 27th of March, 1803. His father having become reduced 

 m circumstances, removed into Renfrewshire while James was yet a 

 child, and the boy was early set to the keeping of sheep and similar 

 employments, and consequently received scarcely any school educa- 

 ;ion. When old enough he was apprenticed to a weaver at Paisley ; 

 aut disliking the occupation, was at the end of a year placed with a 

 stone-mason. At this business, after having served his apprenticeship, 

 lie for awhile worked as a journeyman. But he had, during his spare 

 hours, even when engaged as a weaver, been teaching himself to draw 

 and to make clay models, and by perseverance he attained sufficient 

 skill to win some local celebrity. Motherwell, the poet, was at this 

 time the editor of the ' Paisley Advertiser,' and he warmly encouraged 

 the young man's tastes, and judiciously guided his aspirations. Fillans 

 found in Paisley, at his moderate prices, patrons for small portraits 

 busts, and fancy figures ; but he determined to try the wider field of 

 Glasgow, as much in order to avail himself of the additional facilities 

 that city afforded for improvement in art, as in the expectation of 

 increased patronage. He however met with both, and after a time 

 was in a condition to visit Paris for the purpose of further study. 

 On his return in 1836 he established himself in London, where he 

 found many warm Scotch friends, among others Allan Cunningham, 

 who sat to him for his bust, and introduced him to Chantrey. 



At the exhibition of the Royal AcaJcmy in 1837, Fillans had seven 

 busts, including one of Allan Cunningham, which attracted some 

 attention. He now produced a Tarn o' Shanterjug; ' The Birth of 

 Burns," an alto-rilievo, and other designs of a similar kind, forming a 

 Burns series, which have been more than sufficiently praised ; and he 

 received a commission for a bust of Mr. Oswald of Auchincruive, for 

 his tenantry, which led him to visit Italy, Mr.- Oswald being then 

 resident on the continent. While still depending upon portrait busts 

 for his means of support, Mr. Fillans was not negligent of loftier sub- 

 jects. His chief work of this order was a life-sized group in marble, 

 ' The Blind Teaching the Blind,' a work of real merit and some 

 originality : it was exhibited iu Glasgow, where it produced a great 

 sensation. His ' Boy and Fawn' was another admirable production. 

 But the works which established his fame were his colossal statue of 

 Sir James Shaw, for the baronet's native town of Kilmarnock, and the 

 bust of John Wilson both characteristic works, that of Wilson being 

 indeed by far the most striking head of the poet which has been pro- 

 duced. In Scotland they were received with enthusiasm, and the 

 sculptor was congratulated with two or three public dinners given in 

 his honour. Still, though so far successful, he found his income insuf- 

 ficient to maintain establishments in London and Glasgow, and he 

 resolved to quit the metropolis, his commissions having been chiefly 

 derived from his countrymen. He removed to Glasgow in 1851, but 

 his health, already impaired, became gradually worse ; and at length 

 an attack of rheumatic fever carried him off on the 12th of Sep- 

 tember 1852. He had been engaged as long as his strength permitted 

 upon a colossal statue of ' Rachel Weeping for her Children,' but left 

 it unfinished. 



A life of James Fillans, by James Patersou, was published at Paisley 

 in 1854, in a handsome quarto volume. It contains engravings of his 

 principal statues, of his designs for Motherwell's tomb, the Burns 

 series, an elaborate series of designs of ' Taming the Wild Horse,' and 

 a set of designs illustrative of a tale by a friend. It also contains 

 several pieces of poetry, in which Mr. Paterson finds much to admire, 

 but which would have been as well left in the manuscript, except as 

 evidence of the sculptor's kindheartedness. Fillans used tho pencil 

 as well as the chisel, but with by no means equal success. 



FILLMORE, MILLARD, late President of the United States of 

 North America, was born on the 7th of January, 1800, at Summer 

 Hill, in the state of New York. His father cultivated a small farm, 

 and Millard Fillmore was apprenticed to a wool-carder, and worked 

 at the trade four years, during which he employed his hours of 

 leisure diligently in supplying the defects of his early education. Iu 

 the year 1819 the late Judge Wood of Cayuga County, having become 

 acquainted with Fillmore, and observed that he possessed qualities of 

 mind worthy of cultivation, received him into his office, and offered to 

 pay the extra expenses requisite to qualify him for the profession of a 

 lawyer. FilLnore-however, in order to press as lightly as possible on 

 the bounty of his patron, devoted his leisure hours to the teaching of 

 a school. In 1821) he was in successful practice as a lawyer, and had 

 acquired sufficient reputation to be elected a representative of the 

 county of Erie in the State-Assembly of New York. Towards the 

 end of 1832 he was elected a representative to Congress, and took his 

 seat in March 1833. From 1835 to 1837 he continued in the exercise 

 of his profession, but in the latter year he was again elected a member 

 of Congress, and was successively re-elected to the two following con- 

 gresses. At the termination of the first session of tho 27th Congress, 

 he resumed his practice as a lawyer in the city of Buffalo, and informed 



