FORTESCUB, SIR JOHN'. 



FOSBROKK, REV. THOMAS DtJD; 



went from hu commendation ; and those who know how flippantly 

 to say tbe lewt of much periodical rriticim unacknowledged 

 ability i< sometime* treated, will feel the value of judicious pnue 

 and well-oonaidarcd objection. To sneer, and to " hesitate dulike," 

 U the office of tome censors. Hr. Fontcr ii not of that number. 

 Early in hit literary career he became engaged in a work of high 

 pntensions and considerable extent, ' Lire* of the Statesmen of the 

 Commonwealth,' in seven volume* of the series published as 

 ' Lardner's Cyclopedia.' Exhibiting very extensive research, accurate 

 in its fact*, and lucid in its style, this is undoubtedly a remarkable 

 performance for so young a man ; and its high merits are beginning 

 to be more justly appreciated than they were popularly at the period 

 of its publication, however they were then estimated by careful readers. 

 A writer in the ' iiimrtvi ly Review ' (June 1856), who dissents from 

 many of Mr. Fonter's opinions in that work, acknowledges that he 

 is "peculiarly exact in Ms facts, and that bis 'Lives' contain an 

 immense amount of invaluable information which he was the first to 

 drag into day." This writer alto points out " that there U no other 

 single authority to which M. Quizot refers so often " in his historical 

 works on that period. A revised edition in octavo of these lives is 

 about to be published. 



Mr. Fonter's combination of the qualities that belong to the true 

 biographer, and the generous critic have been displayed iu Ms ' Life 

 and Adventures of Oliver Goldsmith.' The first edition of this 

 delightful book was published in one volume iu 1848. An enlarged 

 edition in two volumes appeared in 1854, the title being changed to 

 the ' Life and Times of Oliver Goldsmith.' Recently has been 

 issued an abridged edition of that of 1854, under the same title. 

 This agreeable volume is perhaps better calculated to interest the 

 general reader than the more elaborate work, however interesting 

 iu large body of illustrative notes and authorities may bo to the care- 

 ful student of our literary history. Mr. Forster has written some 

 striking article* in the ' Edinburgh Review,' and the ' Quarterly 

 Review,' among which are those of Defoe and Churchill in the 

 ' Edinburgh,' which have been separately republishcd ; and those on 

 Koote, Steele, Ac., in the 'Quarterly.' In 1S5G Mr. Forster was 

 appointed Secretary to the Commissioners in Lunacy an office for 

 which his legal education especially qualified him. 



FOKTESCUE, SIR JOHN, KMOHT, an eminent lawyer, lord chief 

 justice of England in the reign of Henry VI., and afterwards chan- 

 cellor. The date of his birth is unknown, and of the place it is only 

 conjectured that it was somewhere in Devonshire, to which county 

 his family belonged. He is said by Tanner to have been educated at 

 Oxford. He was a member of Lincoln's Inn ; in 1430 became serjeant- 

 at-law ; in 1441 King's Serjeant; and in 1442 chief justice of the 

 King's Bench. lie accompanied Henry VL into Scotland, and was 

 included in tbe bill which attainted the king, Queen Margaret, Prince 

 Edward, and their chief adherents of high treason. In 1643 he fled 

 with Queen Margaret to the continent, and remained there in exile till 

 the return of the queen to Englaud. He is believed to have been sub- 

 sequently permitted to lire in England in retirement. The year of his 

 death does not appear to be known. He wrote several works, but his 

 great work it a treatira ' De Laudibus Legum Anglue ;' a work which 

 has been several times quoted with the highest approbation from the 

 bench, illustrated by the notes of Selden, and recommended by such 

 writers as St. German and .Sir Walter Raleigh, in former times, and by 

 every writer who has since given directions for the study of the law. 

 It has been several times translated into English. It U in the form of 

 a dialogue between himself and the young Prince Edward, with whose 

 education he appears to have been intrusted. The author undertakes 

 to show that the common law was the most reasonable and the moat 

 ancient in Europe, and superior to tbe civil law and the laws of other 

 countries. Ho considers at length, in particular, the mode of trial by 

 jury ; and after examining some other points of difference between the 

 civil and the common law, he concludes with a short account of the 

 societies where the law of England was studied. This book, as well 

 as the other works relating to English law of an early date, is written 

 in a bold style, and displays many sentiments upon liberty and good 

 government which are very remarkable, considering the fierce and bar- 

 barous period at wbich they were written. " We cannot," says Chan- 

 cellor Krnt, " but pause and admire a system of jurisprudence which, 

 in so uncultivated a period of society, contained such singular and 

 invaluable provisions in favour of life, liberty, and property a* those 

 to which Fortcscue referred. They were unprecedented in all Greek 

 and Roman antiquity, and being preserved in some tolerable degree of 

 freshness and vigour amidst the profound ignorance and licentious 

 spirit of the feudal ages, they justly entitle the common law to a share 

 of that constant and vivid eulogy which the Epglish lawyers have 

 always liberally bestowed upon their municipal institutions." The 

 English translation of the treatine ' De Laudibus Legum Anglire,' and 

 tbe original Latin text, together with some notes by Mr. Amos, were 

 published in 182& at tbe expense of the University of Cambridge. 

 (Kent, Commmlaria ; Keove, Ilulory of Enijluk Law.) 



FOUTIUU EUU \. Mm I.O, an Italian prelate, whose writing! dii- 

 play little of tbe auiterity or seriousness of a churchman, was born at 

 Piotoja, November;. 1674. In bis youth be studied jurisprudence, 

 and afterwards dUliiigui.li.-d himself by his attainments in Greek. 

 Having published a funeral discourse in honour of Innocent XII., he 



was appointed secretary to the papal nuncio in Spain, and on his return 

 to Rome, in consequence of his ill-health, had a situation as one of his 

 chamberlains bestowed upon him by Clement XI. in 1712, and was 

 likewise made a canon of tbe church of Santa Maria Maggiore. By 

 another pope (Clement XII.) he expected to be raised to tbe dignity of 

 cardinal; but although an encourager of both poetry and poets, that 

 pontiff evaded from time to time the fulfilment of the promise which 

 he appears to have made, until Fortiguerra was lying on his death- 

 bed, when he rejected the honour then proffered him in terms the 

 reverse of courtly. Monsignor Fortiguerra's lyric poetry, iu which he 

 showed himself an imitator of Petrarch, is now forgotten ; his fame 

 rests entirely upon his ' Ricciardetto,' an heroic-comic poem iu thirty 

 cantos. This production, wbich was first published with its author's 

 name Greciauised into Cartcromaco, was begun by him without any 

 plan, merely by way of proving with what facility he could imitate 

 Ariosto, Pulci, and Bcrni, both in regard to their style and their fertile 

 invention of incidents ; when, at tbe instance of those friends for 

 whom the first canto was hit off as a specimen, he was induced to 

 proceed till he completed the whole, at the rate, we are assured, of a 

 canto per day. Little therefore is it to be wondered at that the plot 

 should be BO desultory and the incidents so extravagant. Yet, not- 

 withstanding the groteaquenesa of the characters and event*, and 

 likewise the occasional carelessness of the style, this long 'improvi- 

 satore ' poem abounds with so much comic humour, droll satire, and 

 happy burlesque, that it has long taken its place as a classical work of 

 its kind, and has gone through numerous editions. There are two 

 French translations of it ; nnd a German one by Lines, the translator 

 of Ariosto and Tosso, was published 1831-33. In English we have a 

 poetical version of the first canto, with an introduction and notes, by 

 the late Lord Gleubervie (1S22). 'Ricciardetto' was not published 

 till after the author's death, which happened on the 7th of February 

 1 735, the date of the first edition being 1738. Fortiguerra was pro- 

 bably awure that, however it might contribute to his fame as a poet, 

 it was not likely to advance him in the church, since many of the 

 descriptions are more spirited than decorous; through much of it 

 there in a seasoning of profanity ; and he has been not at all sparing 

 of his satire on the monks. 



FORTIS, ABBATE, an Italian, born in 1740, died in 1803, wrote 

 many works on various branches of natural philosophy. His reputation 

 was established, and his memory has been chiefly preserved, l>y his 

 travels in Dalmutia, ' Viaggio di Dalinazia.' These travels have been 

 translated into many languages, but the English translation, published 

 at London in 1776, is not only the best, but even preferable to tho 

 original, on account of tbe appendix, various plates, and several other 

 additions, which appeared for the first time with this translation. 



FORTOUL, HIPPOLYTE, late Minister of Public Instruction iu 

 France, was born in 1811. He commenced active life as a liu-r.iry 

 man by contributions to the ' National,' ' L* Artiste,' and other 

 periodicals. Iu the earlier part of his career he professed repub- 

 licanism and St. Simoniauism, and was befriended by Berauger the 

 poet, of whom, in 1830, he published a biography. He was a contri- 

 butor to the ' Revue do Paris,' and was an unsuccessful competitor 

 for tbe editorship of the ' Revue des Deux Mondea.' Meantime, by 

 laborious private study, he step by step attained to university 

 honours. He was ma le Professor of Literature iu the university of 

 Toulouse, where he distinguished himself as a lecturer, and was after- 

 words recompensed for his services by being appointed D. an of tbe 

 Faculty of Art. He was also admitted into the French Academy in 

 the section of Belles-Lettres. After the revolution of 1848 he was 

 elected a member of the French National Assembly, iu which ho 

 spoke frequently, ami obtained the favour of the Prince President. 

 Immediately after the coup d'etat he was appointed, December 3, 

 1851, Miuiitre cl' Instruction Publique et des Cultes, and was one of 

 the six ministers who signed the decree for tbe confiscation of the 

 estates of the house of Orleans. He made himself extremely 

 unpopular with the literary classes of Franco by the decision and 

 energy with which he carried out the imperial system of restriction 

 of the press. He had gone to Ems for the benefit of his health, when 

 he died suddenly as he was conversing with his colleague M. Magne, 

 on the 7th of July 1856. By a decree of the emperor he was buried 

 at the public expense, with the firing of guns, processions, and other 

 honours, on the 12th of July, iu the church of St. Thomas d'Acquin, 

 Paris. 



KOSIiROKE, REV. THOMAS DUDLEY, the only child of Mr 

 William Fosbroke, whose progenitors for several generations had been 

 clergymen, was born iu London 27th May 1770. He was educated at 

 St. Paul's School, whence he was elected in 1735, to a Tcasdalo scholar- 

 ship at Pembroke College, Oxford. He took his degree of M.A. in 

 1792 ; and tho same year obtained tho curacy of Hornley, iu Glouces- 

 tershire, which he held till 1MO, when he became curate at Wai ford 

 in Herefordshire. He was presented to tho vicarage of Walford in 

 1830, and he died there on the 1st of January 1842. 



Mr. Fosbroke first made himself knowu as an author in 1796, by the 

 publication of a poem entitled 'The Economy of Monastic Life, as it 

 existed in England, with Philosophical and Archwulogical Illustration*,' 

 4to. It is in the Spenserian stanza, but in the style, as well as in the 

 title, it was intended, it seem*, as an imitation of Darwin's ' Economy 

 of Vegetation.' It is reprinted at tbe end of tho third edition of his 



